6. On her wedding day, Elena held up a small red square in front of everyone, and the man who had just married her stopped smiling.

At six o’clock he called Fernando.

The lawyer answered with a sleepy voice.

—I opened RED.

There was a long silence.

-As?

—The frame had the password.

Fernando took a deep breath.

—Don’t send anything by email. Don’t make copies in the cloud. Bring your computer.

They met that morning with a retired notary named Pilar Santacana, who had worked on several Valdemora transactions before leaving the office where Tomás had influence.

Pilar examined three documents.

“These companies need expert analysis,” he said. “And we would need to obtain original corporate records, notarized deeds, and bank statements. But if the structure is authentic, your father’s company bankruptcy warrants review.”

Elena felt anger.

—Everyone knew something.

“No,” Pilar replied. “Many people suspected different things. That’s not the same thing.”

—And nobody did anything?

The older woman looked at her wearily.

—In large family businesses, silence is very well disguised as prudence.

Elena thought about Diego.

—I’m going to marry one of them in three days.

Pilar put the pen down on the table.

—Then don’t get married until you know what he knows.

It was the obvious answer.

And yet, Elena was unable to accept it.

Not because he was unaware of the risk.

Because she loved Diego.

The word felt almost humiliating to him at that moment.

Loving someone could coexist with distrusting them. It could even make the distrust more painful.

Elena decided to try one last time.

That night she took Diego out to dinner at a small restaurant where they had had their first date.

During dessert, he asked her:

—Did your father ever tell you about Valdemora?

Diego put down the spoon.

-Very little.

—And what about Rojo Uno?

The muscle in his jaw tensed.

—That again.

—I need an answer.

—I already gave it to you.

—No. You told me that maybe you had heard the name.

Diego leaned towards her.

—Elena, my father died three years ago. Yours died six. We can’t build our marriage on a war that started before we met.

She felt tears welling up behind her eyes.

—You know what bothers me? That you talk as if asking a question is the same as attacking.

Diego sighed.

—Because you’ve been trying to get a confession from me for days, and I don’t have one.

Elena took out her mobile phone.

He showed her the photograph from the file: Julián, Tomás and Álvaro around the table with the folder of the red square.

Diego lost color.

—Where did you get that from?

—From my father’s archives.

He looked up.

—What else do you have?

He didn’t ask what photography was.

He asked what else he had.

Elena felt something break.

—You know him.

—I know the symbol.

—Then you lied to me.

Diego looked around.

—Lower your voice.

—No.

—Elena.

—What was Red One?

Diego clasped his hands.

—A company that my father and my uncle used in real estate transactions.

—And why did you pretend not to know her?

—Because I knew where this was going to lead.

-Where to?

—This. You looking at me as if I had ruined your father.

Elena remained still.

—Did you know they were diverting money from Valdemora?

—No.

The response was quick.

Too fast.

—Is it safe?

Diego closed his eyes.

—I knew there were accounting irregularities.

Elena felt the impact of every word.

—Since when?

—For two years now.

—Two years?

—I found some files when my father died.

—And you didn’t tell me anything?

—I didn’t know what they meant.

—You could have shown them to me.

—We were just starting our life.

—My father died believing that everyone thought he was incompetent.

Diego lowered his gaze.

-I’m sorry.

—It’s not enough.

He raised his head.

—What do you want me to do? Sue my own family forty-eight hours before our wedding with documents that we don’t even know if they prove anything?

Elena looked at him.

—I want to know which side you’re on.

The question remained between the two of them.

Diego took too long.

Again.

—I’m on our side.

Elena understood that it wasn’t an answer.

She left the restaurant alone.

The next morning he received a message from an unknown number.

“If you want to know why Diego lied to you, look at who authorized the sale of the Valdemora plots in 2006.”

Below was a blurry photograph of a signature.

Elena enlarged the image.

The name written underneath was not Thomas.

Not Alvaro.

It was Lucía Ferrer.

And Lucia was eleven years old in 2006.

The signature was impossible.

Someone had used his name.

Or someone was trying to make her the culprit in a story that had started when she was still a child.

Chapter 4 — The Woman from Bordeaux