Table of Contents

Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Epilogue
Author’s Note

OceanofPDF.com
Midnight Hunter

Brianna Hale
OceanofPDF.com
 He’s hunting me, and there’s nowhere to run.

East Berlin, 1963. I thought I understood the consequences of trying to flee

to the West. Death. Imprisonment without trial. Instead I’m being hunted by
the most dangerous man in the city, secret police officer Reinhardt Volker.

Now I’m his prize, no longer a traitorous factory girl but his elegant and
pampered secretary. He wants to possess me, body, soul – and heart. I’ll do
anything to get away from him, but first that means getting closer.

I want to feel only hatred for my captor but beneath his uniform I discover a
man with a past as scarred as Berlin’s.

And if I don’t escape him soon it will be too late.

OceanofPDF.com
 MIDNIGHT HUNTER by BRIANNA HALE

Copyright © 2018 Brianna Hale

| All Rights Reserved |

Cover photograph by Igor Vorontsov

Cover design by Brianna Hale

No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever

without written permission from the publisher, except the brief quotations
for reviews. Thank you for respecting the author’s work.

This book is a work of fiction. All characters, places, incidents and dialogue
are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real.
Any similarities between persons living or dead are purely coincidental.

OceanofPDF.com
 Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Epilogue
Author’s Note
Chapter One
Chapter Two

OceanofPDF.com
For the Berlin Crew

Adam
Matt
Nick
Paul
Tamara
Tim

OceanofPDF.com
Because the world is so full of death and horror, I try again
and again to console my heart and pick the flowers that grow
in the midst of hell.
HERMANN HESSE

OceanofPDF.com
 Chapter One
Evony

East Berlin, January 1963

He’s hunting me, and there’s nowhere to run. Every labored breath feels
like I’m drawing shards of ice into my lungs. I stare up and down the dark,
unfamiliar street, vapor billowing in front of my face. Around me are
apartment blocks, lights burning in living room windows—families sitting
up to read or listen to the radio. If I batter on their doors and plead for them
to hide me I’ll only be putting them in danger. I hurry past a call box on a
corner, the telephone inside lit by a neon bulb, but I don’t go in and lift the
handset. I have no one to call who can save me. All my friends are arrested
or dead, and the Volkspolizei will not help.
They’ll only turn me over to him.
A sob rises in my throat as I remember the crack-crack of rifle fire and
the screams of the panicked and dying; the sight of Ana lifting a shaking
arm to aim a pistol at him, and then him raising his own gun, cool and
implacable, to shoot her between the eyes. No matter that she was a citizen,
not a soldier. No matter that she was outnumbered, losing, scared out of her
wits and would have put the gun down if he’d only told her to.
And Dad, what has happened to Dad? Is he dead? Will I ever see him
again?
I shake from cold and fear, the glacial chill biting through my thin coat.
Turning into the street on my left I skid on the icy concrete and go down,
my right knee cracking painfully against the pavement. I do sob now, from
agony and futility. He’s going to get me just like he got Ana and everyone
else in our group. There’s nowhere to run, nowhere that he won’t find me,
and no border that I can cross without being gunned down. But I lever
myself up, limping onward, tears tracking icy ribbons down my face. You
have no choice but to run when you’re being hunted by der
Mitternachtsjäger, the Midnight Hunter, the most feared man in East
Berlin.
His name is Oberstleutnant Reinhardt Volker of the Ministry for State
Security. If he catches you at night you don’t go to the Stasi prison. He
claims you as his special prize and you’re never seen again. There are
whispers of shallow graves. Secret dungeons. Furnaces filled with bones.
The furnace is especially terrifying. I’ve seen the photograph of der
Mitternachtsjäger as a young army captain of twenty-two, standing in front
of the swastika flag, an eagle emblazoned on his jacket. He’ll have learned
a trick or two about making people disappear during the war.
I’ve glimpsed Volker several times striding through the streets of the
city, a heraldic lion of a man, tall and striking in his olive green Stasi
uniform and high black boots, a peaked cap covering his dark blond hair.
People scurry out of his way when he marches by, usually at the head of a
detachment of border guards. From his height of six-feet-five he ignores the
populace, his expression aloof, intent elsewhere.
Unless someone makes a mistake and draws his attention.
Unless that cold, calculating mind senses there’s a traitor nearby.
Then his gray eyes sharpen and his nostrils flare, as if he’s scenting
treason. As if he knows what’s in your secret heart. That’s why he’s called
hunter. That’s why no one escapes Oberstleutnant Volker.
I think I hear footsteps behind me and look over my shoulder as I turn
another corner. If I can get out into the countryside maybe I can shelter in a
barn for the night. In the morning I might get lucky and find some
sympathetic soul who will give me food and maybe some work. They could
have contacts who can help me change my identity, even disappear to the
West. Our group can’t have been the only one trying to get out. If I can just
—
A heavy, black-gloved hand falls onto my wrist and tightens like a
manacle. I watch in horror as a tall figure steps out of the shadows,
moonlight glinting on the silver epaulettes of his double-breasted coat. A
silky, self-satisfied voice murmurs, “Guten Abend, Fräulein Daumler. You
are out very late.”
I recognize the aquiline nose and clean-shaven jaw of der
Mitternachtsjäger and fear threads me like a needle. He glances at his
wristwatch and smiles a cold, cruel smile. “Why, I see it’s nearly midnight.”

OceanofPDF.com
 Chapter Two
Evony

Three days earlier

“Just think, Evony. In a few days we’ll be in the West.” Ana’s eyes are
aglow as we walk through the darkened streets. A light snow is falling and
we’re huddled close to each other so we don’t need to speak above a
whisper, and for warmth. It’s almost impossible to get proper wool coats
and the wind cuts through our synthetic ones. Mine’s too big as well, a
bulky navy blue thing that used to belong to Dad.
“Shh, you mustn’t say that out loud,” I whisper, but I’m smiling as I
say it. My arm is linked through hers and we practically vibrate with
excitement. We’ve just left the final meeting with the group before we all
make our escape: me, Dad, Ana and a dozen others who can’t face living in
the shadow of the Berlin Wall any longer. We all have different reasons for
leaving. Ana wants to go to university and study something artistic. The
things she’s interested in aren’t offered in practical, utilitarian East
Germany, and only a small fraction of the population are allowed to
continue their education beyond sixteen. We’re supposed to turn ourselves
into productive citizens, not over-educated bourgeoisie. My dad despises
the government and the Soviets and chafes under the intrusive gaze of the
Stasi. Anyone could be an informant, he likes to tell me urgently, and often.
Anyone, remember that.
And me? I don’t know what I want, I just want something more than
this. The unending work, the unending gray. The same people, the same
streets, day in and day out. Shouldn’t there be more to life? Unlike Ana I
don’t expect the West to be perfect and offer up a dream life. There are bad
things in the West that we don’t have here, like unemployment and poverty.
It’s just… Shouldn’t we have a choice? If the East is so good, as they like to
tell us, why do they stop us from exploring what people’s lives are like
there? If it’s really so great here we’ll come home again, but they don’t trust
us to make that decision. And now we have the Wall, hemming us in and
looming over us.
For weeks in 1961 there were rumors about a barrier being erected to
make the border more secure. The East was hemorrhaging citizens to the
West, young educated citizens like doctors and engineers, and the
government were getting nervous. The papers told us that they weren’t
really going to build a wall, but the State runs the media and you can’t
always believe what they say. We awoke one morning eighteen months ago
to low coils of razor wire splitting the city north to south with armed East
German border guards stationed along it. Our own people, locking us in.
The papers told us it was to protect us from the West: the Wall encircles
West Berlin, not East Berlin. But who in their right mind wants to cross the
Wall into the East?
The Wall is permanent now. The razor wire has been replaced by a
thick concrete barrier that stands well above a man’s head. It’s not
impossible to climb over if you have some equipment and the guards
happen to be looking the other way, but the space beyond the Wall is
patrolled by more armed guards with dogs. It’s called the Death Strip. It’s
mined in places. There are watchtowers at regular intervals and the guards
have orders to shoot to kill if anyone tries to escape. People have bled to
death from gunshot wounds on the Death Strip, as the Western guards are
too afraid of being shot at and are unable to reach them.
But they can’t patrol underground, which is why my father and some of
his friends came up with the idea for a tunnel.
My heart pounds with excitement as I think of it. The tunnel begins in
the basement of an abandoned bakery right next to the Wall, runs for sixty
feet beneath it and comes out in an apartment building in the West. Ana and
I did our bit along with the others, spending several late-night hours each
week for the last two months digging with spades and pickaxes. It was
filthy, dark and dangerous work and we never knew if the tunnel might
collapse on us. We reinforced the walls and roof with timber but small fall-
ins were common. Once I had to dig Ana’s legs out from beneath two feet
of dirt.
“See you at the factory in the morning,” Ana says, giving my arm a
squeeze and flashing me a last smile before peeling off to take a side street
toward her apartment. We both work in a radio factory where we met when
we were sixteen. I solder transistors and she screws the Bakelite casings
together. It’s unchallenging, repetitive work. We’d likely keep the same job
for the rest of our working lives if we stayed. Seven years later I already
feel like we’ve been there a lifetime.
My route home takes me close to the Wall and my eyes can’t help but
be drawn to it. It’s early evening, but as it’s January it’s full dark already
and the Wall is floodlit. It stands out, a stark white looming presence. I look
away quickly as it’s not wise to pay too much attention to it lest a patrolling
guard thinks you’re considering escaping.
When the entrance to my building comes into view I notice a woman
standing in the street in the snow, staring at the Wall. Her eyes are hollow
and bereft. It’s Frau Schäfer, a woman who lives a few floors below me.
She lives alone because her husband and young children are in the West.
They were visiting family in West Berlin the night the Wall went up and
haven’t returned. I know they’ve offered to but Frau Schäfer has forbidden
it; she won’t allow her son and daughter to grow up in a country that can
split a family so cruelly in two. She’s written many letters to officials, filled
out every form, stood in every queue at the government offices, but they
won’t let her emigrate to the West or even visit. Your family are East
Germans, they tell her. If you want to see them they should come home.
Dad and I have tried to convince Frau Schäfer that she needs to be
more careful about who she tells her troubles to and be better about hiding
her emotions, but here she is, standing in the street for anyone to see,
looking towards the Wall and weeping.
I hurry to her side and take her arm. “You must be cold, Frau Schäfer.
What are you doing out here? Let’s go inside and I’ll make coffee for us.”
 She pulls away. “I don’t want to be here anymore. I want to leave. I
want to die.”
My eyes dart up and down the street. It’s empty, for now, but I’m
conscious that there are dozens of windows overlooking us. “We need to go
inside. It’s not safe out here.”
Frau Schäfer begins to cry even harder, speaking of her children and
her husband. I listen, torn. She doesn’t know it yet but we’ll be taking her
with us the night we leave. Dad has forbidden me to tell her this as he says
she’s too emotional to be trusted to keep it secret, or she’ll suddenly be
blissfully happy and make an informant suspicious. But shouldn’t I tell her
now? There are only three days to go. On the one hand I think he’s being
paranoid; on the other he’s not the only one who says there’s an informant
in every apartment building in East Berlin. There could be several looking
down on us right now.
“It will be all right, I promise. Just hold on a little longer. Just a little
longer.” I’m doing my best to comfort her when I hear the sound of
marching feet. I go still, straining to listen. “Hush a moment.” She doesn’t
heed me, still weeping and wailing, but I hear them, and they’re coming in
this direction.
I’m done trying to persuade her. Taking her arm I start to drag her
towards the building. “We need to get inside, now.”
“No. I want to die. My babies,” she moans.
You might get your wish in a minute. “Stasi,” I hiss at her, pulling on
her harder still. She’s a heavy woman and she won’t budge. “There are Stasi
coming.”
But it’s too late. A detachment of border guards comes marching along
the street perpendicular to the one we’re standing on, not twenty feet from
us. They’re led, as I thought they would be, by a uniformed secret police
officer. I feel a thud of anger at the sight of them. It’s not right that they
march about the city arresting people. We’re all East Germans. We’re all
Germans, for that matter, East or West.
If we’re very still he might not notice us. Unfortunately, Frau Schäfer
chooses this moment to realize that there are soldiers nearby and lets out a
high shriek.
 The officer turns his head, sees us, and holds up a black gloved hand.
The marching guards behind him come to a halt with a stamping of feet. I
recognize him immediately from his height, the hard line of his jaw, the
dark blond hair at the nape of his neck. Der Mitternachtsjäger.
Oberstleutnant Volker. He eyes us curiously, the top half of his face in
shadow beneath his peaked cap. I’ve never been this close to him before
and his features are as cold and hostile as I expected.
I hate you, I think as I look at him, unable to tear my eyes away. I hate
what you do to us. I’ll never miss this place when I’m gone.
Frau Schäfer recognizes him and she begins to shake, pulling my
attention away from him.
“Into the building, quickly,” I whisper to her, and finally she lets me
lead her away. I glance over my shoulder and I’m startled to find that
Volker has taken several steps toward us, leaving his guards standing in the
middle of the street. He hasn’t called out to us. If he calls out we’ll have to
stop, so I walk even faster, hoping he’ll decide we’re not worth it. It’s not
late so we can’t look that suspicious.
Except that I’ve just left a secret dissidents’ meeting and both Frau
Schäfer and I will be in the West by the end of the week.
But he can’t know that. Can he?
I get Frau Schäfer over the threshold and push her toward the stairs.
Risking a last glance over my shoulder I see that Volker is standing in the
street, staring at us. Staring at me. Maybe the stories are true. Maybe he can
smell it on us when we’re traitors.
I turn and hurry into the building, praying he won’t follow. Standing in
the darkness of the hall I hold my breath and listen. A minute ticks by, and
then I hear marching feet receding into the night and I exhale. I shouldn’t
have stared at him so. How awful it would have been to be brought in for
questioning just days before we are to escape.
This is why I have to get out. I can’t live like this.
Peeling myself away from the wall I run upstairs and knock on the door
to Frau Schäfer’s apartment. She’s terrified when she peers out, thinking
I’m Volker.
 “It’s all right. It’s Evony from upstairs.” I put a hand on her arm.
“You’ll stay in tonight, won’t you? You won’t go back outside?” I talk to
her quietly in the doorway for several minutes, trying to console her as best
I can. The truth would be the most cheering thing but Dad’s right. We can’t
risk it. I think about how happy she’ll be when we come for her in a few
days’ time, then bid her goodnight and go upstairs.
Dad was the last to leave the meeting and he returns home half an hour
after me, and by that time I’ve made us a dinner of roasted cauliflower and
boiled mutton. There are no potatoes to be found in the shops right now,
only mounds of cauliflower, so we have to make do. No one ever goes
hungry in East Berlin but the supply of produce is erratic. We go a year
without seeing peppers, and then suddenly we can’t move for peppers.
He scratches a hand through his messy, curly hair and grins at me. It’s
all we dare in reference to the meeting, even in our own apartment. He
suspects the Stasi of bugging us. Maybe that’s more paranoia but I suppose
it’s better to be safe when we’re this close to our goal.
“Cauliflower, again,” Dad mutters gloomily, but tucks in and gives me
a wink. “It’s good, Schätzen.” He’s always called me little treasure, on
account of pulling me from the rubble of our bombed-out house when I was
very small. His buried treasure.
“Danke,” I say, smiling at him.
Later, when I’m lying in bed, eyes wide in the darkness, the image of
Volker standing in the street haunts me. What was the expression on his
face? Curiosity? Suspicion? If only I had been able to see his eyes. Then I
shudder, and I’m thankful I couldn’t as being in close proximity to a man
like that can only be dangerous.
I lull myself to sleep imagining how good the sunsets will look when
we’re finally in the West. Brighter and bigger than I’ve ever seen before.
In the morning Dad goes off to the mechanics he works at and I head
for the Gestirnradio factory. Before I leave the building I go down to the
third floor and check on Frau Schäfer. I knock for some time but there’s no
answer. Cold fingers of worry clutch at my belly. She should be here at this
time of the morning. Finally the next-door neighbor puts his head round the
door. It’s Herr Beck, a pensioner with unruly gray hair.
 “No point in knocking. She’s gone.”
I stare at him. Gone as in escaped? How could she have managed that?
“What do you mean?”
“Took her, didn’t he? In the night.” Herr Beck wears the overbright
expression of someone excited to impart grim news. I hate that attitude. It’s
not me so isn’t this fun.
“Who took her?”
But already I know. I picture him returning to the building late last
night, without his guards, and rousing poor confused and bereft Frau
Schäfer from her bed and taking her away, all for the crime of being
separated from her family. I’m shaking with anger. He’s a monster. How can
he live with himself? How can he do this to us?
“Who do you think?” Herr Beck disappears back into his apartment
and slams the door.
I leave for the factory with a lump in my throat. I don’t understand the
world sometimes. It’s not right that we should be forced to choose between
our family and the State. Without our loved ones, who are we?
If I keep thinking about Volker and Frau Schäfer I’ll burst into tears, so
as I put away my bag and coat and tie an apron on over my street clothes I
put them out of my mind. The factory is a new multistory building with
designated areas for each part of the assembly process. I work on the third
story, and as I emerge onto the factory floor I’m assailed by he sweet tang
of melted solder. My workbench is against one wall and I take my seat and
flick on the soldering iron. As I wait for it to heat up I check over the boxes
of wires and transistors to make sure I have everything I need.
The work is repetitive, but today I’m grateful for the soothing
monotony. I lose myself in the tedium of tiny wires and the smoke and
glimmer of the melted solder. These are my hours. These are my days. But
they will not be my years.
At midday I go to the lunchroom on the eighth floor. While I wait for
Ana to join me I entertain myself by thinking of the life I’m leaving behind.
This old Evony would continue to solder in the factory five days a week.
She would attend the military parade every October 7 to celebrate the
Republic. She would choose a husband from among the men who live in
her neighborhood or work at this factory.
I look around at the young men eating their lunches, sitting in small
groups, laughing and talking. I know most of them by name. Some I like
quite well and some very well. Many of us used to go to Free German
Youth meetings together and in the summer we’d be sent out to the
countryside to work on farms or go on nature walks. There would be
dances, and I would have partners. Some boys even seemed to quite like
me, though Ana was, and is, always preferred for her honey-blonde hair and
long legs. I never wanted to leave the dances and go for a walk in the
moonlight with any of the boys, or dance every dance with just one. I liked
each of them, but there was never any spark.
That’s because my husband’s in the West, I think with a smile. He’ll be
unlike any of the men I’ve known in my life. He’ll have something special.
I don’t know what that something will be but I’ll know it when I see it.
He’ll be remarkable, the man I fall in love with.
“What’s that smile about?” Ana plops down into the seat opposite me
and starts to unwrap a paper packet of sandwiches.
My daydream pops and I remember what I have to tell her. Leaning
across the table I whisper, “Never mind that. Something happened last
night. Something bad.” Immediately her face drains of color. Bad things
that happen in the night usually have something to do with the Stasi. “It’s
Frau Schäfer. She was taken by der Mitternachtsjäger.”
She can’t help her cry of shock and dismay. She’s too careful to say
anything out loud but I know what she is thinking: Frau Schäfer was so
close to getting out. I tell her about the encounter on the street, with Frau
Schäfer looking at the Wall and crying, and me not being able to get her
inside before Volker saw us.
Ana’s silent for a long time, staring at her sandwiches. “It was because
she was looking at the Wall, wasn’t it? It wasn’t because of…anything
else?” She gives me a meaningful look. It wasn’t because he knows about
the tunnel?
I’d considered this, but there was no way Frau Schäfer could have
known about the plan and still been that upset. She’s not that good an actor.
I shake my head.
Ana picks up her rye and cheese sandwich but doesn’t take a bite.
“Ugh, it’s too awful to think about, her in prison. Or someplace worse.
Somewhere that awful man took her. What’s he like, up close?”
I picture Volker standing in the street. “Unsettling. He’s a foot taller
than most of his men and he was like a hungry lion, sizing us up.”
“But he didn’t go after you?”
“No, it was very strange. Perhaps he knew that there was no hurry, that
he could come back for Frau Schäfer later. I mean, it’s not like she was
going anywhere.” I mutter under my breath, “Not last night, anyway.”
Ana takes a bite and chews for a moment, and then says, “Why just her
though? Why not you? I mean, if she looked guilty you must have as well.”
I think back to that moment and recall Frau Schäfer’s tear-streaked,
terrified face. How had I looked? “I don’t think I looked guilty,” I say
slowly. “In fact I think I looked angry. That was probably stupid of me, to
show how much I hate him.”
“I bet it’s been a long time since anyone looked at Volker with anything
but pure terror. Schwein.” Ana tears a shred off her lunch wrapper and balls
it up thoughtfully. “You know, there are some women on my floor who
think he’s handsome. Can you believe it? Marta saw him outside a State
reception last year and said he looked very gallant in his dress uniform.
Even kissed a lady’s hand. But who cares what he looks like when you
consider what he does.”
I snort with laughter, mostly at the expression of disgust on Ana’s face.
“Kiss her hand? More likely bite her fingers off.” Volker’s a big man, broad
and impressive, and he’s got strong features. The mouth I glimpsed last
night was firm with purpose but if he smiled I have the feeling he could
look quite pleasant. I imagine him in his dress uniform bowing over my
hand and kissing it, and then shake myself. Constant daydreaming is a side-
effect of the repetitive work we do but I will not start daydreaming about
der Mitternachtsjäger.
Between misery over Frau Schäfer and nerves over our impending
escape, the next two days pass lightning fast and in a rollercoaster of
emotion. I barely sleep at night and I can’t look at Dad when we’re out on
the street or Ana when we’re at the factory because I’m sure my excited,
tense face will betray us.
Before I know it it’s Friday night, eleven-forty-five, just half an hour
before we’re to meet in the basement of the bakery. Dad’s been pacing up
and down our kitchen all evening, smoking cigarettes and staring at the
linoleum. Frau Schäfer being taken has shaken him badly and I know he
thinks he failed her. I’ve never seen him like this and I hope that he’ll find a
way to calm down before we have to go out onto the street.
Ana and my dad’s best friend Ulrich have arrived, and the plan is that
Ana and I will go together to the bakery, and Dad will go separately with
Ulrich. If either pair are stopped we’ll tell the Stasi we’re going to a friend’s
apartment. As it’s Friday night this is plausible.
Ana and I sit in silence at the kitchen table, and I expect that my face is
as pale and tense as hers. Ulrich, a ginger-haired man with a thin but
friendly mouth, is leaning against the cooker, cracking his knuckles. He’s
watching Dad and frowning, and I can see he doesn’t like how rattled he is
either.
The silence is so thick and tense that when Dad speaks, we all jump. “I
want Evony to come with me.”
I gape at him. He’s changing the plan, now, at the very last minute? I
want to ask him why and what he’s worried about, but fear that we’re being
listened in on stops me. Instead, I say, “Are you sure that’s a good idea?”
Glancing at Ulrich and Ana I see that they’re just as perplexed by this as
me.
“Yes, I want you with me. Let’s go now.” And he hustles me out of the
kitchen, his face tight and closed. I barely have time to wave to Ana and
mouth see you there before he closes the apartment door behind us.
The night is dark and bitterly cold. I wait until we’re down on the street
and crunching through the snow before I say anything. Dad’s walking
quickly, his shoulders up around his ears. “This wasn’t a good idea. Ana
and Ulrich being together will look suspicious. They’re not related and they
don’t look like they’d be friends.” He doesn’t answer and I lose patience
with him and hiss, “This is exactly what you warned us about, getting
nervous and doing something that might give us away.”
 Dad rounds on me suddenly, a wild expression on his face. “You’re all
I have left in this world and I’m not losing you at the eleventh hour. You’re
my daughter and I want you with me. Is that so hard to understand?”
I do understand, but that doesn’t mean I like it. “You didn’t fail her, you
know,” I say, meaning Frau Schäfer. “Things like that happen all the time.
She was unlucky.” And foolish, but I won’t speak ill of her now she’s gone.
Dad just shakes his head. “Let’s get moving. There’ll be time for
talking on the other side.”
But it’s not as easy as that. We run into a patrol and have to hide in the
shadows for a long time. I can see from Dad’s anxious face that he’s
thinking what I’m thinking: if we can’t get to the bakery tonight then we’ll
lose that escape route. A dozen people not turning up for work in the
morning will tip the Stasi off that there’s been an escape. They’ll be out in
full force tomorrow and will find the tunnel in no time.
Thankfully the soldiers eventually march away and we’re on the move
again. When the bakery comes into sight my heart leaps. Dad squeezes my
arm, relief washing over his face. “Make sure you stay close to me,
Schätzen.”
“Of course.”
All is quiet on the ground floor of the bakery as we go inside. We
descend the stairs to the dark cellar. Odd that it’s so dark. I expected there to
be at least one lamp giving a little light.
“Hello?” I call softly, wondering if everyone has gone down the tunnel
without us. Then I hear a scream, a long way off.
Dad grabs me and pushes me forward. “Someone’s been caught on the
street. Quickly, down the tunnel! Gehen! Go!”
But as I scramble for the tunnel I hear running feet—not behind me,
but coming toward me. People surge out of the tunnel, knocking me down. I
see Ana, her face panicked. She and Ulrich must have overtaken us while
we were held up by the soldiers. I run toward her, trying to reach her. There
were soldiers down the tunnel, I realize, my heart in my throat. We need to
get back onto the street. But there are soldiers all around us now and
torches have come on, blinding me. I turn, looking for Ana and Dad but I
can’t see them in the chaos.
 Someone shouts an order, and the night explodes in a nightmare of
screaming and gunfire.

