Yes, Your Honor, my wife and I have agreed that it is best for both of us to go our separate ways. His hand discreetly found Ruth’s, who was smiling from the front row of the audience like a spectator at the theater of her own victory.
Mrs. Montalvo. The judge turned his gaze to Cristina. She fully confirmed. Your Honor, it’s time to close this chapter of my life. Her voice was clear, without a trace of bitterness. Ruth exchanged a triumphant glance with Damian.
Everything was going according to plan. Jordi Wals cleared his throat. Your Honor, before proceeding with the signatures, we need to review some asset-related aspects that may have been overlooked during the previous negotiations.
Damian frowned. Property issues. He had made it clear from the beginning that each would keep what was theirs: his company, his investments, his bachelor apartment in Pedralves.
Cristina could keep the apartment in Leich Chample and her job at the health center. Clean and simple. What exactly does “lawyer” mean? asked Damián’s lawyer, Miguel Santos, a burly man in a mustard-colored tie who was already starting to sweat under his suit.
Jordi pulled a navy blue folder from his briefcase. I’m referring to the business documents for Reformas Hurtado SL, the company that Mr. Damián registered in 2018. His fingers ran over the papers with surgical precision.
According to the Barcelona Mercantile Registry, the company was incorporated with an initial capital of €150,000, contributed entirely by Ms. Cristina Montalvo García as a partner. The ensuing silence was so thick you could cut it with a knife.
Ru stopped smiling. Damian blinked several times, as if the words weren’t reaching his brain properly. “That’s impossible,” Miguel Santos stammered. “My client is the sole administrator of the company.”
He signs all the contracts. He makes all the decisions. Indeed, Jordi continued without flinching. Mr. Damián is listed as the sole administrator and legal representative, but ownership of the company shares belongs entirely to my client, a perfectly legal structure that allows for the separation of management from ownership.
Cristina observed the scene with almost Buddhist serenity. Ruth had turned as white as chalk, and her hands trembled slightly as she tried to process the information. Damian, for his part, seemed to have entered a kind of silent shock.
“But,” Ru murmured from his seat. “Damien told me he was the owner who built the company from the ground up.” The judge cleared his throat authoritatively. “Madam, please, public interventions are not permitted during the hearing.” “How is this possible?” Damien asked in a whisper.
I work day and night at that company. I got the contracts. I supervised the construction. Cristina spoke for the first time in several minutes, and her voice sounded like a crystal bell in the middle of the storm.
Do you remember, Damian, when your previous renovation company went bankrupt in 2017? Do you remember coming home crying because the creditors were going to seize everything? Do you remember me using my inheritance from Grandma Pilar to save you from ruin?
Damian’s eyes filled with a terrible realization. The €200,000 inheritance Cristina had received when her grandmother died, the money she had readily given him so he could start over, the money he had assumed belonged to both of them.
But I thought, I believed those funds were marital property. They would have been, Jordi interjected. But my client had the prudence to keep them as separate property and use them for a business investment in her name.
Everything was perfectly documented and recorded. Ru stood up abruptly, her heels clicking against the wooden floor. This is a trap, a ploy to ruin our wedding day.
The judge struck the gavel firmly. Order in the court. Madam, take a seat immediately or I will have to ask you to leave the courtroom. But Ruth was already running for the door, her sobs filling the hallway as she fled from the reality that had just crashed into her like a tsunami.
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