For many years, caring for him had been the most important thing she did.
In many ways, that made Felix a good man.
He was responsible.
Dependable.
Kind.
He believed that showing up, working hard, and doing the right thing would eventually make everything okay.
But Felix had one enormous weakness.
He could never look at his mother objectively.
It wasn’t because Lucia concealed who she was.
It was because questioning her had always carried an emotional price Felix had learned not to pay.
I recognized that early.
I understood it during the first year we were together.
And for a long time, I convinced myself I could live with it.
Until I couldn’t.
Felix and I had met eleven years earlier at a professional conference.
His company was a client of the accounting firm where I was working as a young associate.
Felix was thirty.
I was twenty-three.
He worked in marketing and had something I immediately liked: genuine curiosity.
When he asked a question, he listened to the answer.
And when you spoke, he remembered.
Three weeks after the conference, he called my firm and asked to speak with the associate he had met who specialized in forensic work.
He claimed he had another question.
He didn’t.
