PART 39: THE WOMAN WITH VICTORIA\u2019S FACE<\/p>\n
Everyone stared at Sofia\u2019s message.<\/p>\n
SHE IS NOT VICTORIA.<\/p>\n
The woman holding the gun tightened her grip.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe has been imprisoned too long. She\u2019s confused.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sofia shook her head violently.<\/p>\n
Then she pointed toward the woman\u2019s left wrist.<\/p>\n
Isabella\u2019s face changed.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe scar.\u201d<\/p>\n
The real Victoria had received a deep burn while rescuing Ernesto from a house fire when he was a child.<\/p>\n
The scar had covered her entire wrist.<\/p>\n
This woman\u2019s skin was flawless.<\/p>\n
Clara stepped closer.<\/p>\n
\u201cWho are you?\u201d<\/p>\n
The stranger smiled.<\/p>\n
Then slowly removed a thin layer of prosthetic skin from her face.<\/p>\n
Beneath Victoria\u2019s features was someone we all recognized.<\/p>\n
Dr. Raymond Keller.<\/p>\n
Alive.<\/p>\n
Isabella stumbled backward.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019re supposed to be dead.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe man killed at the cabin was another patient,\u201d Keller replied. \u201cA man whose identity I erased years ago.\u201d<\/p>\n
His disguise had fooled us because he had spent decades developing reconstructive techniques\u2014and because everyone who knew Victoria closely had either disappeared or died.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhere is the real Victoria?\u201d I demanded.<\/p>\n
Keller glanced toward the vault.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe has been inside for twenty-seven years.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sofia stepped aside.<\/p>\n
A wheelchair emerged from the darkness.<\/p>\n
An ancient woman sat in it, weak and trembling.<\/p>\n
A burn scar covered her left wrist.<\/p>\n
The real Victoria.<\/p>\n
Keller had imprisoned her, stolen her identity, and controlled the Vargas empire using her name.<\/p>\n
Every account marked E.V. had never meant Elena Vargas.<\/p>\n
It meant Evelyn Vale.<\/p>\n
Keller\u2019s birth name.<\/p>\n
Clara raised her weapon.<\/p>\n
Keller pressed the gun against Isabella\u2019s head.<\/p>\n
\u201cOpen the vault.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYou need Victoria\u2019s biological signature,\u201d I said.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo. I need yours.\u201d<\/p>\n
My stomach twisted.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou said Victoria was my mother.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThat was another lie.\u201d<\/p>\n
Keller revealed that I was not Victoria\u2019s daughter.<\/p>\n
I was his.<\/p>\n
He had altered the vault\u2019s security himself, programming it to recognize his bloodline while making everyone believe it required Victoria\u2019s.<\/p>\n
He had arranged every exchange.<\/p>\n
Every false death.<\/p>\n
Every hidden child.<\/p>\n
Our family had been his experiment.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe were never people to you,\u201d Adrian said.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou were variables.\u201d<\/p>\n
Isabella looked through the glass at Sofia.<\/p>\n
\u201cLet my daughter go first.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOpen the vault.\u201d<\/p>\n
I stepped toward the scanner.<\/p>\n
The machine pierced my fingertip.<\/p>\n
A green light appeared.<\/p>\n
IDENTITY CONFIRMED: DAUGHTER OF RAYMOND KELLER.<\/p>\n
The vault door unlocked.<\/p>\n
Keller shoved Isabella aside and rushed inside.<\/p>\n
Shelves held decades of evidence.<\/p>\n
Recordings.<\/p>\n
Ledgers.<\/p>\n
Photographs.<\/p>\n
And biological samples labeled with our names.<\/p>\n
Keller laughed.<\/p>\n
Then the vault door slammed shut behind him.<\/p>\n
Sofia stood beside the emergency control.<\/p>\n
For the first time, she smiled.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe forgot who taught me how the vault worked.\u201d<\/p>\n
Keller fired at the glass.<\/p>\n
It did not break.<\/p>\n
Clara called the police.<\/p>\n
But the real Victoria raised one trembling hand.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo police.\u201d<\/p>\n
She pointed toward a red button beneath her wheelchair.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf that vault opens again, the entire estate explodes.\u201d<\/p>\n
A countdown appeared above the door.<\/p>\n
Ten minutes.<\/p>\n
Keller stopped shooting.<\/p>\n
His confidence vanished.<\/p>\n
Because locked inside with him was not only the evidence.<\/p>\n
A second person stepped from the shadows.<\/p>\n
Ernesto.<\/p>\n
Alive again.<\/p>\n
He faced Keller through the darkness.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou stole forty years from this family,\u201d Ernesto said.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd now we have ten minutes to settle the debt.\u201d<\/p>\n
PART 39: THE WOMAN WITH VICTORIA\u2019S FACE Everyone stared at Sofia\u2019s message. SHE IS NOT VICTORIA. The woman holding the gun tightened her grip. \u201cShe has been imprisoned too long. … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3866","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-insightdrama"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3866","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3866"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3866\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3872,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3866\/revisions\/3872"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3866"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3866"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3866"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}