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Night of Broken Glass--PART 9A
by Junecleavage
It's Berlin 1943, and the Nazis are the Big Bad
PART 9
“Wilma, it’s good to see you again.”
Riley Finn was fresh-scrubbed as ever and grinning. Willow tried to ignore the haunted look that encircled him. At least he looked healthy. She shook his hand.
“Have you seen Tara lately?” he asked her, casually, as he fetched her a cup of coffee.
Willow shook her head. “Not since she left Berlin.” She wasn’t sure how much Tara or her brother might have said about why Tara left Berlin, so she kept her answer simple. “You?”
She watched his jaw muscle tighten, but he turned to her with a smile anyway. “A month ago. Out at her family’s farm. She was good,” he said offhandedly.
Willow could not believe how jealous she felt. Tara hadn’t mentioned in her letters or on the phone that Riley had visited her. Did they sleep together? Was that why she hid the fact from Willow? She felt her cheeks flush and then noticed Riley’s were flushing, too.
“I’d suggested to Tara that you and I join her after you’re done with your interviews here. You know, just take an extra day or two…But…”
Willow reddened and cut him off. Visiting Tara with Riley there was the last thing she wanted to do. “No,” she blurted and then realized she’d sounded like an ass. “I mean, I promised my editor I’d get back to Berlin right away. And Xander has to get back, too.”
“Xander?” Riley asked with a big grin. “He came with you? But of course he would. I should have noticed the ring.”
Willow looked self-consciously at the ring on her hand and found herself twisting it nervously. She didn’t know what to say. “Uh. Yeah. A lot of things have changed.” The words sounded lame even to her own ears, but Riley seemed to nod, thoughtfully. His jaw tightened again, and then he raised a coffee cup to her.
“Well. Where shall we begin? It’s not everyday the Party newspaper sends a reporter to visit us.”
Willow snapped into full Wilma Hermann mode. “I’m writing a piece to give the Germans faith and reassurance in the humaneness of the military’s treatment of prisoners.”
Riley just about spit his coffee across the desk at her. He laughed. Until he noticed Willow wasn’t laughing with him. “Sorry,” he said. “It’s just that you’re going to need to do some serious creative writing to make that story work. I don’t mean to sound jaded.” A beat, and then: “Ok, I am jaded. But this is a prison. It’s not a summer camp.”
Willow frowned. “I’m not expecting a summer camp. No one is. It’s just that word is getting around that there are hundreds of thousands of prisoners scattered in the concentration camps. The people need a piece that will lessen their guilt and anxiety. I don’t care what you show me. But that’s the piece I intend to write for The People’s Press.”
He regarded her carefully. “I knew when I met you that you were a Good German. I think we’re very lucky to have you working for the newspaper. And thank you for selecting me as your interview subject.”
She couldn’t help but smile at his sincere enthusiasm. “It’s pretty intimidating coming someplace like this. I could only do it if I had someone I knew as my guide.”
“I’m more than happy to help.” He took another sip of coffee. “But I’m afraid you’re going to see some things that are upsetting. I can help you make sense of them if you’d like. Maybe together we can craft your story.”
Willow nodded. It felt like she should bridle at such a suggestion of censorship. But then she worked for a propaganda newspaper anyway. Of course she’d play along. “Great. Where do we start?”
##
They started at the beginning. With a brief tutorial on the history and situation analysis of the camp. Riley was candid because he knew Willow’s story would end up positive no matter what he said. “Ravensbruck was built to hold 5,000 prisoners. Right now we have about 40,000, give or take.”
Willow tried to hide her shock. “That’s got to be quite a burden. How do you manage?”
“It’s not comfortable in the barracks. And we have a problem with illnesses running rampant from time to time. But we’ve beefed up the staffing here. I was brought on two months ago to help manage things. I’ve added 20 staff since then, but it’s hard to keep up. We’ve just added another 10,000 prisoners. They just keep coming. It looks like we may be getting another 10,000 in the next two weeks.”
“From Poland?” Willow asked.
“About half the women here are from Poland. Another quarter or so are Germans and the other quarter are Russians.”
He pulled out a stack of colored fabric patches and placed them on the desk before her. “This is our system for keeping the ladies organized. They can find people like themselves, and we know a bit about who we’re dealing with.”
“Tell me,” Willow asked. She pulled out her camera and shot a couple of photos of Riley showing her the various patches.
“The letters signify what country they come from. Red triangles are for political prisoners. Green is for common criminals. Yellow triangles are for Jews. Black triangles are for asocials—Gypsies, prostitutes, homosexuals…”
Willow blanched at that. If she were imprisoned here, she’d be marked twice. Or maybe even three times. And with a wince, she realized that Tara could be imprisoned here as a black-triangle-wearing “asocial,” too. Here was yet another way she put Tara at risk. Anya was right last night: Willow was far from harmless.
“A lot of the Jews here are being shipped out to Poland, to Auschwitz. The government wants Germany to be rid of the Jews, and I guess that goes for the ones in prison here, too.”
The whisperings around the newsroom were that Auschwitz was one of the Reich’s “death camps”—set up to dispose of prisoners as their numbers grow too quickly to manage. Riley seemed to confirm that fact in his next statement:
“Auschwitz is a pretty terrible place. There are so many people there. Too many to take care of. I wouldn’t wish that place on anyone. Regardless of who they are or what they’ve done.”
“Who are the women who are here, really? I- I saw a transport truck carrying women here today. They- they looked so young. How could they even be political enemies?”
Riley eyed her carefully. “Kind of gets at you, doesn’t it? The unfairness.”
Willow couldn’t help but nod.
He exhaled heavily. “I don’t know why they were arrested. We don’t get a lot of information. And our orders are simply to keep them here. But I wonder things like that myself sometimes. I mean, how could I not?”
And with that, Willow saw the haunted look settle about him again.
“I was happy to come here because I thought it meant that I wouldn’t have to continue to see the terrible things I’d seen on the Russian Front. But now I’ve come to think that the things I see here are even worse.”
“How do you do it?” Willow asked, her voice a choked whisper.
He smiled tightly. “You have to depersonalize your job. People have numbers instead of names. You don’t get to know any of them. They’re inventory.” He shrugged. “And you drink a lot. It helps.”
Willow didn’t think there was enough vodka in all of Poland to help enough.
