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“But,” Nik continued, “the woman who stole your identity has been busy.”

My stomach tightened.

“What did you find?”

He studied me for a moment before answering.

“Marcela Reyes is from San Antonio. She earned a law degree, passed the bar, and had a promising legal career before she crossed paths with Ciro.”

“She told me some of that.”

“But she left out an important part. She wasn’t just some young attorney Ciro noticed and trapped. His financial records crossed her desk, and she used the opportunity to study everything she could about him—his businesses, his money, his habits, the people around him, even the kind of woman he was drawn to. Once she understood what appealed to him, she deliberately made herself into that woman and put herself directly in his path.”

I stared at him.

“She chose him?”

“Very deliberately.”

A chill moved through me.

I had always known Marcela was ambitious. I’d watched her flatter the man I used to call Father, sleep with him, manipulate his men, and take more power every chance she got. But somehow hearing that she had targeted him from the beginning made her feel even more dangerous.

“Once I had Marcela Reyes instead of Isabella Delgado to work with, other things started lining up,” Nik continued. “She’s used more than one identity. There are accounts under different names, cryptocurrency wallets, money moved in ways Ciro apparently didn’t know about, and enough financial activity hidden from his people to make it clear she was stealing from him while he thought he controlled her.”

Lachlan gave a humorless huff beside me. “That sounds like Isabeast.”

Nik’s expression remained hard.

“Money wasn’t the worst of it. She helped recruit women.”

My hands went cold.

“I knew that.”

“I don’t think you understood how deeply involved she was. Marcela targeted college students and other young women who wanted modeling careers, scholarships, travel, connections, or simply a way into wealthy circles. She learned what each of them wanted and used those ambitions to lure them in. The deeper I dig, the more her contacts and organizations overlap with the same trafficking network we’ve been tracing through Leon Brands and Franklin Whitaker.”

Lucian’s expression darkened, but Nik continued in the same controlled tone.

“She wasn’t merely carrying out Ciro’s orders. She was quietly using his money, access, and organization to build something of her own, gathering influence, cultivating loyal men, and creating connections Ciro never realized belonged more to her than to him.”

I thought of Mateo, the guards who called her Mistress, and the men who had chosen her the moment she shot Ciro.

“He thought he made her useful,” I said quietly.

“He gave her access,” Nik replied. “She used it to make herself dangerous.”

That sounded exactly like Marcela.

“Everything I’ve found points in the same direction. She wants wealth, control, and proximity to powerful people, and she has no problem using women to get any of it. Ciro wasn’t the mastermind holding an innocent woman hostage. Marcela saw his machine and decided she wanted a hand on the controls.”

My skin prickled.

“And now he’s dead.”

“Yes, which means I’m far more interested in what Marcela Reyes does next than I was yesterday.”

I had escaped her, but that didn’t mean she was finished with me.