She dropped her head in her hands, dreading going back out there too and rejoining the macabre party, all of them waiting for the moment Emil came back down and finished what he’d started. Finished, once and for all, the love triangle between him, Hanna and Max.

She watched Max, grey-faced and sitting stiffly at that table as his daughters enjoyed the private fairground set up on the lawn; keeping a dignified silence as he was forced to accept the hospitality of the man he knew wanted to rob him of his family.

Rob him back, Emil would argue.

She sighed, exhausted by the circular argument. There were no villains to rail against, no fair way out of this. Max wasn’t the bad guy here, but neither was Emil and when all was said and done, he had lost more and been hurt more than anyone. Forget what his family and connections and wealth could get for him; surely the universe owed him some sort of recompense? Who could possibly deserve a happy ending more than him?

Max knew he deserved it, it was why he was here, and she knew it too. It was why, in that bedroom, against all her instincts, she had walked away. It was why she was going to walk out there and do it again, hand in her resignation with immediate effect. Because what was best for Emil was worst for her. She couldn’t stay. Working with or for him simply wasn’t an option, they both knew that; it didn’t even need to be said. He needed a clear run at his future with Hanna if they were going to make it work this time round.

And she needed a clean break. She knew what it was to be alone, to have her heart broken. She had lost love before but she had survived it, and now she would do it again. The roots that had grounded her after Jack’s death now felt tight and constrictive. She had to break free. Be free.

Drawing a slow, determined breath, she stood, her gaze steady upon the small group outside, fidgeting and pretending to be at home. Then she walked back out to the garden to do what had to be done – unaware she was being watched.

Ingarso, Stockholm archipelago, 25 June 2012 – dawn

He walked through the trees, twigs snapping underfoot, the sea an inky ribbon glimpsed in snippets. It was not yet five but the moon was dipping, and across the calm waters of the lagoon, an elk was swimming between the isles. He could see the rowboat bobbing on a slack line, the jetty a shadow on the silvered surface.

He stepped onto the beach and over the weathered boards, their rattles percussive in the silence. Nothing had changed, and everything had. Four years of walking the wrong path had been corrected, and he felt a solidity within his body he’d never known before. He inhabited himself now; his soul had settled like a weight, anchoring him to the ground, the earth, this life. Her.