##
The camp was a chilling place, on one hand comprising so many of the mundane details of regular life—and then on the other feeling entirely alien. As they rounded the barracks on Willow’s photo tour, she got her first glimpse of prisoners at work. A crew of about 250 uniformed women were digging long trenches at a distance of about 50 meters from where Willow and Riley stood.
“What are they doing?” Willow asked, certain she probably knew the grotesque answer, but she asked anyway. She lifted her camera to her eye, focused and snapped some shots.
Riley shuffled his feet in the grass. “Drainage ditches,” he said. When Willow met his eyes in suspicion, he nodded at her notebook. “That’s what I said. Write it down.” Willow took her pen and jotted down the silly words.
She decided to let that pass. “So you said there are about 40,000 women here? What tasks have you got others doing?”
Riley took her to a machine shop. They stepped inside from the glaring sun and cool breeze to a large, dark hangar of building that was hot, stuffy and loud with the whirring of hand machines.
“They’re making components for V-1 and V-2 rockets. The Seimens Corporation pays us for the work.”
Willow jotted down the details in her notebook, taking care to get the spelling right and asking Riley to explain what a V-1 and V-2 rocket were. All the while, her eyes were scanning the shop floor, watching the unsmiling women who were bent to their tasks at their hot little machines. Only one or two at the front of the room even noticed her there. A wave of self-consciousness washed over her. She lifted her camera and snapped a couple of shots here. And then lifted her eyes to let Riley know she was ready to move on.
They went on about this for the rest of the morning, stopping here or there on their tour, so that Willow could make notes and snap photographs. There was a building set apart from the others that Riley referred to as “the bunker,” where troublesome prisoners were taken for solitary confinement. The building had an area where the camp’s doctor practiced.
She also had asked about a smaller building that was emitting a thick smoke. “The crematorium,” Riley had explained, again scuffing at the grass. There were a large company of women with red stars who were dragging barrelfuls of ashes from the back of the crematorium through a gate and down to the lake, where they deposited them without ceremony. Willow watched silently. There was no need to press Riley to explain this. Her heart felt heavy and cold with the knowledge that if the detectives ever captured her, she would end up here—and the end of the road might very well lead to the front door of this otherwise unremarkable building. But she imagined that for Riley this knowledge was far worse: The fact that he was personally responsible for what went on here clearly gnawed at him. In his eyes, she knew he cared. It mattered to him. She wondered if four or five months from now it still would, once he’d become numb to it all…but for now, while he was still new, this was terrible to him.
“I don’t know how you’re going to write about this,” was all he could say. For her part, Willow couldn’t say anything. She quietly took a few more photographs.
##
Willow and Riley ate lunch on the steps outside the administration building, in the sunshine. It would have been lovely except for the fact that they were in a concentration camp. Which was a very stupid-sounding sentence, even in Willow’s own mind. She shook her head and set down her sandwich in favor of the cup of coffee. The two of them had been quiet for a few minutes. Willow needed a rest from information overload. And Riley had become broody. He was gazing at her hand. Or, more specifically, at Tara’s ring, which was on her finger, which was attached to her hand. It was an unusual ring, not so much flashy, but with a distinctive bit of Victorian scrollwork along the silver band. Willow knew that being familiar with it now, she would recognize it anywhere. And realized that Riley could say the same thing. And he did.
“That’s Tara’s ring,” he said finally.
Willow thought back to Anya again and the lesson she’d learned about sticking to the truth being the best course of action. “Yes,” she said lightly. And then she wondered how many other details about Tara he had memorized away. And whether they were exactly the same ones she had memorized herself. She looked at him out of the corner of her eye. She and Riley were so different. He was tall and strong and kind, an Aryan masterpiece, just like Tara was. In fact, she and Riley made a perfect matched set. Willow was just some screwball.
“It’s Xander, isn’t it?” Riley inquired softly. More a demand than a question, really.
It caught Willow flat-footed. “What about Xander?”
“Is he the reason she won’t marry me?” Riley sounded like a small boy. Willow was shocked at his vulnerability. And equally shocked to learn Tara had apparently had a Big Conversation with Riley that she hadn’t known about.
“Tara’s not marrying you?” Willow asked. “I- I didn’t know.”
“I talked to her last night. She broke it off. Said she had feelings for someone else. I’m assuming since you all had been hanging out together in Berlin that Xander’s the reason. I mean, he’s not marrying you.” Riley nodded at the ring. True enough. The ring was not Xander’s and Willow was not his fiancé.
“I assure you that there’s nothing going on between Tara and Xander.”
“You would know?”
“I absolutely would know. And he’s not.”
“Everyone has secrets. You can never know everything.”
Willow thought about the fact she hadn’t known about Riley’s visit to Tara’s farm. Willow knew that she herself had been secretive in the past with Tara to nearly disastrous results. But this bit of news had hit Willow’s jealousy buttons. She hadn’t realized until then how much she hated the idea of Tara being with anyone else. And how much a small omission could sting.
“I know Xander, and there is nothing going on between Tara and him,” Willow said emphatically.
Riley frowned. “So. Is Xander traveling with you?”
“Yes,” she replied.
“And I bet you were headed out to Tara’s farm until I mentioned this morning that I’d been planning to go.”
Willow squirmed. God! He was so right and so wrong about all of this.
He’d caught her awkwardness. “Don’t lie to me about this,” he said a bit harshly. In his place, she would have been just as anguished.
“We’re headed back to Berlin,” she restated. “When you suggested this morning that we might all go to visit Tara, I really thought it was too much. I felt it would be better for you to just go and see her yourself. We’d be in the way.” All of this was true.
“It’s got to be Xander. Who else has she been spending time with?” Riley mused aloud in frustration. “She won’t tell me who it is. That means it’s someone I know.”
Right here looking at you, buddy. Willow’s discomfort grew. Damn, she wished Tara had waited to break up with Riley until after Willow had made it safely back to Berlin. And not when she was sitting here trapped in the middle of the Ravensbruck concentration camp with the man who would lock her away in a heartbeat if he only knew.
Riley was still thinking aloud to himself. “I bet her brother will know. Wasn’t he staying at the apartment for a week or two?”
“A- a week or so,” Willow said, her dread growing even greater at the mention of Donald. Of course, he and Riley would be on letter-writing terms.
“Damn,” Riley was fuming. “I knew she had too much free time on her hands. You, Wilma. You don’t even know, since you go to work every day. I knew it was a bad thing when she sent the kids out to the country and decided to stay in town.”
“I thought she decided to stay in town because you were in town.”
“Who knows. I do know that the night before I left to head back to the Front, she was…different…”
“How so?”
