Chapter 2 - The Question That Could Not Be Taken Back
Marisol’s eyes filled with tears before she could stop them.
For three years, she had rehearsed this moment in her mind. In some versions, Diego listened. In others, he laughed at her. In the worst ones, he accused her of trying to steal money from him.
But now, standing in the center of the marble hall with Valentina pressed against her legs, she could not find any of the words she had prepared.
“Sir…” she whispered.
Diego’s jaw tightened.
“Don’t call me that.”
Marisol looked up, startled.
The man before her was not the Diego she remembered from years ago—the ambitious architecture student who used to buy cheap street tacos for them after class and dream about building homes for families who had nothing.
This Diego wore a tailored suit even at breakfast. A gold watch shone beneath his cuff. His face was sharper, more guarded, as though life had taught him never to trust anyone completely.
But his eyes were the same.
And they were fixed on Valentina.
“Is she mine?” he asked again.
The silence became unbearable.
Marisol’s fingers trembled in Valentina’s hair.
“Yes.”
The word barely made a sound.
Diego inhaled slowly, but the breath seemed to hurt him.
Paulina’s voice suddenly cut through the silence from the staircase.
“She could be lying.”
Everyone turned.
Paulina stood halfway up the stairs, one hand gripping the railing, her face pale but defiant.
Diego’s expression changed instantly.
“I told you to go upstairs.”
“And I’m your fiancée,” Paulina replied. “I have every right to know why your maid is claiming that her child belongs to you.”
“She isn’t claiming anything,” Marisol said, her voice breaking. “It’s the truth.”
Paulina gave a humorless laugh.
“How convenient. A billionaire finds out he has a daughter the same week his wedding invitations are being prepared.”
Marisol flinched.
Diego stepped forward.
“Enough.”
Paulina folded her arms. “You don’t seriously believe this without proof.”
“No,” Diego said quietly. “I don’t.”
The words struck Marisol harder than she expected.
She looked down, ashamed of the relief and pain mixing inside her chest. Of course he needed proof. Any sane person would. But after all the years she had spent imagining him refusing to believe her, hearing it out loud still felt like a door slamming shut.
Diego noticed.
His face softened, only slightly.
“I’m not calling you a liar,” he said. “But this changes everything. We need a DNA test.”
Marisol nodded.
“I understand.”
Valentina looked up at her mother.
“What test?” she asked in a small voice.
Marisol crouched beside her.
“Nothing bad, sweetheart. The doctor will just help us answer a grown-up question.”
Valentina hugged her rabbit closer.
“Will it hurt?”
Diego knelt beside them again. His voice became gentler than Marisol had ever heard it.
“Not much. Just a little swab inside your cheek. Like brushing your teeth.”
The little girl studied him carefully.
“Are you mad?”
The question froze him.
Diego stared at her, his eyes suddenly wet.
“No,” he said. “I’m not mad.”
“Then why are you sad?”
For a moment, he had no answer.
Finally, Diego looked at Marisol.
“Because I think I missed too much.”
Upstairs, Paulina’s fingers tightened around the railing.
Later that afternoon, Diego sent his driver to take Marisol and Valentina to a private clinic. He insisted on going with them, ignoring the calls from his office and the messages from Paulina that kept lighting up his phone.
During the drive, Valentina sat between Marisol and Diego in the back seat.
At first, she was quiet.
Then she held up her stuffed rabbit.
“His name is Señor Bigotes,” she announced.
Diego smiled faintly. “That’s a very serious name.”
“He protects me.”
“Does he?”
Valentina nodded. “From monsters.”
Diego looked out the window.
For the first time in years, he felt like the monster.
At the clinic, a nurse took the samples quickly. Valentina didn’t cry, though she squeezed Marisol’s hand the entire time. Diego watched every movement with the intensity of someone trying to memorize a life that had been kept from him.
When they returned to the mansion, Paulina was waiting in the living room.
She had changed into a cream-colored dress and carefully reapplied her makeup, but anger still flashed behind her eyes.
“We need to talk,” she said.
Diego gave a short nod. “Later.”
“No. Now.”
Marisol began guiding Valentina toward the kitchen, but Paulina’s voice stopped her.
“You should hear this too.”
Diego turned sharply. “Marisol is not part of this conversation.”
“She is the entire reason we’re having it.”
“Paulina.”
Something in his tone made even Paulina hesitate.
Then she smiled coldly.
“Fine. Let’s talk privately.”
In Diego’s office, the argument began before the door had fully closed.
“This is exactly what I warned you about,” Paulina said. “People see your money, your name, your house—and suddenly they remember you exist.”
Diego stood behind his desk, staring down at a framed photograph from years earlier. It showed his late father at the opening of their first hotel.
“My father knew Marisol,” he said.
Paulina blinked. “What?”
“He knew she was in my life before I left for Spain.”
“That doesn’t prove the child is yours.”
“No. But it proves she didn’t just appear out of nowhere.”
Paulina paced across the room.
“You were gone for years, Diego. You had relationships. You made mistakes. Maybe she had someone else.”
Diego’s eyes darkened.
“Don’t talk about her like that.”
Paulina stopped.
For the first time, she looked afraid.
“You still love her,” she whispered.
Diego did not answer.
And his silence was answer enough.
That evening, Marisol sat on the edge of the small bed in her room near the laundry area. Valentina slept beside her, one tiny hand wrapped around Señor Bigotes.
Marisol stared at the ceiling, unable to rest.
She thought of the night Diego had left Mexico. He had promised to call. Promised he would return after dealing with his father’s business crisis in Madrid.
Then days became weeks.
Weeks became months.
Her calls went unanswered.
The letters she sent were returned unopened.
And when she finally learned she was pregnant, she tried one last time to find him.
But someone had told her Diego no longer wanted anything to do with her.
That someone had sounded very convincing.
Someone named Esteban Villaseñor.
Diego’s father.
A knock came at the door.
Marisol sat up immediately.
Diego stood outside, looking uncomfortable in the narrow hallway.
“Can we talk?” he asked.
She stepped outside quietly and closed the door behind her.
For a few seconds, neither spoke.
Then Diego said, “Why didn’t you come to me?”
Marisol laughed softly, but there was no humor in it.
“I did.”
His face went still.
“What do you mean?”
“I called your old number. I sent letters to your apartment. I went to your father’s office.” Her voice shook. “Your assistant told me you had left and did not want to be contacted.”
Diego frowned. “My assistant?”
“Your father’s assistant.”
A terrible realization crossed his face.
“My father told me you left,” he whispered. “He said you met someone else. He said you asked him for money and disappeared when he refused.”
Marisol stared at him.
For years, she had blamed Diego.
For years, Diego had believed she abandoned him.
And somewhere between them stood a dead man’s lie.
Before either could speak again, a glass shattered somewhere upstairs.
Then came Paulina’s scream.
“Diego!”
They ran toward the main hall.
Paulina stood near the staircase, staring at the floor.
At her feet lay a broken wineglass.
But it was not the glass that had terrified her.
It was the envelope beside it.
An envelope addressed to Diego Villaseñor.
And inside was an old photograph.
Marisol, pregnant.
May you like
Standing beside Diego’s father.
---
