One Call from Our Grandson on the Road Used to Turn Us Back, but When My Daughter’s Voice Changed, Teresa Dropped the Phone from Her Hand

“Grandpa, turn around right now. Don’t come home… and please, don’t call Mom.”

My eleven-year-old grandson’s voice was trembling so much that at first I thought he had contacted me by mistake. But in the background I heard a door being locked, and then Mateo held his breath. I gripped the steering wheel tighter and asked no more questions. I turned around.

Teresa grabbed me by the arm.

“Arthur, what is happening?”

“I don’t know. But Mateo has never spoken to me like this.”

We were heading south of Guadalajara, to Mariana’s house. We were supposed to celebrate her promotion. A small grill was in the trunk, and Teresa was carrying Mariana’s favorite garlic sauce. Ten minutes earlier, everything had been normal.

Then Mariana called me.

“Dad, where are you? Rodrigo has already lit the charcoal.”

Her voice sounded cheerful. Too cheerful.

“We got mixed up on the road. We’ll be there soon.”

A brief silence fell.

“You’re still on López Mateos, right? Don’t turn onto the old road. Go straight.”

My hands froze on the steering wheel.

I had not told her which road we were taking.

In the rearview mirror I saw a gray pickup. It was following four cars behind us. I reduced my speed—it slowed too. I turned onto a side street—it followed me too. I returned to the main road—the pickup was behind us again.

Teresa turned off her phone. I did the same.

I entered the crowded parking lot of a supermarket and parked the car under the cameras. The pickup slowly passed the entrance and disappeared.

I called my old friend, the mechanic Chuy Navarro. He had been taking care of my cars for twenty years. He came in half an hour, took the car away with a tow truck, and brought us back to the workshop.

He found a small magnetic device near the rear wheel.

“This did not fall off by accident, Arthur,” Chuy told me. “Someone calmly attached it. It was transmitting your location minute by minute.”

Then he removed the dashboard and inspected the camera module. The camera recorded normally in the city, but it had been programmed to turn off recording on the old road, on the stretch leading toward San Isidro-Masatepec.

There were bends, roadwork, and almost empty places there.

A chill poured through my heart.

Two weeks earlier Rodrigo had taken my car to the workshop. He had said that Arthur had asked him to have the recording malfunction checked. And he had paid with Mariana’s card.

Teresa covered her mouth with her hand.

But I remembered something else. On Thursday Mariana came to us and said that Mateo’s jacket had been left on the back seat. I gave her the keys. She was alone with the car for only five minutes.

Five minutes.

More than enough.

That same night, we took shelter in a small hotel in the city center. At registration, we used Teresa’s maiden name. At nine in the evening Mateo called again.

“Grandpa… I saw two men in the garage. One was wearing gloves. The other was carrying a heavy black bag. Dad said: ‘When they come, they will take care of them.’”

Teresa began to cry silently.

I still could not cry.

At that moment I realized that someone did not merely want to frighten us. They had planned our route, our time, and the moment when the recording of what happened would disappear.

And in the end the keys had been in my daughter’s hands.

Chuy placed on the table a small copper fish-shaped pendant—the one Mateo had given me for my birthday and that hung on the car keys. On the back of the pendant was a trace of wet mud.

“This was from the outside of my car,” Chuy said quietly. “And I found one more thing inside.”

He opened a folder covered with black cloth and reached for the first sheet…

Chuy’s fingers were still touching the edge of the folder when we heard footsteps in the hotel corridor.

Teresa held her breath.

“Could they have found us?”

Chuy turned off the light. A strip of light appeared under the door, then disappeared. Someone stopped outside our room, but did not knock.

In my pocket I squeezed Mateo’s little copper fish. Its sharp tail pierced my palm. The pain calmed me.

At last the footsteps moved away.

“The folder cannot be opened here,” Chuy said. “There is a basement in my workshop. I have cameras there too, and a back exit.”

“I’ll call Mariana,” I said.

“Mateo asked you not to call.”

“He is a child. He may be frightened and may not have understood everything.”

Just then the phone rang. Mariana’s name appeared on the screen.

Teresa nodded at me, but her eyes were telling me not to answer.

I answered anyway.

“Dad, wherever you are, do not tell Rodrigo that you are alive.”

Something heavy fell behind her.

“Mariana, lock the door and tell me what is happening!”

“I… I can’t explain everything. Mateo found what he should not have found. And if you do not return home by morning, Rodrigo will begin his plan.”

“Which plan?”

Her voice faltered. Then Mariana pronounced with difficulty:

“Dad, there is a document made out in your name. It says that you have already given this house to Rodrigo…”

“…and your signature is on the document,” Mariana finished.

A silence fell in the room as if even the city had stopped. Teresa grabbed the chair. Chuy immediately looked toward the door.

“My signature is forged,” I said.

“I know, Dad. But it is registered with a notary.”

“How do you know?”

Mariana was silent for several seconds.

“Because they made me sign as a witness.”

Teresa closed her eyes.

“You helped them?”

“No!” Mariana’s voice cracked. “At the time I did not know what I was signing. Rodrigo told me it was only a loan document. Then Mateo found a small recorder in his father’s bag.”

Chuy connected the secretly running recorder to the phone. At first there was rustling, then Rodrigo’s voice.

“The old road is the best. The camera will not work there anymore. If they resist us, the men will arrange a car accident. And within forty-eight hours the property will be in our name.”

Teresa began to cry.

Mariana’s quiet, frightened voice sounded in the recording.

“You can’t hurt my father.”

“You have no choice anymore,” Rodrigo replied. “Your debts, Mateo’s school, and that house, everything depends on me.”

The recorder stopped.

I leaned on the table. My whole body was trembling, but not from fear. What hurt me most was that my daughter had been fighting all of this alone, while I considered her silence a betrayal.

“Mariana, where are you?”

“At home. Mateo is on the second floor. We have the door locked.”

“Call the police.”

“Rodrigo has two men in the yard. If he finds out that the recording is with you, he will take Mateo first.”

At that moment a message arrived on Chuy’s phone. He read it and his face changed.

“It’s from Rodrigo,” he said. “‘Arthur, I know where you are. Return home by six in the morning, or my wife will no longer be able to help you.’”

Mariana heard this.

“Dad, don’t come back. Please.”

“We’ll get Mateo out.”

“How?”

Chuy picked up the basement keys.

“The city’s old water-supply tunnel leads to the back street by your daughter. But the entrance is now under their house’s garage.”

I looked at the copper fish pendant. The trace of mud was still visible on it.

Then I realized that whoever was watching us was not hunting only us. They already knew that Mateo was resisting too.

We were about to leave the basement when Mariana said in a whisper:

“Dad… Rodrigo has just entered my room. He has a gun in his hand. And Mateo is no longer on the second floor…”