“She was more…forward. More needy.”
More grabby? Willow wondered and then cursed her love of words. She didn’t want the images in her mind that “grabby” conjured up.
Riley was blushing. “She wasn’t herself. And she hadn’t been since we ran into you and Xander at the Officers Club that night.”
Willow knew what he was talking about: that was the night she’d inexplicably found herself flirting with Tara. Suddenly, she was struck by the fact that perhaps Tara had felt the same way about her from the very start. The knowledge kind of warmed Willow inside. But she was in the middle of a dangerous conversation here and she couldn’t let herself get distracted.
“I hear what you’re saying, Riley, but I still don’t believe it’s Xander,” she sighed.
He clapped her on the shoulder. “You are the most optimistic person I have ever met. You give everyone the benefit of the doubt.”
Willow smiled a little. “I just follow my instincts. So far luck’s been on my side.”
Riley took another bite of his sandwich. “I wish I could say the same for me.”
She looked at him a moment. His luck really had been no better or worse than her own. He was just hurting right now. She decided it was time to change subjects. “So. You’re going to introduce me to some of the people here?”
Riley snapped back into his professional mode. “Yes. I’d like you to meet our camp doctor and the women’s head guard. They can both tell you a lot more about this place than I can. But I warn you, they’re not happy you’re here.”
I’m not sure I’m happy I’m here, Willow thought.
##
Spike lit another cigarette and regarded the piece of paper on his desk coolly.
“Well. I’ll be damned,” he said, flicking his gaze up to meet Caleb’s. The Preacher had a stupid evil smug face on him, and Spike wanted to knock it right off. With his fists.
“Yes,” Caleb grinned. “Wilma Hermann.”
Spike took a deep pull on the cigarette to calm his nerves. Well, now. If The Preacher had Red’s number, then she was a lost cause. Now all that mattered was making sure he didn’t start knocking all the dominoes over, leading next to Red’s boy Xander and then to Spike’s girl Buffy.
“The nerve that girl Red has. Working for the Party newspaper. Right here under our noses!” Caleb was ecstatic. Like he wanted Willow as his girlfriend. It was the most excited Spike had ever seen him be about a woman.
“She is a cheeky one,” Spike admitted. “Screwing the captain’s fiancée, working as a girl reporter for the Nazis…”
Caleb’s eyes gleamed malevolently. Uh-oh. That means he has more. “What else you got?” Spike asked.
“Can you imagine where the ‘cheeky’ Miss Willow Rosenberg is right now?”
Spike shrugged. “Screwing Miss Maclay, maybe?”
Caleb shot him a pissy look. “You have a thing for thinking about ladies together, don’t you?”
Spike shrugged. While the Nazis tended to frown upon the deed, there was nothing against the law about dreaming. Yet. He waited patiently for Caleb to say what he was gonna say. Because, knowing the bastard, there was no way he wasn’t going to say.
“Our Fugitive Red right now is at Ravensbruck.”
“The women’s concentration camp.”
“The one.”
“Well, then, I suppose our job is done. A shame, though. I’d kind of like to shake that lady’s hand. Or maybe kiss it a little.”
“Well then you’d suppose wrong. Because she’s not there as a prisoner. She’s there as a reporter. She’s on a story assignment for The People’s Press. Our young Mr. Harris was her escort.”
“Huh,” Spike huffed.
“And that’s not all.” He paused a moment and then: “She’s there to meet with Captain Riley Finn.”
Spike shrugged. “And?”
Caleb kicked the doorjamb in excitement. “Finn is Miss Maclay’s fiancé.”
“Wow, you’ve had a very busy morning,” Spike said. “And that girl is off her nut completely.”
“Definite death wish.” Caleb’s grin was pure evil.
Spike nodded somberly. And then he realized there was nothing else he could do. His mood brightened. “Well. Shall we oblige her, then?”
##
Tara was finding it extremely hard to stay focused knowing that her two lovers were spending the day together. She still couldn’t believe Willow’s audacity to have picked a story assignment that led her into a concentration camp. And then to choose Riley, her rival for Tara’s affections, as the man to be her source. Willow had been extremely sketchy about the story. Tara received what she was sure was the “Party Line” version—the tale Willow probably told Gruber to get him to let her do it. But Tara knew that there was some other motivation. Willow would never do something so big and risky as this without a really good reason, right?
Part of her was frustrated with Willow right now. Why this story? Why now? Why with Riley? Why at such risk? To herself and her friends. Was it fair for Willow to drag everyone out on the limb with her? Was this just the reality of loving Willow Rosenberg?
She’d read about people who experienced some kind of intense trial in their lives and then developed a craving for more and more. Like an adrenaline rush. Tara stopped to consider it: Was Willow an adrenaline junkie? Was she drawn to power?
It’s true that Buffy had been an outspoken university student, helping to distribute leaflets against the war. But Willow had been the one who helped Buffy with the writing. Buffy’s heart and instincts were right, but she didn’t really read the newspaper or stay up with current events. So Willow helped with Buffy’s “homework,” while Buffy networked with other student rabble-rousers. Most of whom were all long gone now.
She thought about Xander, who probably would never have taken an SS job unless he’d realized he was safer on the inside than on the outside. And that, of course, would be because of the company he kept. Willow had explained to Tara how she and Buffy had helped Xander figure out how to alter citizen documents to create new records—or new identities—for people. One of the people they’d helped was, of course, Willow. And Buffy had called upon another contact she had at SS in his off hours to do “favors” of procuring travel papers that had enabled a number of people to leave Germany for France or England or America.
Willow, Xander, Buffy—and now Tara--moved in an orbit around each other. But Tara finally realized that it was Willow who was the prime mover, the one who set everything in motion. Rather than lay low, Willow was climbing ever higher.
Tara knew there would be a price to pay for that. And that Willow would end up paying it sooner than later. Buffy even seemed to understand that. They’d taken a walk around Tara’s family’s farm after breakfast and talked some more. There was something about the intensity of Buffy that was intimidating, but there was also a fierce affection and loyalty when it came to Willow and Xander. It made Tara love Buffy.
“So how long do you figure you’ll be traveling, um, incognito?” Tara had asked Buffy,
She’d shrugged her boyish shoulders. “Until the war is over.”
“What then?” Tara was curious about what her friends’ dreams for the future might be.
Buffy had flashed her a sly look. “I’m going to get a good job so I can help take care of my mom and sister. My mom’s had to work too hard for too long. She was helping put me through college. Until, of course, I went and ruined everything by becoming Public Enemy #1.”
