The door opens, and the attorney steps out.
His name is Ernesto Salgado, and he looks exactly like the kind of man rich people trust with secrets. Late fifties, silver at the temples, measured voice, eyes that seem permanently half a second ahead of the room. He greets Valeria first because people like Valeria always expect the room to bend toward them. Then he turns to you and holds the door wider.
“Mrs. Hernández,” he says. “Please come in.”
You rise slowly.
The conference room is elegant in a cold way. Long walnut table. Bottled water arranged with geometric precision. A soft hum from the air conditioning. On one wall hangs an abstract painting that looks expensive enough to insult the dead. You choose the far end of the table. Valeria chooses the seat closest to Salgado as if proximity itself were a legal advantage.
The attorney opens a file folder thick with documents and rests both hands on it.
“Before we begin,” he says, “I want to express my condolences again. Alejandro was not only my client for several years. He was a remarkable man.”
You almost laugh at the formal wording. Remarkable man. The newspapers said genius, visionary, entrepreneur, digital pioneer. Investors said disruptive talent. Former classmates said prodigy. But when you think of your son, you do not think of adjectives. You think of details. The way he cracked eggs one-handed by the time he was fifteen. The way he always tapped a spoon twice against the mug before drinking coffee. The way he used to say, “Five more minutes, Ma,” without looking up from the screen, and forty-five minutes later he would still be coding at the kitchen table while dawn leaked into the curtains.
Valeria folds her hands over her designer bag. “I’d prefer not to drag this out, licenciado. It has been a difficult time.”
A difficult time.
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