Bella lifted her chin. “No one had to tell me. I can feel it. Pain leaves echoes. Guilt leaves deeper scars than surgery.”
Teresa grabbed her daughter by the shoulder. “That’s enough. We’re leaving. I won’t let them punish you for speaking out.”
Rafael’s voice softened for the first time. “Wait.”
Her gaze shifted beyond Bella, toward the mountains that stretched to the horizon. She remembered the sound of bones creaking and the roaring wind. She remembered the climbing harness failing because the safety check had been rushed.
He remembered his partner, Jonathan Pierce , falling. The man did not survive. Rafael had paid the widow a fortune, but no amount of money could erase the memory.
She swallowed hard. “If you lie to me, the consequences will be serious. If you don’t, everything in my life will change.”
Bella nodded. “So you’ve made your decision.”
At dawn the next day, inside a sterile therapy room, the medical monitors activated. Dr. Helen Strauss , the center’s most skeptical neurologist, adjusted her glasses.
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