“Why?” I whispered. “Why do this to us?”
“Because your husband was the only man in the valley brave enough to stand up to him,” Doña Rosa said. “And because dead men don’t fight back.”
She reached into an old wooden chest and pulled out a small, blood-stained cloth. Inside was a silver crucifix I had given Diego on our wedding day.
“He managed to send this to me through a worker who escaped the mine two weeks ago. There was a note with it.”
She handed me a crumpled piece of paper.
In Diego’s familiar handwriting, smeared with dirt and dried blood, were the words:
“Tell Elena I’m still breathing. Tell her I dream of her and the children every night. Tell her to be strong. I will come back for them… or die trying.”
I pressed the note to my chest and broke down completely.
My husband — the man I had mourned, the father of my children — had been suffering in darkness for four months while I was being thrown out like garbage.
Doña Rosa placed her wrinkled hand on my shoulder.
“There is more,” she said gravely. “Don Fausto plans to marry you by force once the baby is born. He wants your children as workers and your womb to give him more heirs. That’s why he took everything from you.”
