Millionaire Ricardo Salazar woke up at 3 a.m. with his heart pounding so loudly he could hear it in his ears. It wasn’t the first scream that woke him, but the second, the one that sounded like someone being tortured deep inside his own house. The mansion in Polanco, one of Mexico City’s most exclusive neighborhoods, was completely dark, except for the dim light filtering through the windows onto the Italian marble floor, which shimmered like a mirror in the moonlight.
Ricardo slowly sat up in the king-size bed, trying not to wake his wife, Valeria, who slept peacefully beside him, a tranquility that seemed impossible to him at that moment. The scream was heard again, fainter this time, as if it came from very far away, as if someone were shouting from the bottom of a well. Ricardo felt his skin prickle. He knew that scream. It was the voice of his son Miguel, his only child, the 12-year-old boy who had been confined to a wheelchair after a car accident three years earlier.
The same accident that had killed his mother, Elena, the woman Ricardo had loved for 15 years and whose death had devastated him in a way he never thought possible. Valeria stirred beside him, slowly opening her eyes. She was beautiful, even in the darkness, her long black hair falling onto the silk pillow, her skin flawless, without a single wrinkle despite her 35 years. He had married her just eight months ago, after two years of being a widower, two years of utter loneliness during which Miguel had grown increasingly quiet, withdrawn, and distant.
Valeria had come into his life like a whirlwind of light, joy, and promises of a better future. He had met her at a business dinner. She was the public relations director of a rival company, intelligent, sophisticated, with a smile that lit up any room. She had told him that she loved Miguel, that she wanted to be a mother to him, that together they would build a family again. And Ricardo, desperate to believe he could be happy again, had believed every word.
“What’s wrong?” Valeria murmured sleepily. “Did you hear that?” Ricardo asked quietly, staring at the ceiling, as if he could see through the walls to the source of that awful sound. He heard Valeria yawn, stretching languidly. “Miguel, I think it’s coming from the basement.” Valeria sighed with that weary tone Ricardo had been hearing more and more often in recent weeks. “My love, we’ve already talked about this. It’s the wind. This house is almost 100 years old.”
The old pipes make strange noises at night, the ventilation ducts. It’s not Miguel. Miguel is asleep in his room. But it sounded exactly like what Ricardo had started to say, but Valeria placed her soft hand on his chest, gently pushing him back onto the bed. You’re stressed, honey. You’ve been working too much. That merger with the Monterrey company has you exhausted. You need to rest. Besides, I went to check on Miguel two hours ago. He was fast asleep. Everything’s fine. Ricardo wanted to believe her.
God, how she wanted to believe him. But something inside her, something primal and instinctive, told her that something was terribly wrong. This wasn’t the first scream she’d heard in the middle of the night. For the past three weeks, almost every morning, she’d woken to that same sound, that muffled scream that seemed to come from the very heart of the house. And every time she mentioned it, Valeria had a perfect explanation. The wind, the pipes, the neighborhood stray cats, Ricardo’s imagination running wild.
But tonight, tonight the scream had been different, unmistakable. It was Miguel, and he sounded terrified. Ricardo lay back down, but he couldn’t sleep. He stared at the ceiling, listening to Valeria’s calm breathing beside him, wondering if he was losing his mind. Maybe she was right, maybe it was the stress. The business merger he was managing was worth almost 800 million pesos. It was the biggest deal of his career. He had been working 18 hours a day for months.
He barely saw Miguel, except at breakfast, and lately not even then, because he left the house before the boy woke up. Valeria had taken care of everything: the house, supervising the staff, making sure Miguel went to his physical therapy, did his homework, and ate well. He should be grateful, he should trust her, but he couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong, terribly wrong. When the sun finally rose, Ricardo got up feeling as if he hadn’t slept a wink.
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