The Shadow That Stopped Protecting the Don novel · Chapter 1 of 12
Chapter 1: The Cake
I killed a man at six in the morning, and by seven I was already whisking the pancake batter.
It was Saturday, and my son was turning five.
There was a Salazar sniper in the bell tower of the parish church that overlooks the house in Zapopan, and I saw him first.
I went up the service stairs with the silenced pistol and shot him once in the back of the head before he could turn around.
I came down, washed my hands in the holy water font, and went back home through the neighbors' garden.
Five years of doing exactly that.
My husband never knew about the seven assassination attempts I dismantled in silence before they could even get close to him.
His name was Bernardo Ledesma, and all of Jalisco called him Don.
I was his consigliere, his gun, and his shadow, and for the past five years, his secret wife.
Nicolás came down the stairs in his pajamas, hair sticking up, holding a drawing of a boat.
"Mom, is he coming today?"
"He's coming today."
"And will he be able to stay for a long time?"
"He'll stay as long as he wants."
I put a pancake on his plate shaped like an anchor.
Nicolás smiled, and his father's dark eyes stared back at me.
My son had never said the word dad.
Bernardo had decided that the day he was born, with one hand on my sweaty forehead.
"Enemy families are always watching us," he'd told me.
"If they know you have a son of mine, they'll use him against me."
"Your son and you are all I have, Marina. My only weakness."
And I believed him.
That word, weakness, sounded beautiful to me back then.
The night before, I'd left a folder on his desk.
Inside were photos of Sabrina Iturbe, his first love, talking to the Salazar lawyer at a café.
There was also a copy of the child's bracelet she'd brought back from the United States.
It was engraved with Don Aurelio Salazar's crest.
"It's a trap, Bernardo," I told him. "The boy is Aurelio's grandson. She's the bait."
He'd closed the folder without opening it all the way.
"You're jealous."
"I'm seeing a threat."
"You're jealous, Marina." He smiled, with a condescension I'd never seen in him before. "The shadow doesn't feel. You don't have to start now."
I just watched him put on his jacket.
I never argued with him.
That morning, while Nicolás ate his pancakes, my phone rang.
A message from Bernardo.
"I booked the Fantasía park for Sabrina and the kid. I owe them a day. Don't wait for me for lunch. I'll be there for the cake."
I read the message twice.
Then I set the phone face down on the table.
"Mom, what does it say?"
"That he'll be here for the cake."
That afternoon I made the cake with my own hands.
Chocolate, with a blue fondant boat, six candles you light with a match, and a flag that said "Nico."
Five o'clock, six o'clock, seven o'clock.
Nicolás put on his sailor shirt and sat on a chair in the dining room with his hands on his knees.
At eight, he asked if he could turn off the air conditioning, because he was cold.
At nine, the cake started to melt, because the kitchen was hot, and the blue boat collapsed to one side.
Nicolás looked at it without saying anything.
"I'm going to wait a little longer," he said.
He fell asleep in the chair at ten, hugging his drawing.
I carried him to his room.
I took off his shoes and stroked his forehead.
I went back to the kitchen and sat down in front of the cake.
The phone hadn't rung.
Not one call, not one message, not one "sorry, I'm running late."
I thought about five years of birthdays and Christmases.
I thought about fevers at three in the morning and funerals for bodyguards, and the bullets I took in silence.
I didn't feel rage.
I felt something much calmer, like a door closing.
I dialed a number I'd had memorized for years and never used.
"It's me," I said.
"Ma'am."
"I need you to cancel my identity. Mine and Nicolás's. Erase all the information, today."
Silence on the other end.
"Are you sure?"
"Yes."
"This can't be undone."
"I know."
I hung up.
I took off my wedding ring, the one I'd never been able to wear in daylight.
I sank it into the center of the melted cake.
Then I picked up my son, with his drawing, and walked out the back door.
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