Tara chuckled. “I thought Public Enemy #1 was Betty something-or-other.”
“Oh, yeah. Saved by the typo. I still owe Will for that. Or wait, I don’t. I took her shopping and gave her all my girl clothes.”
Tara smiled shyly. “I, um, did notice that she was dressed rather nicely the last time I saw her.”
Buffy snorted. “Ha. Like you two spent five minutes with your clothes on.”
Tara blushed, but she pressed on. “They say that first impressions are what’s important. You know, the first 30 seconds.”
“I see. So the other four and a half minutes of non-naked time were essentially wasted.”
Tara chuckled. “Well, from an apparel standpoint, maybe. I’d have to say that Willow and I managed to pack a lot into that afternoon.”
“Which I need to know nothing about. La-la-la. Here’s me not listening.”
Tara was silent, smiling.
Buffy let out an exasperated gasp. “Damn. The la-la-las don’t help with mind pictures.”
They were near the fence at the front of the property when a military van rumbled by, interrupting the country quiet. The sudden approach of it made Tara and Buffy jump. They watched the vehicle pass slowly, the drivers eyeing the pair of them before the car finally wound its way down the road and out of sight.
“Wow. Jumpy much? I halfway thought they were going to stop for us,” Buffy confessed with a shaky voice.
Tara just nodded, waiting for her heart to stop racing.
Buffy patted her arm. “Willow’s making me nervous. I wish she’d call. What time is it?”
Tara shrugged. “Four maybe?” Her eyes narrowed. “Was Willow going to call?”
“I asked her to. I want to be sure she gets out of there.”
“Why is she there in the first place?”
Buffy looked at her in surprise. “The story,” she said.
“And?”
“And. She’s Willow. She’s big with the intrigue. She’s danger girl.”
“What’s she after, really?”
“Aside from brownie points from her editor? She’s always been an overachiever.” When Tara remained silent, Buffy crumbled a little. “Are you sure you want to know more?”
“You know more, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“Then don’t I deserve to know more, too?”
Buffy sighed heavily, gazing off down the road where the military van had disappeared. “She’s meeting a Russian woman. To give her copies of her notes and some of her film.”
“Who is this woman? And why is she involved?”
Buffy shrugged. “The Russian’s a go-between. She’s going to deliver the story to the Allies.”
Tara stopped, her jaw dropping in disbelief. “How does Willow figure she’s going to get away with that? The only person to get into Ravensbruck to take photos, and she thinks the government isn’t going to know the Allies got the pictures from her? Is she fucking insane?”
It was Buffy’s turn to color. She was pacing now. Tara pressed on.
“And Riley. Does she hate him so much that she’d betray him? He’s going to end up being the poster boy of a traitor. They’re going to assume he’s in on it. God! Doesn’t she realize that hurting him hurts me? And, that’s not even to mention that they’ll be all over her. What the hell is she thinking?”
Buffy. “We all want the war to end.”
“A lot of good that’ll do us if we’re all dead.”
Just then a faraway voice reached them as if floated on the wind. It was Beth, coming down from the house. As the young woman came into view she called out again. “Tara, the phone. It’s for you.”
##
Willow was crying. The sound of it made Tara’s heart hurt.
“Hush, sweetie. Can you tell me what’s wrong? Are you ok?” Tara tried to keep her voice steady. Buffy was standing at her elbow, and Beth was leaning in the doorway, her face concerned. Tara really wished for more privacy.
“Tara, it’s so horrible.”
Tara’s heart leapt in fear. “What’s horrible? Has something happened?”
“Baby, it’s the place. You can’t believe the place. What- what they do to people. People like me. Like us. Everyday people who just happened to get up on the wrong side of the bed one day and suddenly they’re political prisoners. Tara, I saw things I wished I’d never seen…”
“Are- are you someplace safe? Where are you calling from?”
“Oh. Uh. Yeah. We’re back at the inn.”
##
Willow’s mind was full of math. She had a very mathematical mind. And right now she was powerless to stop it from doing multiplication. The numbers ran in the background as she tried to sort out her feelings and somehow manage to be coherent on the telephone. How could she explain to Tara the small building that was set back away from the rest of the barracks and separated by razor wire? The one Riley referred to as “the bunker.” How claustrophobic it was, with its narrow its passages and low its ceilings. Riley had led her around to what he pronounced to be the medical ward, which wasn’t a ward at all, just a few small rooms with cruel-looking apparatus that confused Willow. She’d never seen appliances like these. Were they even from the modern era? They appeared Victorian, or perhaps even medieval. White-washed rooms with stockade-like benches. Riley had frowned when Willow snapped a photo.
“Uh, you probably don’t want a picture of that,” he’d said uncomfortably.
“Why? What is it?” she’d asked, the heat rising up in her cheeks.
But then they were interrupted by a stern-faced blond woman in a lab coat. The woman seemed to appear out of nowhere, materializing from some hole or passageway to confront them. “This is Dr. Maggie Walsh,” Riley had announced by way of introduction. Dr. Walsh’s gaze slid up and down Willow, as if she were examining a medical specimen. “Do you belong here?” she finally asked. And for a moment, Willow wondered what it was that Walsh saw in her when she looked at her like that. Willow felt as if her disguise had been recognized by someone who was an expert at spotting the kind of people who spoiled the gene pool.
She snapped a photo of Maggie Walsh, too. It caught the woman by surprise. Riley gave her that look again.
Willow didn’t have the guts to ask the doctor how she cared for 40,000 women in a facility this small. And vacant. With sickness surely running through the camp, where were the sick people? Instead, there were spotless white rooms with sharp medical instruments. Metal picks, glass bottles of acids, shiny metal pans and shiny little knives. Dr. Walsh said little and watched Willow with a hawkish expectancy that made her glad for Riley. Otherwise she had the distinct feeling Dr. Walsh might have kept her, locked her in one of the stern little rooms with the strange stockades.
How could Willow explain to Tara what it felt like to crawl back out of that place and into the sunshine, to breathe air that wasn’t tinged with antiseptic and chlorine bleach and the faint hint of meat. How could she explain to Tara the haunted looks a group of inmates gave her when they’d resurfaced. The mistrustfulness and fear and curiosity. And loathing. When they looked at her they saw a Nazi. They saw her as one of those others.