OceanofPDF.com
 Chapter Three
Volker

Insubordinate little shit. I’ll string him up by his balls until he begs for his
mother.
Shots are being fired inside the building and I unholster my Makarov
and check that the pistol is fully loaded. Eight rounds. I fantasize about
firing one of them right into Hauptmann Heydrich’s face.
A scream echoes from the bowels of the bakery. Then again, I might
not need to if the traitors get the captain first.
Grinding my teeth together I yank open the street-level door and look
around. Deserted. All the commotion is coming from the cellar and I head
for the stairs. East Berlin is my responsibility and I am both possessive and
protective of it. That I didn’t know about this operation is unfathomable.
Inconceivable.
Humiliating.
A casual remark from a border guard tipped me off. Herr
Oberstleutnant, I was surprised to hear that you are not leading the raid on
the bakery yourself. How admirable that you put your trust in the captain.
Put my trust in the captain? I’ll put a fucking bullet in the captain.
When I get down into the basement it’s chaos. Guards are running left
and right, taking pot-shots at the traitors. There are a half-dozen bodies on
the dirt floor, at least two of them my men. How many exits are there?
Where is the tunnel? Are the rats slipping away to the West even now?
I’m searching the confusion for Hauptmann Heydrich, either to ask him
what the hell he thinks he’s doing going behind my back, or to wring his
neck—when I see her. The dark-haired girl who was with Frau Schäfer on
Jungstrasse, her eyes blazing and defiant as she’d tried to corral the older
woman into the apartment building. She knew me, and for one shocking
second I had known her, felt the press of bodies, heard the rattle of the train.
I questioned Schäfer about her later, though the woman was so hysterical at
the sight of me she couldn’t tell me much. Evony Daumler’s a good girl.
She should have just left me in the street. Anyone else would have. You
won’t hurt her, will you?
Yes, anyone else would have, wouldn’t they? Self-preservation
instincts run high among the residents of East Berlin. What, I wonder, has
given Fräulein Daumler a death wish?
Hurt her? Oh, I don’t think it will be necessary to hurt her. I hope it
won’t be. Now, Frau Schäfer, I’m afraid you’ll have to come with me.
Once I had dealt with the woman it was getting on for four in the
morning but I went back to Stasi Headquarters to look up what we had, if
anything, on Evony Daumler. The file was thin. Name and date of birth.
Work records. There were a few more sheets on her father; an informant
had once heard him make anti-Soviet comments and we’d had him tailed
for a while two years ago. When nothing came of it the resources were
directed elsewhere.
I put the files back, uncertain. There didn’t seem to be anything for me
to do, and yet I had felt I should do something. Arrest her? Question her?
The feeling returned to me like a stray dog over the next few days, pestering
me, and no matter how often I kicked it away it lingered, whining for
attention.
Paying attention to coincidence has served me well as a Stasi officer. I
turn over rocks that other people would ignore and out scuttle traitors who
would otherwise have evaded the State. I saw this girl trying to help Frau
Schäfer and now she’s here, trying to get out of East Berlin.
This girl is a traitor, clearly, but when I picture her in a cell in
Hohenschönhausen waiting for me to interrogate her I don’t feel the usual
warm glow of anticipation. I don’t want what she knows, I want what she
is. I want to own that look of fear and hatred in her eyes.
I’m so lost in abstraction that I almost don’t see the gun. The barrel is
shaking but a gun is a gun, and I raise my arm and shoot first. A scream
rings out as my would-be attacker crumples to the ground—a blonde girl, I
notice—and Fräulein Daumler is staring at me, white-faced, from across the
cellar. It was she who screamed. The door to the street level is behind her
and no one is paying her any attention but me. She realizes this at the same
moment I do and she turns and runs up the stairs, the plaid of her skirt
disappearing into darkness.
Scheisse.
I only have a split second to decide—stay here and mop up Heydrich’s
mess, rubbing his nose in every mistake he’s made in front of the men until
he’s practically bleeding from the eyes from shame, or go after the girl?
The girl.
Bullets are whizzing across the cellar and it takes me several minutes to
manoeuver my way across without getting shot by my own men. Heydrich
is screaming orders, adding to the confusion. He looks both relieved and
irritated when he spots me crossing the dirt floor, assuming that I’m about
to take control of the situation. But I keep going, up the stairs and out into
the night.
The night is so cold that the air is like a fist to my chest when I come
out onto the street. I look left and right, searching for movement. Nothing.
Where is she? Then I see them, a woman’s footprints in the snow, deep as if
she was running.
Got you.
I’m an exceptional Stasi officer and a good East German. I devote my
energy and skills to the State and ask nothing in return.
It’s time I had something in return.
I set off after her, walking quickly, mapping the streets in my head and
attempting to predict where she’ll go. Not toward her apartment building.
Not toward the Wall. She’ll attempt to get out into the countryside or she’ll
try to hide. I smile as I see the telltale marks of hesitation in the snow, her
footprints going first one way and then the other. My quarry is frightened. I
quicken my pace, closing in on her.
Don’t you remember what they call me, Fräulein Daumler? I am der
Mitternachtsjäger, and you are my prey.
I always catch my prey.
OceanofPDF.com
 Chapter Four
Evony

I can’t stop shaking as Volker leads me along the street, one of his large
hands clamped to my shoulder. If this was any other Stasi officer I would
presume he was taking me to Hohenschönhausen, the Stasi prison, for
questioning. But der Mitternachtsjäger could be taking me anywhere.
I could die tonight. But that’s just if I’m lucky. The shivers that are
wracking my body suddenly double. Volker stops walking and he pulls me
to a stop.
“You are cold, Fräulein.”
To my amazement he unbuttons his long, double-breasted coat and
drapes it around my shoulders, the thick woolen fabric swamping me. His
eyes trace the curves of my face as he tucks the heavy coat around me and I
don’t like his bright, hungry expression.
He holds out a gloved hand, inviting me to keep walking with a polite
smile. “Bitte.”
We walk, his hand heavy on my shoulder once more. I’ve never worn a
garment like this coat, so beautifully tailored and made from such fine
wool. It’s warm from his body heat and smells of male, though not any
male I’ve smelled before. The men I know reek of cheap cigarettes, sweat
and engine oil. Volker smells like rich, spicy aftershave, soft leather and
something faintly smoky and comforting, like open fires or cigars. It’s the
scent of hypocrisy. Volker is sworn to protect this so-called classless
workers’ paradise but does he live like a worker? No, he’s our tailored and
manicured jailer.
It’s laborious to walk as my knee hurts so badly, making me limp, but
Volker doesn’t seem to be in a hurry now that he’s caught his prey. I can’t
help but wonder about the others, hoping some of them got free. No matter
what he does to me I shan’t tell Volker anything about my friends. They
won’t suffer just because I was caught.
But when I see the gleam of a large black car ahead and the uniformed
chauffeur getting out to open the rear door, my resolve crumbles. Volker’s
going to take me away somewhere and I’ll never see anyone I love ever
again. I can’t bear the thought of pain. I’m terrified of the unknown.
“Wait,” I cry, the word tearing from my raw throat. I stop short and turn
my face up to his. The white light of a streetlamp illuminates the left side of
his face, but the right is left in darkness. “I know you have to take me, but
please, arrest me, send me to prison. I will do the time, five years, ten. I will
plead guilty. Just don’t hurt me.”
He raises a hand to stroke the back of his gloved fingers against my
cheek. His mouth with its full lower lip is softened by an apologetic smile.
“Oh, no, Liebling. I’m afraid I can’t take you to prison.”
Liebling. Darling. He says it tenderly, and even the touch of his fingers
is tender. Stupidly I remember how I thought he’d look pleasant when he
smiled. He looks more than pleasant. Volker is handsome. Far too
handsome for a monster. There’s no cruelty or evil lurking anywhere in his
clear, open features. He’s looking at me at me like a lover might.
What sort of madman is he?
Volker is clearly insane, and wherever he’s taking me there won’t be
the harshness and isolation of prison at the end of the journey, but
something far worse. My eyes flick to one side. I could run. Shrug off this
coat and bolt. But I remember his cold, impassive face as he shot Ana and I
know he won’t hesitate to do the same to me.
Death would be a gift. Run. Run!
But I can’t do it. I’m a coward and I can’t.
The driver is waiting, standing to attention by the open car door. My
throat tight with tears I allow Volker to help me into the car. He gets in
beside me and the driver closes the door, shutting me inside this polished
metal and leather cell.
We drive in silence through the streets of East Berlin. I’m hyperaware
of Volker sitting at my side on the broad leather seat, one long leg casually
crossed over the other. I don’t notice where we are going. I huddle in his
coat as if it’s able to shield me from him. Light from an occasional
streetlamp slides across his face, which is cold and hard once more as he
looks out into the night.
Some time later—five minutes? Thirty?—the car glides to a halt. I keep
my eyes down. It doesn’t matter where we are.
Volker gets out and helps me out of the car, holding tight to my arm. If
I run he’ll have to shoot me and I sense he doesn’t want to kill his quarry.
He wants to play with his prize first.
We walk through a low gate and then up some stone steps. Volker
opens and closes a door, and then we walk up more steps, broad and
carpeted, the pile thick and richly patterned. One flight, two, three. Another
door is unlocked and he impels me through it. There are polished boards
beneath my feet now. Confusion is starting to worm its way through my
terror. What manner of dungeon is this?
Volker takes his coat from my shoulders and I brace myself, expecting
cold air to bite into me, but wherever we are it is warm. I feel his eyes
examine me minutely, taking in my black woolen stockings that I dislike for
being so itchy; the scuffed navy coat; the snarl that my dark curls have
become. I am cold, wet, thin and pale, more like something the cat has
chewed on and became bored with than a dangerous enemy of the State.
“Take off your coat, shoes and stockings and put them over there.” He
points toward a side table by the door and I do what he says, but it takes
longer than it should as my fingers are clumsy with cold. I drape my coat
over the table and place my shoes beneath it, lining them up neatly. I take
my time, delaying the inevitable. I have to reach up under my skirt to my
garter belt to take off my stockings and I don’t want to do this in front of
him. I’ve never taken off any sort of intimate garment in front of a man and
I don’t want the first and last to be Oberstleutnant Volker. I glance around to
check where he is and I’m relieved to see his broad back on the other side
of the room. He’s stoking a fire, one hand braced against the chimneypiece.
Surprised at the sight, my eyes rove around the room. A fireplace.
Bookshelves. A pianoforte. This is an apartment. What’s going on? I stare at
the dark wood paneling, the brass ornaments, the printed maps on the walls.
There are so many things. I’m not used to things. We only have what is
functional, not decorative, besides the little box of my mother’s—
My hands clench on my skirt. My mother’s family heirlooms were in
Dad’s rucksack. Some photographs of Oma and Opa on their wedding day,
a locket and my mother’s wedding ring. They’re gone now, wherever Dad
is. I picture the Stasi pawing through her things while my father looks on,
trembling and alone in Hohenschönhausen.
Please let him be in Hohenschönhausen. He can’t be dead. I’d know if
he was dead, wouldn’t I, by some instinct? I search my memory for the last
moment I saw him but there were too many people, too much confusion.
And then Volker is lifting his pistol and aiming at Ana.
I clench my eyes shut. No. Don’t think about that. You have to keep
your wits about you if you want to survive this. Think. Watch. Discover
where you are.
Volker puts a log on the fire and red sparks fly up the chimney. This
brings me back into myself and I unhook the sodden stockings from my
garter belt and peel them off my legs. There’s a swollen purple bruise on
my right knee from where I smacked it against the icy pavement.
Volker turns and surveys me, his hands clasped behind his back. Then
he points to a sofa adjacent to the fire. “Sit.”
I go, my bare feet leaving damp footprints on the floor. The sofa stands
opposite another on a Turkish rug. As I sink into its softness the fire basks
me in its warmth.
Volker starts to speak, his voice slow and precise. “Your name is Evony
Adalita Daumler, wireless radio factory worker. Daughter of Adalita Käethe
and Heinrich Michel Daumler, born in Kreuzberg, Berlin on March 14,
1940. Your mother died on April 21, 1945 when a Russian shell destroyed
your home.”
Hearing their names makes me feel bleak and alone. Dad’s told me the
story of the bombing many times; how he returned home to find the
terraced house we lived in blown apart. He and the neighbors searched
through the rubble for our bodies and he couldn’t believe it when I was
pulled out alive, wailing and covered in plaster dust. His Schätzen. He
thinks I must have been asleep in one room, protected by a heavy door,
while the room my mother was in received the worst of the blast. The Red
Army arrived in Berlin just days later. I’ve always wondered if that’s why
he hates the communists so much, because he blames them for my mother’s
death.
Volker knows so much about me. Has he been looking into my
background before tonight? The futility of our attempted escape breaks over
me. We thought we could get out, but the Stasi were watching us the whole
time. But why am I here? Where is here? I should be in prison or dead, not
sitting by a warm fire.
He walks to a small table and pours a measure of what looks like
whisky into a tumbler. Then he returns to the sofas and sits down opposite
me. He takes his time, sipping the liquor, putting it aside, digging in his
jacket pocket for his cigarettes. He even offers me one, and after a moment
of confusion I shake my head. I don’t smoke. The bitter, tarry smell of
cheap East German f6s has never appealed to me. But the packet in his hand
isn’t the familiar off-white color with the green band around the top and an
orange and brown logo. It’s a crisp white box with gold embossing and the
word kent printed in heavy black letters. Western cigarettes.
My eyes dart back to the whisky bottle. It’s a brand I don’t recognize
and I wonder if it’s Western, too. Could I be—is this the West? My heart
thumps with excitement, but then slows. No. Don’t be stupid, Evony. Volker
is a high-ranking Stasi officer. He’ll have access to West German marks and
be allowed to shop in the Intershops that sell Western goods to foreigners.
For all they bleat that East German products are superior to those found in
the West the Stasi and Party members prefer imports.
I realize Volker is watching me closely as he smokes and every
emotion I experience, every thought I have is flickering across my face for
him to see. I look hastily at my hands lest I give away something I’ll regret.
Suddenly, he asks, “Who was the leader of your group?”
My insides clench—so he does mean to interrogate me. But what a
strange interrogation. I should be in a prison cell, sluiced with icy water,
kept awake for days, beaten with electrical cables. Mutely, I defy him. I will
not betray my group. If by a miracle someone escaped I will not implicate
them.
 Volker doesn’t seem bothered by my silence and is still watching me
with speculative gray eyes. Even at rest there’s something predatory in his
gaze, like a lion who isn’t hungry just yet but is beginning to think about his
next meal. He exhales a cloud of blue smoke out of the corner of his mouth.
The Kents smell different to f6s and I realize it’s one of the scents that filled
my nostrils as he pulled his coat around me, that and the woodsmoke from
the fireplace. We don’t have a fireplace at home, only radiators.
Home. “Where is my father?”
He smiles a slow, gloating smile. “You mean you don’t know?”
Anger churns through me. I wouldn’t ask if I knew. Does he mean
Dad’s in Hohenschönhausen, or dead? Volker seems to be enjoying my
confusion, and with effort I smooth my features into blandness. Stop giving
him so much. You don’t know what he’s able to infer from your words and
expressions.
There’s a clock somewhere in the room and it ticks out the seconds. I
lower my eyes to the carpet and fist the pile with my toes. My feet are dry
now in the warmth from the fire and no longer white with cold.
“Whose idea was it that you tunnel beneath the bakery?” Volker brings
the tumbler of whisky to his lips and his last words are muffled in the glass.
He’s not even looking at me. It’s like he’s not trying to interrogate me
properly and I feel oddly disrespected.
“I’m not going to tell you anything, Herr Oberstleutnant.”
Self-satisfaction gleams in his eyes, as if he’s pleased I’ve said this. As
if he’s manipulated me into it. “If you say so. But it hardly matters, as that’s
not why I brought you here, Liebling.”
I feel the blood turn to ice in my veins. How caressingly he says that
word, like a lover might. I shudder at the thought of him touching me with
his large hands. I can’t face what he intends to do to me, so I ignore it,
pretending it’s not occurred to me, not occurred to him, like I’m a pathetic
child hiding beneath the blankets from an intruder who can plainly see her.
“Then—then if you’re not going to question me, let me go.”
Volker grinds out his cigarette in an ashtray and puts his whisky aside.
He stands so suddenly that I flinch away from him. But he doesn’t try to
touch me. He puts one hand behind his back and holds the other out. The
gesture is so well-mannered, as if we’re at a ball and he’s asking me to
dance.
“Oh, you can leave. Please,” he says, brisk now, making a come here
gesture with his outstretched hand.
I don’t move. It’s clearly a trick and all my nerves are screaming at me
not to touch him, not to let him get close. I stare at his hand as if it’s a snake
about to strike.
“You don’t believe me?” Volker grabs my wrist, pulling me to my feet.
He takes me over to the front door, unlocks the latch and opens it. Then he
lets me go and steps back. “Go.”
I stand barefoot on the floorboards, hesitating before freedom. This is a
trick. It has to be a trick. But the open door beckons and I can’t help myself
—I take one step forward.
“You can leave, but you will die.”
My heart plummets through my chest. And there it is, the truth finally. I
am his captive. It’s not a prison or a dungeon, this apartment, but it’s a cage
just the same.
He slams the door closed so hard that the paintings on the wall rattle
and he addresses me with his hands clasped behind his back. “Sensible
choice, Fräulein. You live here, now. You do not leave this apartment unless
it is with me. If you try to escape, you will be found, and you will be killed.
Do you understand?”
There’s a militaristic ring to his voice. His previous silkiness and
amusement were affected. This is the true Volker; ferocious, merciless, in
control. Again I see him raising his gun to shoot Ana. I don’t doubt him
when he says that if I escape he will hunt me down and kill me.
“I said, do you understand?”
Mutely, I nod.
His body seems to unclench and the furious expression melts into a
smile. “Good, Evony, good. I can call you Evony, can’t I?” Without waiting
for a reply he holds out his arm, as obsequious as a hotel clerk.
“Let me show you to your room.”

