Ending of "The Body / El cuerpo"

Question

After having watched The invisible Guest which really amazed me since I am a mystery and mind-bending fan, I wanted to watch more from the director Oriol Paulo. So I just finished watching The Body. The truth is that I didn't expect the ending which was a big twist.

If I get it right, protagonist (Alex Ulloa) tried to poison his wife in order to live a happy life with his lover Carla. However, it turned out that Carla's real name was Eva and all this time she was working with her dad (Jaime Peña), who is a detective, in order to take revenge on Alex and his wife, who were responsible for the death of Jaime's wife (and Eva's mother) ten years ago. So they made Alex poison his wife and then poisoned him too.

So, Mayka (Alex's wife) was never going to capture Alex and the only reason she hired a detective was to find out if her husband was cheating on her. Is that right?

What I don't get is how Eva (= Carla) pretended to be in love with Alex for such a long time (8 months or more if I am not mistaken). She seemed to be really in love with him and she also looked very upset in her last conversation with him when she dropped her phone. How was she able to pretend for so long in such a good way that she made him fall in love with her? Isn't that weird since from the very first moment the only thing she and her father wanted was to take revenge?

Answer 1

Eva wanted to be absolutely sure that Alex and Mayka were the killers before they enacted the revenge plot. This is why she pressed on for 8 months until Alex trusted her enough to spill all his secrets. Once Alex confessed the crime, Eva and her father, Jaime Peña enacted the revenge plot.

Alex:

In the end, the inevitable happened.
With Carla I felt alive again.
That night, I told her my life story, things I'd never told anyone.
Neither of us wanted secrets.

Eva got to Alex in the first place after she remembered the accessory hung from the rear view mirror of the car that hit them. It has the labels: "Avalon" and "California" on it. Avalon in Santa Catalina Island, California was where Alex and Mayka first met. Peña "had all the time in the world" and eventually traced this information to Alex and Mayka.

Peña:

Until, years later, my daughter remembered.
A hotel... in Avalon,... on the Island of Santa Catalina.
It was like looking for a needle in a haystack.
But I had all the time in the world, and I found it.

Peña was sure that Alex and Mayka were the killers, but Eva wasn't and enacted the plan to get close to Alex to have him confess to the crime.

Peña:

Eva got to you without my knowledge.
She feared the car she recalled didn't belong to her mother's killers, that you and your wife were innocent.
I knew it was you.
But she didn't, and she wanted to be sure.
The only way to verify your guilt was to make you talk.
She did it.
You confessed your darkest secret to her.
Eva knew I was ready to act.
She knew if she told me you'd confessed to your crime, I'd have a green light to go after you and your wife.
And she did it.
She told me everything.
Since then you've just been a puppet in our hands.

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Mayka (Alex's wife) was never going to capture Alex and the only reason she hired a detective was to find out if her husband was cheating on her. Is that right?

The whole thing about Mayka hiring a private detective was made up by Peña and Eva. I've elaborated on this in my answer to this question: What was the role of the private detective in the conspiracy?

Answer 2

I think the detective job was as you mentioned. And about the whole pretending thing... I mean, that’s the guy who’s responsible for her mother’s death. I think she could fake her love for a couple of months if it meant she could have her revenge. Her being too emotionally affected I think is kinda plot-holly but in their last call I guess she cried because she wasn’t totally on board with killing him (I guess it’s mentioned by the father).