Book One tells the story of a survivor as written in her journal entries. It includes memories of her early life. Born in 1911 unwanted, into a privileged, wealthy dysfunctional family in Newport, Rhode Island. Ignored by a bitter Southern mother and cold Yankee father, she suffers life-threatening trauma. Following years, she is moved to the loving home of her great aunt. Attending boarding school at 14, she befriends French heiress, Cecile and her powerful industrialist father, Octave Verrault, whose ambition will come to define and possibly threaten Shelby's life.

The book opens with two acquaintances recalling how Shelby came into lives decades earlier. One becomes her lifelong friend, the other's actions compel 18-year-old Shelby to accept Cecile's invitation to live in France.

In Paris, over time, Shelby is drawn into Verrault's world of opulence and eventually forced to confront the evils of Nazi fascism at the core of the Verrault empire. Repelled, she seeks to break free, unexpectedly finding love with Martin, an Austrian doctor and priest, imprisoned during Hitler's rise to power in 1933.

Now Shelby also finds herself a prisoner, trapped by Verrault and unseen forces in Berlin, blocking her from trying to find Martin. Help comes from a surprising source, Verrault's Russian mistress, secretly part of a network aiding fugitives running from Hitler's Germany. Shelby will have to choose, to act alone risking everything or trust in others to free her and the man she loves.