Chapter 12 - DANIELA CAME TO SEE ME WITHOUT RICARDO
Daniela contacted Alejandra three weeks later.
She wanted to meet.
My first answer was no.
Then she sent one sentence:
Ricardo told me you agreed to the financial plan.
I agreed to a meeting in Alejandra’s office.
Daniela was thirty-one and eight months pregnant.
Without Ricardo beside her, she looked much younger than she had in the hospital corridor.
She cried almost immediately.
I did not comfort her.
She told me Ricardo had claimed our marriage had been emotionally over for years.
He said we remained legally married because of family image and Sofía.
He told Daniela I knew about her before the pregnancy.
That lie explained why she had not seemed shocked that Elvira welcomed her.
“What about the house?” I asked.
Daniela looked down.
“He said it would stay in the family.”
“Whose family?”
She started crying again.
There was the answer.
Ricardo had told her that after the company restructuring he would move into the house with her and the baby.
He said Sofía would eventually inherit other property.
He described my parents’ home as if it were already his to redistribute.
“Did you know it was mine?”
“Not at first.”
“At first.”
Daniela closed her eyes.
“When I found out, he said Mexican marital law made that complicated.”
“He lied.”
“I know that now.”
I leaned back.
“Why are you telling me this?”
She placed her phone on the table.
“Because he’s now telling his lawyers I invented the trust idea.”
On the phone were messages.
Ricardo discussing the house.
Ricardo discussing the seven million.
Ricardo telling Daniela:
Once Mariana signs, we stop asking permission.
May you like
But I never signed.
That sentence became one of the most important pieces of evidence in the case.
