Chapter 1 - THE FIRST THING I REMEMBERED
The first thing I remembered after brain surgery was not my name.
It was Alejandro’s voice.
“If you don't wake up, at least Claudia and I can get married without any red tape.”
My eyes opened slowly beneath the fluorescent lights of the recovery room.
Everything hurt.
My head felt as though someone had packed it with concrete, my throat was raw from the breathing tube, and even turning my eyes toward the monitor beside me required effort.
Then Dr. Caroline Hayes leaned over me.
“Camila?”
I blinked.
“Can you tell me where you are?”
“Northwestern Memorial.”
Her smile widened.
“Good. What year is it?”
I answered correctly.
Then she asked who the president was, what month we were in, and whether I knew why I had been admitted.
Every answer came.
So did every memory.
My diagnosis.
The surgery.
Alejandro.
Claudia.
The divorce papers.
Their one-year-old son.
And the humiliation of realizing my best friend had apparently been sleeping with my husband while bringing soup to my house and asking whether chemotherapy made me nauseous.
Dr. Hayes squeezed my hand.
“Your neurological responses look excellent.”
I closed my eyes.
Excellent.
Alejandro was about to discover how excellent.
Several hours later, when I was transferred to a private room, my older cousin Sofia was waiting.
She had always been more sister than cousin.
The second the nurse left, she whispered:
“What happened before surgery?”
I looked at her.
“Why?”
“Because thirty minutes after they took you downstairs, you had me receive an email automatically scheduled from your account.”
I had forgotten.
Not because of the surgery.
Because I had done it in the terrified hour after Alejandro left.
“What did it say?”
Sofia pulled out her phone.
The message contained three instructions.
Contact attorney Rebecca Collins.
Freeze any discretionary cards connected to my separate trust.
Do not tell Alejandro I had survived until the surgeon confirmed my condition.
Sofia stared at me.
“What did he do?”
My eyes filled, but I refused to cry.
“He gave me divorce papers.”
“What?”
“And Claudia has his baby.”
Sofia stood so quickly her chair scraped the floor.
“I’m going to kill him.”
“No.”
“Camila—”
“No.”
My voice was weak but firm.
“I don’t want revenge that gives him an excuse to call me emotional.”
“What do you want?”
I looked toward the Chicago skyline outside my window.
“An accounting.”
That afternoon, Rebecca Collins arrived.
She was fifty-two, sharp-eyed, calm, and had handled several complex trust disputes for my father before he died.
She reviewed the divorce papers.
Then she frowned.
“These are not standard.”
“What do you mean?”
“There’s language here releasing him from claims involving prior transfers, reimbursements, and financial disclosures.”
My stomach tightened.
“Why would that be included?”
“I don’t know yet.”
Rebecca turned another page.
Then she stopped.
“Camila, did you know Alejandro has listed a nine-year-old daughter as a dependent on another financial document?”
I stared at her.
“A daughter?”
Rebecca nodded.
Not the one-year-old son Alejandro had confessed to.
May you like
A nine-year-old girl.
And the mother listed beside her name was Claudia.
