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“I did not touch your paternity test,” Placidie said coldly. “You have not needed anyone’s help to shame yourself, Léonie. But I see that your brother here is sympathetic to your plight.”

Étienne shrugged. “It does not matter what he thinks. He’d love to see me raise a bastard.”

“I asked the doctor,” Faustine put in. She was standing close, way too close to my husband, and I couldn’t help remembering all those days before he chose me that they’d been close, that he’d had an arm around her, a hand on her ass, their mouths meeting in a passionate clash of tongues and fingers and bodies. . .

“He said of course there is no truth to the conspiracy theory. No one tampered with the test.”

“You should ask the doctor yourself,” Hugo put in. “Think about who has a motive to split up your marriage.”

But Étienne, nothing was getting through to him!

“And Mano—he set me up,” I said desperately.

“And for what purpose? What would he have to gain by that?”

Now was the humiliating part. Now I would have to confess what Mano had done, how he had looked at me.

“I think he—has an interest in me.”

“An interest in you? And what the fuck do you mean by that? Stop speaking in riddles.”

“A s-sexual interest.”

My face was flaming in embarrassment and humiliation as my husband stared at me.

Faustine laughed, the tone cold and brittle in the silence.

“You’re delusional. Mano is interested in me. Has been courting me for a while. Everyone knows it.”

“Did you see anything?” Étienne demanded of Hugo.

Hugo glanced over at me. Would it help or hurt my case to explain that he’d seen Mano kissing me?

“I have seen him here, a—more than I might have expected. More than is necessary.”

“He’s been accompanying me,” Placidie put in.

She shifted her handbag to the other shoulder, and her eyes were cold and hard. Your move, her body said.

“I believe Léonie,” Hugo said in a tight voice. “If you weren’t such a fool you’d see she’s telling the truth.”

Étienne scoffed. “You’re soft. That’s all this is.”

“Won’t you—isn’t there any way—please⁠—”

Étienne shrugged, breaking into my incoherent babbling. “What would you have me do? Disbelieve all the evidence in front of me?”

“And what is she wearing?” I burst out. “Did you give her my ring?”

He didn’t answer the question.

“If I had, could you blame me?”

“Yes, yes, I could! Because you refuse to believe me!”

I was fighting panic. This wasn’t how it was supposed to go.

Faustine’s smile was unendurable, and she deliberately put a hand on my husband’s arm, fingers splayed over his biceps. I wanted to fly at her—claw her eyes out. But that wasn’t how I had been raised.