Chapter 3 - The Conspiracy
Weeks turned into agonizing months. Elena was kept in absolute isolation on the
top floor of the Vance mansion. Her window was bolted shut, and guards
stationed outside her door ensured she had no contact with anyone. Her
parents hired an unethical doctor to monitor her pregnancy within the house.
Every day, Elena begged the house staff for help. "Please, Maria," she whispered to
the maid who brought her meals. "Just let me send one email. Let me call Logan. He
doesn't even know he's going to be a father."
The maid looked down, tears in her eyes. "I am so sorry, Miss Elena. Mr. Vance said
if any of us help you, he will make sure we never get a job in this state again. He would
ruin my family."
Meanwhile, thousands of miles away in a dusty combat zone, Logan was frantic.
He sat in a military tent, staring at his satellite phone.
"Still no answer, Sarge?" asked Specialist Miller, his close friend, sitting across from
him.
"Nothing," Logan said, his voice hollow with exhaustion. "All her numbers are
disconnected. Her friends say she moved to France. It doesn't make sense, Miller. Elena
wouldn't just vanish. She wouldn't leave me."
"Maybe her family did something," Miller suggested quietly. "You told me how
powerful they are."
Logan gripped his rifle, his knuckles turning white. "If they hurt her, I swear to
God, I'll tear that mountain down."
Back in Aspen, Victoria Vance was finalizing her plan in the living room. "The
moment she gives birth, we will place the child with a private agency in another state,"
she told Richard. "Then we tell the media she recovered from her 'mental breakdown'
and is ready to marry Julian."
"And what if she fights us?" Richard asked, sipping his whiskey.
"She won't have the strength," Victoria replied coldly. "She will do as she's told to
protect whatever is left of her pathetic life."
Upstairs, Elena overheard their conversation through the heating vent. She looked
at her protruding stomach. She was in her eighth month. "I have to get out of here," she
May you like
whispered to her unborn baby. "I won't let them take you from me." She began
observing the guards, planning her escape.
