CHAPTER 5: The North Prison and the Ghosts of Rome
Rain in Mexico City has the power to clear the smog, but also to wash all the trash into the sewers. Ricardo Landa, huddled on a bench in the Alameda Central park, felt exactly like that: debris swept along by the current, stuck in a rusty grate.
Four hours had passed since Isa left him. Four hours of shivering under his ruined Zegna jacket , four hours of watching patrol cars drive by with the fear of a novice criminal. He was no longer the CEO. He was a homeless man in expensive clothes.
At 2:00 AM, a blinding light hit his face.
“Pull over, young man!” a voice distorted by a loudspeaker broke his lethargy.
Ricardo covered his eyes. A patrol car from the Secretariat of Citizen Security had stopped in front of him. Two officers got out. One was fat, with his uniform improperly tucked in, and the other younger, with his hand on his baton.
“You can’t sleep here, guys,” said the senior officer, shining a flashlight on them. “Now move along or we’ll take you away for an administrative offense.”
Ricardo tried to stand, but his legs were numb.
“Officer… officer, I’m Ricardo Landa,” he stammered, trying to pull out his empty wallet to show identification. “I’m a businessman. I was robbed. I need help.”
The young officer approached and sniffed the air.
“It smells like alcohol, Commander. And his uniform’s covered in vomit. He’s an office drunk.”
“I’m not drunk!” Ricardo shouted, his voice growing aggressive with desperation. “I’m Ricardo Landa! Google me, you idiots!”
The senior officer frowned. In Mexico City, insulting a police officer is the fastest way to disaster.
“Oh, so cheeky? Are you insulting our authority?” The officer grabbed his arm with unnecessary force. “Let’s go to the Civic Center, for disturbing the peace and public indecency.”
“Let me go! You don’t know who you’re messing with!” Ricardo struggled. It was a mistake.
In seconds, he was face down on the wet pavement, a knee on his back, the handcuffs clicking shut on his wrists with a painful, metallic sound . “You have the right to remain silent,” the officer mocked as they shoved him to his feet. “And to sober up in the cage.”
They put him in the back of the patrol car. The seat was hard plastic and smelled of urine and cheap disinfectant. As the siren wailed and the car sped off, Ricardo watched through the barred window as the Torre Latinoamericana receded into the distance. The city he thought he owned was now devouring him.
But the Civic Court was only the first stop.
Upon arriving at the Cuauhtémoc delegation, while they were registering him as “NN” (because he had lost his INE card during the race), the system displayed a red alert on the screen of the Public Prosecutor’s old computer.
The secretary, a grumpy-looking man eating a tamale sandwich at three in the morning, stopped chewing.
“Hey, guys,” he said to the police officers. “Did they say this dude’s name is Ricardo Landa?”
—That’s what the drunk says.
The secretary typed something quickly. His eyes widened.
“Holy shit. It’s true. There’s an arrest warrant issued six hours ago. Serious financial crimes, fraud, and fraudulent administration. The Financial Crimes Prosecutor’s Office is searching high and low for him.”
The police officers looked at each other. They had caught a shark thinking it was a minnow.
“Is this the one from the DNA scandal?” the young man asked.
“The same one. ‘Lord Cuckold.'”
Ricardo, sitting on a metal bench, heard everything. He felt the floor open up.
“I want my lawyer,” he said, his voice trembling. “I have a right to a phone call.”
The secretary laughed.
“You have the right to remain silent, sir. The Investigative Police are coming for you right now. You’re going straight to the North Prison. You better start praying to your saint, because they don’t take kindly to rich kids who steal money in there.”
THE RENAISSANCE: COLONIA ROMA, 9:00 AM
While Ricardo was being transported in an armored convoy to the north of the city, Camila Hartwell (no longer Landa) stood in the middle of a cloud of white dust.
“Mrs. Camila, the load-bearing wall is very damp,” said Don Chuy, the master bricklayer in charge of the gallery’s renovation. “We’re going to have to scrape everything and re-plaster it. That’s going to delay us by two days.”
Camila adjusted her face mask and looked at the wall.