OceanofPDF.com
 Chapter Five
Evony

It’s his apartment. I should have known this from the way he helped himself
to whisky and sat so comfortably on the sofa, but it’s not until he’s giving
me the your bathroom is here, my housekeeper comes at seven speech that
the penny drops. I’m silent throughout, watching his mouth move but barely
registering the words. Finally, he shuts me in a bedroom and leaves me
alone.
I turn slowly, looking at the bed with its whitework comforter, the
large, antique wardrobe, the dressing table with its vanity mirror standing
opposite the window. There’s a print of Dresden above the bed that shows
how the beautiful old city looked before it was fire-bombed in the war.
I stare at the picture for a long time, not seeing it, waiting for
something to happen. To be shouted at, shot at, marched into another car.
But nothing happens. Finally it dawns on me that no one’s coming for me,
and I’m meant to sleep in this room tonight.
The first thing I do is to check to see if the door has a lock. It doesn’t.
There isn’t a chair to put under the door handle, either. Neither of these
facts surprise me, that there’s no way to lock Volker out. I should feel
alarmed, I suppose, but I’m strangely numb. All the edges of the furniture
are too sharp in my vision and the lights are too bright, so I switch them off.
Because it’s late I suppose I should go to bed, so I strip down to my vest,
laying my clothes over the stool by the vanity, and get between the sheets.
Someone is moving about elsewhere in the apartment, but then everything
goes silent.
I lie awake a long time, looking at the pattern the moonlight makes on
the ceiling as it shines through the net curtains. Dad captured, or maybe
dead. Ana dead. Everyone else captured or dead. What’s going to happen to
me in the morning? And, worst of all, what does Volker want from me?
He’s as terrifying up close as I always thought he would be, with cold,
unreadable eyes and a cruel smile. My eyes fly to the door handle and I
strain to hear the sound of a creaking floorboard that might betray his step
outside, but all is silent. I dread the dawn and try to stay awake to keep it at
bay, but exhaustion overcomes me, and I sleep.
When I open them again the room is filled with light and there’s a
woman standing by the stool, holding up each of my garments in turn and
tutting over them. Who is she, and where…?
The events of the previous night flood back. I’m in Volker’s apartment.
I sit up with a whimper and the woman turns and looks at me. She’s in her
late fifties, has short, curly brown hair threaded with gray and is wearing a
bright yellow apron over her blue dress. A housekeeper?
“Guten Morgen. I’m Frau Fischer.” And she scoops up all my clothes
and heads for the door.
I fly out of bed after her, taking the sheet with me in an attempt to
cover myself. “Nein, wait! I don’t have any other clothes.”
She turns to me in surprise. “No other clothes? Didn’t you pack
anything when you left…when you came from…” She trails off and I
realize she has no idea who I am and what has happened to me. I imagine
Volker just told her there was a woman in the spare room and left it at that.
I shake my head, and she puts the clothes back down.
“Oh. Well. Wash up and dress, then. Herr Oberstleutnant wants you at
the breakfast table at seven-forty-five.” And she leaves the room.
Panic flits through me. What time is it now? I have to get to the factory
before eight. But then, where is the factory from here? I could be miles and
miles away on the other side of East Berlin. In fact, I think I must be
because there’s nothing as nice as this apartment anywhere near where I
live. It’s got high ceilings and old plaster and I guess it’s a turn-of-the-
century building. There aren’t many beautiful old houses left in Berlin since
the war but the Party and Stasi have seen to it that they have the pick of
them.
 Feeling anxious about the factory I do as Frau Fischer says and put on
my skirt and blouse from the previous day. Maybe I won’t be able to go to
work as Volker said I was a prisoner here, but then I snort. An East German
not work? Impossible.
When I open the bedroom door I hear voices at the end of the hall, and
see Volker standing in the kitchen drinking coffee and talking to Frau
Fischer. The sight of him, tall and arresting in his uniform, makes my
stomach knot. I don’t head straight there but turn right and go through to the
lounge and put on my shoes and stockings. They’re dry now, though my
shoes are stiff and mottled from the melted snow.
I hesitate by the front door, wetting my lips. Freedom is right there. The
door appears to be latched but might not be dead bolted. Frau Fischer and
Volker are talking in the kitchen; I make out their voices but not the words.
They can’t see me from here.
If you try to escape, you will be found, and you will be killed.
But will I? Volker’s just a man. He hasn’t got supernatural or
omniscient powers. I might make it if I run, and running for freedom is
better than staying here and waiting to see what he has in store for me. At
any moment he might take me to prison, or hurt me. I lift my hands to try
the lock—but as if Volker is omniscient he suddenly calls out, “Evony?”
and I jump back from the door.
Heart thundering in my ears I approach the kitchen and hover in the
doorway, trying to smooth the guilty look from my face. Volker looks up
from his folded copy of the Neues Deutschland and smiles, all politeness, as
if I am an honored guest. “Ah, Morgen, Evony. Did you sleep well?”
I duck my head rather than talk to him, and let Frau Fischer guide me
to the breakfast table. Then I remember the factory and look wildly around
for a clock. There’s one above the sink and it reads ten minutes to eight. “I
have to go to work, I’ll be late!”
“Nein,” Volker interjects. “I have sent a messenger to the factory to tell
them you no longer work there.”
I stare at him. Anyone who refuses to work can be sent to prison. He
surely knows this better than anyone. “But I have to work. Those are the
rules.”
 Frau Fischer approaches him with the pot of coffee and he holds his
cup and saucer out to her. “Danke. Indeed, Evony. Do you not remember
what I told you last night?”
You do not leave this apartment unless it is with me. When I nod, he
says, “So, it is clear. You are coming to work for me.”
Work for Volker? Work for the secret police at Stasi Headquarters? No.
Every fiber, every nerve, screams in protest. I might feel ambivalent about
the State but I hate the Stasi. They exist only to oppress and terrify us, not
protect us as they claim. They sneak, spy, torture and imprison. They pit
neighbor against neighbor and make us suspicious of our own friends and
workmates. They are scum, every last one of them—and particularly him.
Volker is watching me intently and I realize I have let my emotions
play out for him once again. My disgust is written all over my face. He
takes a sip of coffee, and when he speaks again his voice is silky and
dangerous. “Did you have any questions about that, Evony?”
Frau Fischer, as if sensing the tension in the room, makes me sit and
places the butter dish, rolls and a myriad of spreads and cold meats in front
of me, saying, “You’ll like Headquarters. Such a smart building and very
modern, not even two years old. The wood panel walls are just lovely.”
Volker and I watch each other, ignoring the housekeeper as she bustles
around us. I know I have no choice in the matter but I need this small act of
rebellion, making him wait for me to acquiesce. It might not be much but
it’s all I have.
Finally, with exaggerated politeness, I say, “No questions, Herr
Oberstleutnant.” Then I look up at Frau Fischer and smile. “Thank you, this
looks delicious.” It doesn’t, as I have no appetite, but I can feel the desire
for us all to get along radiating off her in waves. She probably doesn’t like
the Oberstleutnant any more than I do. I’ll take any ally I can right now,
even one who seems bent on making this terrible man happy.
“Marmelade d’oranges,” I mutter, reading the French label on a jar. I
don’t think I’ve seen marmalade in the shops for about six years, and the
people aren’t allowed produce from the West. I reach instead for the
familiar brand of East German strawberry jam. He can keep his fancy
imported spreads, the raging hypocrite.
 Volker goes back to reading the newspaper while he finishes his coffee,
and doesn’t touch any food. It’s uncomfortable having someone standing
over you as if waiting for a train while you try to your eat breakfast, but I
do my best to ignore him. I suspect he’s looming on purpose. Or he just has
terrible morning habits.
At eight-o-five he slaps his newspaper down and clears his throat, and
Frau Fischer whisks away my plate and the roll I’m still eating.
“I guess I’m done,” I say under my breath, and follow Volker to the
front door. His lips thin as he picks up my old coat, as if he’s handling a
piece of questionable fish, but he shakes it out and helps me into it. Such a
gentlemanly monster.
The big black car is waiting downstairs for us. It’s a Mercedes-Benz, an
import from West Germany. You see them now and again around East
Berlin and they always belong to someone in the Party or the Stasi. The
little two-stroke engine Trabants, “the people’s car”, aren’t good enough for
them. The Trabis are horribly slow and are always breaking down so
they’re not good for anyone, really. But as my father, the mechanic,
cheerfully says, they keep him busy.
Dad. I stop dead on the pavement and for a moment I can’t breathe.
Volker gives a short exhalation of impatience behind me. I force myself not
to think about Dad or where he might be and I get into the waiting car.
We glide through quiet residential streets and then onto the main roads,
and I realize we’re in Pankow, a well-to-do district in the north of the city
where most of the Stasi and Party live. It’s a clear, frosty morning and I
stare out the window at the houses we pass. East Berlin. I wasn’t meant to
wake up in East Berlin this morning. I was meant to be in a refugee camp in
the West, cheerfully telling a West German that I want to claim asylum and
live in the free world. Instead I’m a prisoner of der Mitternachtsjäger, on
my way to Stasi Headquarters. He can’t make me spy for him, can he? I’ve
heard that the Stasi have all sorts of tricks to make people inform on their
friends and co-workers. But who can he manipulate me with now?
The car takes us right to the front door of the Ministry of State Security
building. The driver opens the door for me and I step out, looking up at the
eight-floor concrete and glass edifice before me, filled with people like
Volker. It’s a very new building, completed just over a year ago. Lovely,
Frau Fischer called it. My chest feels tight. It’s horrific. My father loves
history and he told me once about the Tower of London, built by the
Norman invaders to oppress the English in their hearts and minds as well as
by brute force. The Normans had their castles; the Party has Stasi
Headquarters and the Wall.
Volker places a large hand on my shoulder, startling me out of my
thoughts. When I look up at him he’s smiling his cruel smile. “You are not
frightened are you, Liebling? There is no need. You are not a lamb who
walks into the lion’s lair to face the lion. You walk in at his side.”
He places his peaked cap over his gold hair. I suppose if he was a
young officer during the war he must be in his early forties now, but there’s
no hint of gray in his hair and his face is smooth and handsome. He reminds
me of a lion in his prime. A lion with blue-gray eyes that are gleaming
bright in the morning light as he looks with pleasure upon the Ministry for
State Security.
There’s a large, carved insignia on prominent display in the lobby, a
white shield with a rifle and fixed bayonet flying the flag of the German
Democratic Republic, the GDR. Around the edge of the shield is written
ministerium für staatssicherheit, and the Stasi’s motto, Shield and Sword
of the Party.
We take the elevator to the sixth floor and enter a long corridor. There
are offices on each side, and then the space opens up into a small reception
area. Volker heads toward a pair of desks standing opposite each other in
front of a closed door. A pretty young woman is sitting at one desk, typing,
and when she sees Volker she jumps to her feet and smiles.
“Guten Morgen, Herr Oberstleutnant.” Her smile reveals a row of even,
pearly teeth.
“Morgen. Fräulein Hoffman, this is Fräulein Dittmar, Frau Hahn’s
replacement.” Volker passes her his coat and cap.
My eyes snap to Volker. Dittmar? But he knows my name is Daumler.
Was that a mistake, or has he decided that I’m to be someone else entirely?
Volker meets my eyes, his hard gaze telling me to keep my mouth shut. It
wasn’t a mistake.
 Fräulein Hoffman turns to me, and her smile falters. Her eyes travel
down over my father’s bulky coat, my pilled stockings and ruined shoes. I
notice that her dress looks very new and smart and is made of light green
wool with an A-line skirt that finishes several inches above her knees. Her
legs are clad in nylons and her hair is long and golden, up in a half-ponytail
and tied with a white bow. She’s a very neat, pretty girl, and I can’t help but
feel self-conscious about my frayed, bedraggled appearance. New clothes
are hard to come by in East Berlin and everything I wear only gets filthy in
the factory.
Fräulein Hoffman quickly fixes her smile back in place and greets me
kindly, but I can tell she’s thinking, You? Really?
Volker looks between us, seeming to come to the same conclusion that
his secretary has: I don’t look like I belong here. He digs in his jacket
pocket and takes out a leather wallet. Addressing his secretary, he says, “I
want you to take Fräulein Dittmar to wherever it is you girls go for…” He
gestures vaguely at Fräulein Hoffman’s dress and shoes. “She has found
herself without her things.”
Found myself, as if all this is an accident. The Stasi are probably at our
apartment right now, packing our meagre possessions away and taking them
to be burned or resold. Traitors forfeit the right to their own property. But
did Volker just say what I thought he said—that I’m to go out alone with
this girl? My heart leaps. I could lose her in an instant.
“Yes, Herr Oberstleutnant,” the young woman chirrups, taking the wad
of Ostmarks he hands to her. “You have an appointment at four pm but I’ll
see we’re back before then.”
To my surprise, Volker gives her an amused smile. “Four? Does it take
so long to do a little shopping?”
Fräulein Hoffman’s laugh is musical, almost flirtatious, and she flips
her long hair over her shoulder. How can she stand to look at him like that?
If she secretly hates him she’s doing a very good job of hiding it. “If you
want it done properly it will. You did say she needs everything.”
Perhaps she doesn’t hate him. Perhaps she… But I can’t think any
further in that direction as it turns my stomach. If he’s got her, why me?
 “Hmm. Very well. Hans can drive you, and I’ll call down to the front
desk for an escort. And Fräulein Hoffman? I want the receipts, and the
change.” He wags an admonishing finger at her, but his smile is teasing.
She opens the door to Volker’s office and hangs up his hat and coat on
a hook just inside the door. Returning to us, she bats her eyelashes at him
and smiles sweetly. “Of course, Herr Oberstleutnant.”
Volker bestows his smile on me, but I don’t return it. I’m not a child to
be indulged and I don’t want to be sent off with this silly young woman to
go shopping. Does he think I’ll be grateful if he buys me a new dress? My
hand itches to slap the smile from his face and I want to scream at him,
Where is my father? I didn’t miss what he said about the escort. He means a
guard with a gun. So much for my plans to give Fräulein Hoffman the slip.
Ignoring my baleful look, Volker says, “Enjoy yourself, my factory
girl.” And he disappears into his office and closes the door.
Fräulein Hoffman tucks the marks into a white handbag and gives me a
broad smile. “This is fun, isn’t it? Much better than the morning of
correspondence I thought I had ahead of me.”
She collects her coat from a hat stand cluttered with garments and
umbrellas and we head downstairs. The various sections of the office are
pointed out to me and she reels off names and departments faster than I can
take them in. “Don’t worry if you don’t remember all this,” she says, seeing
my bewildered face. “It takes some time to settle in at HQ but I promise
everyone’s very friendly.”
I grimace. Friendly, Stasi HQ?
When the elevator opens on the ground floor I see Volker’s black car
waiting outside the glass doors and a uniformed guard beside it. He’s young
and dark with too-large ears, and as we cross the foyer toward him he
watches me like I’m a grenade that might not have its pin. There’s a pistol
holstered at his waist. For all Volker’s indulgent smiles it seems he’s taking
no risks when it comes to keeping me prisoner.
My companion gives the guard a curious look but doesn’t say anything,
and we all get in the car. “Michelstrasse in Prenzlauer Berg please, Hans,”
she says to the driver. And to me, “I’m Lenore. I’ve worked at HQ for just
over a year now.”
 “Evony.”
She waits for me to go on, to tell her something about myself, but I
don’t. Her smile fades. A moment later she looks out the window, uncertain.
I don’t mean to be unfriendly but nothing feels normal today and I don’t
think I can pretend it is. The guard is sitting in the front passenger seat but I
feel the constant pressure of his eyes on me in the rear-view mirror. Volker
has probably impressed on him it’s more than his life is worth if I get away.
The car stops outside a private residence and not a store, which I find
odd, but I get out because Lenore does. She’s talking again, pretending that
the moment of awkwardness didn’t happen, and I wonder if this is her
coping mechanism for dealing with the Stasi and people like Volker: to
pretend everything’s lovely. She can’t actually think it’s lovely, can she?
“…because the shops have barely anything, let alone clothes that look
nice on. Herr Oberstleutnant likes us to be well presented at all times and of
course it can’t hurt if the other officers are friendly to us, too.” She gives
me a knowing smile and I wonder if Lenore is a flirt. But after all there are
two men with us now, the driver and the guard, and her eyes have skimmed
without interest over them. Maybe her smiles are only for the officers.
We go up to the second floor of the apartment building and Lenore
knocks on a door. A woman appears, clothed in the most remarkable
assortment of colorful garments, a tape measure round her neck and a
pincushion fastened to her wrist. She greets Lenore like an old friend—or a
good customer?—smiles at me, frowns at the guard, and ushers us all
inside. It’s about the size of Volker’s apartment but every passage and room
is stacked with bolts of cloth.
She’s a dressmaker, I realize. That’s what Lenore was saying: you can’t
find good clothes like the smart green dress she’s wearing in the stores, but
you can have them made. I look around at the silks, wools, velvets and
organzas, wondering where they all came from. Not made in the GDR,
surely. Maybe in Moscow, but my guess is that most are from France and
Italy as the USSR seems to prefer manufacturing synthetic fabrics as
they’re easier to mass produce. Stroking a bolt of pale yellow silk I consider
how much I’m learning and seeing today. This is a very different East
Berlin to the one I lived in. I wish I could tell Ana there is a secret
dressmaker in Prenzlauer Berg and that the wives, girlfriends and
secretaries of the Party and Stasi men must all shop here.
The dressmaker swats my hand away from the pristine fabric. “Filthy
nails,” she scolds. I hide my hand behind my back, my face burning
because my nails are filthy, and broken, too.
Lenore speaks briskly. “We need a new work wardrobe for Evony, Frau
Schneider. She’s just started at HQ this morning and she only has, well…”
Both women look me over, Lenore apologetically and Frau Hoffman
critically. With a twist of her mouth the woman bids all of us except the
guard follow her down the corridor.
“But I’m to—” the guard begins.
Frau Schneider gives a nasty laugh. “I don’t think so, my boy. Wait
outside the room if you must, but you’re not coming in.” She takes us into
what was once the living room but has now been turned into a sort of
reception area with a large sofa, a green and mustard yellow rug on the
floor and stacks of magazines.
“Strip, down to your underwear.” Frau Schneider yanks the measuring
tape from around her neck. Seemingly unsurprised by this, Lenore sinks
down onto the sofa and starts leafing through a magazine. I look uncertainly
between them, not sure why I’m being asked to undress.
“Don’t stand there looking gormless, we’re all women here. Unless you
have scales underneath your clothes?” When I still don’t move she shakes
the tape measure at me. “I need to measure you.”
I do as I’m told and soon I’m standing in the middle of the room in my
bra, briefs, garter belt and knitted stockings while Frau Schneider barks
orders at me. “Arms out. Arms down. Stand up straight, girl.”
“You’ve nice legs,” Lenore says to me over the top of her magazine,
her head on one side. “Herr Oberstleutnant is fond of nice legs.”
“Short-waisted, though,” the dressmaker mutters, her fingers pressing
the tape over my behind as she measures the length of my back. Then she
stops what she’s doing and looks at me closely: my face, my breasts, my
hips. “Working for Oberstleutnant Volker, are you? Just work clothes? No
evening gowns, négligées?”
 The dreadful old bat. I’m not his girlfriend or a tart. Does he send a lot
of women here? Through clenched teeth, I say, “Just work clothes, danke.”
Frau Schneider shoots an annoyed look at Lenore. “When is that man
going to send some proper business my way? Or does it go to another
dressmaker? Is it Frau Werner?”
“Well, he’s spoilt for choice, I assure you. Don’t worry, as soon as he
picks someone I’ll make sure she comes to you.”
“He’s not…Andersrum, is he?”
Lenore shakes her head. “Legs, remember? I’ve seen him looking.”
She sniffs. “Not at mine, though. I think he likes brunettes.”
I follow this exchange, completely bewildered. Andersrum. Different,
other. Frau Schneider seems to be annoyed because Volker never sends
girlfriends to her for dresses, and she wonders if this means he’s
homosexual.
Please be wrong, Lenore, I silently beg. Please let Volker be gay. But
then, why would he want me in his apartment and look at me in that hungry
way if he didn’t like women? I watch the dressmaker work, feeling bereft,
as I know she’s trying to turn me into something Volker wants to look at.
“Dark hair and brown eyes,” the woman says, looking up from the
measurements she’s marked on a chart. “Cream would suit you. Mauve.
Some tawny browns. Black.”
Lenore shakes her head. “Herr Oberstleutnant doesn’t like his
secretaries in black.”
“Black, please. I want black,” I immediately say. Everything in black,
preferably. I’m not going to sit around looking like a pretty doll for his
benefit. Perpetual mourning would suit me better.
Lenore shoots me a look of disapproval and to my annoyance Frau
Hoffman makes a note on the paper. “No black. So. Three dresses, three
skirts, four blouses and a good coat. All winter weight and the blouses with
long sleeves. How does that sound for a start?” She doesn’t say this to me,
but to Lenore.
“Can you do two berets and two scarves, as well? Light and dark. Oh,
and make the skirts short, won’t you?”
I jump in here. “No. Knee length, please.”
 “Evony,” Lenore says, exasperated, holding up the magazine she’s
reading and showing me a color picture of two models in very small skirts.
It’s definitely a Western magazine. “Minis are in.”
In what? All I know is that Volker likes dark girls and their legs so I’d
opt for a nun’s habit if I thought I could get away with it. “Knee length,” I
insist to Frau Schneider, but I don’t think she’s paying attention to me.
The dressmaker waves at my clothes lying on the arm of the sofa. “You
can get dressed now and then I’ll show you some designs.”
I reach for my blouse, suddenly feeling very tired. The stress of last
night is catching up with me. “Look, you don’t need to. Just make them as
you see fit. Simple and plain—and long.”
She stares at me, her eyebrows creeping up her forehead. “If you’re
sure, but… Colors? Prints for the blouses, or plain?”
I’m fast running out of energy not to scream about how much I don’t
care. “It’s fine. Whatever you think best. Where’s the bathroom, please?”
Frau Schneider points out the door and to the right, shaking her head
slightly as if she still can’t comprehend me not wanting to pore over
designs.
“Do you have anything Evony can wear now? I’d like to take her back
to the office this afternoon looking…” Lenore trails off, seeming to search
for a diplomatic way of saying that I look awful as I am. “Fresher.”
“I can probably dig something out that a customer didn’t come back
for…”
I head out and find the bathroom, lock the door, and sink down onto the
closed lavatory. I feel like I’m in one of those dreams where you talk and
talk and no one listens to what you’re saying, except all the words are in my
head and I have no one to whom I can scream them. I feel my gorge rising
and struggle to breathe—
Calm down. You need to keep your wits about you if you’re going to
spot the right opportunity. Where’s the guard? Does this apartment have a
back door? I take a few steadying breaths, get up and open the bathroom
door slowly.
And feel a thud of disappointment. The guard is right there, waiting for
me. All right, now is not my opportunity. But soon. It will come soon, I
have to believe it will. I will get lucky and Volker will be unlucky. He can’t
keep me captive forever.
Head held high I push past the guard and go back to the living room.
Frau Hoffman has several skirts and blouses for me to try on, and a lilac silk
shirt and camel A-line skirt fit best. Lenore holds out her hands for the
garments. “Take them off again and let’s go and get the other things you’ll
need. There are some shops near here. I’ve paid Frau Schneider for the
order.”
“Can’t I just wear these now?” I’m tired of pulling clothes on and off.
“No, later. We’ll go back to my apartment and get you fixed up
properly. Herr Oberstleutnant won’t know you.” Lenore gives me a broad
smile.
Not know me. That would be nice. But I do as I’m asked.
Frau Schneider puts the skirt and blouse into a bag, along with another
blouse of white silk, and gives it to me. “May as well take that one, too, as
the fit wasn’t so bad. I’ll have what I can delivered to Herr Oberstleutnant’s
apartment in two days’ time, and the rest within the week.”
Lenore bids her goodbye and we head back down to the car, but we
don’t get in as she says we can walk. The sun is shining feebly, though it’s
still bitterly cold. Lenore huddles in her cream wool coat with its fur collar.
The guard trails a few paces behind us and I feel his gaze prickle the back
of my neck.
Seeming determined to get me talking, Lenore asks. “So tell me, how
well do you know Herr Oberstleutnant?”
“I don’t.”
She frowns, puzzled. “At all? How did you meet?”
I don’t know what to say and I look away, but this only seems to pique
Lenore’s interest. She could be an informant or may report anything I say
back to Volker. Would this be such a bad thing, though? I’d dearly like to
tell him to his face what I think of him, but by proxy will do. “I don’t like
him. He frightens me, and he’s making me stay with him in his apartment.”
Lenore’s eyes widen in surprise. “Making you?” Seeing her
astonishment I feel tears fill my eyes. It’s just how Ana would look if I
confessed the same thing to her and it makes me miss her so much.
 “Oh, you poor thing, don’t cry. Here.” Lenore digs a handkerchief out
of her handbag and gives it to me. While I wipe my face and try to compose
myself, she talks on, briskly. “These are strange times we’re living through
what with the Wall and the shortages and the border closing. But the Party
has our best interests at heart and we have to make the best of things, don’t
you think?”
No, I don’t think, but I don’t want to say so to her and with the guard
listening in.
“You’re lucky that he’s interested in you. Oberstleutnant Volker is…a
difficult man.” Lenore gives me a quick, wry smile, as if he’s a poorly
trained but loveable hound. “But he’s very handsome, too. Most of the
secretaries at HQ have tried to catch his eye but he keeps to himself most of
the time. If you can grow to like him and make him fall in love with you, he
might marry you.”
The suggestion makes me want to be sick. I know Lenore is trying to
be helpful and I am grateful for that, but like Frau Fischer Lenore seems
only to want to please Volker. And he’s difficult? He’s a cold-blooded killer.
The fact that Lenore doesn’t ask why Volker is keeping me in his
apartment doesn’t surprise me. We don’t know each other and the world we
live in doesn’t invite easy confidences. Prying isn’t just considered rude, it’s
suspicious, and plainly she thinks I’ve landed on my feet so what could I
gain by questioning things?
I refold the handkerchief and hand it back to her. “Thank you for being
kind to me. I know you don’t have to be.”
“Oh, don’t be silly! I’ve been dying for Herr Oberstleutnant to get
another secretary so I’d have some company again, and you’re miles better
than old Frau Hahn who had the job before you. She retired a few weeks
ago. Dry old bat. Smoked horrid f6s all day and made me do all the work.”
Despite everything, I manage a watery laugh. “I’m afraid I won’t be
much better. I only know how to solder radios.”
She links her arm through mine, as if determined that we shall now be
the best of friends. “Yes, but I will have fun teaching you and I know you’ll
put some energy into the job. And you needn’t smoke f6s. A few smiles at
Herr Oberstleutnant or another officer and you can get Kents or Marlboros.”
 I’d sooner die than smile at Volker or any other Stasi officer. “Oh, I
shan’t bother. I don’t smoke.”
“Even better—you can trade with them. Do you know that three boxes
of Kents will fetch a pair of silk stockings, or a little bottle of French
perfume? A tiny bottle, but it lasts for ages.”
I listen as Lenore explains the unofficial bartering that goes on around
Stasi HQ. Though the items are different, the system is familiar. We would
trade for things in the factory and our apartment building, like exchanging
apples for string. Silk stockings didn’t come into it.
She takes me into one small, understocked store after another, the
indifferent wares laid out on dusty shelves. Everything has a picked-over
look and we have to rummage to find anything decent. Lenore asks me
what I already have. “Lipstick? Nylons? Underwear?” I shake my head at
each query and she grows more and more incredulous. I can feel her
wanting to ask me how this could be, but in the end she seems to decide it’s
better not to know. “Well, we’ll just have to get you everything.”
I let her choose the stockings, lipstick, powder and nightclothes for me.
She tells me which shoes to try on, and she decides on two pairs of pumps
with two-inch heels, one brown and one black. Only the black ones are
leather, and Lenore had to go through a mountain of boxes to find them. I
can tell she’s pleased with herself as her cheeks are pink with
accomplishment.
There’s a pair of white patent leather heels that she looks at for a very
long time, but then puts back, her expression pained. I notice they’re her
size, not mine. “Don’t you want those?”
She shakes her head, lips tight, and I guess the reason she put them
back isn’t that she doesn’t want them, but that she can’t afford them.
Despite her adoration of Volker, I like Lenore. I think Ana would have liked
her too. I pick the white shoes up along with my black and brown shoes and
head toward the register. “We’ll pretend they’re for me.”
“No, Evony, don’t—” She tries to take them back but I don’t let her.
The look in her eyes is so grateful that I might have just snatched her
firstborn from the path of a speeding car. “Danke. It’s like finding hen’s
teeth, shoes like that in East Berlin. If I waited until my next paycheck they
would have been sold for sure. I’ll pay you back.”
Doing this for Lenore is the only good thing about today, and I shake
my head. I saw the stack of bills he gave her and it’s more than enough to
cover all this. “No, you won’t. It’s not my money.”
We move onto buying bras, briefs and garter belts, and here Lenore
insists that I take some interest. I tell her I want the plainest ones that will
fit me: no lace, no satin, and no pretty colors. In this the store is against her
as it stocks almost exclusively ugly tan garments.
Putting down a black satin garter belt, she sighs. “Fine. But you’re
getting cream, not the tan. I’m holding the money, remember?” Lenore
gathers up the underthings that I’ve chosen, along with a basketful of
lotions, soaps and other bathroom supplies, and goes to pay.
Carrying string bags full of shopping we head back to the car, the now
thoroughly bored guard trailing in our wake.
“It’s only midday so we’ll go back to my apartment, have some lunch,
and get you fixed up in your new things.” Lenore smiles, but my heart
plummets. I loathe the prospect of being presented to Volker for inspection.
I’m not a willing participant in any of this and I don’t want him getting the
impression that I am.
Lenore’s apartment is just a short drive away and she shares it with
another secretary who works in a different government building. The
apartment is small and plain but they’ve made it cheerful by putting up
fashion photographs from Western magazines and draping bright cloths
over the furniture.
“Go and shower, and I’ll get some lunch ready. Use whatever you find
in the bathroom. Soap, shampoo, help yourself. There are towels under the
sink.”
I didn’t have time to wash properly this morning and I linger under the
spray, washing my hair, enjoying the solitude and gentle fragrance of the
unfamiliar products. Bartered for on the black market system, I presume.
Examining the conditioner I wonder how many boxes of Kent cigarettes it
cost.
 Emerging after twenty minutes swathed in towels I find Lenore has laid
out the new skirt, blouse and undergarments for me on her bed. The clothes
are stitched neatly and the fabric is pristine and soft. I’ve never owned
anything like them before and I’m sure they’ll get dirty or torn. But then I
don’t work in a factory anymore, I work in a clean, hushed office with
nothing more dangerous than a pair of high heels to navigate.
And Volker. What will he see when he looks at me in these clothes?
Someone he’s conquered and made into what he wants of them? Or will he
see the truth in my eyes—that I might look the part he wants me to play but
I’m an unwilling, resentful participant. How long until he tires of my bad
attitude and he sends me to Hohenschönhausen? Will I have to start
pretending that I like being his secretary and his captive? How will I
manage such a thing?
Going into the kitchen Lenore exclaims over my appearance, telling me
how improved I am. She’s made sandwiches from tinned tuna fish and rye
bread and I sit down and attack them, suddenly starving. I feel comfortable
here. It’s a friendly, inviting apartment, and I wish I could remain here
forever.
But I push that thought away. I won’t be staying here, because I’m
going to find a way to escape.
After we’ve eaten Lenore puts what she calls the finishing touches on
my appearance: cutting and filing my nails into neat ovals, dusting my nose
and cheeks with powder, painting my lips with a shade of pale rose lipstick
and curling and darkening my lashes. I sit quietly throughout, listening to
her talk about her brother, who is a border guard, and a sister who’s married
to a baker.
“Your hair is beautiful,” she says, feeling the texture of my curls, which
are nearly dry now. “What do you usually do with it?”
I glance up at her, amused. “Do with it? I tie a scarf over it so it doesn’t
get dusty, and then wash it when it does.”
She laughs. “Well, we can do better than that.” After brushing it
through she starts to twist it and pin it up, and arranges a few curls to fall by
my ears. “There. Take a look at yourself in the big mirror in my room.”
 I go through, unsteady in my new shoes. They’re making my injured
knee hurt and the bright purple bruise is visible through the sheer tan
nylons. Lenore saw it, but averted her gaze and didn’t say anything.
Taking a deep breath I raise my eyes to the mirror, and I don’t know
myself. The girl I was is being steadily erased and there’s an imposter in her
place. She’s painted and neat in form-fitting clothes and has soft,
impractical hair. The skirt finishes mid-thigh, showing a long length of my
legs. He’ll probably like this. Tears burning my eyes, I gather up my
clothes, the last remnants of my old life, and hug them to my chest. I miss
Ana. I miss Dad. I even miss the factory.
You’ll find a way out of this, I tell myself, blinking quickly. I can’t let
the mascara run or Lenore will know I’ve been crying. Dad didn’t pull you
from the rubble of a bombed-out house just for you to give up now.

OceanofPDF.com
 Chapter Six
Volker

“And you didn’t know about this, Volker?”

I turn to my commanding officer with a frown that conveys the gravity
with which I’m taking this matter. On the inside I am brimming with
spiteful glee. It’s been a most satisfying morning. “Nein, Herr Oberst.
Hauptmann Heydrich did not see fit to bring his information about the
tunnel to me.” I flick my eyes up at Heydrich, who is standing to attention
before us both and facing the Oberst. “As he knows he should have.”
Lounging to one side of the Oberst’s desk I have the perfect view of
Heydrich’s whey-colored profile. He mutters something about not having
had enough time. I’m sure that’s a lie. What motivated him to try and show
me up? Angling for early promotion, I presume, by trying to prove that he
can flush out traitors as successfully as I do. I’ll enjoy keeping him right
where he is, a lowly captain, for the rest of my career.
The Oberst folds his hand over his stomach. He should really get
himself out from behind that desk more often. “Hauptmann Heydrich, I am
sure I do not need to tell you what a farce the raid was. Three border guards
were killed.”
“Such a sad loss of life,” I murmur, reaching for my cigarettes. I
wonder what Evony Daumler looks like under those worn-out clothes. I
picture her with her long curls brushed out, sliding silk stockings up her
legs. Yes, for all that she’s a traitor she’s a very pretty young woman. I
don’t like her being out there in the city without me but in addition to the
guard that she can see there are four plainclothes officers tailing her. That
should be enough to keep an eye on a slippery little rat such as her.
 “Four dissidents were shot dead, three are in prison and another five to
seven are unaccounted for. We don’t know how many for sure. Could they
have escaped back into East Berlin?”
“Ja, Herr Oberst.”
“Or could they have escaped down the tunnel to the West?”
Hauptmann Heydrich winces. “Ja…it’s possible, Herr Oberst.”
Yes, quite possible. I think it’s probably a mix of the two: some made it
to the West and the others escaped back into the city, as Evony attempted to
do. By now they’ll be wondering who betrayed them.
The Oberst thumps his desk with his fist. “Scheisse. We’re going to
look like fools when they tell their story to the Western newspapers. This is
going on your permanent record, Heydrich.” He breathes hard for a
moment, thinking. “What happened to your informant?”
“He…was shot, sir.”
I narrow my eyes at Heydrich, but keep my mouth shut.
“And you, Volker? Heydrich tells me you briefly appeared at the raid
but then disappeared again.”
I tap the ash from my cigarette into a porcelain ashtray. “Ja. I shot one
young woman who aimed a pistol at me and then left the premises chasing
another.”
“What happened to her?”
I wonder if anyone’s noticed I’ve shown up with a shabby new
secretary this morning. I doubt Heydrich could put two and two together
and come up with four, but even idiots get lucky now and then. It’s a good
thing Fräulein Hoffman is transforming her as we speak. “She got away.”
“Think you’d recognize her again? What did she look like?
I pretend to muse on this a moment. “Thirty. Red hair. Tall. I only saw
her from the back.”
“Too bad.”
“Ja. Too bad.”
Heydrich and I leave the office together, the other man’s face tight with
anger and humiliation. I feel my good mood swell as his plummets. There
are few things I enjoy more than seeing sneaking little upstarts get their just
desserts.
 Schooling my face into something more professional than I feel, I ask,
“So, Heydrich. What have you learned from this disaster?”
The Hauptmann flushes and mutters banalities about better
preparedness.
I laugh, cutting him off. “No, no, Heydrich. What you learned is that
you’re not as clever, organized or capable as you want to be. You’d like to
be like me, wouldn’t you?” I give him a commiserating smile. “Some of us
were only meant to advance so far, to take orders rather than give them. Try
not to let it get you down. Dismissed.”
And I watch, smiling broadly, as he’s forced to salute me, his cheeks
red and his eyes burning with hatred.

