Chapter 5 - Beneath the Seat
Laura called Rosa before she called anyone else.
“Is the wheelchair still there?”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
“In the downstairs office.”
“Please don’t touch it.”
Rosa paused.
“He’s been taking papers out of that room all morning.”
Nora made two calls.
By early afternoon, Laura had arranged to collect essential belongings with a civil standby officer present.
Nora went with her.
Marcos opened the front door wearing the expression he used when answering uncomfortable questions at dinner.
Reasonable.
Patient.
Slightly wounded.
“This is unnecessary.”
Laura walked past him.
“I need my clothes, my documents, and the wheelchair.”
He laughed once.
“The wheelchair?”
“I bought it.”
“For me.”
“The receipt is in my name.”
The officer stayed near the doorway.
Nora spoke calmly.
“There’s a dispute over property. Nobody needs to settle it here today.”
Marcos’s smile thinned.
“Then it stays.”
Laura looked toward the office.
The chair stood beside his desk.
The cushion had been lifted halfway off.
He had started.
Maybe he hadn’t finished.
She moved toward it.
Marcos stepped into her path.
The officer shifted.
“Sir. Give her some space.”
For a second, Laura thought he would refuse.
Then he backed away.
She picked up the cushion.
The black sleeve was still there.
Her fingers closed around something hard.
A small silver drive.
Marcos saw it.
“That’s mine.”
Laura handed it directly to Nora.
“You can make that claim through your lawyer,” Nora said.
He stared at her.
Then he turned to Laura.
“You have no idea what you’re doing.”
She looked around the office.
Her old drafting lamp sat on his desk.
A photograph from the opening of her studio hung beside a cabinet.
In it, she was holding scissors in front of a red ribbon.
Marcos had his arm around her.
She remembered that day.
He had told everyone how proud he was.
“You’re right,” she said. “I had no idea.”
She took the photograph off the wall.
Upstairs, Elena packed clothes while Laura found her passport and birth certificate.
Half her jewelry was missing.
So was the folder containing the sale documents from her studio.
She wrote down what she couldn’t find.
Downstairs, Marcos remained beside the office door.
“You’ll regret letting strangers into our marriage.”
Laura carried her suitcase past him.
“There was already a stranger in it.”
At Nora’s office, a technician made a protected copy of the drive.
May you like
Then the first folder opened.
Its title was Laura - Signatures.