“It doesn’t matter, Don Chuy. I want it done right. If we have to postpone the opening, we’ll postpone it. I don’t want a patch job. I want the foundation to be sound.”
“I don’t want any half-measures.” That was her new philosophy of life. For years, she had patched up her marriage, smiling in photos, ignoring messages, pretending everything was fine. No more. Now, if something was rotten, she would pull it out by the roots.
Her phone rang. It was Benítez.
Camila dusted herself off and answered.
“Tell me, Horacio.”
—They caught him, Camila.
The world stopped for a second. The noise of the drills and hammering seemed to fade away.
“Where?” she asked.
—In the Alameda. He was sleeping on a bench. He was detained for minor offenses, but an arrest warrant was issued for the fraud against the company. He has already been transferred to the North Prison. The initial hearing is at 11:00 AM.
Camila closed her eyes and exhaled. She felt no joy. She felt an enormous weight, like lead, lifting from her shoulders. The physical threat was gone. Ricardo could no longer go to the house and shout. He could no longer try to take the children. He was locked in.
—What’s going to happen now?
—The judge is going to order justified pretrial detention. He has no ties to the community, no fixed address (thanks to the asset freeze), and he has (or had) the means to flee. He’s going to stay in jail for the entire trial, Camila. At least a year, maybe two, before sentencing.
—Do children need to know?
—They’re going to find out, Camila. It’s already on the news: “The Titan falls: Ricardo Landa arrested as a homeless person downtown .” You’d better tell them before they see it on TikTok.
“Thank you, Horacio.” Camila paused. “Did he… ask about me?”
—According to the Public Prosecutor’s report, he shouted your name as they were putting him in the transport van. He said you could explain everything.
Camila felt a pang of old pain, but she quickly crushed it.
“There’s nothing to explain. Thank you, lawyer.”
He hung up. He looked at the damp wall that Don Chuy was chipping away at with a chisel.
“Don Chuy,” he said firmly, “tear it down. Tear down the whole wall. We’re going to make a window. I want more light in.”
THE GOLDEN CAGE (WHICH WAS NOW MADE OF IRON)
The North Men’s Preventive Prison is a place where hope dies at the entrance, right where they take your shoelaces off.
Ricardo Landa, dressed in a worn beige uniform two sizes too big, walked down the entrance hall. The smell was a mixture of creosote, stale sweat, and rotten food. It was cold. Very cold.
They had put him in the intake area, in a 3×3 meter cell that he shared with five other men. There were no beds, only concrete slabs. There was no toilet, just a hole in the floor.
“Look who’s here,” said one of the cellmates, a man tattooed up to his neck with a vacant stare. “The guy from TV. The millionaire.”
Ricardo pressed himself against the wall, hugging himself.
“I don’t want any trouble,” he whispered.
“Nobody wants trouble here, dude,” another one said, laughing. “But trouble comes on its own. Hey, is it true your old lady screwed you over with the DNA test?”
Ricardo didn’t answer.
“I’m talking to you, you bastard,” the man said, getting up and shoving him.
“Leave me alone!” Ricardo shouted, trying to maintain a shred of dignity. “My lawyer will come and get me out of here in a few hours! And when I get out, I’m going to have them transferred to a maximum-security prison!”
The five men burst out laughing.
“Oh, how scary.” The boss got angry. The tattooed man approached and spat in his face. “You’re nobody here, blondie. Your money’s worthless here if you don’t have it in your hand. And from what they say on the news, you’re even more broke than we are.”
Ricardo wiped the spit from his mouth, trembling. He slid down the wall until he was sitting on the dirty floor. He closed his eyes and tried to imagine he was in his office, that the smell was his espresso, and that the noise was the printers. But reality was inescapable.
He was in hell. And he’d bought his own ticket.
At 11:00 AM, they took him out for the hearing. They led him to a courtroom through an underground tunnel. They placed him behind bulletproof glass.
On the other side, he saw the prosecution: three young, aggressive lawyers.
He saw the plaintiff: Lang Tech ‘s lawyer .
And he saw his defense attorney. It wasn’t Castañeda. It wasn’t any famous lawyer. It was a public defender, a tired-looking man who was reviewing the case file five minutes before the hearing began.
