He had done to her, in miniature, the same thing he was doing to me.

He had found a person who wanted something — she wanted status, money, a man who seemed powerful — and he had used that want to make her useful, and he had structured the whole arrangement so that when it collapsed, she would be the one holding the wreckage.

The shell company was in her name.

The criminal exposure was hers.

She had thought she was his partner and discovered she was his fall guy, precisely as I had thought I was his wife and discovered I was his mark.

We were, Ravenna and I, two women who had made very different choices and been used by the same man in the same way, and the only real difference between us was that I had found out early enough, and had resources enough, to turn the trap around, and she had found out with nothing left but a flash drive and the choice of whom to hand it to.