The point was that it had failed.

I was here, warm and safe.

The baby was here, kicking against my ribs.

Their plan had depended, like everything Julian did, on my continued obedience, on my standing in that cold car for fifty hours because he told me to, and I had stepped off the train at the very first stop and flown to safety instead.

Across the room, Marcus had gone ghost-white.

He took one of the photographs from his father’s hand, and looked at it, and I watched him recognize his own wife, her smile, her ring, in an embrace that was not with him.