Chapter 5 - The Marriage Everyone Distrusted
I couldn't read the rest.
Not immediately.
My vision blurred.
Mariana leaned forward.
“What does it say?”
I closed the letter.
“Nothing.”
She stared at me.
“You're lying.”
I looked at the notary.
He quietly said, “Mrs. Salgado instructed me to allow you to read the letters alone.”
Mariana stood.
“I'll wait outside.”
When she left, I opened the first letter.
Teresa's handwriting was neat.
She wrote that she had noticed my eyes before I ever touched her medicine boxes.
She had seen me look at her handbag.
She had seen me look at her car.
She had seen me stare at the house when she later invited me inside.
She knew.
From the beginning.
But she hadn't been angry.
She had been curious.
She wanted to know whether desperation could be changed.
The next pages described things I had forgotten.
The first time I lied about traveling.
The first time I looked at the property folder.
The first time I accepted money.
The first time I refused to admit I needed help.
I put the letter down.
My hands were shaking.
The notary returned.
“There are more.”
“How many?”
“Twelve.”
“Why?”
He looked at the box.
“Mrs. Salgado wanted you to understand something in stages.”
“What?”
He didn't answer.
I opened the second letter.
This one was dated three months after we met.
Teresa wrote about my first woodworking project.
She said she had watched me stare at the broken table for ten minutes before fixing it.
She had seen something different.
Not greed.
Not ambition.
Persistence.
She wrote that she had decided to give me a chance.
Not a house.
Not money.
A chance.
I closed my eyes.
For years, I had believed I had manipulated Teresa.
Now I realized she had been observing me the entire time.
The third letter was dated the day she offered me the room.
She wrote:
“You think I rescued you. I did not. I simply opened a door. What you do after entering is yours.”
I read that sentence three times.
Then I found a photograph.
It showed the old room before I moved in.
The bed.
The small desk.
The broken lamp.
On the back Teresa had written:
“He will sleep here tonight. I wonder which man will wake up tomorrow.”
I pressed the photograph against my chest.
For the first time since her funeral, I cried.
Not quietly.
Not with dignity.
I cried like the twenty-eight-year-old man who had slept inside a broken truck because he had nowhere else to go.
The notary waited.
After several minutes, he said:
“There is one more thing.”
“What?”
“Mrs. Salgado wanted you to know that Mariana was not her first choice to inherit the house.”
I looked up.
“What?”
“She changed the will three times.”
“Why?”
“I don't know.”
“You're the notary.”
“I can tell you what she instructed me to tell you.”
He placed another document on the table.
“She wanted the house to go to someone who would protect it.”
I stared at the paper.
“Who?”
He shook his head.
“You need to read the next letter.”
I opened it.
The date was the day Teresa asked me to marry her.
My stomach tightened.
She wrote that she had deliberately tested me.
She had shown me the property valuation.
She had asked about money.
She had watched whether I would become more possessive.
She had even discussed the possibility of dying and observed my reaction.
Then she wrote something that broke me.
“I asked him to marry me because I wanted to know whether he would finally stop running from himself.”
I couldn't breathe.
The door opened.
Mariana stepped back into the office.
She looked at the box.
“How many letters?”
“Four.”
She frowned.
“There should only be three.”
The notary looked at her.
“Mrs. Salgado added another.”
“When?”
“Two days before she died.”
Mariana's face changed.
“What did she add?”
The notary reached toward the box.
But before he could touch it, his phone rang.
He answered.
His expression changed.
“What?”
He listened.
Then slowly looked at me.
“The bank just called.”
“Why?”
“They found a safe deposit box in Teresa's name.”
Mariana stood rigid.
“What is inside?”
May you like
The notary lowered the phone.
“They said the box contains documents connected to you.”
