Ellard looked at his daughter’s grief-grooved eyes and began, dimly, to understand the shape of what had been done to her mind, and it was worse than the padlock, worse than the hunger, worse than anything the body could be made to suffer.

Before he could even begin to take that in, Cormoran crouched beside them and turned his phone screen toward her — the photograph of Tamsyn Grimes, alive, healthy, smiling, walking out of a bistro on Radley’s arm three weeks ago.

Sidonie had spent six years believing she had killed her best friend.

She had no idea that the friend was alive — that she had been sleeping, all this time, in Sidonie’s own house, beside Sidonie’s own husband.

Chapter 15 — What They Staged

She stared at the phone for a long time, her breath coming in ragged catches.