“Bella. Come here.”
Teresa shuddered. “Mr. Cortez, please. You don’t want any trouble.”
“I didn’t ask him if he wanted trouble,” Rafael replied. The words cut him like a knife. “I asked him to come.”
Bella approached, her hands trembling around the rag. When she stood before him, Rafael reached into his jacket and pulled out a checkbook. He tore off a page, scribbled a number, and held it between two fingers.
“One hundred thousand dollars,” he said. “This can be yours if you prove me wrong.”
Levi raised his eyebrows. “What am I supposed to do? Blow up the chair?”
Rafael leaned forward. The courtyard fell silent.
“Make me walk,” he said.
A wave of disbelief swept through the group. Gerard was the first to burst out laughing, followed by Mason’s theatrical guffaw. Even Silas, normally quiet, smiled wryly as if he had witnessed a performance.
Teresa gasped. “Please, sir. You can’t. We’re not charlatans. We clean rooms. We don’t perform miracles.”
Bella’s voice surprised everyone. “Miracles are just things that science hasn’t discovered yet.”
The courtyard fell silent. Rafael watched her. “Do you understand what you’re saying?”
“Yes,” Bella replied calmly. “I understand everything you’re afraid of feeling. You want to get better, but wanting isn’t the same as trying.”
Gerard scoffed. “This is very rich. A philosopher with ragged shoes.”
Rafael ignored him. “Tell me, Bella. Why should I believe that you, a child, can fix what the best surgeons in the country couldn’t?”
Bella looked at her legs. “Because you believe they can. And you believe money can. But you don’t believe you deserve to heal. So nothing works.”
Something inside Rafael shuddered. He clenched his jaw. His fingers tightened around his cheek.
“Who told you that?” she asked in a low voice.
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