I Was Asking My Aunt for Fifteen Euros, but the Reply from an Unknown Number Stopped My Life in One Second

That evening, when my ten-month-old brother was crying from hunger, my mother called us three hours before returning home and whispered that we would not open the door to anyone.

It was Tuesday, nearly four o’clock. The wind entered through the window of our apartment as if the frames were not frames but paper. I held Lucas against my chest, and his little fingers clenched around my neck so tightly, as if he were trying to escape from someone.

“Calm down, Lucas, please,” I told him, although I myself could barely keep the trembling out of my voice. “We will have milk soon.”

I did not know whom I was promising this to—to him or to myself.

In the kitchen, I opened the cupboards. Once. A second time. Even a third, as if a miracle could be found on an empty shelf. There was only a jar of salt and a torn packet of rice. In the refrigerator lay half a bottle of water and a dried lemon. Cold air struck my face, and I felt in my stomach the kind of emptiness Lucas must have felt.

Mother, Elena, cleaned hotel rooms. She left in the dark in the morning and often returned at night; her hands were cut from chemical liquids. That morning, as she left the door, she put her hand on my hair.

“I’ll come a little later today, my girl. Will you look after Lucas?”

“I always look after him.”

She smiled at me, but there was fear in her eyes. Now I understood why.

I found the old phone that Mother had left on the kitchen table. The screen was cracked, and in the corner was a small red star sticker—the one I had stuck on after Lucas’s birth so that we would not confuse the phones.

I dialed Aunt Carmen’s number from memory and reread the message three times.

“Aunt, can you transfer fifteen euros to me? I need to buy milk for Lucas. Please, Mother and I will definitely return it to you.”

My fingers were trembling. Shame was choking me in the throat, but Lucas’s crying was already weakening. This was no longer ordinary crying. His voice was breaking hoarsely.

I pressed the send button.

Ten seconds passed. Then thirty.

The phone chimed. An unknown number appeared on the screen.

“Sophia, who is this child Lucas?”

My blood froze. I checked the number again and then saw the mistake—I had mixed up one digit.

“Sorry, I mixed up the number,” I wrote quickly. “Please delete the message.”

The reply came immediately.

“Wait.”

Lucas was resting on my shoulder. His breathing had become too light.

Then a second message appeared.

“Now tell me, is this child really starving?”

I did not dare answer. I had entrusted the most terrible minute of my life to a stranger. But at that very time, at the other end of the city, Victor Salazar, sitting at a huge wooden table, read my text once again.

Everyone knew his name. They called him “the Wolf.” They said that one call from him made men disappear from the city. Armed guards protected his mansion, and streets emptied at the sight of his black car.

But that evening Victor was not planning to punish anyone. He was only asking a thirteen-year-old girl where she lived.

The phone lit up again.

“Do not hang up. Is someone knocking at the door?”

At exactly that moment, three heavy blows sounded at the door of our apartment.

I pressed Lucas to my chest and held my breath. Then a fourth blow sounded, stronger, closer.

A new message from Victor came to the phone: “Sophia, do not go to the door. First answer me, did your mother hide something from you?”

I looked at the screen, while from outside someone pushed down the handle. The stranger was already standing on the other side of the door, and my finger tensed to send the answer…

The handle was pushed down a second time. I hid Lucas under the blanket and crouched in the kitchen corner. Into the phone I typed: “Someone is at the door.”

The reply came within seconds.

“Go to the window only if you see a black car in the back yard.”

I pulled the curtain aside slightly. Two men stood below. One held a yellow folder, and the other held a tool for breaking the door lock.

“Your mother owes money,” one said. “She has to pay today.”

“She isn’t home,” I barely said.

“Then open the door and we’ll talk.”

Suddenly, the heavy sound of a car engine came from the end of the street. A black automobile stopped. The rear door opened, and Victor Salazar got out.

One of the men stepped back.

“This is none of his business,” the other whispered.

Victor merely looked at them.

“Now it is.”

Both men ran away. Victor did not knock on the door. He wrote to me on the phone: “Sophia, do not call the police. Listen to me first.”

“How could I trust you?” I whispered.

“You should not trust me. Just do not open the door.”

A few minutes later Mother returned. At the sight of Victor, her face went pale in one second.

“Why are you here?” she asked him.

Victor looked at Lucas, then at Mother.

“Because your daughter accidentally dialed my number.”

Mother grabbed the chair.

“Sophia, go into the room.”

“No,” I objected for the first time. “I want to know who he is.”

Victor took a sealed folder from his pocket.

“The answer is here. But before you open it, you should know: Lucas’s life is now threatened by more than hunger alone…”

Victor placed the folder on the kitchen table. The red star sticker still shone on the cracked phone screen, as if that little sign were guarding our fear.

Mother stood by the window. Her hands were trembling.

“Do not open it, Sophia,” she said. “Please, believe me just once.”

“I believed you all my life,” I answered. “But now strangers are breaking down the door, and this man says Lucas’s life is in danger.”

Victor looked calmly at Elena.

“We have no time left.”

“You promised that you would never find them,” Mother whispered.

“I also thought that you had crossed the border and were dead.”

At these words, the room seemed to grow smaller. Lucas was breathing silently in my lap. I looked at the sealed folder and broke the seal.

The first sheet was a copy of a child’s birth certificate. The mother’s name was written—Elena Mendoza. In the father’s section there was one name: Victor Salazar.

My breath caught.

“This is impossible,” I said.

Victor lowered his eyes.

“Lucas is my son.”

Mother began to cry, but I did not turn toward her.

“Why did you hide it from me?”

“Because Victor’s enemies were looking for everyone close to him,” Elena said. “When they learned that you were expecting a child, they wanted to kill you too. I decided to run away.”

Victor handed me the second sheet. There was a genetic report on it. The result was clearly written: Lucas’s father was Victor Salazar.

“Why now?” I asked.

“Because today they came to your address,” he answered. “Someone told them that Elena lived here.”

Mother covered her face with her hands.

“I did not tell them.”

“I know,” Victor said. “That is exactly why I protected you.”

Suddenly a call came into his phone. He listened, then his face changed.

“What happened?” I asked.

Victor looked toward the window.

“One of my men has disappeared. He knew where these documents were kept.”

“So the danger is still here?”

He did not answer me. He only took a small memory card from the folder.

“This is a recording that may change everything. If you want to see it, we must decide now.”

The video started on the screen. In the recording, my mother could be seen handing an envelope to someone. The man’s face was not yet visible, but his voice sounded through the room.

“The child must disappear before Victor learns the truth.”

Mother screamed. And I knew that the owner of this voice was one of our enemies. Then the camera turned in the frame and the face appeared—Victor’s most trusted adviser, Daniel Ortega.

Victor put his hand on the screen.

“Daniel knows that Lucas is alive. And now he is coming toward us…”