How could she explain to anyone the feelings she experienced when Riley showed her one of the barracks where the women slept, when they let them sleep at all. The only furniture the place held were sturdy wooden bunk beds. They were three-tiered, like tall warehouse shelving. But Willow’s mind was good at math. She knew how many buildings were here. And how many women. And how few bunks.
“Do they sleep on the ground?” she’d asked, jumping ahead of herself. The uncomfortable look in Riley’s eyes told her he knew what she was asking. And the way he averted her gaze gave her her answer. The quarters were so close. They had to sleep at least three if not more to a bed. And they probably slept on the floor, too. The hall was dark and smelled like sweat and soiled laundry. She snapped another photo, and she was sure from the look on Riley’s face that he’d never let her out of here with her camera.
Willow tried to keep her voice light. She was a reporter for The People’s Press. She was Wilma Hermann, here on assignment. “I need a shot of a group of women…maybe chatting. You know. Something pedestrian and everyday. That people can relate to…”
Riley looked confused. Of course he was. That’s not the kind of thing you typically saw here.
Willow pressed on. “I need them to be wearing clean uniforms. And no patches. No red triangles or black triangles. And I need them to appear to be at leisure.” She looked him square in the eyes as if she were instructing him how to save his own life. It took a moment and then he comprehended what she was getting at.
“You’ll have to give us some time to find what you’re looking for,” he’d replied tightly. “But I think that’s a good idea. And we can manage it.”
They swung back by the office and Riley gave his instructions to two of his staff. Who’d stared at Willow with open contempt. But they’d agreed to do it because Riley was their superior, and they’d all been told to cooperate with the reporter. Willow snapped a photograph of their sour faces.
How could she explain the thick column of smoke that rose from the chimney of a building Riley said was the crematorium? “We have to deal with death here,” he’d commented. “We’re bigger than most cities, in terms of our population. Every city has to deal with its dead. We’ve found that this the best way to avoid spreading disease.”
Willow did the math again, thinking about the small number of infirmary beds for a “city” of 40,000. And wondering what means of disposing of the dead they’d tried before they’d settled on this one as “best.”
Behind the crematorium lay the beautiful lake. There was a large work crew of younger women prisoners, carrying wheelbarrowfulls of gray ash from the back of the building and down to the waterfront, where they deposited the material into the water itself or onto a small barge which, Willow presumed, would be taken out into the middle of the lake for dumping. Perhaps under the cloak of night. Armed guards stood all around, their rifles slung over their shoulders or gripped tight in their hands as the women trudged about their work, fine gray dust coating their clothing, their hair, their faces.
“Don’t even think about taking a picture of this,” Riley warned under his breath.
One of the women guards interrupted them. Willow turned to find a pretty blond woman with a dark look in her eyes. “We have your garden tableau all set up, Captain,” the woman announced. Willow recognized sarcasm when she heard it.
“So quickly!” Riley said, obviously relieved to be leaving this place. “Very good. Miss Hermann, this is Glory, one of the head guards. She’s worked here for several years. She’s one of our best.”
“Pleased to meet you,” Willow had said as impassively as possible, though it was becoming harder and harder to keep her cool.
Glory merely gave a toss of her head and turned to lead Willow to the “tableau” she’d assembled for the photo shoot. Riley trailed behind them as they strode across the courtyard to the one tree in practically the whole compound. As they approached, Willow surveyed the light and pulled out her camera bag for another roll of film.
“Can’t believe you’ve gone through a whole roll already,” Riley commented, almost as if to let her know he was keeping track. Willow had felt irritation, but didn’t let it show. That other roll of film. That was for Anya. This one, the “PR” roll: That was for The People’s Press. Gruber didn’t want to know the details. He didn’t want to see the bunker and the crematorium and the cloth patches of triangles and stars. He didn’t want to see the bunks or the skinny dying women in their threadbare and dirty uniforms, covered in fine gray dust. He didn’t want to see creepy Maggie Walsh or even Riley. All he wanted was a wholesome photograph. One shot was all that was needed. Willow knew this. She threaded the film carefully and advanced the roll a few frames, checking the light meter and setting her aperture.
Before her were three shrunken and sad-looking women. As Willow looked closer she realized they couldn’t have been any older than she herself. In fact, they were barely teenagers. But their faces were hollow and ancient. They had long blond hair. When Willow raised an eyebrow, Glory explained that these were Norwegian student dissidents. As if that explained why they got to keep their Aryan hair, as opposed to all of those other women whose heads were humiliatingly shaved. These women, because they were more Aryan than even the average German, got to keep some part of their dignity here. Willow smiled ruefully and focused her camera, snapping off a couple of candid shots of the women standing in the shade of the tree. They looked stiff and uncomfortable. Willow would have to try to get them to relax.
“I need to work with them a little. Get them at ease,” she explained to Riley and Glory. “Any chance I could get you two to stand over there and let me pose the women myself?”
Riley nodded, but Glory shot her a suspicious glare. “Don’t believe the shit they tell you. Fucking whores are always making stuff up. They’ve got it good.”
Coldness pooled in Willow’s belly at the thought of why Glory would tell her something like that. “It’s ok,” Willow nodded. “I’m not interested in anything they might say. I just need a really good photograph.”
That didn’t seem to sit any better with Glory or Riley, who stood aloof, off to the side and out of earshot, as Willow returned to her reluctant photo subjects.
“I’m Wilma,” Willow introduced herself. “I’m just going to take a few photos for The People’s Press newspaper, and I need you to just talk naturally together, like you would if I weren’t here.”
“If you weren’t here, we’d be digging graves,” one of the women deadpanned. Was that deadpan? Or was that not? Willow adjusted her camera lens, but kept her eyes locked with the woman’s.
“Is there something you can tell me? Something you want me to know?”
“There’s nothing you can do with your Nazi newspaper,” the second woman said with a tentative air of contempt. If contempt could ever be tentative, which Willow discovered, yes, it could be.
“I am taking your photograph for a Nazi newspaper,” Willow confirmed. “But there are a lot of people out there who would be interested in your story…” She left the words hanging, hoping that the women understood her meaning. She couldn’t safely spell it out any more plainly.
The first woman gazed at Willow contemplatively. Willow pulled the shutter, capturing her image.
“A lot of people, you say,” the woman repeated. “Like who?”
Willow shrugged, advancing the film and refocusing. “Anybody with a human heart or soul.”
The second woman snorted in derision. “A lot of good it would do.”
Willow shrugged, giving the woman her best earnest look. “Tell me and we’ll see.” She snapped another photo.
