My Pregnant Sister-in-Law Took the Cup Prepared by Her Mother-in-Law, but When the Family Blamed Me, Someone Suddenly Turned Pale

When the emergency doctors told me that Paula’s bleeding was life-threatening, Monica looked at me as though I had killed her secret. That morning at the hacienda, at ten o’clock, one clay cup stood on the marble kitchen table. A small golden sunflower was painted on its edge—the object Monica had given me after the wedding and had always told me to keep for happiness.

Thick, hot chocolate was steaming in the cup. Monica placed it in front of me and lowered her eyes with excessive calm.

“These are herbs beneficial for pregnancy, drink it.”

“The doctor told me not to take an unknown infusion.”

“Does the doctor know more now, or the mother who raised two children?”

Her fingers were gripping the cup’s handle tightly. I put my hand on my belly. I was five months pregnant, and after seven unsuccessful treatments I felt my child as a miracle in every movement.

Monica went out to buy bread. The door had not yet closed completely when Paula entered, wrapped in a silk robe. She looked at the cup and smiled.

“If this really makes the baby stronger, I need it more.”

“Paula, you don’t know what is inside.”

“You simply don’t want my child to surpass yours.”

“Put that cup down!”

But it was already too late. She drank everything, and at the end she even removed with her finger the foam left on the wall of the cup.

An hour later Monica returned. First she examined my face, then looked at my belly.

“Do you have pains? Cramps? Is the baby moving?”

“I didn’t drink anything. Paula drank it.”

The bread bag slipped from Monica’s hand. A glass bottle shattered on the floor. She ran toward Paula’s room, and within seconds such a scream rang out in the hacienda that even the clock hanging on the wall seemed to stop.

At the hospital, the doctor told me that a powerful substance had been found in Paula’s body, one capable of causing painful contractions of the uterus. They could not save the baby. Paula survived, but her face turned to stone.

In the corridor Monica came to me and seized both my arms.

“You did this!”

“I did not even touch the cup.”

“You kept telling everyone that the hotel belonged to your child!”

That same evening Nicholas arrived. He took a seat in front of me.

“My wife would not do this.”

Monica only smiled.

“Then tomorrow the whole family will hear what Clara has to say.”

Clara, the family’s longtime helper, was waiting for us the next morning in Don Arthur’s office. On the table lay a box of my anti-anxiety medication, and beside it—the cup with the golden sunflower.

“I saw how Elena put powder into the drink,” Clara said.

Blood burst in my ears.

“That is a lie.”

Monica lowered her eyes, as though she were suffering because of me.

“She is capable of doing anything for the hotel.”

Don Arthur stared at me for a long time. Five years earlier, in this same room, he had told me that his first great-grandchild would receive the majority share of Hotel Mirador. Now he was tapping his fingers against his cane.

“Until the truth is established, leave the house. The inheritance fund is suspended.”

Nicholas stood up.

“Then I am leaving too.”

“If you cross this door, you will lose your position and your accounts,” his father warned.

“Elena and my child are my family.”

That night we moved into a small apartment. Only one lamp was lit beside the bed. At midnight a sharp pain in my belly woke me, and I saw a bloodstain on my underwear.

At the clinic the doctor said that the baby was still alive, but I needed complete rest. Nicholas took my hand.

“I will prove the truth.”

“No,” I whispered. “We only need to show what they did.”

That night we called investigator Teresa Robles. The former prosecutor’s investigator came at six in the morning, put her scratched leather notebook on the table, and told me:

“We must reconstruct the entire morning minute by minute. One mistake and they will win again.”

Teresa took a small steel tool from her bag and pointed it toward the cup.

“But first we must understand why this cup stood in the camera’s blind spot……”

Teresa decided to return to the hacienda in the evening. In the kitchen only the hum of the old refrigerator could be heard. She picked up the cup with a glove and examined the dried layer on the edge.

“Something remained here,” she said.

“Powder?”

“More interesting. The cup was washed, but not inside the handle.”

At that moment an unknown number called Nicholas. A woman’s voice was trembling.

“I am Clara. Monica told me that I had to repeat my testimony, but I was not in the kitchen that morning.”

“Then why did you lie?” I asked.

“She threatened to take my son’s job away. But I know one thing: she put the powder into the drink herself. I was standing by the door and saw it.”

My belly contracted again, but this time the pain was stronger than fear.

Teresa arranged a meeting with Clara. Before the meeting she quietly told me:

“If Monica did this, why did she give the cup to Paula?”

I had no answer.

Clara came and took a small broken card from her bag. The hotel laboratory’s number was written on it.

“I found this in Monica’s office. I heard her tell someone that Paula’s blood test had to disappear.”

Nicholas took the card.

“Why didn’t you say this at first?”

“Because I was afraid.”

Teresa illuminated the back of the card. One sentence was visible there, barely written in pencil: “The sample must not affect Elena alone.”

At that moment I understood that the cup’s story was bigger than an attempt to get rid of my child. But what Monica was hiding even from Paula, only the laboratory result would tell us……

The laboratory result came three days later. We were sitting in the clinic’s small conference room: I on the bed, Nicholas by the window, and Teresa at the table, where a white folder lay. Outside, rain struck the asphalt, while inside only the ticking of the clock could be heard.

Monica came too. Beside her sat Paula, still weak and with a frozen expression on her face. Don Arthur leaned on his cane with both hands.

“All of this is slander,” Monica said. “My daughter almost died.”

Teresa opened the folder.

“That is exactly why we must hear the complete answer.”

She looked at the first page.

“A substance that causes strong contractions was found in the cup’s residue. But that is only half the truth.”

Paula’s eyes widened.

“What does half mean?”

Teresa took out the second page.

“The substance was mixed with a medication Paula had been taking for the last two months. This medication served to conceal a serious genetic disorder of the fetus in her body.”

The air disappeared from the room.

“What are you saying?” Paula whispered.

“Your blood test had been altered,” Teresa continued. “Your fetus had a condition that should have been detected at an early stage of pregnancy. Monica paid the laboratory to record the result as healthy.”

Paula looked at her mother.

“You knew?”

Monica shook her head.

“I was only protecting you.”

“From my baby?”

Teresa placed a small voice recorder on the table. Monica’s voice sounded in the recording:

“If Paula gives birth to the first great-grandchild, the fund will concern her too. Elena’s child must disappear, while Paula’s pregnancy must continue at any cost. If it does not continue, we will tell the doctors that Elena changed the cup.”

Monica pushed her chair back.

“This voice has been edited!”

For the first time Nicholas looked at his mother as though a stranger stood before him.

“It is your voice.”

Don Arthur’s face froze. He extended his hand to Paula, but the girl pulled her hand back.

“You wanted not your daughter, but the inheritance seal.”

I was crying, but not from victory. Paula’s lost child could not return through my truth.

Teresa turned over the last page.

“There is one more thing. The hotel fund documents state that Don Arthur’s signature had been forged for the last six years. Monica transferred the funds to her own accounts.”

Don Arthur stood up, but immediately leaned against the chair.

“My signature?”

“And the doses of your medications had also been changed,” Teresa said. “She needed to weaken your mental condition.”

Monica ran toward the door, but two investigators were already standing there.

“You are under arrest,” one of them said.

At these words Paula lowered her head. I clasped Nicholas’s hand.

However, before Monica was taken away, Nicholas’s phone rang. He answered, and within a few seconds he lost color.

“What happened?” I asked.

He slowly lowered the phone.

“All the accounts of my father’s fund are empty this morning. The money was transferred abroad……”