OceanofPDF.com
 Chapter Seven
Evony

I compose myself and go back out into the living room to Lenore, holding
onto my old clothes like they’re a lifebelt. “Could I please have a bag for
these?”
Lenore looks puzzled. “Don’t you want to throw them away? They’re
rather…” But she trails off, polite to a fault. “Of course, I think I have a
paper bag somewhere.”
The guard gives me a stunned look as we walk out into the hall where
he’s waiting for us. I couldn’t give anyone the slip in these stupid shoes and
resign myself to the fact that my escape won’t be effected today.
Volker’s office door is shut when we arrive back at our desks, which
I’m intensely relieved about. We can hear him talking but the conversation
is one-sided so it seems he’s on the telephone. Lenore shows me how to use
the heavy Optima typewriter that’s sitting on my desk, getting me to feed
the paper in and pointing out how to change from lower case to upper case
letters. It’s completely baffling and hitting the keys makes my fingertips
hurt, but she tells me I’ll toughen up in time. She gives me three pages of
correspondence to type out and I work slowly and awkwardly, stalking
letters across the keyboard like they’re prey. Why on earth couldn’t they
have made the stupid machine with the letters in order?
Opposite me Lenore’s fingers fly over the keys, making a sound like
machine-gun fire as she copies out a document from shorthand. She’s not
even looking at her hands. It’s witchcraft.
Half an hour later we hear Volker go silent so he must have finished his
phone call. After a few minutes Lenore pulls the letter from her typewriter
and holds it out to me. “Would you mind taking this through to Herr
Oberstleutnant?” Her face is carefully blank but I’m sure I catch a gleam in
her eyes.
I’ve been nervously waiting for that door to fly open and for Volker to
appear, and now my stomach clenches. I have to go in to him? I like it here
behind my desk. The wood is like armor. I can’t keep the pleading note
from my voice as I say, “Oh, can’t you? I don’t want to go in there.”
She flaps the paper at me, insistent. “Get it over with, like a plaster.
You look lovely.”
So she’s not even going to pretend this is about her stupid letter. I get
up and take it and she leans forward, dropping her voice. “Knock, wait for
him to call out that it’s all right to enter, and then go in. And smile and say
thank you when he compliments you!” she adds in a hiss as I turn away.
Sweat breaking out on my lower back, I raise my fist and knock.
Volker’s voice mutters from within, a deep, distracted, “Ja.” I go in.
The office is large and bright and the opposite wall is all windows. The
venetian blinds are up and I can see the Brandenburg Gate in the distance,
the gray scar of the Berlin Wall running alongside it. On the other side is the
West. I can see it, actually see it.
Volker is writing with a fountain pen and hasn’t looked up. His desk is
large and empty apart from a tan Bakelite telephone, a lamp and a blotter.
There’s a bookcase of bound volumes behind him and a portrait of
Chairman Walter Ulbricht to my left, his small beard neat and salted.
As I approach Volker’s desk my hands are shaking. He finally looks up,
expressionless, expecting Lenore. His eyes sharpen when he sees me. I
expect them to travel down over my body, rude and possessive, but he looks
only at my face. There’s brightness in those eyes and I’m reminded again of
a predator. No one’s ever looked at me like this. What does he see that no
one else ever has? Vulnerability, because he knows I’m alone and
friendless? Does that excite him?
I swallow, and it’s difficult to speak because my mouth is so dry.
“Fräulein Hoffman…wanted me to give you this.”
He takes the letter from my outstretched hand without looking at it.
“Danke, Evony.” His voice is soft and pleasant, and he even smiles a little.
But it’s his eyes that unnerve me, as they seem to see everything that I don’t
want him to. That I looked for opportunities to escape today. That I’ll go on
looking, no matter what. He knows this and it doesn’t concern him one
whit. He’s so confident that I’m right where he wants me, and that I’ll never
escape.
Heart racing, I turn on my heel and hurry out as fast as I can, closing
the door behind me. When I’m behind my desk again my chest is heaving
like I’ve run a race and my fingers feel cold and tingly.
Lenore is eager to hear what happened. “So? What did he say?”
That it’s hopeless. That I’ll never get away from him unless he allows
it. “He said thank you for the letter.”
“Is that all? He didn’t say how pretty you look or how the new clothes
suit you? And after all the effort we went to.” She scowls down at her
typewriter and raps out her indignation on the keys.
At a quarter to six she leaves, telling me how well I’ve done today and
giving my shoulder a squeeze. She seems to think my silence and pale face
are because of first-day nerves.
I don’t know what to do once she’s gone, so I keep copying out the
pages, conscious that Volker is just a dozen or so feet away behind his
closed office door. My eyes flick around the alcove, the corridor that runs
alongside it. I’m alone. I could run now if I chose. But will Volker have
thought of that and given the people who guard the exits my description?
I’m going to do it. I’m going to get up and walk out of HQ—
And then Volker’s door opens and I see him reach for his cap and coat
and flick off the light.
Little idiot, you should have run while you had the chance, I tell
myself, fitting the cover over my typewriter like Lenore showed me how.
The whole evening stretches ahead of me, hours alone with Volker in his
apartment.
I collect my paper bag full of clothing and string bags of shopping and
follow Volker to the elevator. He seems to be in a very good mood, glancing
down at me with that small smile of his. “Did you have a good first day?”
As the elevator doors slide closed I think of something bland to say.
“I’m not a good typist. The keys are in a funny order.”
 He laughs, a delighted, full-throated laugh. “I’ve always thought so,
too.”
Are we sharing a moment, me and my captor? I don’t want friendship
from him, or shared confidences. I feel him tug on the string bags in my
hand and nearly swing them at him, thinking he’s attacking me, before I
realize he just wants to carry them for me. He tries to take the paper bag,
too, but I shake my head, my heart pounding. He doesn’t get to touch these.
They’re all I have left of the person I used to be.
When we arrive back at the apartment I’m relieved to hear Frau Fischer
in the kitchen and I wonder how long she stays in the evenings. I hope it’s
hours and hours.
Volker heads for my room with the bags of lotions and nylons, and I
dump my paper bag on the hall table and cry out, “I’ll take those!” The last
thing I want is him thinking he can waltz into my room whenever he likes.
Amused, he watches me prize the bags from his fingers and hurry away
from him. I take my time in the bathroom and bedroom, putting away my
new things. There’s plenty of space. There’s no evidence, either, that
anyone else has stayed in my bedroom recently. No telltale long hairs in the
corners. No half-empty tubes of lipstick or discarded bobby pins. Has he
done this before? Is this how he always recruits a new secretary, by stealing
a traitor, or am I the first?
When I come out into the lounge I can see Frau Fischer in the kitchen
but no other movement in the apartment. Maybe Volker’s gone out.
Standing in the kitchen doorway I watch the housekeeper for a moment and
then say, “Can I help with anything?”
She looks up with a friendly smile. “No, dear, I’m all right. Well, don’t
you look lovely. Did you have a good first day?”
I shrug. “It was all right.” I hear the front door open and close behind
me and jump. Volker did go out then, but he’s back. I can’t bear to be near
him so I push past him as he comes toward the kitchen, fleeing for my
room. I sit on my bed and hear him talking on the telephone, the sound of
Frau Fischer washing the dishes. An hour must tick by this way and I don’t
move. I’m frozen and scared in a way I wasn’t at HQ. This is his home and
I have no purpose here. I don’t know what he wants from me.
 I jump at the sound of a knock on my door. It’s Volker. “Dinner,
Evony.”
It’s been a long time since the tuna on rye at Lenore’s and my belly’s
rumbling, and whatever Frau Fischer was cooking smells delicious. But
eating means being close to him. “I’m not hungry.”
Volker’s voice turns cold. “It wasn’t a request. Come out, now.”
My hands clench on the bedclothes. I don’t want to do anything he
says. Giving into these little things could eventually mean giving in entirely.
But I look down at my clothes and realize I’ve given in a lot already.
Finding a way to escape may take some time. It will be exhausting and
possibly suicidal to fight Volker every minute of every day. As much as I
hate the idea, I’ll have to concede to do as he asks sometimes. I take a deep
breath and open the door. Volker’s smile is his sarcastic, obsequious smile,
the parody of a good host.
He holds out his arm. “After you, Fräulein.”
A set of sliding doors has been pulled back on the other side of the
lounge revealing a dining room. The table is set for two and laid with linen
placemats and silver. There’s a decanter of ruby wine and candles in sticks
and the food is in covered casseroles. Frau Fischer has gone, then. It’s so
disgustingly civilized that I want to sweep it all to the floor.
Choose your battles, Evony.
On the way to the table I remember my things—I left them on the hall
table. But when I go to collect them and put them safely in my room I see
that the table is empty.
I turn to Volker, a chill prickling down my neck. “Where are my
clothes?”
He pretends to look puzzled but he knows exactly what I’m talking
about. “That paper bag? I took it down to the incinerator.”
For a moment I can only stare at him, certain he must be lying. My
clothes can’t be gone. It’s impossible because I put them by the hall table
and they were right there, waiting for me. But I see from his face that he’s
not lying. He did burn them, and without asking me first.
I launch myself at him, my scream shattering the peace of the evening.
“They were all I had left of my life! That coat was all I had left of him. It
was my father’s coat. They were my clothes. You had no right.” I batter his
chest and shoulders but his body easily absorbs the blows. He holds onto
my elbows but doesn’t move—he doesn’t even seem surprised. When I
reach up to claw at his face with my newly manicured nails he grabs my
wrists, turns me around and crushes me against his chest. My arms are
trapped beneath his and I shriek, thrashing about, trying to twist free, trying
to bite, but I’m held as if in a vice.
“Let me go.” The memory of his hard, hungry eyes fills my vision. Are
his hands going to move down over my body now, taking what I won’t
give? I’ll scream so loudly the neighbors will think someone’s being
murdered. I’ll bite him until he bleeds and scratch his eyes out.
“No. I will not let you go.” His mouth is close to my ear and he doesn’t
need to speak above a harsh, sinister whisper. “You don’t need reminders of
your old life as you are never going back. Do you understand? This is your
life now. You’re mine.”
Hearing him lay it out so coldly and brutally takes my breath away. I
wish his housekeeper and secretary could see him now. They haven’t felt
him ruthlessly hunt them down, catch them, possess them. Take sadistic
pleasure in trapping them, body and soul. “You can’t make me forget who I
am. I’ll always remember, and I’ll always hate you for what you’ve done.”
“Oh?” There’s so much scorn and amusement in that one brief
question. His breath is warm against my ear and I feel him looking down at
me, enjoying that he has me his mercy. He plants a slow, tender kiss on the
side of my neck and I feel my pulse thundering beneath his lips. It’s a kiss
that belies the cold cruelty of his words and the steel of his embrace. It’s the
kiss of a lover, soft and sensuous, and something clenches low in my belly
in response.
I expected cruelty, and armed myself against brutality, but I wasn’t
prepared for this. I wasn’t prepared for him to be gentle and I don’t know
how to fight it. He shifts his arms, one hand moving to caress my throat and
I draw in a soft breath of surprise and need. He feels it, and his lips move up
to my jaw, trailing burning kisses.
No, please, I don’t want this. He can’t strip me of my will to resist him
along with everything else. I will garb myself in hatred for him. I will steep
my body in antipathy and rage. Even so, it takes every ounce of strength I
have to speak. “I’ll never be yours.”
But it comes out as a breathy whisper, not the defiant shout I wanted it
to be.
His lips curve into a smile against my throat. “Oh, Liebling. Yes, you
will. I have not even begun to try and you are already giving in.”
My eyes fill with tears. He’s wrong. He’s wrong. But my body has
betrayed me because I’m not even fighting anymore. How can this be
happening, after all he’s done? I remember my father and Ana and I feel so
ashamed. “I hate you.” But my voice is filled with anguish, not defiance.
Volker releases me so suddenly that I stagger, and drag breath into my
lungs as if I’ve been drowning. When I turn to face him that hard,
emotionless look is back in his eyes. He straightens his uniform jacket and
cuffs as if he can’t bear to be in even the slightest disarray. “Go to bed.
You’re overwrought.” And without another word he turns and walks into
the dining room.
I stand shaking where I am. What gives him the right to do the things
that he does? Is it this system which grants him so much power without
restraint? Yesterday I would have said that I distrust how East Germany is
organized, with its spies and secret police, but now I detest it. On unsteady
feet I make my way to my bedroom, tears brimming on my lashes. I feel
sick of crying before I remember that I haven’t actually cried, not properly.
No longer able to swallow down my tears they break like a storm, and I
throw myself down on my bed and muffle my sobs in a pillow.
My mind keeps circling back to one thing, and it’s the most ridiculous,
insignificant part of this whole mess: that was the first time a man’s ever
kissed me. It was my neck he kissed, but it doesn’t matter. That was being
kissed. There was passion in it, and desire. Possession. I felt it, responded to
it, and for that I’m so ashamed. I’m a traitor of a different sort now—to Ana
and my father.
There’s a knock on my door and my whole body clenches in fear. But a
moment later I hear Frau Fischer’s voice, not Volker’s. “Evony, can I come
in?”
 I sit up wiping my face, and my fingers come away black: the mascara.
It’s everywhere, and gumming my eyelashes together. Frau Fischer opens
the door, bearing a tray of something steaming and sets it down on the
bedside table. “Herr Oberstleutnant called to say you are unwell. But what’s
the matter? Have you been crying?”
There are black smudge marks on the white pillowcase as well.
“Called?” I ask thickly.
“Ja, I live just down the street, the top apartment in the blue and white
building.”
“Oh.” I know the one she means. It’s just a few doors down, and even
though she’s loyal to Volker it’s comforting to know that she’s nearby.
“Have you got a stomach ache or are you homesick? I’ve brought some
soup for you. Herr Oberstleutnant said you haven’t eaten yet.” She makes
me get into bed and puts the tray over my lap, and I let her because it’s nice
to have someone fussing over me in this motherly fashion. All my life it
was just me and Dad and I looked after him for as long as I can remember.
Frau Fischer sits on the bed and tells me about herself while I eat a
little of the soup. It’s very good, a clear broth with sliced sausage and
mushroom. I think I taste lemon and thyme, too. It’s miles better than the
food I make though I’m sure I could have bought the same ingredients.
There’s a piece of rye bread, very dark and cut thickly.
She has three grown daughters and the eldest lives with her along with
a baby grandson, whose name is Thom, and her granddaughter called Lea.
“Their mother is working at the television station right now.”
I look up in surprise. “But who is watching the baby?”
“Lea is watching Thom. She’s eleven, and a very good girl, though
how she does complain when she has to babysit.”
“You should go back to them. I’m sorry you were called away.”
She shakes her head. “In a minute, when you’re finished your supper.”
I’m grateful for her kindness, but I’m also curious. She’s more familiar
with Volker than anyone else is as she knows his private habits. Hoping that
I won’t somehow get her into trouble, I ask, “What do you think about
Oberstleutnant Volker? As a man, I mean?”
 She looks baffled by my question, as though it’s never occurred to her
to have an opinion about her employer. “He’s a very good man. A fair
man.”
Oh, what rot. She can’t really believe that, can she? I wonder if she’ll
think I’m spying on her if I ask too many questions, but I can’t help myself.
“I won’t tell him what you tell me, I promise. I’m just trying to understand
him better.” I want to be able to predict his behavior. If I can predict him, I
can outwit him.
She gives me a curious look. “But you must know him quite well
yourself? Though I don’t hold with people knowing everything about each
other before they are married. Some things should come later. Like living
together.” She looks around the room. “But you’re in here, so that’s
something in this day and age. Young women have so much more freedom
since the war and I can’t think that it’s good for them.”
I nearly choke on a bite of bread. She thinks I’m going to marry
Volker? Is that what he told her, or has she come up with this palatable
explanation for my presence herself? I want to tell her what I told Lenore,
that he’s keeping me here against my will, but if I do she might clam up. “I
know a little about him. I just thought you might know more.”
The older woman thinks for a moment and says, “Herr Oberstleutnant
keeps to himself much of the time and he works a great deal. He’s not had a
happy life, I think.”
I frown down at my soup. I don’t want to sit here and listen to someone
try and make me feel sorry for that monster. Oblivious to my rising hackles,
she goes on. “He doesn’t talk to me, of course, but I can feel he hasn’t been
happy. He’s never married before, but of course you would know that.”
So, he keeps to himself and works. I wonder how he’s getting his kicks.
“Has he had any other women here in his apartment before?”
Frau Fischer looks scandalized. “No, he never has guests to stay.”
I ponder this for a moment, tearing bits off the rye bread and rolling
them between my fingers. “Doesn’t that seem odd to you? Doesn’t he seem
like the sort of person who likes…” I struggle for a tactful way to put it.
“Female company?” The way he looks at me, the way he kissed my neck,
he might have done those things merely to frighten me, a way of keeping
me scared and guessing. But it felt like he was doing it at least in part
because he wanted to, and could.
Frau Fischer hesitates, uncertain. “Well, there is one rumor.”
“That he is known as der Mitternachtsjäger and people tend to go
missing after he captures them?”
She blanches, and I see that she’s heard this rumor and doesn’t like to
think about it. “No. I mean, yes, I’ve heard something to that effect, but I
meant—well, I shouldn’t really tell you…”
I plaster a smile on my face, hoping it makes me look like someone she
wants to confide in. “Oh, do tell me. He talks so little about himself, and if
it’s just a rumor there’s no harm in sharing it. I don’t believe every rumor I
hear.”
Frau Fischer gives me a stern look. “Very sensible of you. You
certainly shouldn’t believe this one as I’m sure it’s not true.”
“Of course.”
“And I only tell you this as you are to marry him and a woman should
always be aware of these things.”
“Oh, I agree.”
After looking around the room as if to make sure an informant hasn’t
snuck in while we’ve been talking, she leans forward and whispers, “It’s
rumored he has a lover in the West.”
If she’d told me Volker spent his weekends doing amateur acrobatics I
couldn’t have been more floored. Stasi officers might be hypocrites and eat
French marmalade but they do not have liaisons with Westerners. If anyone
at HQ found out about it he would be accused of passing on State secrets,
summarily tried and executed by firing squad.
“It’s only a rumor of course,” she says hastily, seeing the incredulous
look on my face.
“But where did it come from? Is there any truth to it?”
Frau Fischer is opening her mouth to reply when we hear footsteps out
in the apartment. Volker is moving around somewhere. She gets up quickly,
tells me to finish my supper like a good girl and leaves the room.
I was only eating to keep Frau Fischer talking so I put the tray aside
and think. The rumor might be true. Perhaps Volker is arrogant enough to
believe that he’s so important no one can touch him. If it’s true and I find
proof he could be dead within a week.
I wince, as I never used to be so callous. But these are desperate times
and if he can shoot Ana in cold blood and keep me captive in his apartment
then he deserves whatever I can do to him. I might even escape prison: if I
prove a trusted Stasi officer is a traitor the evidence might secure a pardon
for my attempt to flee to the West.
But it can’t be true. If he has a woman in the West, why doesn’t he
defect? And if he has her, why does he want to keep me locked up here and
look at me like he’s a starving wolf?
No, it doesn’t make sense, but anything might be possible and I resolve
to keep my eyes and ears open. The more information I gather about Volker
the better chance I have of escaping this nightmare.

OceanofPDF.com
 Chapter Eight
Evony

When I wake in the morning I know where I am before I open my eyes but I
want to pretend I’m still at home. It’s difficult because the bed feels
different. Spongier, and bigger. The light’s different, too. At home my
bedroom faced south and there’d be bright morning light shining around the
curtains to wake me up. This bedroom must face north or west as the light
is soft.
I feel different, too. Weary and gritty-eyed. But I make-believe that my
dad’s hanging out the window with an f6, smoking it quickly before I get
out of bed because he knows I’ll make him go downstairs to smoke once
I’m up. He’s got a map of East Germany unfolded on the table, and we’ll
plan our first daytrip of the year, maybe to Naturpark Barnim north of
Berlin. We don’t own a car but my dad will borrow one from the
automotive shop and we’ll take Ulrich and Ana with us. Ana and I will sit
in the back and sing songs we learned in the Free German Youth, making
my dad moan his displeasure. As soon as we’re outside the city limits we’ll
beg Ulrich to tune the radio to a Western station, and he will, and we’ll all
sing along at the tops of our voices to Buddy Holly and Elvis Presley,
muddling through the English words as best we can.
Dad will park the car on the edge of the forest and we’ll walk miles and
miles through the trees and across the fields, and Ana and I will say that
isn’t this far enough? But there’ll be another field to cross, and another hill
to climb, because Dad will look over his shoulder, pretend he can still see
the Brandenburg Gate and holler, “No, we’re not far enough away yet!”
Finally we’ll stop and spread the picnic rug out and all flop down,
exhausted. I’ll be the first to declare that I’m hungry and I’ll dig through the
basket and pass out tinned beef sandwiches, apple juice and bottles of beer
for Ulrich and Dad.
Ulrich will lay on his back and call out the animals he can see in the
clouds or start a game of I spy. Dad will drink two beers and loudly list all
the things he hates about the regime and the USSR that he’s been keeping
bottled up in the city. “Did you know Stalin allowed five million Ukrainians
to starve in the thirties while he continued to export grain? Maybe even ten
million. Forced deportations. Fourteen million people sent to the Gulag
labor-camps. And this is who we have to thank for our glorious GDR.
Prost!” And he’ll thrust his beer bottle into the air and roar with laughter.
And we’ll laugh too, not because what he’s saying is funny but because it
feels so wickedly defiant.
I open my eyes and the dream evaporates. Ana’s gone, Ulrich’s gone,
Dad’s gone. There’s only the smooth white plaster of this strange bedroom
ceiling and tears fill my eyes. I miss them so much it’s a physical pain. I
hope Dad and Ulrich are together, wherever they are. I’ve considered asking
Volker if they’re in prison but I’m afraid he won’t answer me and I’m afraid
that he will. So I cling to the hope that they’re somewhere in East Germany
and we’ll find each other soon.
The days are as tense and unpleasant for me as the first one was. Volker
always seems to be somewhere nearby, listening, watching, though
thankfully he doesn’t try to touch me again. Guilt and self-loathing dog me
wherever I go. I’ll be in the middle of a task Lenore has given me, like
filing or typing, when a wave of it hits me and I struggle to breathe. Why
did I react the way that I did when he kissed me? It must be because I’ve
never been kissed before. I was caught off guard. It wasn’t that I liked it or I
find him attractive.
When Lenore and I are alone in the filing room I ask her if she’s heard
the rumor about Volker having a lover in the West. Her eyes grow so wide I
think they’re going to pop out of her head. “Are you mad? Herr
Oberstleutnant would never betray the Party like that. He’s loyal to them
above all other things.” She’s so indignant at the suggestion that Volker
could be doing anything illegal that she doesn’t talk to me for two hours and
I become quite annoyed with her.
 Lenore’s devotion to Volker, I soon realize, isn’t put on to ingratiate
herself with him. She really does think he’s wonderful. He’s affectionate
toward her in an elder brother sort of way, teasing her and making her smile
when he’s in a good mood. He doesn’t attempt to tease me, though he
brings us little presents now and then like Western magazines and Swiss
chocolate. Whatever one gets the other gets, too, as if he’s careful of not
creating friction between his two secretaries, though his fingers seem to
brush mine in a way they don’t Lenore’s. Whatever he gives me I put into a
drawer as soon as his back is turned and slam it shut.
I want to dislike Lenore for being naïve about Volker but just when I
think I have her figured out, she surprises me. One long, wet afternoon
neither of us seem to have the energy to be good little secretaries and my
fingers ache from so much shoddy typing. Volker is out somewhere,
probably putting the fear of God into the populace. Lenore brings her chair
over to my desk, ostensibly to teach me shorthand, but we end up flicking
through magazines and eating the chocolate Volker has given us. I try not
to, but it really is very good chocolate, creamy and sweet and melts on your
tongue. Heaven in a little silver foil packet. The sugar makes us giggly and
we end up trading jokes. Lenore tells me a political gag that I never thought
could pass her lips.
“A group of East German ministers are sent on a diplomatic mission to
Austria where they are introduced to all sorts of important people. Finally,
they meet the head of the Austrian Navy. One minister bursts out laughing.
“But you have no coastline!” The Austrian is very offended. ‘How rude. We
were very polite when the GDR’s Minister for Trade was introduced.’”
It’s a very Lenore sort of joke because she does get so annoyed with the
shortages, but I’m still scandalized she would tell it. Scandalized and
delighted. I start to snort with laughter when I notice that Volker has
returned and has stopped dead a few feet away from us. He’s overhead
every word and there’s a hard, unfriendly look in his eyes. Lenore makes a
little gasping sound when she notices him and her fingers grab mine
beneath the desk.
Volker sits on the edge of her desk, facing us, his legs crossed at the
ankles. I feel my spine straighten, ready to defend her, words of protest on
my tongue. It was my idea, I made her tell me. I told five jokes just like that
you didn’t hear. She didn’t mean anything by it.
“Why do Stasi officers make such good taxi drivers?”
My mouth falls open. Volker looks back and forth between us, then
leans forward, conspiratorial, and lifts his dark brows once, twice. “Because
we know where you live.” He tips back his head and roars with laughter,
then goes into his office and closes the door.
Lenore looks at me, white-faced and bewildered, then buries her face in
my shoulder, her body shaking with helpless giggles. I can’t quite believe
what just happened.
Another day Volker comes in from a meeting with his coat slung over
his arm and he stops in front of my desk. “Liebling,” he murmurs, so quietly
only I can hear. He usually calls me Fräulein Dittmar when there are people
around. When I’m alone with him in his office he calls me Evony. I’m
rarely in his office, though, as I can’t take dictation without knowing
shorthand and I ensure I’m making very slow progress at it.
When I look up, Volker draws a short-stemmed red rose from a fold of
his coat and holds it out to me. A red rose, in January. He must know
someone with a greenhouse. “Take it,” he says, a small smile on his lips, but
I shake my head. He’ll get angry now, and his eyes will turn black because
I’ve refused him. The magazines and chocolates I took at once, if
gracelessly, but a rose? I can’t take a rose from him.
He only smiles, his eyes a tender blue. “It’s for you, take it.”
As with the softness of his kiss, it’s his gentleness that undoes me.
Chewing the corner of my lip, I take the bloom, and as he lets go of the
stem his forefinger strokes the length of mine, sending shivers up my arm.
“Danke,” he says, just as quietly. He turns to Lenore and in a normal tone of
voice says, “And of course there’s one for you.”
Lenore’s exclamations of thanks are loud and effusive but he waves her
off and goes into his office, closing the door. “Aren’t they beautiful?” she
says, smiling down at her flower. “I’ve not seen roses like these in years.
Herr Oberstleutnant is so good to us.”
It is a beautiful flower. The petals are vivid red, like blood, and are as
soft as the insides of cats’ ears. I look to the window at the far end of the
corridor, of which I can see just a sliver. All is leaden and grim beyond the
glass. I hold more beauty in my hands than there is in the whole city.
Lenore finds two small vases for our roses and places mine beside my
typewriter. My eyes can’t help but be drawn to it for the rest of the day.
In the evenings after dinner I try to hide in my room, but from the third
day Volker insisted I sit with him in the living room. I’m to read or do
anything else I want, but I must remain on the sofa opposite him. I don’t
know why, as he ignores me for hours on end, reading over reports which I
think must be Stasi intelligence. Occasionally he lifts the telephone at his
elbow and makes a call, presumably to one of his colleagues, questioning
them about production figures at a factory or the number of new recruits
among the border guards. I listen carefully, pretending to read a history of
Rome or the Americas, but I don’t learn anything useful. Probably the really
interesting work that he does happens behind closed doors where I can’t
listen in. It baffles me why he concerns himself with things that seem far
beneath him and incredibly tedious. But I begin to realize that Volker is a
thorough and methodical man. Thanks to Lenore, I know that the Stasi
doesn’t just amass informants and raid the houses of traitors. They do a
whole host of things. Gather intel on the West, for instance. Intercept mail
and communications, thwart sabotage, investigate suspected dissidents.
They guard the Wall and protect government buildings and Party members.
They’re responsible for documenting travelers, providing diplomats,
liaising with the Soviets, running prisons. Their reach is breath-taking. I had
no idea.
Which one of these was our undoing? I wonder. The Stasi knew we
planned to flee through the bakery. How?
While covertly studying Volker in the evenings I work out that he’s
looking for coincidences or inconsistencies, small things that probably don’t
mean anything, but might. When he spots something he picks up the phone
and arranges for someone to look into it. Despite my dislike of him I have
to respect his dedication to his work, though I suppose it shouldn’t surprise
me that der Mitternachtsjäger is good at his job.
Every now and then his eyes wander from the typed pages and I catch
him watching me, his expression thoughtful. Sometimes he looks at my
ankles, crossed together as I read. Sometime it’s my neck as I flex it from
one side to another, stiff from sitting still too long. My insides clench with
alarm when I see him looking at me, wondering if he’s about to get up and
move toward me, but he doesn’t. They’re admiring looks. Softly
appreciative. I think it must be the way a man looks at a woman when he
wants to touch her, but I don’t know how I know that. It unnerves me, and I
find myself wishing that if he did have to look at me he would be a lecher, a
groper, so I could tell him how disgusting he is.
At night I’m sometimes woken by the click of the latch on the front
door and I know he’s going out hunting. He always leaves just before
midnight and when he’s gone I get up and watch him through the living
room window as his uniformed figure retreats down the garden path to his
car. The front door is deadlocked and there’s always a guard standing by the
gate. I’ve seen from the kitchen window that there’s another in the alleyway
out back. Volker is careful.
When he goes out on these forays he takes his car and drives it himself,
but beyond that I have no idea where he goes or what he does. Sometimes
I’m still awake when he comes back at two or three or four am. Other
nights I fall back asleep and find him standing and reading the paper in the
kitchen at half-past seven. He never yawns or appears weary or
acknowledges to me that he went out. I covertly study his face, wondering
if der Mitternachtsjäger had a successful night or not, but he gives nothing
away.
On Sunday morning, after I’ve been his captive for nine days, I go out
to the kitchen very early. It’s so early that Frau Fischer hasn’t come yet and
I don’t expect Volker to be up, and he doesn’t seem to be as the apartment is
quiet. There are small things moving down in the garden, blackbirds and
thrushes whirring through the bare branches. I want a cup of coffee, and I
stand yawning by the stove waiting for the kettle to whistle and watch a red
squirrel take a few pattering steps over the frozen ground.
Nine days. There haven’t been any opportunities to escape as almost
every day is the same: I go to Stasi HQ with Volker and then I return with
him. If he leaves me alone then there are always soldiers nearby to make
sure his prisoner doesn’t get away. But something will happen and I’ll get
my chance, I’m sure of it. Volker will let his guard down or he’ll take me
somewhere where I can get away from him. Or one of my friends will find
me, one of the people who was in the bakery that night who got away. I
can’t have been the only one to run back out onto the streets of East Berlin.
It was chaos down in the bakery. I was captured because I was unlucky
enough to have drawn der Mitternachtsjäger’s attention but that means
others could have evaded him. We’ll pass on the street and our eyes will
lock, and they’ll know I need help.
I remember Dad and how jumpy he was the night of our intended
escape. Maybe it was because of Frau Schäfer being taken, or maybe he had
some premonition that it was all going to go wrong. Animals are said to
seek shelter hours before a thunderstorm hits through some sixth sense, so
maybe that happens to people, too. Or maybe he was just rightly terrified
because we were about to attempt something dangerous.
Prison, dead, East or West? I wonder, my mind revolving over where
Dad might be. Four possibilities, and Volker knows the answer. He can’t be
in the West as he’d never leave me behind in a country he hates, and I will
not countenance him being imprisoned or dead. I pray that he’s in the East,
biding his time until we can escape together. But I don’t know. I can’t know.
So until I ask the possibilities are all true, and none are true.
Once I’ve made my coffee I stand where I am, sipping it, my hands
clasped about the mug and enjoying a rare moment of solitude.
Except I’m not alone. A movement out of the corner of my eye makes
me turn and I see Volker in the doorway, leaning against the frame,
watching me. He’s in his shirtsleeves, his hands deep in his trouser pockets.
I don’t know why but I find him even more unnerving when he’s not in
uniform. The nights when he takes his jacket off, throwing it over the sofa
and rolling his sleeves back I find it hard to concentrate on my book. My
eyes keep drifting up from the page to look at his forearms, which are
strong and roped with veins. His skin has a faint golden cast to it even in the
depths of winter and his hands are large and square. His bearing is
confident. The people I’ve known all my life don’t look like Volker. I prefer
him in uniform because it reminds me of what he is: a Stasi officer, not a
man.
 He steps forward, his eyes on my hair. I normally keep it pinned up but
this morning I haven’t bothered yet and it’s hanging in long curls. He lifts
his hand and brushes the back of a finger down one strand and I feel it as
keenly as if he were caressing my face. It’s so intimate, so private in the
post-dawn hush. We might be anyone. We might be lovers. I feel an awful
compulsion to angle my cheek toward the warmth of his hand. But he’s
Volker, not my lover, and not someone I should be letting my guard down
around let alone wanting him to touch me. I jerk away like he’s burned me.
And he looks hurt. Breathing my anger in and out through my nose, all
the words I don’t dare say to him blare in my head. You don’t get to be hurt
that I don’t want you to touch me. You stole me, you’re keeping me prisoner.
I’m the one who reproaches you.
Smoothing out the taut expression on his face, Volker looks back at my
hair. “You should wear it down sometimes, Liebling.” He leans past me and
grasps the coffee pot, and I hurry out of the room.
Anger boils through me for the rest of the day and I can’t take to
anything. I almost wish it wasn’t Sunday and I was at Stasi HQ so I could
lose myself in work. Why I should be so unreasonably furious about what
happened in the kitchen I don’t know, until I realize that I’ve gradually
begun thinking of Volker not as a Stasi officer, and not as der
Mitternachtsjäger, but as a person. I don’t want him to become a person to
me. I don’t want to admire the verve with which he works or enjoy the low
rumble of his voice as he talks on the telephone, twisting a fountain pen in
his long fingers. He’s a cruel, cold-blooded killer who—
And then I remember. How could I have forgotten? He’s a Nazi on top
of everything else. I held the picture in my own hands: Oberstleutnant
Reinhardt Volker of the Staatssicherheit was once Hauptmann Reinhardt
Volker of the Wehrmacht. Someone in the factory got a hold of the photo
and we passed it around furtively, this evidence that the man we most
feared was once a hated Nazi. Some people, especially the men of my
father’s age and older who’d been conscripted, were circumspect, saying
that not everyone who fought for Germany was a Nazi. They were in the
minority, though. He was an officer, most said. He wasn’t like us. Those
that had power then have power now. The bastards in charge have merely
changed their uniforms.
By evening I’m thoroughly enraged, with both him and myself, and I
decide that this bizarre attraction I have to him stops now. I should have
made more of an effort to get to know the boys at school and the young men
at the factory instead of holding out for a ridiculous fantasy. Then I could
have experienced what normal attraction was like. This close proximity to
Volker is making me crazy.
After a silent dinner, we sit on the sofas as usual and he works, but I
can’t keep my eyes on my book. They flick up every few minutes to glare at
him and my heel bounces on the rug.
Finally, Volker looks at my feet and puts his papers aside. Folding his
hands together, he asks, “Is there something you wish to say, Evony?”
Oh, you bet there is. I can’t hold it in any longer and the words come
out like bullets. “What did you do during the war?”
He raises his eyebrow in surprise. “The war? I was in the Wehrmacht,
an officer in the Afrikakorps. Why?”
“Were you a Nazi?”
Something flickers in Volker’s eyes, almost as if he’s flinched. “No. I
was in the armed forces, not the Waffen-SS.”
I’ve heard this distinction before but I don’t know enough about the
two divisions to understand what that means. I do know that the SS were
more brutal and terrifying than the regular army. They ran the secret
services and the concentration camps and were closer to Hitler. But Hitler
and his subordinates commanded the Wehrmacht, too.
“Where were you born?” We were taught in school that there were
never any fascists in East Germany, that they all came from the West. I
don’t know whether this is true or not but it’s all I have to go on.
“Dresden. Evony, why all the questions?”
Dresden is in East Germany and he could be telling the truth. After all
there is a picture of Dresden in my bedroom and an antique, gold-rimmed
Dresden porcelain dinner set displayed in a glass cabinet not six feet from
where I’m sitting. I examined it late one night when he was out hunting,
looking for more clues as to who this man is.
 Instead of answering his question I ask another of my own. I don’t
know where this newfound bravado has come from but I’m determined to
use it before it dries up. “Did all the fascists come from the West or is that
just what the Party wants us to believe?”
Volker laughs, a genuine, amused laugh. “They still teach you that?
Germany was divided down arbitrary lines after the war. East Germany is
geographically close to the USSR so this eastern sector now answers to the
USSR. Of course some Nazis were born and bred in what is now East
Germany.”
Is that the extent of his loyalty to the Soviets and communism, the fact
that he found himself in a part of Germany closer to the USSR? If he can
base his loyalty on something as flimsy as geography then I can very well
believe he was once a fascist. “So you were a Nazi.”
His face hardens. I know I should stop talking but I’m tired of all this
hypocrisy and pretense. I jump to my feet, no longer able to control my
emotions. “Why can’t you just admit it? You exchanged one regime for
another, one uniform for the next. If China invaded tomorrow you would
probably be wearing their uniform by sunset. You love power more than
you love what is good and right, and you always have.”
Volker stands too, looming over me, his eyes dark and flashing. I seem
to have gravely offended him. “Call me a Nazi again, Liebling, and I will
make you regret it.”
He’s standing very close, too close, and even with his jaw set in anger
he’s handsome. “You’ve already taken everything from me. You’re a Nazi.
So go on, hit me, send me to prison, do your worst. Do you think I care?”
But he only shakes his head slowly, frowning like he’s puzzled. “I
don’t think you really believe that. So why are you…?” Then his face clears
and a smile dawns on his lips. “Ah, I see what you are doing. You were
hoping I was a Nazi, weren’t you? Is it easier for you to think of me as a
monster?”
His sudden change of attitude catches me off guard. I prefer him to be
angry so I can be defiant. I don’t know what to do when he smiles at me.
“You are a monster. You’re keeping me here against my will.”
 “I’m keeping you safe. Do you know where you’d be if any other Stasi
officer had caught you? In Hohenschönhausen. They’re not all as merciful
as I am.” He hooks an arm around my waist and draws me closer to him. I
feel the heat coming off his body and my hands come up to press against his
chest. I stare up into his face, too shocked to react or pull away. When he
speaks his voice rumbles against my fingers.
“I’m not a monster, Evony. I’m very nice if you get to know me better.
Would you like to get to know me better?”
I open my mouth to protest that it’s the last thing I want, but he kisses
me. His arms wrap around me and his lips are soft but insistent. It’s just like
that first night in his apartment, my head screaming that this is wrong but
my body not listening. So this is what it’s like to be kissed. Every place he’s
touching me, his lips on my mouth, his hands on my back, feels over-
sensitized.
“No, I wouldn’t,” I say breathlessly when he pulls away to look down
at me.
“I know when you’re lying to me, Liebling.”
His mouth descends on mine again, harder this time, and his hands
smooth down to my behind, squeezing lightly. Being touched there makes
my mouth open in surprise and his tongue slides against mine, questing,
probing. My body responds to his without conscious thought and I’m
kissing him back, wrapping my arms around his neck and rising on my toes,
wanting to get closer to him, needing more of him. It’s not gentlemanly
what he’s doing with his hands, kneading my flesh and beginning to ruck up
my skirt, but I don’t want him to be a gentleman. My tongue flicks his top
lip and he makes a sound in the back of his throat, a little growl, and it
sends a ripple of fire through me. I made him do that. Him, Volker—
Volker.
It’s as if a basin of cold water has been dumped over my head. I tear
myself away from him and swipe the back of my hand across my mouth.
I’ve been kissing Volker. That’s disgusting. What’s worse is I enjoyed every
second of it and there’s a fierce pulsing between my legs. “Why did you do
that? I don’t like you. I hate you.”
 He reaches for me, but I step quickly away. His eyes are gleaming like
a prowling animal’s. “Ja, you hate me. But you don’t dislike me, do you,
Liebling?”
I don’t know why the distinction is important. Hate, dislike, I just want
him not to make me feel the way that he just did. “There are plenty of other
women in East Berlin who would be happy for your attentions. Why me?
Don’t you care that I hate you so intensely?”
“Not really, no.” And as if to prove his point he kisses me again,
wrapping one arm around me and squeezing one of my breasts with his
other hand, rubbing the hard nipple and making me whimper against his
mouth. My body is on fire and he’s the only thing I want to be touching me.
My clothes feel tight and restrictive; his shirt feels too rough against my
hands and I know that if it was just skin against skin it would be so, so
much better. He breaks the kiss and looks down at my flustered face. “You
don’t dislike me, do you?”
The heat from his body is scorching me. I’m fully aware of who he is
and yet I can’t seem to pull away. He begins unfastening the buttons at the
front of my blouse and I’m struck by the dangerous reality of the situation. I
need to stop this now before I totally lose control. Volker is a killer. Volker
murdered your friend and probably put your father in prison. He doesn’t
need to be a Nazi—isn’t that enough for you?
A sob rises in my throat and finally the spell is broken. I pull myself
out of his arms and run. When I reach my bedroom I throw myself down on
the bed and pound a pillow with my fist over and over again until my hand
aches.
What have I done?

