CHAPTER NINETY-NINE

FAST ATTACK

Lipe was in a tough situation with Lara at his house. According to what Clara told him, the girl had caused trouble during the meeting they went to and brought her back with them. He watched her sleep on her stomach, sprawled out on the bed, and stayed there for a long time listening to her snoring and occasionally saying incoherent words. Sitting on a chair facing the bed where she slept, with his elbows resting on his knees, he pondered ideas. He had invited her to go out for a drink. It had never crossed his mind that she was dependent, and during the three hours he spent there watching her sleep, some of the words he had said in his alcoholic coma, he noticed in the silence of the room that some were painful cries and she called for her mother, asked José to let her go, cried, and pleaded for him to leave her alone.

Lipe lay down next to her when she cried desperately, struggled, and begged for her mother, for God, and for José to leave her alone, and spoke softly and