Chapter 4 - THE VIDEO THAT PROVED ESPERANZA LIED
Esperanza did not deny the video.
She sat across from Helena in the convent library while rain tapped against the old windows.
Caridad remained between them.
Not physically.
That would have felt theatrical.
She sat at the end of the table where both women had to turn to look at her.
Helena’s attorney placed the tablet on the table.
“Ms. Vega-Delgado voluntarily recorded this before the first embryo transfer.”
Esperanza whispered, “Yes.”
Helena looked almost triumphant.
“Thank you.”
Caridad turned.
“Do not thank her.”
Helena’s expression cooled.
Caridad looked at Esperanza.
“You lied to me.”
“Yes.”
“To Benedicta?”
“No.”
“To the other sisters?”
“Yes.”
“To the diocese?”
Esperanza looked down.
“Yes.”
Caridad’s stomach sank.
After Miguel was born, the Diocese of the Rio Grande had requested a private review because Santa Lucía was an Episcopal women’s religious house and Esperanza had taken temporary vows.
The written explanation said conception occurred “before the community understood the medical circumstances.”
Technically vague.
Deliberately misleading.
Caridad had inherited the file after Benedicta’s death and accepted it as settled.
Helena folded her hands.
“Now perhaps we can stop pretending Elena is a victim of some mysterious force.”
Esperanza looked up.
“The first time was my choice.”
“And Tomás.”
Esperanza said nothing.
Helena’s jaw tightened.
“You signed.”
“I said yes after six months of you calling me every week.”
“You wanted another child.”
“I wanted you to stop telling me Mateo would hate me for leaving his embryos frozen.”
Helena’s face changed.
“That is not what I said.”
“You said I was keeping his children in a tank because I was afraid of losing my habit.”
Caridad looked at Helena.
“Did you?”
Helena turned to her attorney.
The attorney said, “My client disputes the characterization.”
Esperanza laughed softly.
“No one ever says no in a lawyer’s sentence.”
Caridad almost smiled.
Then remembered why they were there.
Helena produced another video.
Esperanza sat in Paloma’s Albuquerque office eighteen months earlier.
She looked exhausted.
Miguel was an infant.
Paloma asked:
“Do you understand you are requesting transfer of a second embryo?”
Esperanza answered:
“Yes.”
“Do you understand pregnancy may require changes to your religious life?”
“Yes.”
“Are you being forced?”
Esperanza paused.
Then said:
“No.”
Helena stopped the video.
“Two pregnancies. Two consents.”
Esperanza stared at the frozen image of herself.
Caridad said, “And the third?”
Helena’s expression changed.
Small.
But enough.
“There was prior written authorization.”
Esperanza turned.
“No.”
“The embryo disposition agreement—”
“Was signed when Mateo was alive.”
“It directed that all viable embryos be transferred to you.”
“If I requested them.”
Helena’s attorney said, “The language is subject to interpretation.”
Esperanza laughed again.
“I spent eight years listening to people interpret my body.”
Helena leaned forward.
“You begged Mateo for children.”
“Yes.”
“He died believing you would have them.”
“I wanted a family with my husband.”
“You have one.”
“I have two sons I love.”
Esperanza’s voice broke.
“And a third pregnancy I did not choose.”
The room went quiet.
Caridad looked at Helena.
“Did you know Esperanza refused another transfer?”
Helena did not answer.
“Helena.”
Her attorney intervened.
“My client should not answer questions that may become part of threatened litigation without—”
Helena raised one hand.
“Yes.”
Esperanza stopped breathing.
Caridad felt something cold settle in her chest.
“When?”
“After Tomás was born.”
“What did she say?”
“That she was finished.”
“And you still signed a pledge paying this convent if another pregnancy reached twelve weeks.”
Helena’s mouth tightened.
“I believed she would change her mind.”
“Did she?”
“No.”
“Then why did the transfer happen?”
Helena looked toward the window.
“Ask Paloma.”
Esperanza stood.
“You knew.”
“Elena.”
“You knew she was planning it.”
“I knew she believed the last embryo should not be discarded.”
“It was mine.”
“It was Mateo’s too.”
“Mateo is dead!”
The words shook the room.
Miguel began crying somewhere down the hall.
Esperanza closed her eyes.
When she spoke again, her voice was low.
“He cannot consent for me from a grave.”
Helena’s face collapsed for one second.
Then hardened.
“You think I don’t know he’s dead?”
No one answered.
She picked up the leather folder.
“I buried my only son.”
Esperanza stared at her.
“And I buried my husband.”
The two women looked at each other across three years of births and eight years of grief.
Caridad finally understood what money had hidden.
Helena did not want grandchildren only because of bloodline.
She wanted Mateo returned in pieces she could hold.
Esperanza had wanted the same thing once.
That shared grief had created Miguel.
Then Tomás.
Then become something neither woman controlled.
Caridad asked Helena’s attorney for copies of every consent document.
The attorney hesitated.
Helena said, “Give them to her.”
By evening, Rachel Sosa, a Santa Fe attorney who advised the convent’s board, was reviewing the files.
Caridad sat beside her in the office.
Rachel pointed at the third consent.
“This is the document Helena says authorized the latest transfer.”
Esperanza’s signature appeared at the bottom.
Witness:
Dr. Paloma Reyes.
Date:
Seven weeks earlier.
Caridad said, “Esperanza says she never signed it.”
Rachel enlarged the image.
The signature looked clean.
Too clean.
“What?”
Rachel pointed.
“The exact pressure pattern repeats.”
“I don’t understand.”
“This may be a copied signature from an earlier form.”
“Can you prove that?”
“Not tonight.”
Rachel flipped to the first-transfer consent.
Then the second.
The third signature matched a portion of the first almost perfectly.
Caridad’s stomach tightened.
Rachel said:
“Someone may have lifted her old signature digitally.”
Then she pointed to another line.
Medical facility authorization.
SANTA LUCÍA INFIRMARY.
Authorized institutional representative:
MOTHER CARIDAD MORALES.
Caridad stared at her own signature.
“That one is real.”
Rachel looked at her.
“You signed this?”
“I signed a medical permission after Tomás was born.”
“For what?”
“Postpartum care.”
Rachel turned the document.
The second page contained language Caridad had never seen.
INCLUDING REPRODUCTIVE PROCEDURES AS MEDICALLY INDICATED.
Caridad stood.
“That page was not attached.”
“You’re sure?”
“Yes.”
Rachel looked at her.
“Then somebody did to you exactly what they did to Esperanza.”
Caridad stared at her own signature.
May you like
For three years she had believed she was investigating other women’s secrets.
Now her name was inside the conspiracy too.
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