Chapter 7 - MY FATHER’S SECRETMy father had known Victor Soren.
Nobody had ever told me.
Daniel found the first connection in an archive box from Marlowe Infrastructure.
My father and Soren had been partners in a development project outside San Diego.
The partnership lasted eleven months.
Then lawsuits began.
My father accused Soren of bribery and falsifying environmental reports.
Soren accused my father of breach of contract.
The case settled privately.
Six months later, Soren’s company collapsed.
My father bought several distressed assets.
Those assets eventually became part of Marlowe Infrastructure.
Including the Santa Monica land.
“This was never about one development,” Daniel said.
We were sitting in my father’s old office, a room I kept almost untouched.
“He thinks your father stole his future.”
“My father bought assets through bankruptcy.”
“Legally.”
“Then why revenge against me?”
“Men like Soren rarely distinguish between losing and being wronged.”
We found another clue in my father’s journals.
He didn’t write often.
Mostly numbers.
Project notes.
Occasional warnings.
One entry mentioned Soren.
Victor never forgets humiliation. If he ever returns, protect Elena from him.
I read that sentence until the letters blurred.
My father had known.
Perhaps not specifically.
But enough.
Federal agents believed Soren might try to flee the country.
Yet no confirmed sighting surfaced.
Then one of his companies made an unexpected move.
Pacific Arc withdrew its purchase filing on my Santa Monica land.
Publicly, it looked like surrender.
Privately, Daniel knew better.
“He’s cleaning up.”
“Meaning?”
“Removing anything prosecutors can freeze.”
Meanwhile, Sebastian began cooperating.
His story filled missing pieces.
Soren had approached Evelyn three years earlier.
Before my wedding.
Before I joined the family.
That fact stunned me.
“How did he know Rodrigo was dating me?”
“He tracked you,” Sebastian admitted.
The interview was recorded.
“Soren knew who Elena was before we did.”
I felt sick.
Rodrigo’s chance meeting with me at a charity dinner suddenly looked different.
“Was Rodrigo told to meet me?”
Sebastian shook his head.
“No. That part was real.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes. That’s why Soren became interested. He realized Rodrigo had accidentally gotten close to Richard Marlowe’s daughter.”
Accidentally.
My marriage began by chance.
Everything after that had been manipulated.
Soren convinced Evelyn that if Rodrigo married me, the Valez family could rebuild its fortune.
At first, Evelyn resisted.
Then she discovered I had far more money than anyone realized.
She became encouraging.
Too encouraging.
I remembered her sudden warmth before the engagement.
All those dinners.
All those compliments.
All those conversations about “family legacy.”
Sebastian continued.
“Soren said once Elena trusted us completely, she’d combine assets.”
“But I didn’t.”
“No.”
“So you started forging documents.”
“Yes.”
“What about the medication?”
Sebastian looked away.
“My mother didn’t tell me until later.”
“How much later?”
“After Grace died.”
I stood so fast the interview had to pause.
After Grace died.
Evelyn had told her son what she had done.
And Sebastian stayed.
He continued helping.
Money was a remarkable anesthetic for conscience.
The prosecutor asked him where Soren might be.
Sebastian said there was one place.
A ranch in northern Nevada.
Owned through shell companies.
Federal agents searched it.
Empty.
But inside they found an office containing hundreds of files.
One file had my name.
Another belonged to my father.
Inside mine were photographs spanning fifteen years.
College graduation.
My first company acquisition.
My mother’s grave.
My wedding.
Grace’s funeral.
Victor Soren had watched me grow up.
At the bottom of the file was a letter addressed to me.
He had never mailed it.
Your father built your fortune from my ruin. One day, you will understand what it feels like to watch everything you love disappear while the person responsible continues living beautifully.
The letter was dated five years before I met Rodrigo.
This had always been personal.
The next break came from an FBI financial analyst.
Soren had transferred $42 million into cryptocurrency and offshore accounts.
But one transfer was different.
$2 million to a Los Angeles private security contractor.
The payment happened three days after I left Rodrigo.
Daniel stared at the report.
“He hired someone.”
“For what?”
Nobody wanted to answer.
My security was increased.
Two agents stayed near me.
I hated it.
I refused to hide completely.
Marlowe Infrastructure still had employees.
Projects.
Responsibilities.
I went to work.
Three days later, during a board meeting, the fire alarm sounded.
Security immediately evacuated the floor.
Halfway down the stairwell, the lights went out.
Emergency lights should have activated.
They didn’t.
My bodyguard, Agent Torres, grabbed my arm.
“Stay behind me.”
A door opened below.
Footsteps.
Running upward.
Torres drew his weapon.
“Federal agent! Stop!”
The footsteps continued.
A man appeared around the landing.
Black clothing.
Gloves.
Something metallic in his hand.
Torres slammed me backward as the man lunged.
The fight lasted seconds.
Violent.
Fast.
The attacker escaped through a service door.
But he dropped something.
A syringe.
Lab testing later found the same anticoagulant used during my pregnancy.
Soren wasn’t trying to kill me with a gun.
He wanted history to repeat itself.
He wanted my death to resemble a medical emergency.
That night, I finally broke.
Not publicly.
Not in front of Daniel.
Alone in the hotel bathroom.
I sat on the floor and cried until I couldn’t breathe.
For Grace.
For my marriage.
For my father.
For the woman I had been before discovering how long hatred had been circling me.
Then someone knocked.
“Elena?”
Rodrigo.
Security had allowed him upstairs because the FBI wanted him relocated too.
I didn’t answer.
“Elena, please.”
I opened the door.
He saw me.
Really saw me.
Then he did something different from every other time.
He didn’t touch me.
He didn’t explain.
He didn’t apologize.
He simply sat on the hallway floor outside the bathroom.
“I’ll stay here,” he said.
“Why?”
“Because no one should be alone tonight.”
I hated that part of me still remembered loving him.
We sat in silence.
At 2:13 a.m., Daniel called.
Soren had surfaced.
Not in Nevada.
Not overseas.
In Los Angeles.
A traffic camera captured him entering Beverly Hills.
Near the mansion.
My mansion.
Agents surrounded the property.
But Soren wasn’t inside.
What they found instead was a message painted across the nursery wall.
YOUR FATHER TOOK MY SON. I TOOK YOUR DAUGHTER.
Below it was an address.
A cemetery.
The cemetery where my father was buried.
May you like
And beneath that:
MIDNIGHT TOMORROW. COME ALONE IF YOU WANT THE TRUTH.
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