Chapter 19: No Paperwork Tonight

"No paperwork," I said, "after nine o'clock."

Emiliano looked at the stack of bank statements on his kitchen table.

"That's all we have."

"Then we make it something else."

My neighbor had Camila until morning, with a bag of bottles and a list she had refused to read.

It was Wednesday, three days before the gala.

On the table lay ten cream envelopes and a stick of black sealing wax.

A candle burned beside them.

He had printed the statements himself, thirty-one months of them, split into ten stacks.

The hearing had been moved to the Monday after the gala, because Soledad's lawyer asked for time.

"Show me how it works," I said.

He sat down across from me and folded a statement in thirds.

He slid it into an envelope and held the wax to the flame.

It softened and dripped, black and slow.

It pooled on the flap, and he pressed a brass stamp into it, an A.

"Soledad's initial?" I said.

"Yours."

I looked at the seal for a long moment.

Then I stood and walked around the table.

I sat on the edge of it in front of him, my knees on either side of his chair.

"Is this a conflict of interest, Counselor?"

"I stepped off your case two weeks ago."

"So it's not."

"It's not." His voice had gone rough. "It's an excellent idea."

I took the stamp out of his hand and set it down.

I took his hand and put it on my knee.

He didn't hurry.

That was the thing about him that undid me, every time.

His palm slid up the outside of my thigh, under my skirt.

It stopped at the edge of my underwear, and he looked up at my face.

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