Bishop Álvarez’s Final Secret
Then Esperanza reached into her bag.
“There’s one more thing.”
Mother Caridad groaned.
“I’m getting too old for your one-more-things.”
Esperanza handed her an envelope.
It had arrived from a Swiss bank.
Inside was a letter written by Mariana one month before her death.
There was also a twenty-seven-year-old DNA report.
Esperanza’s biological father was listed.
Mateo Álvarez.
Bishop Mateo Álvarez.
Mother Caridad stared at the page.
Álvarez had not selected a random girl.
He had used his own daughter.
The child he had secretly fathered with Mariana Salazar.
He had hidden Esperanza inside Santa Lucía partly because her existence threatened his reputation.
Then, decades later, he helped turn his own daughter into the carrier for the Valdés embryos.
“That’s why he never killed me,” Esperanza said.
“He knew.”
“He always knew.”
The following day, Esperanza visited him in prison.
Álvarez entered without robes, ceremony, or power.
He looked smaller.
Older.
They sat across from each other behind glass.
“You found Mariana’s letter,” he said.
“You knew she left it?”
“I suspected.”
“You are my father.”
“Yes.”
No denial.
No apology.
Esperanza asked if he had loved Mariana.
“In my way.”
Then:
“Did you kill her?”
Álvarez avoided the question.
“She threatened everything.”
“Your position?”
“My life’s work.”
“Your reputation?”
“My ability to serve.”
Esperanza almost laughed.
“You still think you were serving.”
Álvarez listed schools.
Clinics.
Shelters.
Santa Lucía.
“You benefited from what I built.”
“That’s how you justify it?”
“Your children will inherit more money than you could spend in ten lifetimes.”
“They nearly inherited no mother.”
“You survived.”
“Because other people betrayed you.”
Something changed in Álvarez’s face.
Paloma.
Beatriz.
Caridad.
The women he considered tools had dismantled him.
Esperanza leaned toward the glass.
“You know what your mistake was?”
He didn’t answer.
“You spent your entire life believing frightened women were obedient women.”
Then she named them.
Paloma had been frightened—and kept Tomás alive.
Beatriz had been frightened—and switched the final embryo.
Mariana had been frightened—and hid evidence.
Caridad had been frightened—and opened the tunnel.
“And I was terrified,” Esperanza said.
“But I walked into that office with two babies and told Mother Caridad I was pregnant because I knew somebody would panic.”
Álvarez finally looked shocked.
“You did that deliberately?”
“Yes.”
“You tricked them.”
Esperanza’s expression stayed calm.
“I gave the truth a chance to become noisy.”
She stood.
Álvarez grabbed the telephone tighter.
“Wait.”
She paused.
“I’m still your father.”
Esperanza looked at him through the glass.
“No.”
His face hardened.
“Blood is blood.”
Esperanza answered:
“So is evidence.”
Then she hung up.
And walked away.