The third woman, the one who had been silent so far, finally spoke up. She gave a little head nod toward Glory and Riley. “I’ll tell you something those other two would never tell you.”
Willow looked up from her camera, expectantly. In kind of a queasy way. She lifted the camera to her eye and focused. “Tell me.”
The third girl furtively glanced around the compound. Women were marching in long columns. There were sounds of digging and industry and hard labor. As the girl’s eyes scanned the place, Willow let her senses follow while she kept her viewfinder firmly aimed at the three women. “Look around you. Forty thousand women.”
“Yes,” Willow said, snapping another shot. “Closer together now, please.”
The women linked arms. One of the girls ruffled the other’s hair in a rare moment of playfulness that Willow recognized as genuine. Willow caught the shot. “Forty thousand women,” Willow repeated.
“And have you wondered where their children are?”
Willow straightened and gestured for the women to sit together in the grass under the tree. “I assume they’re at one of the nearby subcamps?”
The woman pressed on. “Forty thousand women. You ever wonder how many of them came into the camp pregnant?”
A city. A city of women. How many at any one time might be pregnant? Willow’s mind started doing math again. “Um, a lot,” Willow breathed, pushing the numbers away.
“Yes, a lot. Do you see any children here?”
“Aside from you?” Willow knew these girls couldn’t be more than 15.
“Any babies?”
Willow advanced the film to the end of the roll and popped out the canister. She pulled another roll from her bag and reloaded the camera quickly. “Um. I don’t want to know the answer to this, do I?” she said softly as the three girls looked up at her with round eyes that should be full of youthful innocence but just plain weren’t. Willow understood the answer: The Nazis committed infanticide. They killed the children and the newborns.
The third girl gestured toward Glory and Riley again. “That woman. The guard. She’s the worst. She’s referred to as ‘the stomping mare.’”
Willow contemplated this as she threaded the film with shaking fingers. It was too horrible to even conjure mind pictures. She took several deep breaths to steady herself and then began snapping more photographs of the three girls. In silence. Because the tears had threatened to well up, and if she let them, then she wouldn’t be able to stop. And Wilma Hermann needed to keep calm. The girls saw her struggle, and a wordless understanding seemed to pass between them.
“Thank you,” Willow finally said, dropping the camera to her side. “I think I have what I need.”
Then the armed guards were there to herd the three prisoners back to their labor. Willow turned slowly back to Riley and Glory, somehow unable to take her eyes off the woman’s heavy boots. When at last she was able to meet Glory’s gaze, it was cold and mean. Willow got the distinct impression that Glory knew exactly what the prisoners had told Willow. And didn’t give a shit.
“So, lover. Like what you see? Doesn’t it make your heart bleed?”
Willow looked to Riley, whose face was an impassive mask. How much does he know? What barbarian ways are people treated here? Or murdered? Suddenly, all of this was making a few run-ins with the SS in Berlin seem like nothing. Glory stared her down cold. Willow had no doubt the woman could snap her neck instantly with a flick of her wrist, if she wanted to. And Willow had no doubt that she wanted to.
So she found her voice. “Like I said. I’m writing a piece for The People’s Press. And the people have no desire to know anything your prisoners might have to say. What they or anyone else tell me is irrelevant. I have my assignment and that’s all.”
“Oh, but you’re human and weak. You’re not going to tell me you’re not running home to your fiancé—nice ring, by the way—and tell him all about this horrible, nasty old place.”
“I don’t have a fiancé.”
“Word games. You know what I mean. You don’t look like you live under a rock. What about the boys back at the newspaper office?”
Willow held her ground. “I was briefed. I know my orders.”
“Do you always follow orders?”
Riley was shifting from foot to foot, uncomfortably. He couldn’t help her in this conversation.
“I’m not military, if that’s what you mean. But I do know how to follow orders,” Willow answered crisply.
“Girlfriend, I don’t care who you are or who you work for, but you shouldn’t have come here. You’re either a dumb sheep or sly as a fox. And why is it you don’t strike me as a sheep?”
I can be very sheepy, Willow wanted to say, but somehow managed to put a lid on that comment. “You’re just messing with me. I get that. Well done.”
“Darlin’, if I were messing with you, you’d know it.” She leaned in close, whispering almost conspiratorially. “What if I told you that everything the women here say about me is true? ‘Cause, you know, it is. Does that make it harder for you to follow orders?” She wiggled her eyebrows, and Willow wanted to smack the smug look off her face. “Or…what if I were to say someone—Captain Riley, for instance—that I think you intend to use your notes and photos for purposes other than your newspaper?”
“Why would you do that?”
“Because it’s true, isn’t it?”
Thankfully, Glory didn’t let Willow answer. She pressed in. “Every person in this place would be tempted. Anybody who ever got out. They’d talk to people. How could they not? And your photos. They’re just the thing that turns one woman’s story into truth. Photos don’t lie.”
Willow looked from Glory to Riley and shrugged. “She has a point,” Willow conceded. “The film is too valuable. And too dangerous. Even for people in the newsroom.” She reached into her camera bag and pulled out a roll of film and handed it to Riley. “It’s yours. Keep it. Burn it. The shots in the camera are the photos of the ladies under the tree. Those are the only shots I’d consider using.”
Glory raised an eyebrow skeptically.
“You saw me load the camera. Though if it makes you feel better…” She removed the film from the camera, inserted it back into its metal canister and handed it to Riley.
“Develop the roll and send us just the pictures you want us to have. In fact, when you have someone develop them, give the specific instructions to destroy any negative that’s not a shot of the women under the tree.”
Riley nodded. “Sounds reasonable. Under the circumstances. But I’d still like the option to send no photograph if that’s what we determine is best.”
“Fine. Take it up with your superiors who can sort it out with Hans Gruber. I’ve done my job here. Now I’m done.”
That was the end of the tour. Riley had one of his men drive Willow back to the inn, saving Xander the trip. She’d felt relief wash over her to be out of that place and then intense anxiety. She hoped Riley wouldn’t discover that she’d kept back one roll of film. The one with all the photos of the camp. And she ached with the knowledge that she couldn’t tell anyone—except perhaps for Anya—what she’d seen there.
So here she was on the phone with the one person in all the world she wanted to break down and cry to—to share this terrible knowledge with and be comforted—and she didn’t dare.
“Tara, I can’t tell you more, baby. I just wish you were with me…”
Tara heard something plaintive and scared in Willow’s voice that reminded her of Riley. Had Willow become bruised like he had? Would she be haunted? Was this the price of getting too close to the truth?
