“I did. He was handsome and romantic and clever and rich. I thought, Why, here comes my prince and we’ll live happily ever after. I was dazzled and flattered and in love. He worked very hard to make me fall in love with him. There’s no point in going into all the details. You’ve guessed some of them anyway. He was cruel, in little ways, in big ones. He made me feel small. Small, smaller, smallest, until I all but disappeared. When he hit me . . . the first time it was a shock. No one had ever hit me before. I should’ve left, right that minute. Or tried. He would never have let me, but I should’ve tried. But I’d only been married a few months, and somehow he made me feel I’d deserved it. For being stupid. Or clumsy. Or forgetful. For all manner of things. He trained me like a dog. I’m not proud of that.”

“Did you get help?”

It was so quiet in the woods. She could hear, in that quiet, every step she and Zack took over the ground already strewn with fallen leaves.

“Not at first. I knew about abuse, intellectually. I’d read articles, stories. But that didn’t apply to me. I wasn’t part of that cycle. I’d come from a good, stable home. I’d married an intelligent, successful man. I lived in a big, beautiful house. I had servants.”

She slipped a hand into her pocket. She’d made a magic bag for courage, and had tied it with seven careful knots. Letting her fingers worry it helped calm her nerves.

“It was just that I kept making mistakes, that was all. I thought that once I learned, everything would be fine again. But it only got worse, and I couldn’t keep deluding myself. One night he dragged me upstairs by my hair. I had long hair then,” she explained. “I thought he would kill me. I thought he would beat me and rape me, then kill me. He didn’t. He didn’t do any of those things. But I realized he could have, and I wouldn’t have been able to stop him. I went to the police, but he’s an influential man. He has connections. I had a few bruises, but nothing major. They didn’t do anything.”

Knowing that burned a hole through him. “They should have. They should’ve taken you to a shelter.”

“As far as they were concerned, I was a rich, spoiled trophy wife causing trouble. It doesn’t matter,” she said wearily. “They could have taken me anywhere. He’d have found me. I ran once, and he found me. And I paid for it. He made it clear to me, he made sure I understood one vital point: I belonged to him, and I would never get away. Wherever I went, he’d find me. He loved me.”