Shadow Lover novel · Chapter 1 of 16
Chapter 1: The One Who Looks Like Me
I turned twenty-seven holding two pink lines in my hand.
I stared at them in the penthouse bathroom, sitting on the edge of the tub, while the Bogotá sun streamed through the tall window.
I'd been in a secret love affair with Valentín Cuervo, my brother's best friend, for three years.
Three years of coming up the service elevator, sleeping in his bed, and getting up before the doorman opened the lobby.
Three years of hearing "we'll announce it soon" and believing him.
I never doubted him.
Aldo, my brother, had told me long ago that Valentín had been with ninety-nine women before me.
And that ever since he'd been with me, he didn't even look at other women.
That was enough for me.
When I had the flu, he left a forty-million-dollar meeting in Cartagena and caught the first flight home to put a cool cloth on my forehead.
I knew him.
Or so I thought.
I tucked the proof into my pajama pocket.
That night, after my birthday dinner, I was going to tell him.
I'd rehearsed it in the mirror.
"Valentín, we're going to be three."
It sounded good.
It sounded like what I wanted.
By eight in the morning, I was already alone in the house.
He'd left early, without saying goodbye.
It seemed strange, but I let it go.
By ten, I had no messages.
By noon, still none.
Not even a "happy birthday."
I called him three times.
It went to voicemail.
The woman who helped around the house, an older lady who loved me like a daughter, came out of the kitchen drying her hands.
"Mi niña," she said, and couldn't look at me. "The gentleman left very early. He said he was going to the airport to pick up someone very important."
My body went cold.
"Who?"
"He didn't say. But he put on the blue tie. The one he wears for bank meetings."
I stood still.
You don't wear a blue tie to pick up a business partner.
You wear it to pick up a woman.
I grabbed the keys.
I got to El Dorado at one ten, my heart in my throat.
I parked in the first spot and ran through the international arrivals terminal.
I saw him from a distance.
Valentín, tall, in a dark suit, shoulders rigid, holding a bouquet of white roses.
White roses.
He never gave me flowers.
He said it was too public a gesture.
I stopped behind a column.
An arm grabbed my elbow.
"Renata?"
It was Aldo.
My older brother, with his wide smile and leather jacket, holding a cup of coffee.
"What are you doing here?"
"I... was going to travel."
"What a coincidence." He laughed. "I came to keep Valentín company. He didn't want to wait alone."
"Who's he waiting for?"
Aldo's eyes lit up.
What happened next was horrible.
My brother told me, with the pride of someone telling a great love story, what I didn't know.
That Valentín, when he was young, had had a first love.
That her name was Josefina.
That she'd gone to Spain eight years ago and broken his heart.
That he'd stood up to his family for her, that they almost disinherited him, and when she left him, he lost his mind.
"He went looking for ninety-nine women who looked like her," Aldo said, lowering his voice. "Ninety-nine, Renata. One by one. Thinking that if he found one who was the same, the pain would go away."
I couldn't breathe.
"Like... her?"
"All of them just alike. Long black hair, skinny, dark eyes." He sighed, moved. "That's a man in love. What depth, right?"
I looked at my hands.
My hair was long and black.
My body was skinny.
My eyes, dark.
"And now she's coming back," Aldo went on. "She got divorced. He found out a week ago. He hasn't slept in seven days."
The automatic doors opened.
A group of passengers started coming out with suitcases.
Among them, a woman around twenty-seven, with long, freshly straightened hair, dark eyes, and a light coat.
She looked like my sister.
She looked like me.
More accurately: I looked like her.
Valentín stepped forward.
He held out the white roses with both hands, trembling.
She let go of her suitcase.
She burst into tears.
And she threw herself into his arms.
I watched him close his eyes.
I watched him kiss her hair, press her against his chest, like a whole life coming back.
Aldo wiped away a tear.
"How beautiful," he whispered. "How beautiful real love is."
I said nothing.
I stood there watching the scene for a long, long time.
My brother never knew that one of the ninety-nine was standing right beside him.
Number ninety-nine and a half.
The one who stayed three years.
Then I turned around.
I walked to the car with steady legs.
I drove to a clinic in Chicó that I knew by heart, because that very morning, before he left, I'd had the ultrasound there.
A small heartbeat on the screen.
Eight weeks.
I walked into the gynecologist's office without an appointment.
The doctor looked up from her desk.
"Señorita Gaviria. What happened? This morning you were so happy."
I sat down across from her.
My voice was calm.
Very calm.
"Doctor," I said. "I don't want to have this baby."
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