“He didn’t fall.”
Valeria looked at me for the first time with that coldness some people hide beneath a pretty smile.
“I think you’re forgetting your place.”
“My place,” I replied, “is next to the boy you hit with a belt.”
The office froze.
Alejandro put his glass down on the table.
“What did you just say?”
Valeria let out a short, incredulous laugh.
“This is absurd.”
But I wasn’t talking to her anymore.
“Sir, your son’s back is covered in marks. Old and new. They’re not from a fall. He told me so in the car.”
Alejandro looked at Mateo again. This time for real.
Not like a distracted father.
Like a man who suddenly understands that something terrible has been happening inside his own home.
“Mateo,” he said, his voice breaking, “look at me.”
The boy couldn’t.
Valeria took a step closer.
“Honey, tell your dad you’re confused.”
Mateo shuddered all over.
That gesture was enough.
Alejandro saw it. Claudia, who had already positioned herself near the door, saw it too.
And I understood that it wasn’t the first time someone had suspected something.
It was just the first time someone had dared to break the script.
“Show him,” I said to Mateo slowly. “Only if you want to.”
Valeria changed her tone.
“Mateo, don’t make a scene.”
Then Claudia spoke, without moving from the doorway.
“Last week the boy’s shirt had blood on the collar.”
Valeria turned her head toward her with icy fury.
“Shut up.”
Claudia didn’t shut up.
“And three months ago I heard the boy crying in the east wing. You said they were nightmares.”
Something broke there.
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