“Cesar,” I say.
"He's tracking you," Nico says simply, his fingers tightening protectively around mine. "Has been for a while, probably. You never noticed because…"
"Because I was too drunk to notice anything." The words taste like vomit.
All those nights. All those parties where Cesar would materialize like magic, always knowing where to find me, always there to "check on" his troubled niece. I thought he was protective. Loving. A father figure when my own father could barely look at me without disappointment clouding his eyes.
But tracking me? Following my movements like I'm some asset to be managed, controlled, eventually liquidated?
My whole life. My hands shake as the weight of it crashes over me. A lifetime of Tío Cesar carrying me on his shoulders at family parties, teaching me to dance salsa in my mother's kitchen while she sang, holding me at her funeral while I sobbed into his Armani. A lifetime of trust built from before I could walk.
"Maybe there's an explanation," I try desperately, but even I can hear how hollow it sounds. "Maybe he's trying to protect me in his own way. Maybe he thinks he's helping."
"Maybe." Nico doesn't argue, just waits with that patience he's learned, knowing I need to reach this conclusion myself or I'll fight it forever.
I look at the rum in front of me. Still there, untouched since Nico arrived. The amber liquid catches the bar's dim light, promising the familiar blur that's always been my escape when reality cuts too deep. But if I drink it now, I'll lose the sharp edges of this truth I'm finally seeing. And I need to see clearly now. I need to be present for this betrayal.
I push the glass away, sliding it across the scarred bar with finality.
"Show me everything," I say, my voice steadier than my hands. "Every piece of evidence you have. Every connection. Every proof that the man who helped raise me has been planning to destroy me."
We walk out of the bar into the Miami afternoon, and the world looks exactly the same: palm trees swaying in the salt breeze, heat rising from pavement in waves that distort the air, the sound of merengue from someone's radio mixing with distant traffic. But nothing is the same at all. The humidity presses against my skin like a living thing, and I wonder if I'll ever feel clean again.
Nico stays close but doesn't touch me, sensing when contact would shatter instead of steady me. The evidence sits like poison in my stomach: all those financial threads, those connections, those perfectly timed leaks that could only come from someone who knew our family's deepest secrets.
What if every hug was reconnaissance? Every concern a calculation? Every offer to "help" really meant tightening the noose?
The worst part burns like acid in my throat: I helped him. Every time I got too drunk to notice details, too high to question coincidences. I made his job easy by being exactly the disaster he could point to and say, "See? She's unfit. Someone needs to manage things when Jorge dies."
"If you're right," I tell Nico as we reach the corner where he parked, my voice stronger now, fury beginning to replace shock, "if Cesar has been holding a knife behind his back all these years, pretending to love me while planning to gut me the moment my father takes his last breath…"
I stop, turn to face him in the blazing sun. His hazel eyes are steady, patient, waiting for me to finish transforming from victim to something else.
"Then God help Cesar Vega," I say, and mean it with every atom of my body. "Because I‘m done hiding in bottles and pills and parties while people I trust destroy me. If Cesar wants to play this game, then let's play."
21 - Nico
The Delgado estate looks like a palace and feels like a mausoleum. Money can buy everything except more time, and Jorge Delgado’s time is running out faster than the medical equipment upstairs can slow it.
We pull through the gates in Marisol's car, and I immediately note the threats. Mediterranean mansion sprawling across manicured grounds that require a staff of a dozen to maintain. Royal palm trees lining the drive that Marisol told me her mother planted decades ago, back when this was a home instead of a fortress. Security cameras at every angle, none of them original to the architecture. Cesar's additions, according to my research. The old man never needed them. Never thought his right hand would become the knife at his throat.
"That's new," Marisol says, pointing to another camera. Her voice carries exhaustion beneath the observation. "And that one. When did he…" She trails off, answering her own question. When her father got too sick to notice. When Cesar started his slow takeover.
His car sits in the circular driveway like it belongs there. A silver Mercedes, spotless despite Miami's humidity. Of course he's here. He practically lives here now, everything but the deed in his name. My hand drifts to where my Glock sits, that familiar weight a comfort when walking into enemy territory.
The staff greet us at the door, and I immediately flag their nervous energy. The housekeeper's eyes dart past Marisol to me, then away. The groundskeeper pruning roses keeps his distance.They're afraid, but not of Marisol. They've known her since she was born. They're afraid of something else. Someone else.
"Miss Delgado," the housekeeper says, wringing her hands. "Your father is… he's having a difficult morning."
Marisol goes rigid beside me. Battle-ready, but I've seen soldiers walk into fights they can't win, and she has that same look. Not hope for confession, she's past that after our discoveries, but determination to see this through, to face whatever manipulation comes next.
We climb the stairs to the medical wing. Jorge's master suite converted into a hospice. At his door, she stops.
"Wait here," she says.
"No." The word comes out rougher than intended, my body already positioning itself between her and any potential threat.
"Nico, he's my father. I don't want him to see…" She gestures at me, at what I represent. "It says something. About what my life has become."
