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It was the way of things. He was strong and I was not.

It was normal that I loved him more. But now he wanted none of it.

No man could have been kinder than Hugo, putting aside his own bitterness at his imprisonment to try and coax me out of my fugue state.

But nothing worked. I knew I had to live for my son, but it was like I couldn’t make myself go through the motions.

My days were filled with a dull, constant fear that Mano would be allowed to come and take me away.

But if only I had known. . .

Hugo took me on walks outside to try and cheer me up, and today the sun was beating down on my head, but as usual I barely felt. The grounds outside were perhaps two acres of pretty, soft-smelling wildflowers and tall grasses with the occasional apple tree.

The rest was high iron bars and a fingerprint scanner to get in and out.

One end of the gates abutted a bit of the dense forest, another end was facing the road winding up and up to where Étienne still lived in the house we had shared.

Was Faustine there with him? Had he already asked another woman to marry him?

I didn’t know, and I wouldn’t know unless he came to visit again.

And he had no indication of doing that.

This is a prison, I thought with dull resignation. I’m walking the prison yard.

“Look at these,” Hugo said, “Dutchman’s Breeches. Aren’t they so funny looking?”

He was pointing at a group of flowers in the hollow of a tree, but I couldn’t make myself focus on them, my vision blurred and shadowy.

I knew he was trying to help me and that I was being ungrateful and horrible, but I still couldn’t make myself even speak in response.

And then.

I heard the first shot.

My brain moved through a dense fog of depression, and I was slow to realize what had happened. Too slow.

It wasn’t until Hugo lunged toward me that I realized what was happening.

With a cry, I dropped to my knees and scurried behind the tree, Hugo dragging me up against the bark as I cradled my belly protectively.

I heard another shot, and this one hit a branch behind us.

Suddenly, it was like the world was crystal-clear again, colors and sounds intruding with painful sharpness on my brain.

I wanted to live

“Security!” Hugo called. “Two intruders to the northwest!”

Another shot hit, closer this time, so close I felt bark shrapnel all down my arm.

My breath caught in my throat. It was a complete bluff, a total lie. There was no one at the lodge today but us and the two older servants.

“Get them!” Hugo barked, his voice sharper now, an order. “They’re hiding in those bushes right at the edge! Aim right there!”

There was a rustle of leaves and as soon as we heard that Hugo had me moving, down on the ground on my hands and knees among the high meadow grasses.

“Go!”