OceanofPDF.com
 Chapter Nine
Evony

Over the next week delegations of ministers from other Soviet-controlled

countries visit East Berlin, which means Volker’s constantly in meetings
with other uniformed, medaled, braid-festooned men. Lenore and I take
endless trays of coffee into his office while they smoke and talk,
presumably about the amusing ways they oppress people in their own
countries. Volker has State dinners and receptions every evening and he
either drops me back at his apartment himself or gets Hans to take me under
guard. Even though he barely has time to eat or read a report he never
forgets to remind me that there’ll be soldiers outside his apartment “for my
protection”. On Wednesday morning he even apologizes for leaving me
alone so much, a regretful expression on his face as he helps me into my
coat. I have to bite the inside of my mouth to keep from laughing. He thinks
I’m missing him?
In the evenings there’s nothing much for me to do at the apartment but
listen to the radio or read the books in Volker’s history and politics
collection. Biographies of Marx and Lenin aren’t my idea of fun and I leave
them on the shelves. He doesn’t own a television but I don’t find that to be
much of an inconvenience as I hate the bland, government-approved
programming. I’ve poked into all the drawers and cupboards, not looking
for anything in particular but just out of curiosity. I’m like a cat, sniffing in
the corners of an unfamiliar room. The one place I haven’t investigated is
Volker’s bedroom. I dread the thought of him coming home suddenly and
finding me in there. Just how angry that would make him I’m not sure, but I
don’t want to find out.
 Frau Fischer comes to the apartment between seven and eight every
evening to prepare dinner. I’m perfectly capable of making my own meals
on the nights that Volker is out but she insists that he wouldn’t like it, it’s
what she’s paid to do, and it’s what he expects.
By Thursday night I’m almost crying from boredom. Volker was
entertaining Bulgarians in his office for most of the day, three unattractive,
oily-haired men with ill-fitting uniforms that wore them rather than the
other way around. Volker looked markedly different, broad shouldered and
long limbed, his uniform perfectly tailored as always. And I learned a new
thing about him: he speaks another language. Presumably Bulgarian, as
they were all speaking it. He had the smallest of smiles for me as I passed
him his coffee cup, and my traitorous heart leapt into my throat when our
eyes met.
Does the gazelle tell the lion he’s handsome as he’s eating her up? No.
Get a hold of yourself, you stupid girl.
Having glared around the neat, comfortable, empty apartment, almost
wishing that Volker was there as resenting him is at least something to do, I
wander into the kitchen and find the housekeeper making soup. “Can I help
you with that, Frau Fischer?”
Predictably, she says, “No, dear, I can manage. How was your day?”
“Oh. Fine.” I slump into a chair and pick at the hem of my skirt. Lenore
had me memorize twenty shorthand symbols and I obediently did, despite
my intentions of being useless at it. I couldn’t help it. I was so bored. It’s
not as if I was used to endless fun and games in my past life, but I had
friends. I had people who loved me. I miss them.
Frau Fischer frowns at me, slicing up sticks of celery. “Anything the
matter? You’re not feeling unwell again, are you?”
I grimace. Unwell. A pretty euphemism. “Just lonely, I guess.”
Her lips compress in sympathy. “That’s understandable with the
Oberstleutnant being so busy. Would you mind stirring this while I pop
downstairs for a moment? I’ll be right back.”
I bite back my retort that I do not miss Volker and do as I’m asked,
swirling the stock and vegetables in a half-hearted manner while staring out
the window. The nights are slowly getting longer but the days are still
freezing and wet. It will improve a little in the spring, but even in summer
East Berlin is an unlovely place. The sunshine is never bright enough, the
sky is never blue enough for me. The heat makes me feel restless and
hemmed in as if the Wall is making the humidity rise. Families often take
trips to Hungary or Bulgaria in the summer but even before the Wall Dad
never liked to. “Swap one communist regime for another? We may as well
stay here.”
Frau Fischer is back a few minutes later, but she’s not alone. There’s a
beautiful baby boy on her hip, chubby-limbed and with one fist stuffed into
his mouth. “This is Thom,” she says, smiling broadly. “Would you like to
hold him?”
I’ve already got my arms out for him. “Yes please. Aren’t you a sweet
boy?” I sit down on a chair with Thom and hold him up facing me, his feet
pressed against my lap. His blue eyes are very wide as he stares at my
unfamiliar face, then he gives a gurgle and grins at me, still chewing on his
fingers.
Frau Fischer smiles and goes back to her cooking. “I thought he might
cheer you up. Thom’s a good baby and Lea will be glad to be free of him
for a little while.”
He is a good baby, and I tell him so repeatedly as I bounce him on my
knee. When I bury my nose in his curls he smells like soap and applesauce.
“Do you want children?” the housekeeper asks me as I’m reading the
label of the pickle jar to Thom.
I feel a pang of regret and loss. I did want children, but I can’t imagine
what bizarre set of circumstances could result in me having children now. I
feel like I have one foot in Hohenschönhausen everywhere I go. “Oh.
Maybe.”
Frau Fischer adds sliced sausage to the pot. “Herr Oberstleutnant will
make a wonderful father.”
I make faces at Thom and think to him, Your Oma thinks I’m going to
marry her horrible boss and have his babies. Isn’t that funny?
The housekeeper suddenly stops stirring the pot and pricks an ear at the
ceiling. “Did you hear something?” I listen, but I don’t hear anything.
 “Rats,” she mutters darkly. “I can hear them scurrying around in the
rafters when I’m lying in bed. All these attics are connected and they run up
and down all night long.”
Now that she mentions it I have heard scuffling at night. “Rats, Thom.
Yuck.” Thom stares at me and says “Ooo.”
“It’s those nasty people who lived in the top apartment next to mine.
They were always leaving food out. Good thing they’re gone now.”
We’re so busy talking and I’m so preoccupied with making Thom
giggle that we don’t hear the front door. There’s movement out of the corner
of my eye and I look toward it, mid-laugh, Thom cuddled in my arms. It’s
Volker, and he’s looking down at me and the baby with such naked
displeasure that my happiness is vaporized as if shot by a laser.
A moment later Volker’s face closes and he starts going through the
bundle of letters he’s holding in his hands, examining postmarks and
addressers with exaggerated care. “Frau Fischer, if you’re in need of a
babysitter so that you may perform your duties here perhaps you could go
through a more suitable channel.”
Thom is whisked out of my arms by the red-faced housekeeper. I stand
up and follow Volker into the living room as he continues to peruse his
letters. He’s pretending nonchalance but his jaw is flexing in anger. Why,
because I was happy for once in this miserable place? “She was only being
nice. I was lonely. There’s nothing to do in this prison.” I wave my arm
around at the living room.
Volker takes a letter opener from the desk in the corner and rips across
the top of an envelope as if he’s disemboweling it. “Frau Fischer is here to
do a job and you’re not to distract her from that.”
“Frau Fischer is doing her job. Thom has a babysitter but she brought
him upstairs to make me feel better.” How dare he upset her like that?
Everything she does is to make his life more comfortable.
Volker’s standing with his profile to me and looking down his long,
straight nose at his letter, but I can tell he’s not seeing the words. “How self-
righteous you are, Evony. It’s surprising, considering what you are.”
This change of tack catches me off-guard. “What do you mean, what I
am?”
 Folding the paper, he puts it back into its envelope and glances up.
There’s a bright, nasty gleam in his eye. “What I say, what you are. A
coward. A shirker. A traitor.”
Oh, so we’re going to play the who’s-a-worse-person game, are we?
Drawing myself up to my full height of five-feet-five I practically spit at
him, “If attempting to flee this regime makes me a traitor, then I’m a traitor
and proud, and every good, decent person I’ve ever known is one, too.
They’re ten times the people the Stasi are.”
Volker shakes his head, a withering look on his face. “I’m not speaking
as a Stasi officer, I am speaking as a German. You’re a poor excuse for one,
East or West. Everyone who flees is corrupt. Weak. Like a building infested
with termites.” He looks at his next letter, inspecting it front and back. “One
wonders how the West has not collapsed under the burden of you all.”
I’m being lectured on morality by a Stasi officer. I wish my father were
around to hear this—he’d die of laughter. “You’d tell me how to be a good,
moral German? You who terrorizes us and imprisons us in our own city?”
“Yes, I am a good German. I have fought for Germany, been
imprisoned for Germany; I devote my life to East Germany. Every single
thing I do is for this country. Since the war my every action has been to
build a stronger Republic and I will continue to do this until the day I die.”
He turns toward me, looming over me, making me feel like a kitten raising
her hackles at a German Shepherd. In a cold, seething voice, he asks, “What
have you ever done for something bigger than yourself, or can you not see
beyond the tip of that pretty nose of yours?”
If this country expects my devotion then I should be able to demand
something in return, shouldn’t I? Like freedom of thought and movement. If
ever I was going to love East Germany that love was killed the day the Wall
went up. “I have worked in the factories since I was sixteen. I’m not afraid
of work.”
Volker laughs. “Oh, you worked? The bare minimum required of our
citizens. Things are a little uncomfortable for you so you want to flee,
taking all the time and money that East Germany has invested in you,
keeping you clothed and fed and educated for twenty-three years, to the
West, where they can exploit it for themselves. They will take you in and
spit you out when you’re no longer useful, when instead you could be here,
working to make this country great.”
Uncomfortable? He thinks this regime is uncomfortable? How would
he even know, with his West German car and his French marmalade?
Things are never uncomfortable for those in power. “Not everything you do
is for the Republic. I’m not being kept here “for Germany” am I?”
Volker’s teeth grind together. “This is my home and I do not wish to
return to a menagerie of women and babies after a long day. Now get out of
my sight.”
I fold my arms, pleased I hit a nerve. “Gladly. Send me to prison, I’ll
do time for Germany if it means I don’t ever have to look at you again.”
He laughs coldly. “You have no idea what you’re talking about.”
Oh, and you do? I’m about to retort, but then I remember what he said.
I was imprisoned for Germany. How could an officer in the Wehrmacht and
an officer in the Stasi have been in prison and still hold the positions that he
has and does? Does he mean he was imprisoned in East Germany, or
Germany when it was one country?
Despite my bravado the idea of real prison is terrifying. Less than a
week of slow evenings here and I’m climbing the walls. Ten years in
Hohenschönhausen would send me mad. “No? I’ll happily learn.”
He must see the fear in my face as his body relaxes and he digs in his
jacket pocket for his cigarettes. “It’s a pleasing thought, driving you down
to the prison and locking you in for a few nights until you learn some
gratitude.”
He’d enjoy that wouldn’t he, collecting me penitent and cowed from
prison. “Do it. I don’t care. I’ll never be grateful for you.”
He chuckles, lighting a cigarette, and that infuriatingly indulgent smile
is back. “Never say never, Liebling.”

∞ ∞ ∞
The argument with Volker casts a pall over me for the next few days. Being
called selfish for believing that I have the right to opt out of the country I
was born into and go elsewhere stings. Surely it’s not selfish to want more
than this? But what is more? My father hates the Soviets and Ana wanted to
go to a free-thinking university. Ulrich wanted to start his own business and
to own land like his parents once had. I didn’t really have a plan. I think I
was swept along by the currents of their needs. If I was in the West now
with them I’m certain I’d be happy as I’d be with the people I loved. But
what do I want? I’m stunned that I could have made the choice to flee so
unthinkingly, and the knowledge that I did makes me feel like I’ve
misjudged the last step on a staircase.
I dearly want to ask Lenore what she thinks about all this as she’s the
closest thing I have to a friend, but I know without asking that she doesn’t
think anything about this. She’s one of the least political people I’ve ever
met though she’s intelligent and quick-witted. It’s as if she’s never thought
beyond the pond she swims in. The ideal East German.
Because thinking is too upsetting I try and be a good little secretary
instead. I learn where the w key is on the typewriter without having to look
and decipher the wriggles and lines of shorthand until I can transcribe from
Lenore’s stenography pad and just about keep up with the speed of normal
human speech. Every morning I dress in the clothes that Volker paid for and
twist and pin my hair up. I don’t wear the makeup that Lenore chose as it
feels uncomfortable on my face, but she can usually cajole me into putting
on a little lipstick after we’ve drunk our morning coffee.
I’m accepting things. I’m acquiescing to what Volker has made of my
life and I hate him more than ever. The feeling seems to be mutual. He
barely looks at me now and I wonder if he dislikes me enough not to find
me interesting or attractive, or whatever it was he thought of me.
Until the afternoon he calls me into his office.
Lenore has disappeared into another part of the building and Volker
puts his head around his office door, saying he has an urgent letter that he
needs to dictate so I can type it out.
“Fräulein Hoffman will be back any minute…” I call, but he goes back
to his desk, leaving his door open. My stomach flutters. I don’t like the
thought of going into his office and I’ve heard how quickly he dictates
letters to Lenore. If he talks that fast to me I’ll be able to catch about one
word in ten.
I go in and close the door. Once I’ve settled myself in the chair in front
of his desk he fixes his eyes on a point somewhere above my head and
begins to recite his letter. He’s as clipped and professional with me as he is
with Lenore, though I notice he’s speaking a lot slower than usual and I’m
able to keep up. My skin’s prickling with awareness of him, making me
forget the symbol for every third word so I have to write them out in full.
It’s not a long letter and we’re done in less than five minutes, and
examining its contents it doesn’t sound particularly urgent, either.
But when I look up and see him gazing at me with a speculative gleam
in his eyes, I realize it isn’t. The letter was just an excuse to get me in here.
“I’ve got a present for you, Liebling.”
My heart plunges through my body. He hasn’t called me that for days.
Leaning forwards he places a cellophane wrapped packet on the desk in
front of me. Silk stockings. Lenore’s favorite sort. Getting her hands on a
packet is the highlight of her month.
“Thank you, Herr Oberstleutnant,” I mutter, taking them and standing
up. Lenore’s welcome to these.
“Evony.”
I just want to get out of his office but his voice holds me in place.
“Would you like to come here?” He glances at the desk in front of him
and then back at me.
My pulse races. There and do what exactly? “I thought this letter was
urgent.”
“I’ve changed my mind. I want to put those stockings on you instead.”
The packet grows clammy in my hands even as I feel my body heat.
Put them on me. Touch my legs. Put his hands beneath my skirt. I can
anticipate the touch of his fingers, the gentleness with which he’ll smooth
the soft, gossamer fabric up my thighs, and my body begins to feel liquid
and heavy. That’s why I can’t go anywhere near him. I can’t be trusted.
He watches me for a moment, thoughtful. “Most people can’t imagine
what it’s like in Hohenschönhausen. It’s bleak, Liebling. The guards do not
talk to the prisoners. The prisoners don’t talk to each other. The prisoners
do not even get to see each other. The lights stay on all night. There is no
sky. No wind. No hope.”
The hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. I don’t doubt what he’s
telling me is true but I will never be thankful for the life he’s given me
instead. A little of my bravado from the other night stirs within me. “You’ve
got an interesting seduction technique, threatening me. Out of practice?”
A sleek smile crosses his handsome face. He knows exactly what he’s
doing, I just haven’t figured it out yet. It’s not supposed to happen like this,
I think desperately. I was supposed to meet a nice young man in the West
who wants to hold my hand, not a predatory, cold-blooded Stasi officer who
wants me to sit on his desk while he puts silk stockings on me.
“Perhaps I’m just trying to make this easier for you.”
I don’t understand him at first, and then I realize what he means: if I
think I have no choice I won’t have to feel guilty for enjoying what he does.
“That’s so manipulative,” I whisper.
The silky, dangerous tone is back. “I think you mean thank you, Herr
Oberstleutnant.”
Biest. I walk around his desk and thrust the stockings into his hand, not
looking at him.
Volker’s gaze travels from my feet, up to the hem of my A-line skirt
and back again, his gaze soft and appreciative. “Take off your shoes.”
I’m stubbornly still for a moment, making him wait, and then I slip my
feet out of the pumps and stand on the carpet. My eyes are drawn to his
fingers as he slowly unwraps the stockings. For all me being a morally
corrupt, poor excuse for a German he certainly gives me lots of little
presents and admiring looks. And now this.
But my thoughts are cut short when he grasps me by the hips and
settles me on his desk. He looks up at me, that small, satisfied smile playing
around his lips. He’s holding me lightly, his fingers a gentle pressure, but
suddenly I don’t think I could move away if I tried. His hands move down
to my thighs, over my skirt, and I begin to breathe a little faster, my lips
parting. He watches every emotion that flickers over my face, studying me,
hungry for my reactions.
 Sliding his fingers beneath my skirt, he deftly unclips the awkward
little fastenings on my garter belt, first the ones at the front, and then
gliding his hands round to the ones at the back. Despite Lenore and Frau
Fischer’s intel that Volker doesn’t date he seems to know his way around a
woman’s undergarments.
He strips the nylon stockings off me in one long, fluid movement, and
then he turns his attention to my legs. His hands are warm as they caress the
soft skin behind my knees, making my pulse beat hard, and then they run
down my calves to my ankles. He places my bare feet on his lap, drinking
in the sight. Lenore was right. Volker likes legs. He likes my legs, and it’s
heady, the way he looks at me. No one’s ever looked at me the way he does.
Wordlessly, he reaches for the packet and slips the stockings up my
legs, careful not to snag the delicate fabric. The little clips are fastened, and
it’s done. Except he doesn’t pull my skirt back down. He smooths his
fingers higher, across the skin of my inner thighs. Gentle, unhurried. I can
feel my breath coming faster and I realize the stockings, like the letter, were
a preamble to something more. We’re in his office. How far is he going to
take this? How far am I going let him take this? His fingers touch the fabric
of my underwear and my eyes snag on the silver epaulettes on his jacket.
“I hate your uniform.” It comes out in a soft whisper, and for a moment
I don’t even realize I’ve spoken aloud.
Volker’s hands still. Then he lets me go and begins unbuttoning his
jacket. I watch the path of his fingers, the gray-green wool parting to reveal
a white shirt underneath, a black tie. He stands up, towering over me, and
shrugs out of the jacket. Leaning over me he braces his hands either side of
my legs, his mouth very close to mine.
“It comes off. I’m just a man underneath.”
“No you’re not, you’re—” But he kisses me, stoppering the words with
his mouth. The scent of him envelops me, warm and inviting, and his body
is hard beneath my fingers. I’m touching him, pulling him closer, opening
my mouth beneath his so that his tongue invades me. I capture his hips
between my knees. But he pushes me away from him and I’m confused,
resisting, until I realize he’s laying me down on the desk. I prop myself on
my elbows, aware my skirt is falling back, aware he’s standing between my
thighs, and I don’t care because he takes his forefinger and runs it down the
length of my sex over my underwear. That one, soft touch cascades through
my body, pushing away everything else. Again. Please. I look up at him
with need in my eyes.
He circles his finger back and then concentrates the motion where it
feels best, on the swollen nub at the apex of my thighs. I make a
whimpering noise and fall back onto his desk, my eyes closing. As he rubs
that spot I give in shamelessly to the sensations, not caring what I must look
like, that I shouldn’t want this. Not caring what he is or who I am. Just
wanting him, as I have since he planted that first soft, tender kiss on my
neck. Since he showed me that he could make me enjoy forgetting about
everything but him.
He hooks my thighs over his shoulders and I realize he’s sat down and
pulled his chair closer. Easing my underwear to one side he licks me, slowly
and carefully, his tongue soft and slippery and very warm. The intensity
makes my head rear up in surprise. Is this what people do? Does he like
that? He’s got his face right there. And then his tongue dips down, pushing
into me, and I cry out, startled. It’s too weird. It’s too strange. Please don’t
stop.
Volker pulls away a little and mutters, “Hush, these walls are thin.”
He goes back to working my hard little nub with the tip of his tongue
and I wrap both my arms over my face, pressing them against my mouth to
muffle my cries. Everything seems to be slowly tightening down there, my
hips curving upwards with every whimpering breath. He keeps up that slow,
circling movement with his tongue and I feel my toes curl, my hands
reaching for something to grasp. They find his wrists and I hold on for dear
life. A bright, golden sensation is building inside me and I don’t know what
it is, until I do. I’m going to—he’s going to make me—
My back arches and my head flies back, but he keeps a firm grip on my
legs, still licking, making the sensation go on and on until I can’t bear it any
longer. I sit up and take his head in my hands, clenching my thighs around
his shoulders, breathing hard.
He kisses my thigh, blotting his mouth. I feel very hazy and heavy,
needing to hold onto him to steady myself. When he eases my legs off his
shoulders, they grip his ribs instead. My hands touch his shoulders, rub
across the short hair at the nape of his neck, slide across his jaw.
“Gut?” he asks, an ironic look in his eyes, because good clearly doesn’t
come into it when I’ve got my legs clenched around him and I’m rubbing
my thumb over his lower lip wondering how the hell he just did that.
Good? I’m done for. If he can make me feel like that then moral
considerations, borders and uniforms don’t come into it. One kiss from him,
one look, and all my good intentions amount to nothing.
“Verdammt,” I pant. Damn it. Damn me.
He laughs and pulls me onto his lap so I’m straddling him, and I feel
the hard length of him beneath my damp underwear. He’s aroused and I
didn’t even touch him?
“You said you preferred it if I hate you,” I mutter, as he kisses my
throat and his fingers caress my breasts, sending residual sparks through my
body.
“You do hate me, don’t you? Or was it dislike? I can’t remember.” He
kisses my collarbone and adjusts me on his lap so his erection is pressed
even tighter against me. I feel a repellant urge to rub against it.
“Why do you bring me presents, and smile at me and…do that, if you
want me to hate you?”
There’s mock-innocence in his voice as he murmurs, “Do what, kiss
you?”
“No. Um, that.” That thing you did with your tongue. You know what I
mean. You’re just trying to make me say it.
“Make you feel good?”
I nod.
He leans back in his chair, smiling broadly at me. “Oh, Evony, you can
still find it in your heart to hate me even if I make you come, can’t you? Or
are you falling in love with me already?”
Schwein. Red-faced, I try to get off his lap but he holds me fast. “Let
me go. Why do you have to be so…be such a…”
“Such a what? Such a bastard? Such a prick? Come on, let’s hear a few
dirty words from that prim mouth of yours.”
“So confusing.”
 He reaches past me for his cigarettes. “It’s not confusing at all. You
hate the Stasi but you want me to touch you. Simple.”
I stare at him, stunned. Is that it? When did he come up with that, or
did he think this all along? He offers me the box. For something to do with
my hands I take a cigarette and he lights it for me. I don’t like the taste but I
smoke it anyway.
He exhales a cloud of blue smoke from the corner of his mouth and his
eyes narrow. “Same as I loathe sneaking little traitors running like rats for
the West. Come here.” He kisses me, his tongue sliding into my mouth,
tasting faintly of something musky. Tasting faintly of me.
I pull away and stab my cigarette out in the ashtray. There’s nothing
like being told you’re a sneaking rat to dampen your ardor, and I get up off
his lap. “That’s not it at all. I’m just being manipulated by someone older,
more experienced and far more devious than I am.”
He watches me straighten my underwear and stockings and pull my
skirt down, his head on one side. “If that’s what you need to tell yourself,
Liebling. Do you touch yourself thinking about me?”
But I just put on my shoes and walk off, his soft laughter following me
out of the room.

