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“No tears,” she’d told me. “Those aren’t for Bastides.”

“You are welcome for dragging you out of that ravine, though,” I said, shaking away the memories. “Idiot.”

I heard the low snort of his laughter.

“What’s your plan?”

“I don’t know.”

What could I bring the woman who needs nothing from me?

I turned to face the house.

And—through the bars I saw her.

It was like the inverse of what I had done—now I was barred from her, me in the prison of my own making.

The curtains of her room were drawn back, and she was facing the other direction, pulling her long curly hair up into a loose bun. I would kill to get my hands on her, to be able to bury my face in her curls, take her in my arms so she melted against me.

“Léonie,” I whispered.

She couldn’t hear me, but I wondered if somehow she could feel my presence, with the way she suddenly turned, scanning the treeline.

At first I was too busy looking at her beautiful profile, the elegance of her long neck, to notice.

And when I did, my gut dropped and it didn’t stop.

Her belly—her swollen, bursting belly—was gone. Gone! I would never be able to get that time back.

Then she bent down and picked up our baby. Tiny, perfect, swaddled in a soft blue blanket, with so much thick, midnight-dark hair that it was practically a mohawk.

And as I looked at my wife holding our baby my heart began to shatter, and I let out an unearthly, inhuman howl as I clutched the gates so hard my bones began to crack. . .

CHAPTER 18

Léonie

The last days of a mountain summer were always hot, like summer didn’t want to let go, didn’t want to stop baking the earth to a fine, crispy finish.

A thunderstorm rumbled in the distance as Hugo and I sat on the front porch, my nose resting on the milky-sweet scent of Ciel’s head.

The most beautiful baby in the whole wide world, we all agreed, as Tilly brought out cups of tea and Armand and Hugo consulted about some security measures.

With Hugo and his big brain now in charge of Savatier business interests, they were already nipping at Bastide heels, trying to figure out how to undercut Étienne with his suppliers, wondering if there was a direct route they could bring some motorcycle parts through.

I was learning so much more about French family business than he had ever told me before.

It was a risk to go against the Bastides, but if anyone could do it and keep his hands clean, it was Hugo.

Without even missing a beat, he took Ciel from me and burped him gently, carefully.

“Oh, Hugo, you’re the best uncle Ciel could ever have. You rock him when he’s fussy, you bring me food when I’m nursing him. I’d do anything for you. I only wish I could help make right what was taken from you.”

“It’s enough to be able to help you, sister. And my nephew.”

But no, it wasn’t, I insisted to myself. I could never repay Hugo enough. I would find some way to get him what he deserved.

It was so bittersweet to know that if Étienne had truly been fooled into believing I was unfaithful, that one sight of this perfect baby and he couldn’t have denied it. They looked so alike, both with the same dark hair, the same shape of their eyes and lips.