“Sweetie, I love you. As long as you’re safe, it’s going to be all right.”
“I- I don’t know…What’s safe anymore? What was ever safe?” The math, the terrible math was running in the background, in her mind.
Tara’s voice was gentle but firm. “I want you and Xander to come down here now. Tonight. Get in your car right this minute and don’t stop along the way.”
Willow nodded wordlessly on the other end of the line. “I need that. I need you.”
##
She hung up the phone and composed herself. When she turned back to the room, Xander and Anya were sitting at the bar together laughing about something. They’d seemed to hit it off. Willow walked up to them and pressed her one last roll of film into Anya’s palm in handshake. The little metal canister was cool between them.
“Anya. It was wonderful meeting you. Xander and I have to go. Like right now. If you need anything more, call me at the newspaper. But this is all I have for now. Please don’t let these go right away. Like we discussed, I can’t have them traced back to me. You’ll give it eight weeks like we talked about?”
Anya nodded and eyed her suspiciously. “They rattled you, eh?”
Willow nodded reluctantly, her eyes nervously focused on the floor. Which was waxy.
Anya’s voice was soothing. “Well, that’s their job, and they’re really good at it. But no worries, Wilma. You did good.”
Willow wondered.
##
Riley’s head hung heavy in his hands. It was well after six o’clock, and the office was quiet. He sat silently in the small pool of light his lamp made across the desk. Before him lay the one film canister that Wilma Hermann had asked him to have developed for her. His stomach was in knots. Maggie Walsh had already been by to chastise him for letting the reporter into the bunker. And he’d endured Glory’s vocal tirade about letting outsiders in at all. And they’d both expressed displeasure with the notion of The People’s Press doing a story on Ravensbruck. Some stones were best left unturned, Dr. Walsh had suggested. Riley couldn’t have agreed more. It’s just that he had his orders. And he wanted to give Wilma the benefit of the doubt. Could she create a piece that retold the story of the camps so that for posterity people saw them as something slightly less evil than they actually were?
His stomach growled, but he didn’t have the heart to go to dinner. He listened instead to the sounds of the camp that filtered through his opened window. The whistles and shouts of the guards rounding up the women and herding them back to the barracks for dinner. There were so many women moving about out there that he could hear the shuffle of their collective footsteps, their slow slog back to the barracks. For most of the women, they’d go back to work after dinner. But for this little 45-minute window, the whole camp seemed to heave a collective sigh of relief. And Riley wanted to find the peace to be able to relax, too. His world was falling apart.
A loud rap at his office door jolted him to attention. Maggie Walsh was there. “You have visitors,” was all she said, her ubiquitous smirk firmly in place.
Riley ran his hands across his face and looked up to see two plainclothes men standing in the doorway before him. One was tall, with eyes so dark they were almost black. The other smaller with sharp blue eyes.
“Captain Finn?” the smaller one asked.
##
Riley held the photograph in his hands, bending it this way and that under the pooled light emanating from his desk lamp. He was silent, choosing to ignore the two SS detectives seated across from him while he gathered his thoughts. And stuffed down his anger. A flick of a glance at the detectives told him they were amused by his reaction and perfectly content to let him take whatever time he needed to finally say something. He sighed. Then Riley returned his gaze to the photo of Wilma Hermann. Or, actually, the detective named Blood had just told him she went by another name: Willow Rosenberg.
Rosenberg. Jewish. No doubt about it.
“She works for The People’s Press, for chrissakes,” he ground out through gritted teeth. His jaw was tight again, giving him a headache, as usually happened by the end of the day. But this headache was different. He knew it wouldn’t be going away anytime soon.
“Yeah, she’s a real scamp,” Blood replied with a mean twinkle in his eye.
He squeezed his temples, trying to tame the dull ache, to no avail. “I had no idea she was a Jew.”
Blood’s reply sounded sympathetic. “How could you?”
“That’s right. She works for the Party newspaper. My own superiors cleared her to come here. How could I have known she’s a Jew and a fugitive?”
The other detective, the quiet one, bent forward out of the shadows to speak at last. “Thought maybe your fiancée might have told you.”
That jerked Riley out of his stupor. He shot a fiery glare at the two detectives. “Tara! You’d better be careful talking trash about…” But then he lost steam, fell back in his chair and sighed heavily, wondering: “Tara?”
Blood shook his head. “You mean she didn’t tell you?”
Riley shrugged. “No.” He was angry she knew and hadn’t told him, that she’d let him be compromised in this way. But he loved her and wouldn’t say anything further. He opened his mouth to deflect the conversation back to Willow Rosenberg, but Blood cut him off before he could speak.
“So she didn’t tell you then…about the two of them?”
Riley’s stomach took a dive and the silence of the room suddenly pounded deafeningly in his ears. What were they trying to say? “Just tell me,” he growled. Was Tara in on some conspiracy? What, exactly, had she been doing in Berlin while he was gone?
“She didn’t tell you that she and Red were, ah, lovers?” Blood drawled out sweetly. “Or are. Could be they still are.” The other detective nodded in agreement.
That did it. Riley swept his arm across his desk in fury, knocking everything but the desk lamp to the floor with an ugly clatter that resonated slowly back into silence. The lamp sat askew, shining a bit more now on the detectives, who squinted like a couple of raccoons caught in a flashlight beam. He wanted to knock those stupid smirks right off their faces.
“Don’t mess with me,” Riley yelled in his meanest go-to-hell voice. And then he collapsed again into his desk chair, scowling at them as their words started to sink in. The ring. Tara not wanting Riley to bring Wilma—or Willow—down to the farm. Tara calling off their engagement. Wilma defending Xander’s honor. Shit. It did add up.
“Oh, God,” he groaned, rubbing his hands across his face. The detectives sat impassively watching the emotions play out.
But Tara had left Berlin two months ago. So that meant if Wilma were her lover, they couldn’t have been together since then, right? Maybe Tara hadn’t told him because she was embarrassed. Trying to forget about it herself. Just a short, embarrassing indiscretion. Maybe she thought her unfaithfulness made her unworthy of him and that’s why she broke off their engagement. Things started making more sense. He could just talk to her and tell her he was angry and that he’d get over it. He could forgive her.
“Do you have any idea where the woman formerly known as Wilma Hermann was headed after her appointment here with you?” Blood asked softly.