OceanofPDF.com
 Chapter Ten
Evony

I’m restless at my desk for the rest of the day, the inside of my underwear
damp and hot and the places Volker licked me over-sensitized. I have to
type his pointless letter out three times because I keep making mistakes,
every other sentence punctuated in my head by his sardonic Or are you
falling in love with me already? Hateful man.
When he comes out of his office to collect me at the end of the day he’s
in that irritating mock-obsequious mood, helping me into my coat and
calling me Fräulein Dittmar even though there’s no one else about, while
my face burns with shame. “And did you have a good day, Fräulein
Dittmar?”
I ignore him and stalk to the elevator.
Throughout the evening he’s his usual self, absorbed in reports and
work. Frau Fischer has brought me some novels to read, to apologize for
getting me into trouble for bringing Thom to the apartment. “There’s
nothing to apologize for,” I told her. “Herr Oberstleutnant was very rude to
you.” But she just shook her head, looking contrite.
I read a little, but mostly I stew. They’re romance novels and I’m not in
a very hearts and flowers sort of mood. At ten o’clock I get up off the couch
without a word and go to bed, but I’m not sleepy and Volker’s voice is still
revolving through my head. Do you touch yourself thinking about me?
Thinking about how I most certainly don’t makes my mind wander in that
direction and soon I’m imagining all sorts of scenarios. Volker kissing me
in his car while he gently twists my nipples. Volker coming up behind me in
the filing room, his lips on my neck and getting his fingers inside my
underwear. Volker stealing into my room and—but here I turn over in a huff
and try to think about sheep, lots of sheep, jumping over a gate.
In the morning Volker seems subdued and I feel, if not calmer, then a
little more removed from yesterday’s events. Lenore and I spend a quiet
morning at our desks, typing up memos and answering letters. The
methodical work is soothing.
Just before lunch Volker comes out of his office putting on his cap and
coat. There’s a weary cast to his face that I’ve never seen before, even after
the nights I know he’s been out hunting. But his eyes alight on mine and
warm a little as he says, “I’ll be back at three.”
I turn my attention to my typewriter, which is jammed, and tug on the
stuck paper. He can come and go when he chooses, what do I care? Volker
hovers for the merest fraction of a second and then strides away.
Lenore, who is leaning over my shoulder trying to help with the jam,
lets out a gusty sigh. “I wish someone would look at me the way Herr
Oberstleutnant looks at you. Well, not anyone. An officer.”
I give another sharp tug on the paper but it doesn’t budge. Stupid
typewriter. “Don’t be ridiculous. We don’t even know each other.”
Lenore’s been tactful about what my relationship with Volker is but I
can feel the curiosity rolling off her in waves. “No? But you’re living in his
apartment.”
“He works all evening. We don’t talk and we have nothing in common.
Oh, drat this thing.” I thump the keys, making all the type bars fly up and
stick together.
She shoos me out of my chair. “Let me fix it. You’re making it worse.”
With deft fingers she releases the jammed paper and the stuck keys in
minutes. “There. Try it now.”
I sit down and feed a sheet of paper into it and it goes in smoothly.
Good, now we can get back to work.
But it seems she’s not done talking. “Maybe it’s like what we read in
Brigitte magazine. He recognizes something in you because you’ve met in a
past life.”
I snort. Recognizes something in me? Yes, a traitor to the Republic.
“Oh, Lenore. You don’t believe in that sentimental nonsense, do you?”
 She shrugs, annoyed. “I don’t know. It’s nice to think about sometimes.
I can’t always be thinking about shorthand.”
“Real life’s not like that. Real life’s complicated.” It’s not complicated
to Volker, though, is it? You hate the Stasi but you want me to touch you.
Simple, ja? But I don’t think it’s simple and I don’t understand how he can
be so sanguine about separating the two things.
Because she’s the only person I can ask, I say, “Lenore, have you ever
been attracted to someone even though you think they’re a terrible person?”
She raises her eyebrows at me and goes back to her desk. “You think
Herr Oberstleutnant is a terrible person?”
“Could we at least pretend I’m speaking generally?” I beg.
“What would be the point? I know you’re talking about him. What I
don’t understand is why you dislike him so much. Yes, he’s moody and
difficult, but he’s also clever and good-looking, and so sweet to you.”
And a Stasi officer! I want to shout. But it would be crossing a line with
Lenore. She’s too faithful to the regime to understand how I feel about it,
for all her seditious jokes about trade ministers.
Looking at me over the stack of papers she’s shuffling she asks, “Has
he kissed you?”
I look away quickly. When I came out of his office yesterday she was
at her desk and gave me a bland smile before turning back to her typing.
Later in the afternoon she noticed my legs and said with a wink, “Ooh, silk.
Who’s a lucky secretary.” I flushed red to the roots of my hair but I quickly
realized she was simply admiring the gift, not telling me she knew what had
happened in his office.
Her eyes are wide and shining. “He has kissed you. Tell me! What was
it like?”
Awful. Repulsive. Heavenly. I felt it right down to my toes and I never
wanted him to stop. “It doesn’t matter. I don’t like the Oberstleutnant.”
Lenore aligns a piece of paper in her typewriter and begins to rap out
the address from an envelope. “All right, put it this way: if it was from
someone you liked, was it the sort of kiss that would make you think, I
could fall in love with you?” Her fingers hover over the keys and she gives
me a sharp look.
 How is it that everyone but me can be happy compartmentalizing their
feelings? This box for the kiss, this box for who it was from.
“Never mind,” Lenore says in a sing-song way, resuming typing. “I can
see from your face that it was a very good kiss and all I can say is what a
waste it is that you don’t like him. With connections like his you could have
had a proper gold engagement ring.”
Volker comes back at three-thirty and disappears into his office, but
less than an hour later he appears again, looking even more tired than he did
this morning. Wordlessly he nods his head toward the elevator and I take
this to mean he’s done for the day and we’re leaving.
“You go too, Fräulein Hoffman. Get some sunshine.”
Lenore beams at him and collects her things. It’s a lovely day outside,
the first blue-sky day of the year. Volker doesn’t seem to be in the mood to
enjoy the good weather, though, and we sit in silence in the back of his car.
I’ve never known him to be so downcast. What happened to him between
last night and this morning? Maybe he did leave the apartment at midnight
and I just didn’t hear, and something happened?
Hans is changing lanes on Frankfurter Allee when a powder blue
Trabant cuts in front of us. The driver either didn’t see the black car or
thought he could out-pace a Mercedes-Benz travelling at forty-five miles an
hour while the little two-stroke Trabi was still accelerating.
He can’t. Hans swears and slams on the brakes, making Volker look
toward the front of the car and automatically reach for the grip above his
door. It all happens too fast for me, though, and when we crash into the
Trabant I’m thrown against the driver’s seat with barely time to get my
arms up to shield my face. Pain explodes in my lower lip as it smacks
against the lumpy bone on my wrist.
The engines cut out and it’s eerily silent.
“Evony. Evony, are you all right?” I feel Volker’s hands on me, gentle,
as if he’s wary of broken bones. He turns me toward him.
“I’m all right,” I start to say, but I taste blood in my mouth and it hurts
to speak. Something warm drips onto my blouse.
“Scheisse. Here.” He pulls a handkerchief out of his pocket and holds it
carefully over my mouth. “Have you broken any teeth? Let me see.” I
wince as he tugs my lip down, his large fingers gentle. Now that the shock
is passing my face really starts to throb.
Volker’s mouth twists, sympathetic. “Bitten on the inside and split on
the outside. Bleeding a lot, but it looks like nothing’s broken.” He presses
the handkerchief back over the cut. “Keep that there. Press firmly.”
Blood. I hate blood, and tasting it and seeing it on my shirt makes the
world start to slide sideways. He takes my cold hand in his gloved ones and
rubs his thumbs over my knuckles. “Liebling? Are you all right? Christus,
don’t faint, look at me.”
I do, and his blue-gray eyes are steadying. I could see the accident
happening, the car cutting in front of us and Hans slamming on the brakes,
but I didn’t do anything. There’s a handle over my head, too, but I didn’t
think to grab it. Idiot. You’re meant to be aware of your surroundings so you
can try to escape. And you will not faint just because you cut your mouth.
Meanwhile, Hans and the other driver have got out of their cars and are
gesticulating wildly at each other, the road and the vehicles. Volker’s
expression of tender anxiety hardens. “Stay here. I’ll be back in a minute.”
I feel sorry for the Trabant driver, who pales as Volker bears down on
him, six-feet-five of enraged Stasi officer. The man should have known
better than to cut in front of an imported car. I can see the pistol glinting at
Volker’s hip and from the way his gloved hand is clenching I think he’s
sorely tempted to use it.
My mouth fills with blood again, and when I swallow a wave of nausea
rolls up. I need fresh air. There’s a bench a few feet to the right and I get out
of the car and walk unsteadily toward it.
A man’s voice says, “Evony?”
I freeze. I know that voice. It belongs to someone from another life. My
former life as a factory girl and Heinrich Daumler’s daughter. I turn toward
it, my head spinning, and see Ulrich. He’s got a week’s worth of ruddy
beard on his face and his clothes are smeared with grease. I’ve never seen a
more welcome sight in my life. “Ulrich, you’re alive!”
He looks startled by my face and the blood-soaked handkerchief but
pulls me into an alcove. “You’re alive. Where’s Heinrich? What happened
to you?”
 I don’t want to talk about me, I want to talk about Dad. “You mean you
don’t know either? I haven’t seen him since the bakery.” My voice cracks.
If not even Ulrich knows where Dad is, that’s bad. But sudden hope fills me
—I can get away from Volker while he’s distracted. Together Ulrich and I
can find Dad somehow and get to the West, and these past few weeks can
recede like a nightmare.
I clutch his arms. “Please, we need to go now before he notices I’m
gone.”
But Ulrich’s not listening. He’s staring at the tailored clothes I’m
wearing, the black Mercedes-Benz with its passenger door still open, der
Mitternachtsjäger arguing with the Trabant driver. His eyes grow cold,
suspicious. “Were you in that car?”
“I’ll explain later, we need to go.” Any second Volker’s going to look
around and see that I’m gone. This chance won’t come again.
But Ulrich’s not listening to me. “Were you in that car? Answer me!”
He thinks it was me, I realize. That I’ve been working for Volker this
whole time and I’m the one who betrayed everyone. “Yes, but I’m not—”
His face transforms into something frightening, this man who was once
my friend. “You traitorous bitch,” he snarls. “You Stasi whore. No one’s
been able to discover who sold us out, but it was you.”
“I didn’t, I swear—” I try to pull out of the sudden death grip he has on
my arms. How could he think I would betray the group like that, and my
own father?
“Geh zur Hölle, du Stasi Schlampe.” Go to hell, you Stasi slut. And he
wraps his hands around my throat and squeezes. I pull at his wrists,
desperate to explain, but he doesn’t care what I have to say. The pain and
burning pressure of his hands are intense, making my eyes bulge and the
blood thunder in my ears. I can’t breathe, and I can’t look away from his
face as I start to choke. Fury blazes from his eyes. He’s demented with it.
He’s wrong and I can’t tell him. Why won’t he let me tell him? My nails
scrabble at his hands, clawing him in my panic. The world is starting to
darken. I’m going to die. I got ten feet away from Volker, I almost managed
to escape, and now I’m going to die.
 Distantly I hear shouting and Ulrich’s hands are ripped from my throat.
I grasp the door jamb, bent double as I drag air into my lungs. I still feel
like I’m choking. Through streaming eyes I see figures move in front of me,
Ulrich on the ground and Volker standing over him. He takes out his pistol
and aims it at Ulrich’s head.
No. I call out but can only make a wheezing sound that Volker doesn’t
hear. Pushing away from the door I grab his gun arm, pulling it down.
Ulrich will not die for this. He doesn’t understand. A shot rings out, blasting
a hole in the pavement.
“Evony!”
Ulrich looks up, sees me grappling with Volker, scrambles to his feet
and runs.
“Don’t…hurt him,” I wheeze between coughs.
“Evony, let go.” Volker tries to extricate himself from my grip but I
cling onto him as hard as I can. Ulrich runs past Volker’s car—and Hans
dive-tackles him and they both hit the ground. Ulrich’s head cracks against
the bitumen and he groans and lies still.
For the second time in ten minutes an eerie silence falls. The driver of
the Trabant is watching me, open-mouthed, the girl with the blood all down
her front who just prevented der Mitternachtsjäger from performing his
duty.
Volker holsters his gun and gathers me into his arms, his chest heaving.
His hands smooth my hair back and his stricken eyes run over my face and
raw throat. Then he pulls me closer and his lips are warm against my
temple. “Just breathe. I’ve got you.”
I shudder against him, sucking in uneven breaths. This is Volker I’m
pressed against, the man who stole me and kept me prisoner. But in this
topsy-turvy world where my friends try to kill me it makes sense that my
captor protects me. Noticing how I’m shaking he takes off his coat and
wraps it around me, just like that first night when I was so afraid of him. I
burrow into the warmth, the familiar scent of him.
When I’m breathing easier he pulls away and leans down a little so he’s
looking into my eyes. “Evony. Who is that?”
But I shake my head. I won’t betray Ulrich.
 “He’s in custody. I’m going to find out anyway.”
Tears fill my eyes. Of course he will. He’ll take Ulrich to
Hohenschönhausen and interrogate him. “His name’s Ulrich Weber. He’s—
he’s my father’s closest friend.” I duck my head and swipe at the tears
falling down my cheeks, trying to hide my face from the people who are
watching us. “I thought he was my friend, too.”
Volker pulls me into his arms again. “Es tut mir leid,” he whispers into
my hair. I’m sorry.
I look up at him, perplexed. “Why are you sorry?”
His thumb caresses my cheek, wiping away my tears, and his eyes are
bleak. “Because he nearly killed you while I was standing a dozen feet
away. You are under my protection and no one should be able to hurt you.”
Volker’s the one I need to be protected from but my arms are wrapped
tightly around him and I don’t think I can ever let go. He glances toward
Ulrich, who is handcuffed and supported by two policemen; the Volkspolizei
have finally arrived. Ulrich’s looking with loathing at me in der
Mitternachtsjäger’s arms. I turn away and bury my face in Volker’s
shoulder.
“Liebling, I have to go.”
He’s the only thing keeping me afloat. I’ll drown without him. “No,
please—”
“Sei ruhig. Hush. It’s all right.” He waves to Hans and the driver walks
over to us. “Take Fräulein Dittmar to my apartment and fetch the woman in
12D to sit with her until I return.”
They help me toward a police car and I try to give Volker his coat back.
“No, you keep it. Don’t get cold, and don’t let Frau Fischer give you any
brandy. It’s not good for shock. Have her make you sweet tea.”
Before he turns away I grasp his arm. “Please don’t hurt him.”
Volker’s eyes grow dark and hooded. “You are not to think about him
anymore. Now, go with Hans.” I notice how his gloved hands flex and a
sick feeling spreads through my belly.
“Wait, Herr Oberstleutnant, please.”
He turns back to me, jaw tightening, expecting me to beg for Ulrich’s
life. But instead I ask, “Where is my father?” If he’s dead I need to know.
He can’t exist in limbo for me any longer. Volker presses his lips together
and from the look of regret in his eyes I can tell he’s not going to hide the
truth from me.
But it’s not the truth I was expecting.
“I’m sorry, Evony. I don’t know.”

OceanofPDF.com
 Chapter Eleven
Volker

The route I take to Hohenschönhausen passes Bahnhof Lichtenberg train

station and the sight of the steel tracks settles dismal clouds over my
already low mood. I had the dream again last night. The dream on the train.
The carriages were dark and oppressive and teeming with humanity. I was
searching but I couldn’t find her among the tightly-packed bodies. Except
this time it wasn’t Johanna I was searching for, it was Evony, and when I
finally glimpsed her at the far end of a long carriage she couldn’t hear me
shouting. The baby she held was Frau Fischer’s grandson, blond and curly-
headed, his face streaked with tears. I pushed through the bodies, stepping
over them, stepping on them, but she was always just out of reach. Finally
Evony saw me and her eyes filled with cold loathing—and then the train
lurched as it went over a set of points, throwing me to the ground. When I
regained my footing she was gone. I searched and searched, growing more
frantic with each passing second, knowing we were approaching the end of
the line and there wasn’t much time. The train squealed to a halt and I
awoke drenched in sweat, winded like I’d been running for my life.
The dream always ends this way. I never find her in time.
The dented but functional Mercedes-Benz is held up at a level crossing
as an S-bahn train pulls into Bahnhof Lichtenberg, carriage after carriage
flashing past in the dusky light. I see Evony as Weber strangled her, her
face a ghastly mottled red, eyes bulging and glassy.
The road clears and I drive north-east. The high cinderblock walls and
concrete watchtowers of the prison appear and I show my pass to the guards
at the gate. The design of Hohenschönhausen echoes the Wall and its
fortifications and I feel similarly about them. Unfortunate, but unfortunate
necessities.
Ulrich Weber has been put into an interrogation room, a windowless
cell empty of everything but a table and two chairs. I don’t sit. The prisoner
is breathing hard, psyching himself up to resist whatever I’m about to do to
him. I regard him in silence for several minutes. There’s information I could
get out of him about the group. Maybe even about Heydrich. The little prick
has files elsewhere, I’m certain of it.
But right now I don’t care.
I take out my pistol and point it at his head. No, too close. I don’t want
to return to Evony covered in blood spray. Weber’s eyes widen at the sight
of the gun. I take one step back, and the bullets fire cleanly, one-two, into
his head. He rears back, blue eyes staring. Then he slumps forward,
forehead hitting the table. Blood starts to pool and drip.
The guard rushes in as I’m holstering my gun. “Take him to the
morgue. Herr Weber was shot attempting to flee from me on Frankfurter
Allee. He is one of the traitors who escaped during the bakery raid.”

OceanofPDF.com
 Chapter Twelve
Evony

Frau Fischer wants to put me to bed but I shake my head and point towards
the sofas and she nods understandingly. “Of course. You’ll want to see Herr
Oberstleutnant as soon as he comes in. A car accident and being attacked on
top of that, you poor girl.”
It’s not seeing Volker that I want, but asking him what he’s done, what
he’s doing at this very moment. He wouldn’t torture Ulrich, would he? I
hear rumors about what goes on in the Stasi prison. Sleep deprivation, water
torture, beatings. I imagine him looking on, smoking impassively while a
guard breaks Ulrich’s fingers.
Once I’m tucked onto the sofa under a blanket, Frau Fischer gives me
ice cubes wrapped in a tea towel to put over my swollen lip and examines
my neck. “I was a nurse in the war,” she explains, putting a first-aid kit on
the side table. “Though I don’t remember treating anyone for strangulation.
Can you swallow?”
I can, though it’s painful. Remembering what Volker said, I croak,
“Could I please have some sweet tea?”
The housekeeper tilts my chin up. “In a minute. You’re going to have
some nasty bruises.” She rubs arnica cream on my neck, looks at my lip and
informs me I’m going to need stitches. The needle is threaded before she
tells me she doesn’t have any anesthetic. With the same persuasive tone she
uses to get me to eat more breakfast in the mornings she coaxes me into
allowing her to put two stitches in my lip as she did this “all the time during
the war”. I want to tell her that there isn’t a war on and there are things such
as doctors with anesthetic readily available, but she’s strangely overbearing
in nursing mode and I find myself submitting without protest.
 I realize after she’s put a mug of weak, sugary black tea in my hands
and gone to prepare beef broth that I probably should have insisted she call
a doctor because my mouth hurts even more now. These people who lived
through the war. Do they all go about shooting people and sticking needles
in them as if it’s nothing?
A wretched mood settles over me as I watch the fire crackle. For weeks
I’ve imagined crossing paths with someone from my old life and fantasizing
that they would help me. The moment I do find someone he jumps to the
wrong conclusion and tries to kill me.
I drain my mug of tea, turning over the other unhappy thought in my
mind. Neither Ulrich nor Volker knows where my father is. I don’t
understand how this can be. Volker not tell me where my father is, because
he likes to control and manipulate? Yes. Not know? Impossible. Or at least
it should be. I think back to that first night when I asked him what became
of Dad. His sly smile, and then, You mean you don’t know? So, he was
bluffing. Pretending to be all-knowing to make me feel powerless. Or is he
lying now?
I must doze off because I wake some time later to Volker taking the
empty mug out of my hands. He’s crouching down next to me, his face
close to mine, and his eyes are soft as he looks at the stitches in my lip.
“How are you feeling mein armes Mädchen?” My poor girl. I notice
he’s taken off his uniform jacket. Did it get bloodied or is it because he
knows I don’t like it?
“Where’s Ulrich?” I croak. I clear my throat and it hurts like tonsillitis.
He tucks the blankets around me. “Not now, Liebling. You’ve had a
shock and—”
“No, now. Tell me.” But from the way his mouth compresses into a thin
line and his eyes drop away I know that Ulrich’s dead. My face creases and
I start to sob, my stitches pulling painfully. “How could you? I asked you
not to hurt him.”
“Evony, he nearly killed you. Was I supposed to just—”
But I put my hands on his chest and try to push him away. “It wasn’t
about me. He was a good person. Now you know how much we hate you,
that he saw me with you and thought the worst. He thought I betrayed
everyone to you.”
Volker lets me cry for several minutes, not moving from where he is.
My hands are still pressed against his chest and his thumbs rub over my
knuckles. I pull away, hating that he’s the one comforting me. “You’re not
even sorry, are you?”
“Nein,” he mutters. The weary look on his face is back. I suppose it
takes a lot out of you, murdering.
“And Ana? Why did you have to kill her?”
A puzzled line appears between his brows. Of course. He doesn’t even
know who she is. “Ana Friedman. She was there the night we tried to
escape. She pointed a gun at you and you shot her. You didn’t even give her
a chance to surrender.” My voice is rasping but I don’t care. I need to know
how he can be so ruthless.
Recollection clears his brow. “A young woman about your age, ja?
Blonde? She pointed a gun at me so I fired first.”
“But she wouldn’t have shot you! She was terrified of you. If you’d
just told her to put the gun down you know she would have—”
He cuts across me with a shake of his head. “No, I do not know that.
You may know because you were her friend, but I could not see inside her
mind.”
“She was my friend,” I echo bleakly. Ana and Ulrich and my father, all
gone. Dead, or just lost.
Volker regards me for several long moments, frustration and pity
warring on his face. Then, briskly, as if he wants to put all this behind him,
he says, “I have been a soldier for a long time. If my enemy points a gun at
me then I shoot first. Your friend knew the risks when she tried to escape.
She could have surrendered as the guards told her to do but she chose to
attack.”
I shake my head over and over, too upset to speak. I can’t get the
memory out of my head of him raising his gun to kill Ana. “East Berlin
isn’t a battleground and we’re citizens, not your enemy.”
Volker’s eyes grow flinty, the firelight flashing in their depths. “It is a
battleground. You have no idea what is at stake and how quickly things can
change. Regimes rise and fall, fascists take hold. Invasions, genocide.”
“Don’t be so melodramatic. The war was twenty years ago.”
He nods slowly. “Ja, Liebling, it was. You don’t remember it at all.
You’ve seen pictures and heard stories but that can’t compare to seeing
things for yourself.” Volker gets to his feet and goes to the whisky decanter,
pouring a measure of amber fluid into a glass. “I went to Auschwitz after
the surrender and I saw what they had done, and it haunts me. That is
something to flee from. The Wall, what I do? It doesn’t compare.”
I don’t like him talking about the death camps and the war. I don’t see
what they have to do with Ulrich and Ana.
He sits on the opposite sofa, resting his elbows on his knees and
looking down into his glass. “You have seen only this Germany, this
divided but stable Germany, and though I know it’s not perfect you think it
is worthless. I do what I have to do to protect it and I sleep easily
afterwards.”
But he doesn’t always sleep easily, does he? I can see the smudges
beneath his eyes, the lines of fatigue on his face. I turn over what he’s just
told me and something seems odd. “Why did you go to Auschwitz?”
He takes a mouthful of whiskey. “I just did.”
It sounds like him, this need to see things for himself. To discover what
his beloved Germany had done while he’d been fighting. But there’s a
strange look on his face and I feel like he must have gone there for a reason.
And suddenly I realize what that reason might be.
“You were looking for someone.”
He turns the glass in his fingers. He doesn’t reply but he doesn’t say no
either.
We learned about Auschwitz in school. It was one of the extermination
camps, a place of highly efficient slaughter. The descriptions of the camp
gave me nightmares and I suspect the awful answer before I ask the
question. “Did you find them?”
Volker stares into his whisky for several long minutes. “You know, I
suppose, how the camps worked?”
I give a non-committal nod. I read about it, so I know as much as I can
from books.
 “The prisoners arrived by train. When they alighted, an SS officer
assessed each one, and either pointed recht—” he points to the right “—and
they were put to work, or links, and they were gassed immediately. She was
sent to the left.”
Just like that, as if sorting marbles or players for a game of football.
Who was she? His mother, his sister? But from the bitter look on his face I
think it must have been someone even more dear. Someone who must have
been Jewish. If they were lovers or married she was probably the age I am
now, or thereabouts. Is that why he took me, because he never got over
what happened to her? This captivity, this manipulative facsimile of love, is
this all he’s capable of now?
“She was my…”
But he doesn’t need to say it. I can see from his face that he was in love
with her.
“She suffered and died while I was a prisoner of war, and I was
powerless to stop it.” He puts his empty glass aside and gets to his feet. I
see how tired he is, but also how conviction burns brightly in his eyes as he
looks at me.
“But I’m not powerless now. So you see, Liebling, if anyone hurts you,
and I’m able to, I will kill them.”