“Where is my legal team?” Ricardo asked into the microphone.
The public defender didn’t even look at him.
“They resigned, Mr. Landa. Non-payment. And a conflict of interest. I’m Attorney Gómez. I’ll be taking your case. I recommend you don’t speak unless I tell you to.”
The hearing was a massacre.
The judge heard the charges: embezzlement of 45 million pesos, tax evasion, document forgery. The evidence was overwhelming. The proof Camila had gathered—the receipts for Isa’s “consulting” services, the private flights disguised as logistical support—was irrefutable.
“Your Honor,” said Gómez, the defense attorney, without much conviction, “we request that my client be released pending trial. He has no criminal record.”
“Objection,” the prosecutor said. “The defendant has no fixed address, his accounts are frozen, and he has dual (American) citizenship, which makes him an imminent flight risk. Furthermore, he attempted to bribe the officers who arrested him.”
The judge nodded.
“The defendant is hereby formally charged. Pretrial detention is ordered. Three months are granted for the completion of the supplementary investigation. Take him away.”
Ricardo banged on the glass.
“No! You can’t leave me here! I’m innocent! It was her! It was my wife! It’s revenge!”
No one paid him any attention. The guards dragged him back into the tunnel. Back into the darkness.
THE DIFFICULT CONVERSATION
That afternoon, Camila picked up Diego and Sofía from school.
The atmosphere in the car was tense. Diego was sitting with his head down.
“Mom,” Sofia said. “At recess, some girls said my dad is in jail. Is that true?”
Camila stopped the car on a quiet street in Las Lomas, before reaching the house. She turned off the engine and turned to face them.
She wasn’t going to lie to them. Not again.
—Yes, my loves. It’s true.
Diego slammed his fist on the front seat in fury.
“Damn it! What a disgrace! Now we’re the convict’s kids!”
“Diego, look at me,” Camila said in an authoritative voice. “You are not the children of a prisoner. You are the children of Ricardo and Camila. What your father did were his decisions. His mistakes. Not yours.”
“But we have their last name!” Diego shouted, crying with rage. “Everyone’s going to think we’re the same!”
“Your last name doesn’t define you, Diego. Your actions define you.” Camila took a deep breath. “Your father committed crimes. He took money that wasn’t his. And the law is the same for everyone, even if you have money. He has to pay for what he did.”
“Are we going to see him?” Sofia asked in a small voice.
Camila thought for a moment.
“Not right now, Sofi. Jail isn’t a place for children. And I think your father needs time to think about what he did without an audience. But if he calls, and you two want to talk, you can. I’m not going to stop you.”
“I don’t want to talk to him,” Diego said, crossing his arms. “Never. As far as I’m concerned, he’s dead.”
—It’s your decision, son. And I respect it.
Camila started the car again. She knew Diego’s road to healing would be long. The idol had fallen from his pedestal and shattered into a thousand pieces, and those pieces cut.
CONJUGAL VISIT (WITHOUT SPOUSE)
Two weeks later.
Ricardo had lost ten kilos. He had dark circles under his eyes and an unkempt beard. He had quickly learned the rules of prison: don’t look anyone in the eye, pay for protection (with the little money his mother deposited for him), and keep his mouth shut.
It was visiting day.
Ricardo sat in the common area, staring at the door. He had this absurd, childish hope that Camila would come in. That she would come in wearing her blue dress, scold him, but then drag him out. She always fixed his problems. She always found the keys when he lost them.
The door opened.
Attorney Benítez entered.
Ricardo felt such a sharp disappointment that his chest ached.
Benítez sat down opposite him. He didn’t wear a mocking smile. He wore a serious, professional expression.
—Hello, Ricardo.
“Where is she?” Ricardo asked, his voice raspy.
—She’s not coming, Ricardo. Not today, not ever.
—She has to come. We need to talk. Tell her I’m sorry. Tell her… that I was wrong. Tell her Isa was a mistake. That I miss her.
Benítez pulled out a folder.
“Ricardo, listen to me carefully. That doesn’t matter anymore. The damage is done. And I’m not talking about the emotional damage, which is irreparable. I’m talking about the legal damage.”