“I don’t know. Back to Furstenburg? She must have been staying at an inn in town there. Of course, she could make it back to Berlin easily tonight.” He was fairly sure she was headed out to see Tara. Should he say it? Should he send the SS out to the farm? What if they weren’t telling the whole truth? What if Tara was in on a conspiracy and they wanted to find her? He thought again about the ring. No, the ring was something romantic. It had to be a love affair. If he sent the detectives to the farm, they’d apprehend Wilma, probably piss off Tara and make her cry, but then she’d be done with the whole business and could get on with her life. As long as Wilma was out there, Tara wouldn’t be safe. Nor would Riley. If he helped the detectives capture their fugitive, things would go easier on Riley. It would take the heat off him. It would prove he wasn’t somehow in on whatever agenda Wilma had for coming to Ravensbruck under the guise of reporter. He’d ask the men to go easy on Tara, in return for his cooperation. He took a deep breath and rolled the dice.
“Wait…” he said, almost under his breath.
The detectives leaned forward in their chairs. They were all ears.
##
Beth was confused. The dogs were barking outside, and Tara was pacing nervously across the length of the front room. She looked impatient and…what? Scared? Bert sat stoically on the couch, arms crossed, looking somehow far older than his 14 years. He looked dangerous, like a tightly-coiled spring ready to release. Beth wanted to say something, to ask her cousin what was up. Why were they so worried about Bert’s Aunt Wilma? They’d been agitated ever since the phone call from Wilma that neither of them would tell her about.
All Tara would say was that Wilma and somebody named “Zander”—her boyfriend?—were on their way and would be staying over. Beth had been busy trying to work out the sleeping arrangements: Where would the boys sleep? All together with Bert, so that Wilma could sleep in the guest room? Would Zander have to take the couch? But then Tara hadn’t moved to help her make up the rooms. That was not like her. And when Beth had offered to set a kettle of soup on the stove, Tara had not pitched in to help ready the house for her guests.
And Bert who had seemed so charming and precocious before was merely broody now. He’d gone with Tara outside for a few minutes, to the barn and back, but otherwise hadn’t moved from the couch in over an hour. He’d suggested a couple of times that Tara relax and sit down, but she wouldn’t.
For their part, Donald’s boys were disappointed that Bert was preoccupied. They’d wanted him to play with them. And when he declined to join them, they’d gone upstairs to their room to read comic books and sulk.
Then headlights swept up the driveway, illuminating a swath across the front window. The dogs erupted again into wild barking outside, and Tara and Bert jumped. The boys upstairs started stomping their way excitedly down the hallway and then down the stairs.
But before they had even hit the landing, Bert and Tara had grabbed their coats and were out the front door.
Beth moved slowly over to the window and pulled back the drape.
##
The expanse of grass between the front steps and the car was entirely too far. Tara bolted with Buffy close on her heels. First Xander and then Willow climbed out of the car, looking tired but happy to have found the place. Tara crossed the grass in two heartbeats and swept Willow into her arms in a tight embrace, which Willow returned with equal fierceness. They spun together, breathing in and acclimating to the heft and feel of each other. “Buffy’s right,” Tara whispered into Willow’s neck.
“About what?” Willow asked, live and in the flesh.
Tara chuckled. “She is dressing you better these days.”
Willow laughed and pulled back so she could survey Tara better. “God, I’ve missed you,” she gasped and then clutched Tara closely to her again.
Buffy’s arms snaked around them both, so she could give Willow a hug, too. “Glad they let you out,” she said.
“Definitely not a place I’d like to stay.”
“This a little better?” Tara asked, meaning her embrace.
Willow nuzzled in closer, burying her face in Tara’s chest. “Vixen. This is definitely much better. In fact, I think I’ll move in here.”
“I wish you would…I think I could manage to find a place to put you…” Tara purred.
“Is that right? Hmmm,” Willow mumbled into Tara-cleavage.
Buffy stepped back. “Ok, stop with the double-entendres, please,” she joked. “I’m at a very impressionable age, remember?”
Tara grinned and straightened, noticing for the first time the small nervous-looking woman dressed in body-hugging white. And beside her was Xander, who stepped forward and gave Tara a hug, since Willow had finally managed to let go of her.
“This is Anya,” Xander said. “She’s an associate of Wilma’s.”
He turned to Anya. “This is Tara, Wilma’s…friend. And this is her nephew Bert.”
Anya’s dark eyes narrowed in confusion. “’Bert?’ Is she a lesbian, too?”
For a moment, everyone stopped. Tara swung her head around to see if Beth was behind them. She was still in the house. Wow.
Xander laughed a bit nervously. “Uh, this is one of those things we don’t talk about, okay?”
Buffy stuck out her hand to Anya. “Please call me Bert.” They shook. “Please,” Buffy said, pointedly.
Anya leaned in closer. “So you prefer that people think you’re a male?”
Buffy blinked. “Uh…yeah?” She shook the cobwebs from her head. “But ‘prefer’ is probably an overstatement.”
Willow stepped in. “It’s okay, Anya. ‘Bert’ has a backstory is all.”
Anya shoved her hands in her pockets uncomfortably and glanced from Buffy to Willow. “I think I get it,” she said, uncertainly. “Backstories. Very interesting.”
“It’s probably not what you’re thinking,” Buffy said, obviously worrying about what Anya might be thinking.
Anya blinked. “Huh. Because I was thinking that you’re probably in disguise because you’re on the lamb from the Gestapo, just like these two are.” She hooked her thumb at Willow and Xander. “But now that you said that I’m wondering if you’re actually just a little uncomfortable about your sexuality. Which, by the way, Wilma, bravo for you for living your life out loud and proud.” Anya gave Tara an approving glance.
Tara watched both Willow and Buffy squirm, and she felt the color rise up in her own cheeks as well.
Xander stepped in. “Okaaay…Thank you, Anya, for making me think about my friends in entirely new—though not at all unpleasant—ways.” He turned to Tara and Buffy, explaining: “Anya has almost superhuman powers of observation. Willow and I have learned quickly to just let it go.”
Anya looked disgruntled. “What? I just say it like it is. It’s all the rest of you who get freaked out about the truth. I don’t even want to know the truth about any of you. It’ll make things easier when the SS sends its henchmen down here to arrest us all.”
“Arrest who?”
Everyone spun around to find Cousin Beth standing on the grass, looking warily at the newcomers.
Tara blushed. “No one, of course. It’s just an expression,” she lied.
##
To be continued in 9B
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