OceanofPDF.com
 Chapter Thirteen
Evony

Volker insists I go to bed after that and asks Frau Fischer for a sleeping
draft. He watches me drain the milky, benzodiazepine-laced glass of water
as I sit on the edge of my bed, and then accepts the tumbler back.
“It will be better in the morning,” he tells me, watching me get under
the covers and turn my back to him.
Liar. It won’t be better in the morning. Everything will be just the
same.
He leaves me alone, shutting the door softly behind him. Within
minutes the drug starts to work its numbing effects on me, and I’m grateful.
I don’t know what to do with the things he’s told me. That he was once in
love. That he holds Germany dear and believes he’s doing his part to keep
the peace. That he feels no remorse about imprisoning and will kill anyone
who tries to take me from him.
Am I like her, this girl the Nazis murdered? Does he see her when he
looks at me?
Cotton wool finally encircles my brain, muffling my thoughts, and I
sleep.
When I appear at the breakfast table the next morning, sluggish and
gray-faced, Volker tells me to go back to bed. I shake my head and reach for
the coffee pot.
“I’m fine,” I rasp. “I’d rather keep busy.” The last thing I want is to be
in the apartment alone but under guard while the nightmare that was
yesterday churns in my head. Volker has a righteous air about him as he
examines the bruising on my face and neck, as if he’s congratulating
himself for killing Ulrich.
 It’s too painful to swallow anything solid so I just have coffee for
breakfast. Frau Fischer ties a printed satin scarf around my neck in an effort
to cover the bruises but it doesn’t work very well.
Hans must have taken the Mercedes-Benz to be repaired as we drive to
Stasi HQ in a different car. When we arrive at the office Lenore’s eyes
widen at the sight of me, but she waits until Volker closes his office door
before she says, “What happened to you? Evony, your lip.”
I touch it carefully. It’s a little less swollen this morning but it looks
terrible, all black and red, the stitches making me look like something out of
a horror film. “Car accident after leaving the office yesterday. We hit a
Trabi. I hit the back of Hans’ seat.”
Her eyes slide to the scarf. “Why do you sound funny?”
“I, um, ran into someone while Volker was talking to the Trabi driver.
He wasn’t pleased to see me.” Lenore looks perplexed, but she recognizes
my desire not to talk about it and we get to work.
I don’t know how to deal with Ulrich’s death or what to make of the
things Volker told me last night, so I throw myself into typing. Now I know
why Volker works so much. Working means you don’t have time to
remember terrible things.
Later in the morning both Volker and Lenore are in another part of the
building and I’m alone at my desk when someone steps into the alcove.
“Is Volker in his office?”
I look up at the sound of the unfamiliar voice, and freeze. A Stasi
officer is standing a few feet from my desk. He has a captain’s decorations
on his uniform, meaning he’s a few ranks below Volker. It also means he
shouldn’t be referring to the Oberstleutnant as just Volker, even to me. But
that’s not what makes the bottom fall out of my stomach.
I know him. He was in the bakery the night of the raid, yelling orders
to the border guards. He’s thirty or so, dark-haired with a thin moustache. I
don’t like his eyes, which are an unsettling shade of ice blue. They seem to
be looking at me speculatively and my heart starts to pound, wondering if
he’s recognized me, before I remember he must be looking at my injuries.
“Nein, Herr Hauptmann. He’s out at the moment. Shall I let him know
you wanted to see him?”
 He says, with what I’m sure is artificial concern, “Oh, dear. What
happened to you?”
I feel guilt flash over my face at the thought of Ulrich and my attempt
to flee. “Nothing. Car accident.”
The Hauptmann tuts sympathetically and sits down on the edge of my
desk. I have the urge to lean away from him but I hold myself still, looking
up at the man with blank politeness. He hasn’t recognized you. He’s just
being nosy, like all Stasi officers are.
“You’re living with Volker, aren’t you?”
I see his eyes stray to the bruises on my neck and I resist the urge to
fidget with the scarf. “Yes. I’m—I’m from outside East Berlin. He’s a friend
of my family’s so I’m staying with him.” Why are you saying this? Just shut
up. No one expects you to volunteer this information.
Herr Hauptmann smiles down at me once more and I see the first
honest expression in his eyes: one of vague recognition. “Have we met
somewhere?”
My heart moves up into my throat but I keep smiling even though it
makes my lip hurt. “I’ve been here a few weeks. You’ve probably seen me
around the office.”
“Herr Hauptmann. Can I help you with anything?” Lenore is standing
by her desk, an unfriendly expression in her eyes. That’s not like her.
Usually she’s all smiles for the officers.
He stays where he is, still watching me and smiling his synthetic,
curious smile that makes me want to leap out from behind my desk and run.
“Just looking for Volker, Fräulein Hoffman.”
“Herr Oberstleutnant is not here at the moment but I’ll make sure he
knows you wanted to see him.” Lenore puts a hard stress on Herr
Oberstleutnant as if correcting his insubordination, and gestures for me to
come to her desk. “Fräulein Dittmar, can I get your help with this?”
Willing my legs not to shake, I peel myself out of my chair and go over
to Lenore. What will happen to me if he remembers where he last saw me?
Will Volker be punished, too, or will it just be me who’s sent to
Hohenschönhausen?
 I feel the Hauptmann’s eyes on me for several moments longer, and
then he gets up and leaves. I notice Lenore glaring after him.
Trying to sound curious rather than terrified, I say, “Don’t you like that
man? Who is he?”
“Hauptmann Heydrich. And no, I don’t.”
“Why?”
“Herr Oberstleutnant doesn’t like him. No, it’s all right. I didn’t
actually need you, I was just getting you away from him.”
I go back to my desk, thinking. Volker not liking Heydrich is enough
for Lenore to dislike him? She’s very loyal, so that’s not a surprise. But
what can Volker have against him? Remembering Heydrich’s careless use
of Volker’s name, the comfortable way he settled himself on my desk to talk
to me, I suppose the man’s arrogance could rub Volker the wrong way.
There’s probably only room for one self-important autocrat in this building
as far as Volker’s concerned.
Twenty minutes later Volker himself strides through our alcove on the
way to his office. Lenore calls after him, “Hauptmann Heydrich was here
earlier, asking Fräulein Dittmar where you were.”
Volker stiffens, and he turns to me. His tone carefully even, he asks,
“Did he talk to you?” But I can see what he really means is, Did he
recognize you?
I shake my head. “He didn’t say what he wanted.”
Volker taps his forefinger against his thigh, thinking. He’s got an
expression on his face that I haven’t seen before, something akin to
wariness. Is he afraid of Heydrich? But from the way he’s looking at me I
realize that he’s not afraid for himself. He’s afraid for me. That’s why he
changed my name from Daumler to Dittmar, I realize, in case Heydrich got
my name from one of the people who were captured during the raid.
Then again, maybe Volker is a little worried for himself. I doubt his
superiors would be pleased to hear he’s got a traitor working for him and
living with him. How much trouble would he get into if they found out?
Those silver epaulettes of his probably get him out of all sorts of crimes.
Like shooting a prisoner. I wince and look down, thinking about Ulrich.
Volker’s standing in front of my desk, watching me. Me and my stupid
glass face. He’s probably seen every thought I just had flicker across it.
There’s a smudge on the side of my typewriter and I rub it carefully,
keeping my eyes averted. Finally, Volker realizes I’m not going to look up
at him again and he disappears into his office.
Not looking at Volker becomes a habit over the next few days. The
bruises on my neck fade to a flat purply-brown and my voice goes back to
normal. A few capillaries that had burst around my eyes shrink and
disappear, and Frau Fischer pronounces that my lip is healing well and
she’ll be able to take the stitches out in a day or two. Volker doesn’t call me
into his office to dictate any letters and the drives back and forth between
his apartment and HQ are made in silence. I can sense he wants to talk to
me but I’m too angry with him, too confused. I don’t want to hear more sad
tales from his past.
But that doesn’t mean I’m not curious. I wonder who the woman was,
the one who died at Auschwitz. Did he know she was Jewish when he met
her? Surely not, or he would have tried to get her out of the country, if he
really loved her. So why did she keep being Jewish a secret? Was she afraid
of him? Maybe he felt about her the way he feels about me—a dark
possessiveness that’s more like ownership than love. Or maybe she just
didn’t trust a Nazi officer with the truth.
I wonder too about his time as a prisoner of war and when it was he
decided that communism was the way forward. I wonder about his love for
Germany. I even envy it. What must it be like to feel so strongly about your
country—about anything—that you would devote your life to it, to the
exclusion of almost everything else?
But I keep my questions to myself and turn my face away when he
offers his arm to help me out of his car, when he offers me a cup of coffee,
or when he removes his uniform jacket the second we’re inside the
apartment. One evening he even offers me a cigarette, a sardonic glint in his
eyes, which makes me angry as he’s reminding me of what happened in his
office with the silk stockings.
Things seem like they will go on like this indefinitely until Thursday,
when a very strange thing happens.
 I’m in the filing room putting away some correspondence when a boy
from the mail room walks past the door, stops when he sees me, and comes
in with his wire box on wheels. I’ve seen him around the office. He’s
nineteen or so and is always whistling or chatting to the secretaries. “Oh
good, you’ll save me a trip. I’ve got some post for your Oberstleutnant.”
I clench my teeth. Volker is not my anything, but I bite down on my
temper because it was meant as an innocent turn of phrase. I’m about to
point out that I’m hardly saving him a trip as Lenore’s desk, where the mail
is usually delivered, is only thirty feet down the corridor, when I hear him
mutter something under his breath so quietly I’m not sure if I heard him
right.
“Are you looking for friends?” He’s still flipping through the envelopes
in the basket and I can’t see his face through the fringe of auburn hair that’s
fallen over his forehead.
I stare at him. Friends? What does he mean by friends?
When he glances up his green eyes fasten on my lip and the faded
bruises on my neck. He’s got lots of freckles on his face, like cocoa powder
scattered over cold milk. Still speaking softly, he says, “He did that to you,
didn’t he?”
He means Volker. I don’t say anything, letting him draw his own
conclusions. There’s a tight, angry look on his face as he holds out a bundle
of letters to me, and I take them. “I’ve always thought Volker was a nasty
son of a bitch.” In a normal tone of voice he adds, “Hang on, I think there’s
some more in here somewhere.”
I flip through the letters, trying to look nonchalant, but my heart is
racing. What do you mean, friends? Do you mean people who can get me
out? How do you know it’s safe to ask me this? Do you know who I am?
My companion murmurs into the correspondence, “I’m part of a group.
We’re all over East Berlin. In offices, factories, the border guards. We can
get you out, if you want. Away from him.”
My heart leaps for joy and I’m sure he can see it in my eyes, but I can’t
speak. It’s as if Ulrich’s hands are still tight around my throat. My father
taught me never to trust strangers and that if something seems too good to
be true, it probably is. This boy could be anyone. It could be a trap.
 “If you’re interested we can help you. But we’d need you to do
something for us first.”
I study a postmark on a letter, hoping that he’ll keep talking. I’ve heard
how this sort of thing works. Help has to be earned, like when I did my bit
to dig the tunnel beneath the Wall. Ana once told me there are some groups
who get each other out leapfrog-style: as new people join, old members can
escape. That way the groups’ secrets are kept alive. But how did this young
man know to approach me? Perhaps Volker’s sinister reputation and my
injuries are enough for to him to believe that I’m suffering enough to want
to flee to the West.
He watches me for a moment, amused that I still haven’t said anything.
“You don’t talk much, do you? My name’s Peter.” He hands me another
stack of letters and says softly, “Don’t lose hope. And don’t tell anyone we
talked.”
I can’t let him go like this. “Wait!” I hiss. When he turns back to me I
whisper, “If someone was interested, what would they have to do?”
Peter casts a quick look over his shoulder and comes back into the
filing room. “We need dirt on Volker. Things that he has lying around his
apartment that might incriminate him. Details of any shady activities. And
we want to know where he goes at night. He’s up to something and we
don’t like it.”
My excitement dims. Gather information on Volker. Spy on Volker, he
who must know every surveillance trick in the book. How long would it
take for him to realize what I was doing?
Peter watches my face closely and his eyes brim with sudden
amusement. “I know what you’re thinking, but he’s only human. It can be
done.” With a jaunty whistle, he grasps his cart and pushes it out into the
corridor. I listen to the tune as it fades away, and realize it’s one of the Free
German Youth songs that Ana and I would sing on car trips to exasperate
my father.
I go over and over the conversation with Peter for the rest of the day,
thinking about every time I’ve seen him around the office; trying to
discover from these remembered glimpses whether I can trust him.
I can’t trust him. He works for the Stasi.
 Yes, but in the mail room. The mail room is probably staffed by
ordinary people.
So he just approached me out of the blue and asked if I wanted to flee
to the West? Sure. That’s normal.
I look like I’ve been beaten up, and he thinks Volker did it. Maybe that
made him angry enough to approach me. And he was honest about wanting
something in return.
The needing something in return makes him seem authentic, but I
would rather be sure.
That night, I get into bed just after eleven, tense and exhausted, and in
my distraction I realize I’ve forgotten to bring a glass of water with me.
Telling myself it doesn’t matter I try to fall asleep, but soon my mouth is
dry and all I can think of is water, so I throw the covers off and tie a
dressing gown over my nightclothes.
The apartment is dark and quiet except for a single lamp burning in the
living room, casting a pool of light over stacks of files and paper. There’s
no sign of Volker. The papers are just lying there, unprotected.
We need dirt on Volker. Things that he has lying around his apartment
that might incriminate him.
Incriminate him in what way, exactly? Does Peter’s group believe he’s
involved in illegal activities? Perhaps they are trying to topple him from his
position of power. That could be useful to them if they believe that he’s an
inordinately good Stasi officer and whoever would replace him wouldn’t
have his zeal and cunning. Or maybe it’s just that Volker’s captured a lot of
their friends and they want revenge.
These papers that Volker brings home, I’ve always assumed they’re
unclassified reports that he reads out of thoroughness, but the possibility
crosses my mind that they might be something more. I take a step toward
the sofa—
And Volker steps out of the darkened kitchen rubbing a hand over the
back of his neck. He stops short when he sees me, and studies my face and
my long, loose hair. His eyes travel over my fading bruises, the redness of
my lower lip. Frau Fischer has taken the stitches out and told me my lip is
healing nicely. He steps closer and with a gentle forefinger traces my
mouth, his touch feather-soft.
I stand stock still, my heart pounding. Did he see me looking at his
reports, and do I look guilty now? I can never trust my face.
Then his finger is gone and his mouth is on mine, his kiss gentle as if
careful of hurting me. I feel that magnetic pull toward him as I always do
when he’s close to me. In this strange, unpredictable world he is safety,
warmth, strength. It’s madness, this desire, but I feel myself sinking deeper
and deeper into him just the same. I kiss him back, my mouth opening
beneath his.
It’s not madness if his desire for you could be useful.
My eyes open wide and I see his dark lashes against his cheeks as he
kisses me. I could do it. Use this against him to escape. But it doesn’t make
me feel triumphant, this realization, only wretched, and I shove him away
from me.
“No. Stop it.” I don’t want to become like the Stasi, sneaky, lying,
betraying. I’m not like them. I’m not like him.
But how badly do you want your freedom?
Not like that. There must be another way.
As I turn toward my room he grasps me by the wrist and pulls me back.
“You wanted me for a few moments, Liebling. Remember? You needed
me.”
I’m confused, thinking that he’s talking about the incident in his office
with the stockings. But then I realize he means how I clung to him,
struggling to draw breath after Ulrich strangled me, and begged him not to
go. We were both so raw in those moments, so afraid. Amid the blood and
pain and fear I had needed him.
“I was weak.”
His eyes flash with anger and frustration but he lets go of my wrist. I’m
coming to understand something about Volker. He wants me to go to him
willingly despite everything he’s done. He wants absolution. And it’s not
even for what he’s done to me, it’s for what happened to her. He can’t
forgive himself for her death so I’m to offer some sort of twisted, surrogate
forgiveness.
 “It’s not even me you want, it’s her. Do you think she’d be happy to see
what you’re doing to me? Is this what she’d have wanted you to become?”
But it’s as if he hasn’t heard me, and his voice is low and sinister. “You
shouldn’t have clung so sweetly to me, Liebling. You shouldn’t have told
me not to let you go.”
He doesn’t follow me into the refuge of my room. I ask myself, my
back pressed against the door, why my skin should crawl more at the
thought of spying on Volker than the feel of his hands on me.
A few moments later I hear heavy footsteps in the living room, and
then the front door bangs shut. Der Mitternachtsjäger is going hunting. I
send up a prayer to whomever might be listening that they protect anyone
who crosses Volker’s path tonight.

OceanofPDF.com
 Chapter Fourteen
Evony

He goes out hunting every night that week, slamming out of the apartment
just before midnight and not coming back until the small hours. I lie awake
waiting for him to return, unable to sleep while he’s abroad, worrying over
what he’s doing. In the morning I have gritty eyes and a fuzzy head and
come yawning to the breakfast table.
Volker seems much the same as ever, and is even energized by his
nocturnal activities. There’s a self-satisfied air about him as he drinks his
coffee and reads Neues Deutschland, and his smiles for me are sharp and
unfriendly. I had hoped to shame him into better behavior by reminding him
of the woman he once—I have to presume—sincerely loved, but he delights
in proving that he won’t be shamed. Though I wonder, if late nights don’t
exhaust him what was it that gave his eyes their haunted, weary cast the day
of the car accident?
During the restless nocturnal hours I spend waiting for him to return to
the apartment I worry over the things Peter told me. I’m still not sure that I
can trust Peter, and even if I can, what he imagines I can discover about
Volker. How will I spy on the Oberstleutnant without him discovering what
I’m up to? And, most important of all, can I leave East Berlin without
knowing what happened to my father? It’s crossed my mind that Peter could
use his network to find out where Dad is. He said that the group had people
all over the city.
On the sixth night in a row that Volker has gone hunting I doze off
before he returns. I’m awakened in the darkness to the feel of a mouth at
my breast. A low moan escapes me as I emerge from sleep, and then I gasp
as he moves to suck my other nipple through the fabric of my nightclothes.
Volker is sitting on the edge of my bed fully clothed with a bright gleam in
his eye.
I glare up at him. “You’ve had a good hunt, have you? You’ve spent an
enjoyable night terrorizing my fellow citizens?”
The room begins to lighten as my eyes clear, and I see him smile. “I
think you mean my fellow citizens, little traitor.”
“Men like you are despicable.”
He laughs softly. “Then I’m sorry to tell you that you like despicable
men.” He palms my breast, rolling the nipple with his thumb and I try not to
whimper. The sensation shoots straight down through me to pool between
my legs. Desperately I try to summon the words to tell him to get out, but
then I remember that I am Volker’s weakness, and I could also be his
undoing if I am clever.
He kisses me, and my hands rest on his shoulders, neither pulling him
closer nor pushing him away while I think rapidly. This is how I will do it,
by making him believe that I’m giving in. He’ll be a difficult man to fool but
he might just be arrogant enough to believe it. I’ve tried to think of another
way. There isn’t another way.
I allow my body to unclench beneath his hands and I tilt my mouth up
to meet his. It’s not difficult to shift from angry and rebuffing to tentative
surrender as that’s how it’s been between us every time. It’s not hard, either,
for me to draw him down so that he’s lying against me.
And he believes it. He slips his hands beneath my hips and holds me
against him. His eyes close as he kisses me and his breath deepens. I find
myself pressed against his chest, my nipples rubbing against his shirt and an
ache growing between my legs. When his knee pushes between mine,
pressing them open, I feel a thud of thankfulness.
Then I realize with alarm that this isn’t like those other times. We’re in
bed together and I can feel the hard length of him against my thigh. I pull
away, my breathing uneven, my expression uncertain.
“Liebling?”
“I haven’t—I’ve never—” Oh, Christus, am I really doing this?
He kisses me. “I know. It’s all right.” He gets up off the bed and
undresses, laying his clothes over the stool. His underwear comes off last
and I see the length of him spring free, thicker and longer than I expected
when I felt it through his trousers. I can’t look at him, it’s too strange,
seeing a man naked and in this state, and I turn my face away.
I feel the bed sink as he approaches me and he lays out beside me. His
hand runs up the length of my body, from hip to shoulder. Turning my chin
toward him he kisses me once more, and gathers me into his arms. The heat
coming off his body is almost scorching and despite myself I press myself
into his warmth as his tongue slides against mine. The skin across his
shoulders and back is very soft, far softer than I thought a man could be.
He’s hard and muscled beneath that skin and my hands follow the ridges
and planes of his body, mapping him beneath my fingers. His hands are
doing the same to me except his touch feels more calculated than
exploratory, and makes me gasp against his mouth.
When he moves to take off my nightgown I allow him to tug it over my
head. I watch his face, lip caught between my teeth and wondering what
he’s thinking. Though there’s little light I can see the softness in his eyes,
the small smile at the corner of his mouth as his gaze runs over me. He’s
beautiful in the half-light, all warm, smooth skin and long limbs, and in
admiring him I forget to be shy about my own body.
Then he pulls me close once more and our legs tangle together. I’m
hungry for him now, my hands smoothing up his chest, reveling in the
breadth of him, the hardness of him. His fingers find the slick folds between
my thighs, dip into me just a little, and then move to the hard nub at the top
of my slit and start to rub it in firm circles. I almost come apart in his arms,
arching against him, sounds coming from my throat that I didn’t know I
could make. His mouth hovers inches from mine and he watches me as I
respond helplessly to his touch.
I rake my nails along his shoulders as the sensation builds—and then
he takes his hand away. With a dismayed cry, I watch him reposition me
beneath him and take the length of himself into one hand. There’s an
unfocused look in his dark eyes as he gazes down at me, and I feel
something silky yet hard slide down along my slippery sex, searching for
entrance. He’s got me trapped beneath him, though, his body pressing
heavily on mine. He pushes deeper, sinking into me, and it hurts. With a
final push he’s all the way to the hilt, the dark hair above his pubic bone
pressing against my own. I feel stretched, overfull. He keeps still, not
moving beyond kissing my face softly.
“That was the worst of it, Liebling. I promise.”
I’m gripping his shoulders, both to hold him close to me and to prevent
him from moving. Liar. The worst is yet to come now that we’ve crossed
this line. “I don’t believe you.”
He licks his thumb and sits up a little so he can reach down between us,
and he starts to work at my clit again. The sensations pick up almost where
he left off, and as the pleasure grows, the pain inside me eases. I keep my
eyes open and my expression reproachful, wanting him to know what I
think of him for hurting me even as the pace of my breathing picks up. My
hands slide down his arms, clasping his strong wrists, needing to hold onto
him.
A smile tugs the corner of his mouth as he watches my face, as if he
knows that I’m trying not to show how good he’s making me feel. “Tell me
you like it.”
My eyes narrow at him. “Fick dich, Reinhardt.” Fuck you. I never
swear, but if ever somebody needed to be sworn at it’s him right now,
pinning me to the bed with his cock and his heavy body, making me hate
him even more because he knows I do want him.
He smiles wider. “You’ve never said my name before.” He pulls his
hips back a few inches and then surges forward. I cry out and grip him
tighter, and the pain is back, mixed with pleasure. But he’s right. The worst
is over. He thrusts again, and again, his thumb still working on me, pleasure
sparking through my body.
“I think you mean fick mich, don’t you?” he says. “Fuck me, please,
Reinhardt, because I like your hands on me, and your tongue inside me, and
even though it hurts I like your cock inside me.” His low, inexorable voice
seems to be talking me closer to orgasm. “Don’t you, Evony. Don’t you.”
My voice is almost a sob. “Yes. Yes, all right.”
His hand catches me around my throat and turns my head toward him.
“Look at me when you say that.”
 I look up at him through my haze and his eyes are sharp, calculating.
I’m the one who’s falling apart. “Yes, Reinhardt,” I manage, before my
head tips back and my body clenches with my climax. As the sensations
pound through me I hear his soft laugh, feel his hand tighten ever so slightly
on my throat, the way a predator’s jaws tighten on its prey.
When I come back down again I watch him, eyes narrowed, hating him
again. Hating that it feels good. Hating how good he looks, muscles moving
in the semi-darkness, his lower lip full and soft. I put my hand up to touch
his mouth and he kisses my palm. It’s so tender a gesture, but anger boils
through me and I pull back my hand and slap him hard across the face.
For a second he looks shocked by my audacity. There are things I
would never dare do or say to Oberstleutnant Volker that I find I can do and
say to Reinhardt. Grabbing my wrists he pins them either side of my head,
moving harder and deeper now. He looks oddly proud of me. Yes, he likes
this very much, and unable to look away, unable to cover my face, he sees
the truth laid bare in my eyes. He knows I want him.
He pulls out of me suddenly and takes himself in his hand, making a
low, harsh sound at the back of his throat. Something hot spurts against my
inner thigh and then he’s still. He breathes hard once, twice, his head
bowed.
Then he looks up at me. “Are you all right? I didn’t want to draw it
out.”
But I can’t say anything. I feel raw and confused, uncertain now how
sleeping with him was meant to give me the upper hand.
“It will be better for you next time.” He eases himself off me and tries
to draw me into his arms.
Next time. I curl into a ball and roll away from him, tugging the tangled
sheets over my body. Suddenly I can’t bear for him to see me like this. I’ve
given up everything to this hateful man and there’s no escape. He’ll take
what he wants again and again, until—until what? What does he want from
me? To screw me until he’s bored? This isn’t how I imagined my life would
be. He should have chosen Lenore, or someone like her. She would have
wanted this.
 “Liebling? Would you like to come to my bed?” He puts an uncertain
hand on my shoulder but I shrug him off angrily.
“Go away.”
I feel him watching me for several minutes and then he gets up with a
sigh and collects his clothes. A moment later I hear the door close behind
him.
With a soft groan I roll onto my back and stare at the ceiling. I stare for
a long time, searching for ways to escape, to end this. But nothing comes.
No solution offers itself.
What have you done?

∞ ∞ ∞
The morning casts its cold, gray light on the evidence of Reinhardt’s visit to
my bedroom. My sheets are smeared with blood and his semen. It’s a
ghastly, embarrassing sight that I can’t leave for Frau Fischer to discover, so
as soon as I’m washed and dressed I pull all the linen off the bed, making
sure the most visible stains are buried deep in the bundle before I open my
door.
I head for the laundry, noticing a slight ache low in my belly and a
vague feeling of self-loathing clinging to my skin, but other than that I feel
no different. Even the self-loathing is not unfamiliar these days.
I’m as silent as I can possibly be but luck is not on my side. Frau
Fischer comes bustling out of the lounge and exclaims loudly, “Let me take
those for you, my dear. I was going to change them today, anyway. You
must tell me if you require clean sheets more regularly.”
At the other end of the hall I can see Reinhardt standing in the kitchen
drinking a cup of coffee, dressed in his uniform. When he hears the word
sheets he smirks down at his newspaper.
I go red and keep a tight hold of the linen, stammering that I want to
wash them myself, it’s no bother, but she’s a determined woman and
wrestles them out of my arms. Please, please just think that the blood is my
period, and don’t notice the other stains, I beg silently.
Reinhardt is still smiling to himself when I enter the kitchen and he
greets me with a conspiratorial look. “Guten Morgen, Evony. Did you sleep
well?”
Volker, I tell myself. Think of him as Volker, not Reinhardt. But I have
the feeling that after last night it’s going to be difficult to think of him in
that distant way again.
I don’t like his cozy attitude, as if we share a cherished secret. “Frau
Fischer has asked me to tell her if I require clean sheets more regularly, but
that’s not really for to me say, is it?”
He catches my unsaid meaning. Are you going to be making these visits
nightly? Putting the paper down, he walks slowly around the table and
looms over me. I have to tilt my head back to look him in the eye.
“I don’t appreciate your tone, Evony. Kindly moderate it.”
I swallow. All right, so it seems I can get away with saying fick dich
and slapping him across the face while he’s in my bed, but a little sarcasm
over breakfast is going too far. Lowering my eyes I mutter, “Yes, Herr
Oberstleutnant.” I turn away to pour some myself coffee but he pulls me
back. His lips are very close to mine.
“I prefer it if you call me Reinhardt in this house.”
I don’t want to call him Reinhardt out loud unless it’s accompanied by
fick dich. He already rules my body and is getting inside my head. Calling
him Reinhardt as well is too much.
I’m saved from answering by Frau Fischer entering the kitchen. Her
gaze drops to Reinhardt’s—Volker’s—hand on my arm and she frowns in
disapproval. I’m stubbornly mute, so he either has to make a scene in front
of her or let go.
He lets go. I sit at the table and Frau Fischer fusses about me, putting
rolls, marmalade, ham and boiled eggs on the table. I notice she’s still
frowning, and shooting looks at Reinhardt. I remember what she said about
it not being proper me living with him even though—as she presumes—he’s
my fiancé, and I realize she’s seen what was on the sheets and has guessed
what it means. She makes sure I have plenty of the cheese I like and ignores
his empty coffee cup, so it seems I’m above reproach. It was my bed, not
his. He came to me.
All the while Reinhardt stands behind my chair, reading his newspaper
and breathing down my neck.
I can’t concentrate at the office, images from last night flashing through
my mind. The things he said. The things I said. They way he felt beneath
my fingers, smooth and delicious and vital. It will be better for you next
time.
No pain at all, only the good parts.
Lenore watches me seal and address an empty envelope and asks
what’s got into me.
“Nothing. Just—”
And then I hear it. Whistling.
There’s a stack of files on my desk and I grab them and walk quickly,
muttering something to Lenore about needing to get this done. As I duck
into the filing room I see Peter at the far end of the corridor, talking and
laughing with another secretary. He’ll be heading this way any moment. I
yank open a cabinet draw and begin flicking through files with unseeing
eyes.
I hear the squeaky wheels of his mail cart and my pulse goes through
the roof. Then he’s passing the door and I call in a soft voice, “Peter.”
His face doesn’t change and he pushes the cart into the room. “Yes,
there’s mail for you today. Here you go.”
As I take the proffered bundle of letters I look into his green eyes and
say, “I’ll do it. I’ll spy on Volker.”
Peter smiles, and it’s such a warm, genuine smile that all my doubts fall
away. “Thank you, Evony. Welcome to the group.”

OceanofPDF.com
 Chapter Fifteen
Volker

It’s not even me you want.

I push back from my desk and stare out the window at the streets of
East Berlin. I know what they in the West say about this city. That it’s a
gray, unlovely prison. That the people have no hope, no pleasure. My spies
across the border bring me their chatter and jokes at our expense and they
make me laugh, though not for the reason they intended. How smug they
are, when West Berlin is adorned not with hope and happiness, as they like
to believe, but with billboards.
My eyes stray toward the Brandenburg Gate and the hard line of the
Wall just beyond. How different the gate was in my youth, the centerpiece
of this great city and adorned all around with Baroque buildings. When I
returned from the prisoner of war camp that gate stood out amid so much
rubble. The last beautiful thing in a destroyed city. And Dresden…I have
never returned to Dresden to see the jewel-box city of my childhood in
ruins. I will never return.
When I look behind me there is only death and rubble and horror, so
why do I turn and look today? Better to think no further back than last
night, to Evony, to the feel of her beneath me, to the anger and desire
burning in her eyes like twin stars. I must be mad to have chosen a woman
like her, who turns my thoughts back to long-ago times. Perhaps I should
never have told her about Johanna but I need Evony to understand: she is
mine, and there are no lengths to which I won’t go to hurt those who hurt
her, to keep her safe, from my people as well as hers. On these cold,
unfriendly streets I found a flower, and I plucked it. I will have this one
pleasure, this girl whose final surrender was that of a queen in battle.
 But her warmth in my arms was short-lived. She turned away from me,
and I know that while the battle is won the war is far from over.
My wristwatch reads sixteen forty-five and I stand up and get my coat
and cap. Enough for today. I want to get her alone again. I want to discover
if she’ll slap me before or after I kiss her, or if she’s done with pretending
and has admitted to herself that she wants me as much as I want her. I can
feel her on the brink of acquiescing. Not resigning herself, as she has too
much fight to resign herself to any fate. But how sweet it will be when I
pull her close and she tilts her mouth up to mine without hesitation. With
desire for me, unfettered. I can taste how sweet it will be, and I will have
that sweetness.
I open my office door and she looks up from her typewriter at me, her
eyes bright and wary but with the faintest pink blush spreading over her
cheeks.
It’s not even me that you want.
I nod toward the elevator, letting her know my intention to leave and
she collects her things. Her skirt rides up her thighs as she leans down to a
bottom drawer for her handbag and I see the soft gleam of silk on her legs. I
remember how her legs felt tight about my hips, her nails digging into my
shoulders, and a thud of heat goes through me.
Not want you? Oh, Liebling, you couldn’t be more wrong.