Benítez opened the folder.
—I’ve come to bring you the final divorce agreement.
“I’m not going to sign anything,” Ricardo said. “If I don’t sign, we’re still married. And she has to help me.”
“If you don’t sign,” Benítez replied evenly, “the no-fault divorce proceedings will continue, and the judge will issue a ruling in a month anyway. But if you don’t sign this marital property settlement agreement, Camila will not drop the personal charges she has against you for defrauding the children’s trust fund.”
Ricardo went pale.
“Do you have any other charges?”
“The fraud against the company is a federal matter. That’s no longer in our hands. But the theft of the three million pesos from Diego and Sofía’s university fund… that’s a private civil and criminal case. If you sign this, relinquishing full parental rights and waiving any claim to the house and remaining assets, Camila will withdraw that specific lawsuit. You’ll save yourself an extra five years in prison.”
Ricardo stared at the documents. They represented total surrender. He was giving up his children. He was giving up his home. He was giving up the life he once knew.
“She hates me,” Ricardo whispered.
“No, Ricardo,” Benítez said, setting his pen aside. “The worst part is that she doesn’t hate you. If she did, she’d come to see you and spit on you. Camila doesn’t feel anything for you anymore. You’re indifferent to her. You’re a stranger with whom she shares memories, nothing more. She’s already let you go. Now it’s your turn to let go.”
Ricardo took the pen. His hands shook.
He looked at his signature—the same signature that once moved millions of dollars in international contracts. Now it was worth nothing more than the promise of parole (someday).
He signed.
Slowly, he slid the papers across the table toward Benítez.
“Tell my children…” Ricardo stopped. His voice cracked. He broke down, crying for the first time in years—raw, loud, unrefined sobs. “Tell my children I’m sorry. That their father is lost.”
Benítez nodded as he gathered the documents.
“I’ll tell them. But I suggest that when you leave here in a few years, you try to be a man they won’t be ashamed of. Start over, Ricardo. Like when you lived in Iztapalapa. Maybe there you’ll find the man Camila once loved.”
Benítez stood and walked out.
Ricardo remained seated at the metal table.
He looked out into the courtyard. The sun was bright, but it carried no warmth.
“Start over.”
He had no money. No family. No reputation.
Yet somehow, after signing those papers, he felt a faint sense of relief. He no longer had to pretend to be the Titan. The Titan was gone.
Now he was simply Ricardo, inmate 4055. And for the first time in a long while, that was the only truth he had.
EPILOGUE TO THE CHAPTER: THE INAUGURATION
A month later,
the Hartwell Gallery opened its doors.
There were no gossip magazines. Only art critics, serious collectors, and genuine friends.
The space was stunning: white walls, reclaimed wood floors, and warm lighting that wrapped gently around the artwork.
The exhibition, “What Remains After the Fire,” showcased sculptures formed from charred wood and twisted metal, casting shadows that resembled dancing human figures.
Camila stood at the center of the gallery, wearing a simple yet refined cream-colored dress. She held a glass of wine but didn’t drink from it. She was deep in conversation with a curator from the Museum of Modern Art.
“The honesty of the pieces is brutal,” the curator said. “You can feel the pain, but also the reconstruction.”
—That’s what art is— Camila said with a soft smile. —It’s taking what’s broken and finding a new purpose for it.
Diego and Sofía were there. Diego wore a neatly pressed shirt and helped pass around canapés, feeling useful, included. He no longer hid behind a screen. Sofía moved quickly through the room, explaining the works with the same passion her mother had.
Camila watched them. They were okay. They were healing.
She walked to the window overlooking Orizaba Street. Below her, the Roma neighborhood glowed with life—music, movement, people walking freely through the night.
She thought of Ricardo. She knew it was his birthday today. Forty-two years old. He was probably marking the day with beans and rice on a plastic tray.
She felt no bitterness. Only deep peace.
She lifted her glass toward the moon in a silent toast.
“Goodbye, Ricardo. Thank you for the children. Thank you for the lesson. And thank you for leaving.”
Then she turned back to the celebration.
Her life—her real life—was just beginning.
(THE END OF THE STORY)
