“You’re going to make me cry.”

Leandro’s smile now betrayed malice. “Do you see how, deep down, we’re the same? Where will you be better off than by my side? I have grand plans for us. I’ve been thinking a lot these past few weeks, and I’ve understood why you want to leave this. Moreover, I’ve realized that I want to leave it too. I’m sick and tired of cleaning up after incompetent idiots. You and I are made for other things.”

“Oh, are we?”

“Well, of course. Or did you imagine we would always be dealing with other people’s messes? That’s over. I’ve set my sights on something far more important. I’m also leaving all this behind. And I need you to be by my side, I need you to come with me. Without you, I can’t do it. You know what I’m talking about, don’t you?”

“I haven’t a clue.”

“I’m talking about politics. This country is going to change. Sooner or later. The General won’t last forever. New blood is needed. People with ideas. People who know how to manage the world out there.”

“Like you.”

“Like you and like me. You and I, together, can do great things for this country.”

“Such as murdering innocent people and stealing their children to sell them?”

Leandro sighed, a look of annoyance spreading over his face. “Don’t be naive, Alicia. Those were other times.”

“Was it your idea, or Valls’s?”

“Does it matter?”

“It matters to me.”

“It was nobody’s idea. It’s simply the way things happened. Ubach and his wife took a fancy to Mataix’s daughters. Valls saw an opportunity. And then came others. It was a time for opportunities. And there’s no supply without demand. I just concentrated on doing what I had to do and making sure the matter didn’t escape Valls’s control.”

“It looks like he didn’t quite pull it off.”

“Valls is a greedy man. Unfortunately greedy people never know when it’s time to stop abusing their position, so they force things until they blow up. That’s why, sooner or later, they fall.”

“Is he still alive, then?”

“Alicia . . . What do you want from me?”

“The truth.”

Leandro laughed to himself. “The truth? You and I know such a thing doesn’t exist. The truth is an agreement that allows innocent people not to have to cope with reality.”

“I haven’t come here to listen to your book of quotations.”

Leandro’s look hardened. “No, you’ve come here to poke around where you know you mustn’t. As you always do. To complicate everything. Because that’s how you do everything. That’s why you left me. That’s why you betrayed me. That’s why you come here now to talk to me about truth. Because you want me to tell you that yes, you’re better than me, better than all this.”

“I’m not better than anyone else.”

“Of course you are. That’s why you’ve always been my favorite. That’s why I want you back by my side. Because this country needs to have people like you and like me. People who know how to control it. How to keep it in line, and calm, so it doesn’t all turn into a sack full of rats again, living to feed their hatred, their envy, and their spiteful anger, rats who eat one another alive. You know I’m right. You know that even though we’re always being blamed for everything, without us this country would go to hell. What do you say?”