Gabriel stood in the police station waiting for me to apologize.

I didn’t.

Instead, I placed the driver’s information and my statement on the officer’s desk.

Gabriel frowned.

“Elena, withdraw the complaint.”

“No.”

“It was a stupid joke.”

“A joke Sofia ordered.”

His expression hardened.

“Don’t drag her into this.”

That sentence told me everything.

Even after what had happened, his first instinct was still to protect her.

I stood carefully.

“We’re done, Gabriel.”

He laughed.

“Done with what?”

“Our engagement.”

His smile disappeared.

“You’re six months pregnant.”

“I know.”

“And you think someone else is going to marry you now?”

I looked directly at him.

“Yes.”

He stared at me as though I had lost my mind.

Then my phone rang.

Unknown international number.

I answered.

“Elena?”

A familiar male voice.

“I’ve landed. Where are you?”

Gabriel heard it.

“Who is that?”

I ignored him.

“Police station.”

“I’ll be there in twenty minutes.”

When the call ended, Gabriel grabbed the engagement ring hanging from the chain around my neck.

“What game are you playing?”

I removed the chain myself and placed the ring in his palm.

“No game.”

His face finally changed.

“Elena.”

“You postponed our wedding twenty-nine times because Sofia hadn’t found a husband.”

I smiled faintly.

“Now you don’t need to wait for me anymore.”

I walked outside.

Twenty-three minutes later, a black car stopped at the entrance.

A man stepped out.

Adrián Vega.

Gabriel knew the name.

Everyone in his family did.

The Vega family owned the medical group Gabriel’s company had spent two years trying to secure a partnership with.

But Adrián wasn’t there for business.

He walked straight toward me.

His eyes immediately dropped to my belly.

“Are you all right?”

“Yes.”

Only then did he look at Gabriel.

Gabriel’s face was pale.

“You know her?”

Adrián answered calmly.

“For much longer than you think.”

Years earlier, before Gabriel and I began dating, Adrián and I had studied together.

When he moved abroad, life separated us.

Three months ago, after hearing what was happening with my engagement, he contacted me.

He hadn’t asked me to betray Gabriel.

He had simply said:

“If one day you decide you deserve better, call me.”

That afternoon, I had called.

But there was something Gabriel still misunderstood.

Adrián wasn’t marrying me because I needed someone to rescue me.

The proposal I had accepted wasn’t originally a marriage proposal.

It was a position.

Director of a new maternal-health research center in Switzerland.

A career I had abandoned years earlier because Gabriel wanted me to remain close to his family.

Adrián had personally recommended me.

The wedding suit?

That decision came afterward.

And it wasn’t for the wedding Gabriel had postponed twenty-nine times.

Three days later, Sofia arrived at my parents’ house carrying invitations.

She walked inside smiling.

“Elena, Brother Gabriel said you’ve been emotional lately, so I came to—”

She stopped.

My old wedding invitations were stacked on the table.

Beside them were new ones.

Different date.

Different venue.

Different groom.

Sofia picked one up.

Her smile vanished.

“Elena Navarro and Adrián Vega?”

Gabriel appeared behind her.

He snatched the invitation away.

“This is ridiculous.”

“No,” my mother said coldly.

“What’s ridiculous is making my pregnant daughter wait while your family laughs at her.”

Gabriel looked at me.

“You can’t marry him.”

“Why?”

“Because you’re carrying my child!”

The room went silent.

There it was.

The certainty he had used against me for six months.

I opened my medical folder.

“You never once came to an appointment.”

His expression shifted.

“What does that have to do with anything?”

“You never asked why my pregnancy required additional monitoring.”

“Elena…”

“And you never asked why I refused to announce the baby’s paternity publicly.”

Sofia suddenly stopped smiling.

Gabriel looked between us.

“What are you saying?”

I placed the hospital results on the table.

“I discovered something after my first specialist consultation.”

He reached for the papers.

I stopped him.

“Before you read them, answer one question.”

“What?”

“Do you remember the fertility tests you took two years ago?”

His face changed.

Sofia went completely still.

That reaction caught my attention.

Gabriel whispered:

“The doctor said there was nothing important.”

“No.”

“The report said something very different.”

His eyes moved toward Sofia.

And suddenly she backed toward the door.

I noticed.

So did Adrián.

“Sofia?”

Gabriel turned toward her.

“Why do you look scared?”

She shook her head.

“I don’t.”

But Gabriel was already opening the report.

His hands began trembling.

The old medical record showed that his results had required follow-up testing.

Testing he had never completed.

More importantly, the clinic had recorded that someone collected the sealed results on his behalf.

Gabriel stared at the authorization signature.

“Sofia?”

Nobody spoke.

She swallowed.

“I was helping you.”

“Why did you take my medical results?”

“I don’t remember.”

“Yes, you do.”

Her composure cracked.

Gabriel looked at me again.

“Then the baby…”

“The baby is healthy.”

I placed my hand protectively over my belly.

“But before you make another assumption, you should know the hospital ordered additional testing because the dates and your old medical records didn’t make sense.”

His face drained of color.

Then my phone rang.

My doctor.

I answered.

She didn’t waste time.

“Elena, the final laboratory confirmation just arrived.”

I listened.

Then slowly looked at Gabriel.

Sofia was already crying.

And suddenly I understood why.

Because she hadn’t only known about Gabriel’s old medical report.

She had known something else.

Something about the clinic.

Something about the records.

Something she had desperately needed Gabriel never to investigate.

I ended the call.

Gabriel stepped toward me.

“What did the doctor say?”

I looked past him at Sofia.

“The question isn’t whether you’re the father.”

Sofia covered her mouth.

I continued quietly:

“The question is why your sister knew there would be a problem before any of us did.”

Gabriel turned toward her.

And for the first time in seven years, Sofia wasn’t standing safely behind him.

She was standing alone.

With everyone waiting for her answer.