John Franklin sat in the kitchen in his father’s house and flicked through the messages on his phone. He had muted the TV and was using the remote to hop through the news channels. There was only one story in play. He was in free fall and everyone was deserting him. The only person left he felt he could trust was Cathy, who had also been chasing him down. He called her and she picked up instantly.

“John, what the fuck? Everything has gone to shit. The party is about to announce your deselection as their official candidate. Donors and supporters are dropping us like a stone and heading for the hills. I know this story can’t be true, but the evidence looks compelling. Tell me what the hell’s going on?”

Franklin suddenly saw live shots of the front gates of his father’s house appear on Fox News. Someone must have spotted his car on the drive and a huge media crowd was gathering outside. He felt like a rat caught in a trap.

“Cathy, of course it’s bullshit. You need to issue an instant denial and set up a live press conference for me to publicly rebut the allegations.”

Cathy knew Franklin well enough to know, instantly, that he was lying to her. She paused for a moment before cutting her losses.

“John, it’s over.”

Caroline Franklin was shell-shocked. She sat on the bar stool in her kitchen watching CNN, transfixed by the breaking news. She had missed the initial BBC broadcast but it was impossible to avoid the blanket coverage revealing her husband’s true identity. Her life lay in tatters, shattered by the incredible revelations. Her marriage to the presidential candidate had been exposed as a sham. He was not the man he made himself out to be. Her mind flooded with questions. Could the revelations possibly be true? Was John’s grandfather actually the most reviled man in history. The questions kept coming, but she had no answers. She glanced down at the copy of Vogue lying open on the breakfast bar and bit down on her lip. The exclusive double-page spread displayed a stunning photograph of her posing in her bedroom, wearing a gorgeous ten-thousand-dollar Armani trouser suit. She stared at the headline: Is This the Next First Lady?

Caroline stood up, walked out of the kitchen and made her way into the large breakfast room as though in a trance. Her twelve-year-old son didn’t sense her presence, as he was totally absorbed in the Tomb Raider Legend game he was playing on his Xbox. She came to a stop a few feet behind Bill and stood there, frozen to the spot, just staring at him. There was only one question now dominating her thoughts: was she really the mother of Adolf Hitler’s great-grandson?