Friday evening brought a strange, heavy silence to the estate. The sky turned a bruised purple over the Hudson River.
In the Master Suite, Victoria watched the weather report on the television. A meteorologist stood in front of a map of the Northeast, which was covered in a swirling mass of white.
“This is a historic system,” the weatherman warned. “A Nor’easter of unprecedented scale. We are expecting three feet of snow, hurricane-force winds, and potential power grid failures from D.C. to Boston.”
William walked in, looking at the screen.
“They’re calling it the Storm of the Century,” William said quietly.
Victoria felt a tightening in her lower back–not quite pain, but a pressure. She looked at the date. She was thirty-six weeks pregnant. Isabella was thirty-seven.
“The roads?” Victoria asked.
“They’re already salting them,” William replied. “But if it hits as hard as they say, the Estate will be cut off.”
Outside, the first flakes of snow began to fall, drifting past the window like white ash. The barometer on the wall dropped sharply. The gates were closing.