OceanofPDF.com
 Chapter Sixteen
Evony

Find out what Volker’s doing in the West. He’s caught too many of our
people since the Wall went up and he’ll continue to be a threat unless we
stop him, permanently. Get him imprisoned and we’ll get you out.
I stare at the page of my book with unseeing eyes and go over and over
what Peter told me this morning. He’s not asking much, is he? Just for me
to topple the most ruthless man in East Berlin on behalf of a group I know
nothing about. I wonder what the other members have to do to earn their
passage. Almost with fondness I remember the dirty, cramped nights I spent
digging the tunnel with Ana.
See if you can find anything incriminating in his apartment. Find out if
he has any contact with Westerners. Volker’s arrogant enough to believe he
can get away with treason, murder, anything.
I glance up at Reinhardt sitting on the sofa opposite, his long legs
crossed and the firelight burnishing his handsome face. How sleekly
cheerful he’s been today, and how irritating his mood has been. I keep
reminding myself that I’m supposed to be letting him think he’s won, that
he’s beaten me, but my instincts are to be difficult. When we returned to the
apartment and he helped me out of my coat, he crooked a finger under my
chin. I looked up at him in stony silence, but he just smiled.
“I’d kiss you but I think you’d sink your teeth into my lip.” Then he
playfully tweaked my nose.
Peter said he needed twenty-four hours to organize things for me and
then I’m to start following Volker at night. From dusk tomorrow there’ll be
a Trabant parked two blocks away that I will use to follow him wherever he
goes at night. But what if Reinhardt’s business in the West is perfectly
legitimate as far as the Stasi’s concerned, and what if there’s nothing
incriminating in the apartment? I could be risking my neck spying on the
most dangerous man in East Berlin for nothing. There’s also the issue of
getting out of the apartment and down to that car without his men seeing
me, which is surely an impossible task. But I wasn’t thinking about that this
morning when I told Peter I wanted in, I was only thinking that it couldn’t
be for nothing that I’d given myself to Reinhardt. Given myself to him and
enjoyed it, heaven help me.
All this back and forth is making me tense and I find myself glaring at
Reinhardt as he reads, because all this is his fault. His, and some long-ago
lost love. What has she even got to do with me? I’m not Jewish, there’s no
war on. It all happened twenty years ago.
Throwing my book to one side I say, “Do I look like her? Is that it?”
Reinhardt glances up, surprised. Then his eyes drop back to his papers
as he realizes who I mean by her. “Not particularly.”
I should hold my tongue and focus on the problem of spying on him,
but I feel reckless. My fate is in the hands of Reinhardt and this unknown
group but I wont be silenced. “I just feel like I should know more about her
seeing as I’m her replacement. Should I style my hair a certain way? Wear a
certain color?”
Eyes on his papers, he mutters, “It was a very long time ago. I hardly
remember.”
Liar. A man like Reinhardt would remember every detail. “Were you
cruel to her like you are to me? Did she look at you like she hated you, like
I do? Is that what you enjoy so much?”
He makes a note on a report with his fountain pen, smiling. “Oh, but
you didn’t hate me last night, did you? You quite enjoyed my attentions.”
Looking up, he says, “If you would like to talk, we can talk. I find I am in a
very good mood this evening.”
I’ll bet you are, I think sourly.
“Johanna looked at me with love, always. Very different from the way
you look at me.”
I feel a lurch at hearing her name. Johanna. Suddenly she becomes
more real to me, this Jewish girl who was in love with a German officer and
hiding a deadly secret. I remember the picture of Reinhardt in his military
uniform standing in front of the swastika flag, his youthful, open face alight
with some strong emotion. I’d thought it was political fervor but perhaps it
was love. Despite myself, I wonder what he was like back then, before
death and grief and imprisonment hardened him into the man he is today.
But perhaps he was born to mock and hunt and take what isn’t his.
My voice is husky and uncertain as I say, “So talk.”
“About Johanna?”
I flick a piece of lint off the arm of the sofa, pretending I’m not burning
with curiosity. “If you want to.”
He’s silent for a long time, watching me, amused, as if he can see right
through my nonchalance. He reaches for his cigarettes and lights one,
gathering his thoughts. “I met her…it would have been in May of 1938. I
was seventeen, she nearly so. We’d moved from Dresden to Berlin by then
and I saw her one day as I was cycling home from a Hitler Youth parade.”
He sees my expression of disgust and explains, “Membership was
mandatory for Aryans by then, but my father had signed me up before that.
The day after my fourteenth birthday, in fact. We were a military family and
I was destined to be an officer like he was before me, and my grandfather
was before that.”
“No matter who you were fighting for?”
He takes a pull on his cigarette and exhales slowly. “I wasn’t raised to
question those in power. Not like you.”
“You haven’t changed much, then.”
His eyes grow a shade chillier, but he goes on. “My father never
accepted Germany’s defeat at the end of the Great War. Not a single enemy
soldier sets foot on German soil but we roll over and take it? It wasn’t going
to happen a second time. Germany was going to show the world what it was
made of.”
Bitterness has crept into his voice and he’s silent for several moments,
watching the smoke from his cigarette twist in the air. When he continues
his voice is lighter. “So. I was cycling home, and I saw a girl on the other
side of the street. A very beautiful girl. Dark hair. Dark eyes. And as I was
wondering how to get a girl like that to talk to me, my front wheel hit a
pothole and I was thrown over the handlebars. Broke my nose. Blood all
down my uniform.” He rubs the side of his nose and for the first time I see
there’s the slightest imperfection in its strong line. “She cleaned me up and
talked to me, between laughing at me.”
I try and picture a Jewish girl going to the aid of a member of the Hitler
Youth, the red and black swastika armband bright against his tan uniform. It
seems impossible. “Wasn’t she afraid of you?”
He shakes his head. “Johanna didn’t know she was Jewish. She was
adopted and her parents had raised her Catholic, like them. In a few weeks’
time I was eighteen and in the Wehrmacht and they could barely disguise
their distaste at seeing their beautiful, Jewish daughter on the arm of a
German army ensign. I just thought they didn’t think I was good enough for
her. It was easy to believe, because I wasn’t.”
His eyes drop, and I can sense his good mood has evaporated. He talks
on in a low voice, almost as if I’m not there. “I saw her every time I was
home on leave in Berlin and I fell in love with her. Her parents finally told
her she was Jewish when she told them we were engaged. They were
worried about her adoption records surfacing if we requested a marriage
certificate and urged her to break things off with me and flee. She refused.”
“How do you know this if she was…” I trail off. If she never told you
she was Jewish and she was dead by the time you returned from the war.
“I tracked down Johanna’s mother after I’d been to Auschwitz. She was
in a terrible way. She’d lost her husband in the bombing and her daughter in
the camps. She spat at me, hit me. She blamed me for Johanna being
killed.” His eyes are unfocused and fixed on a spot above my head. “When
I think back I remember one of the last times Johanna and I were together,
and I’m sure that she almost told me then but something stopped her.
Maybe she was afraid for me. Or maybe it was my Nazi uniform. I don’t
know. There was something worrying her but she said it was the war. The
bombing. That I was fighting. The last time I saw her we were supposed to
be married but she said she couldn’t find her birth certificate and there
wasn’t time to request a copy. I was sent to North Africa to fight, and a few
months later I got the letter saying that—” His lips press together. “Saying
that she loved me and she couldn’t wait to be my wife. Then I was captured,
and I never heard from her again.”
He’s silent a long time, and then he notices that his cigarette has burned
down to his fingers and grinds it angrily into the ashtray. “Why do I tell you
these things? I haven’t spoken this aloud in twenty years.”
It’s on the tip of my tongue to say something wounding. She didn’t trust
you, that’s why she didn’t tell you she was Jewish. She can’t have really
loved you. But it’s rare to see him so raw and open and despite everything, I
feel for him. Or, I feel for the man he once was, the focused but blinkered
young man who wore the uniform of those who killed the woman he loved.
I see the same hatred of the Nazis in his eyes that I saw in my father’s for
the Russians, their hearts both hardened with hate because they lost the
women they loved. How quickly the political becomes personal when those
you love are taken from you.
Reinhardt reaches for his uniform jacket which is slung over the back
of the sofa and digs in one of the pockets. “Here.” He tosses a small
cardboard box over to me and I catch it.
“What’s this?”
“Birth control.”
I’m still lost in his past and it takes me a moment to switch back to my
present. I stare down at the box, feeling like a chair has been pulled out
from beneath me. “Did you have to do it like that? Make me feel sorry for
the things that happened to you and then throw this in my face?”
“I thought you’d be pleased. There are women in countries all over the
world who are denied access to these pills.”
“Oh, yes, the women of East Germany are so lucky,” I fume. When did
he get them, today? Or did he acquire them during these last weeks and has
been keeping them aside for the cruelest possible moment?
But he just reaches for his reports and begins packing them back into
their files. “Don’t feel sorry for me, Liebling. I landed on my feet after the
war. I always will.”
“Yes, I have no doubt you’ll be fine. You get to do whatever you want,
take whatever you like. Everything will always work out for you, while I
—”
 Faster than I can follow he’s crossed the space between us and is
leaning over me, hands braced on the sofa either side of my body and his
face close to mine. Eyes blazing, he speaks in a low, threatening voice.
“You think I’ve had a say in all the things that have happened to me?
You think I would choose them? Yes, I took you, but it was the Fates who
put you in my path twice in the same week and I knew then it would be this
way between us. I have been patient, waiting for you to feel it too. And you
do. You may hit me, swear at me, declare ten times a day that you hate me,
but all it takes is one look, one kiss, and you will give me everything.”
His words burn through me like fire. I remember what I thought the
very morning after I encountered Reinhardt in the street. The man I’ll fall in
love with will be unlike any of the men I’ve known in my life. He’ll be
remarkable.
“You were meant to be mine. And I will have everything.”
I don’t believe in fate, but he’s right about one thing. I do feel it, and
it’s not just his physicality, his intensity. Chemistry, the Western magazines
call it, that indefinable connection that two people have to each other on a
frequency only they can hear.
But it doesn’t matter what I call it. We want each other. And we are
going to tear each other apart.
He stays where he is a moment longer, just watching me, just
breathing, content to wait. He’s thinks he’s got all the time in the world.
When he finally straightens I ease myself off the sofa, my face averted,
letting him think that it’s shame or submission making me look at the
ground, but really it’s because I don’t want him to see the anger burning in
my eyes. I will bring this man down if it’s the last thing I do.
Later, as I’m hanging my skirt up in the closet something inside on the
ceiling catches my eye. I’ve seen it dozens of times before without realizing
what I’m looking at. I step inside to get a closer look, and reach my fingers
up to touch it.
What a curious place to put such a thing, but I suppose it has to go
somewhere. I stand in the semi-darkness of the little space for some time,
just thinking, remembering something Frau Fischer told me.
Yes, it could work. It could work beautifully.
 Brimming with excitement, I step back into my room and spy the box
of birth control pills sitting on my dressing table. The smile is wiped from
my face in an instant. My plan could work, but it will take time. Possibly
weeks, and in the meantime I’ll be living under the same roof as Reinhardt.
My heart beating in my throat, I reach for the box and read the
instructions. One every day at the same time… Inside the box the pills are
arranged in a case that resembles a telephone dial and labelled one to
twenty-four. Each one a tiny decision.
I can still feel his mouth whispering against mine. I remember how he
looked in the semi-darkness, naked and implacable; the slide of his tongue
against mine, against my sex. The memory makes me whimper because I’m
no longer the indifferent, sexless creature I once was. He’s awoken a hunger
in me that burns hotter than wildfire and I pray that it won’t consume me
before I manage to get away from him.
I count back the days, reach for the eleventh pill and swallow it down
with some water.

OceanofPDF.com
 Chapter Seventeen
Evony

“Did you take your pill?”

Reinhardt asks this as soon as I enter the kitchen. Frau Fischer has her
back turned toward us and is stirring something on the stove, but I notice
her ears prick up.
“Good morning, Evony, did you sleep well, Evony,” I mutter while
helping myself to coffee from the pot.
He waits, watching me narrowly. I feel safe with the housekeeper in the
room and merely take an ostentatious sip from my cup. If he’s so interested
in me not getting pregnant then I feel safe from him in that way, too, for at
least a week. Maybe longer if I can pretend I’m not taking the pills.
He slaps his paper down and rounds on me, his face a snarl. “Listen to
me. I gave you those pills for a reason and I’m not in the mood to play silly
games. Now, did you take your pill?”
I’m startled by how quickly he’s erupted into a burning temper. I give
him a look that I hope conveys how detestable I find the idea of both him
and the possibility of his children, and say, “Yes. Of course I did.”
Somewhat mollified, his shoulders unclench and he speaks in a softer
tone of voice. “And will you take them as per the instructions and inform
me when you need more?”
“Yes,” I mutter.
“What was that?”
I match his volume from a moment ago and shout, “Yes, Herr
Oberstleutnant!”
Reinhardt straightens the belt on his already perfectly straight uniform
jacket, his expression seething. Why couldn’t he have just asked when we
were alone? Why does he have to make such a drama out of it? I stare him
down, thinking with pleasure about the plan I’ve concocted to spy on him,
right under his very nose. Let him see the defiance in my face. I know I
should try harder to pretend I’m going along with this man’s wishes but I
can’t.
Reaching for his cap he pulls it down onto his head. “I’ll be downstairs
by the car and will expect you there at zero eight hundred and five hours.
Don’t keep me waiting.” He storms out, his polished boots flashing in the
morning light.
I sit down and notice Frau Fischer watching me, her eyebrows raised. I
give a half shrug, as if I don’t know what has got into the Oberstleutnant
this morning either.
At exactly five past eight—or as he puts it in his punctilious military
manner, zero eight hundred and five hours—I close the front door and
sweep past Reinhardt with a sunny smile, relishing how good it feels to
provoke him. He narrows his eyes at me as Hans opens my door but doesn’t
say anything. When he’s in a temper with me he doesn’t try to kiss me or
give me little presents so I only wish it would last longer.
After lunch I type up an important letter incorrectly three times and
Lenore banishes me to the filing room. I didn’t even mess it up on purpose.
Lately I’ve given up deliberately trying to be a poor secretary as it hasn’t
helped me avoid Reinhardt, and I feel badly for Lenore if I don’t pull my
weight. Unfortunately, though, I’m a poor secretary even when I’m trying. I
can type at a reasonable speed but my mind wanders, and then I make
mistakes and the page gets covered in Tipp-ex. Lenore spotted me stamping
over a b that should have been a p and tore the sheet out of my typewriter.
“Evony, for heaven’s sake, we can’t send a letter to the Chairman’s
office looking like this. I’ll do it. You go and file everything in that tray.”
I’m partway through the stack and thinking that the Chairman himself
won’t even see the damn letter, when I hear someone come into the room. I
turn, hoping it’s Peter, but it’s Reinhardt. He’s got a file in his hand and
ignores me as he opens a cabinet and thrusts it back in its place. His face is
closed and set and I’m wondering why he didn’t give the file to Lenore or I
to put away when he turns suddenly, slips his arms around my waist and
pulls me back against him.
“You are very provoking,” he murmurs into the side of my neck before
kissing me there. I angle my head to one side, instinct taking over like it did
that first day, my eyes closing as I enjoy the touch of his lips. My hands
reach for his arms and I feel the wool of his uniform jacket beneath my
fingers, and I hold onto his wrists.
“And you are quite a beast.”
I feel him smile against my throat, and then growl softly. The
vibrations travel throughout my entire body like thunder rumbling in a
summer sky. Then he releases me and is gone, and I don’t see him again for
the rest of the working day. Not in person at least. The memory of his large
hands are imprinted on my body, his lips on my throat.
Later that evening when we’re siting in front of the fire he gets up and
twitches the curtains aside, peering up at the sky. It’s poured with rain the
last few nights but tonight the sky is clear. My heart begins to beat a little
faster. Could he be thinking of going hunting? I run through my plan again,
searching for problems. I could encounter dozens but I won’t know until I
put it into action.
I make a show of yawning and heading sleepily for my bed. Once the
bedroom door is closed I listen for moment, trying to discern what my
captor is doing. Going to bed? Having a last cigarette before going out? I
can’t tell, but I spring into action. It’s imperative that I’m down in that
Trabant before he leaves the house or the plan won’t work.
My coat has to stay on its peg in the hall but I pull a woolen sweater
over my blouse, a beret onto my head and wind a scarf around my neck.
Taking the stool from beside the dresser into the closet I push my clothes
aside and look up at the trapdoor. It was the conversation I had with Frau
Fischer the night Reinhardt got so angry about Thom that gave me the idea.
She mentioned hearing rats in the roof. “I can hear them scurrying around
in the rafters when I’m lying in bed. All these attics are connected and they
run up and down all night long.”
If I can get into the attic and make my way along the length of the
building to the empty apartment I’ll be able to let myself out onto the street.
I’ll have to be careful not to be spotted by Reinhardt’s guards, but if I’m
lucky they won’t be paying much attention to comings and goings at other
buildings on this street.
If I’m lucky. So much of this plan hinges on luck, but it’s the best idea
I’ve got. Surely I’ve got to get lucky sometime.
Of course, just because rats can get through doesn’t mean there’ll be
room for a person. I might trip and put my foot through a plaster ceiling.
Someone might hear me and call the police. One thing on my side,
ironically, is the Stasi. If anyone does hear footsteps they might believe it’s
a Stasi agent going about their secretive business and decide it’s safer to
pretend they haven’t heard anything.
Standing up on the stool I carefully maneuver the cover aside and
straighten so that my head and shoulders are in the attic. The air up here
smells flat and musty and it’s very dark. Grilles high up in the brickwork let
in some street light but it’s not much after the brightness of my bedroom. I
stay where I am for a few minutes, praying my eyes will adjust. Soon I can
make out the dark rafters running along the attic and the lighter ceiling
plaster between them.
Hauling myself up I perch on the rim of the access hole, take a
steadying breath, and then stand up. The ceiling is low and slanted and I
have to bend at the waist, but I’m able to brace my hands against the roof
for balance and begin edging my way along the narrow beams. It’s slow
going as I have to be as silent as possible, and I can’t risk falling and
putting a foot through the plaster. After just a few minutes my back prickles
with sweat and I’m panting, more from nerves than effort. But I remember
the tunnel with Ana and the constant danger we faced of being buried alive.
This is nerve-wracking, but it’s not the most dangerous thing I’ve done.
There are rat droppings everywhere and I try not to think about fat
brown rats with their worm-like tails nipping at my ankles. Reinhardt has
called me a sneaking rat on occasion, and look at me now, creeping around
like a rat, a spy, when I swore I would never become like the Stasi. But it’s
either stay in East Berlin and be what Ulrich said I was, a Stasi Schlampe,
or this.
I choose this.
 It’s hard to track my progress in the low light. I keep waiting to come
up against a brick wall diving one attic from the next, but I don’t. They are
all connected like Frau Fischer said, one long open space that goes on and
on. The balls of my toes grow sore from treading the narrow beams. I try to
gauge how many apartment lengths I’ve come—when I spot it. A solid
wall. Does it divide one apartment building from the next or is it the
exterior wall? Am I over the empty apartment? I should have thought to
count the trapdoors as I went, but I was concentrating on not falling. I’m
standing over a trapdoor now and, paralyzed with indecision, I just stare at
it.
My legs start to shake and I either have to go back or lift that trapdoor.
Praying that it’s the empty apartment and I’m not about to peer into
someone’s living room, I ease that trapdoor open. And breathe a sigh of
relief. I’m over an empty room and there are rat droppings on the carpet.
I’ve never been so happy to see rat droppings.
I drop down to the floor as silently as I can and make my way through
the empty apartment to the back door. I can unlock the door from the inside
and I find a piece of discarded cardboard, place it over the latch and wedge
the door closed. When I return all I’ll have to do is push the door open to let
myself back in, but from the outside it will look secure.
Finally out in the night air I stand in the darkness of the spiral fire
escape for a moment, just breathing. So far so good. But how much time
has that taken me? Reinhardt could be far away by now.
The Trabant is parked around the corner and once my feet are on the
ground I walk quickly along the laneway and out onto the side street,
keeping watch for guards and Volkspolizei. I spot the car parked beneath a
tree which is just beginning to bud with spring leaves. Feeling for the keys I
find them atop the driver-side wheel, just as Peter promised they would be,
and in that moment I want to hug him. My little mantra, So far so good,
grows stronger.
But once I’m sitting in the driver’s seat I become paralyzed again.
What now? I didn’t think this far ahead because getting out of the apartment
without being seen by Reinhardt’s guards preoccupied all my thoughts.
 I’m no good as a spy. This is too nerve-wracking. My heart starts to
race but I force myself to take another deep breath. First things first: I need
to be able to see the front door of his building when he leaves. Starting the
engine I ease the car forward, the headlights off. The car makes a loud put-
put sound and I cringe, certain someone is going to become suspicious
about what I’m doing.
I park at the end of the street where I can watch the front door and
switch the engine off. The clock on the dashboard reads five minutes past
eleven. If Reinhardt’s going out hunting it will be in the next hour. There’s
nothing to do but sit and wait, and feel the cold seep into my bones.
Finally I see his tall, uniformed figure striding down the front steps of
the apartment building and making his leisurely way to the Mercedes. Light
from a streetlamp glints on the silver buttons of his double-breasted coat. I
start out of my slouch and reach for the ignition—but stop myself just in
time. He’ll hear me if I start the engine now, and my stomach quails at the
thought of him turning and seeing me sitting here in the shadows.
I wait until I hear the purr of the West German car and see the red flash
of parking lights before I turn the ignition. When he peels out of his parking
space I count to three and then do the same. He drives fast, much faster than
I was expecting, and he’s disappeared round the corner before I’ve driven
six feet. I put my foot on the accelerator and the car whines in protest.
“Come on, come on,” I mutter, coaxing a little more speed from the
cold engine. I turn a corner and find the street ahead of me is empty. When I
reach the next junction I look left and right but those are empty, too.
“Scheisse.” At random I swing the wheel to the right and drive as fast
as I can to the next corner, but there’s no sign of the black car.
I’ve lost him.
I drive about for a few minutes hoping to catch sight of him but my
heart is soon pounding in fear. This is too reckless. I run the risk of being
stopped by the Stasi or driving straight into Reinhardt if I crisscross the
streets aimlessly. Reluctantly, I turn back towards the apartment and park
the Trabant, feeling very disappointed about my failure.
Getting back into the empty apartment is easy, and so is stacking up a
few packing cases so I can get into the attic. I’m soon back in my bedroom.
In the stillness and silence of the familiar surroundings I realize how tightly
wound I am. I can’t get my heart rate to slow down and adrenaline makes
me pace up and down the room. Finally I lie flat on my back on the floor
and take deep breaths.
Tonight was a waste of time but at least I know my plan can work and I
didn’t get caught. Tomorrow I can try again and I’ll be better prepared. I
will do this.
But the next night I wait in the Trabant for two and a half hours and
Reinhardt doesn’t appear. At half past one I give up, chilled to my bones
and feeling teary from exhaustion and nerves. As I trudge back to the empty
apartment and let myself in I think how much I hate this. How does
Reinhardt do this day in, day out? Even get excited by it? The subterfuge,
the sneaking around. Perhaps it’s because he doesn’t have to do any of the
sneaking himself. What he does is proudly proclaimed by his uniform and
he gets others to do the sneaking for him.
The next night is another fruitless wait, but on the fourth he appears at
a quarter past midnight. I turn the ignition of the Trabant as soon as I see
the Mercedes’ lights come on—but the engine only sputters. I turn it again
and again and watch in despair as the black car slides around the corner and
out of sight. There’s no point trying the ignition again. I’ve flooded the
engine. Tears prickling in my eyes I make my way inside, not knowing how
I will keep doing this night after night only to face disappointment. I
consider going to Peter and begging him let me do something else for the
group, but I know he’ll refuse. Oberstleutnant Volker is too dear a prize.
On Friday evening as we’re getting into the car outside Stasi HQ
Reinhardt touches the back of my cheek with his gloved fingers, an
expression of concern on his face. “Are you feeling ill, Liebling? You are
pale.”
I look down quickly, knowing there are dark smudges beneath my eyes.
I’ve always needed a solid eight hours of sleep and it’s showing that I’m
getting barely half that at the moment. “Yes, fine. Just not sleeping very
well at the moment.”
He opens his mouth to speak again but I push past him and get into the
car. I’m a terrible spy. I’m the worst spy.
 Reinhardt must say something to Frau Fischer that evening as she stays
later than usual and gives me a mug of hot beer to drink after dinner. “Hot
beer will cure any cold or fever,” she tells me, standing over me as I drink
it.
What it actually does is make me sleepier than I can ever remember
being and I nod off on the couch. Sometime later I wake to find Reinhardt
gently shaking me and helping me to my feet. Once I come to I push him
away and stand up by myself. He protests, but I make my unsteady way to
my room alone and close the door. I don’t bother going out at all that night,
though I feel guilty about it as I fall asleep.
Over breakfast the next day I start to worry he’s becoming suspicious.
It’s Saturday, which means he actually sits down and eats something, and
out of the corner of my eye I can see him watching me narrowly.
When he gets up for his cigarettes he puts a hand on my shoulder. “Are
you feeling better, Liebling?”
I shrug him off. “Yes, I’m fine. I told you, I’m just tired not sick.”
Unable to bear being near him I retreat to my room and close the door.
Partly from exhaustion and partly from despair, I get back into bed and
close my eyes, willing the world to go away.
I sleep for a little but when I wake up I feel worse, not better. I’ll be
rested enough to follow him tonight, assuming he goes out, but thinking
about sitting for hours in that cold Trabi casts a pall over my already low
mood.
There’s a soft knock on the door and, thinking it’s Frau Fischer with
more warm beer I call out. “I’m awake.”
But it’s not Frau Fischer. It’s Reinhardt, and he pushes open the door
watches me from the doorway. He’s in a white shirt and gray trousers,
looking smart as always but without his usual black tie. His sleeves are
rolled back past his elbows and I can see his irritation in the taut muscles of
his arms as he folds them. “What’s got into you?”
“Nothing. I’m fine.”
“No you’re not. Come on, Evony. You’re stronger than this.”
I stare at the ceiling. “What’s got into me? It could be I’m being held
captive by a madman in a country I hate. What do you think?”
 Out of the corner of my eye I see him shake his head. “Tell me the
truth.”
Damn his perception. Damn everything about him. “Fich dich.”
He strides forward and strips the bedclothes from me. I squeal with
indignation as he scoops me out of bed and carries me out into the hall,
struggling in his arms. “Put me down. Let me go.”
“No. If you’re going to sulk and swear at me you may as well do it in
my bed.”
Anger and something else, something carnal, flickers through me. My
nails dig into his shoulders and before he’s pushed open the door to his
bedroom I’m kissing him. He kisses me back, fierce and needful, like a man
dying of hunger. Then I bite his lip and he groans, and throws me down on
the bed. I glare up at him through my messy curls as he begins to unbutton
his shirt.
“You are the most obstinate young woman I’ve ever met. Am I ever
going to touch you without it being an unnecessary battle?”
“No.”
He smiles his hard, unfriendly smile, shrugs out of his shirt and begins
undoing his belt and trousers. “Good. Take off your clothes.”
At the sight of him naked some of my bravado evaporates, because it’s
broad daylight this time and I can see quite clearly the hard lines of his
chest, his flat stomach, and the length of his cock, thickening before my
eyes, strange and beautiful at the same time.
He must see apprehension in my eyes. “Don’t worry, Liebling. I’m
going to be very sweet about this.”
I strip off my vest and underwear, all I was wearing in bed, and level a
look at him that very plainly says, I’m not.
When he gets onto the bed I pull back my hand to slap him across the
face. I almost succeed but he captures my wrist and pins it to my side. I
attack him with everything I have, my feet, my knees, my nails. He doesn’t
try to stop me, though he deflects the fiercest of my blows without hurting
me back. All the while he kisses me, plucks at my nipples, squeezes my
behind. He finds my sex and the slickness there and he pushes one thick
finger into me and the fist that lands on his shoulder suddenly clings to him.
I moan his name, some of the fight going out of me. Capitulating shouldn’t
feel good, but I let him lay me down on the cool mattress and he licks me
while his finger explores. Then he adds another and I bury my hands in his
hair. I teeter on the brink of coming for a long time, but the movements of
his tongue are almost lazy and then when I finally think he’s going to push
me over the edge he sits up, and I scream in frustration.
He yanks me down the bed, cutting off my cry, and, still unhurried,
rubs the tip of his cock against my slipperiness. My anger grows again as I
watch him consider me, his head on one side, drinking in my desperation,
enjoying it.
“Do you want me, Liebling?”
I will not say yes. I will not beg.
He leans over me, sleek and smug, and pierces me slowly. It’s not like
the first time. It doesn’t hurt. He feels good. So, so good, that I pull him
closer and sink my teeth into the hard line of muscle across his shoulder and
he hisses in pain. How dare he feel so fucking good. His thrusts are slow,
easing into my tightness, exploring how deep he can push before I grab his
hips and gasp. Every few thrusts he pushes a little deeper, and a little
deeper, coaxing surrender from my body. And then he’s all the way to the
hilt and he braces his hands on either side of my head, his eyes dark and
goading.
“Do your worst then, you little cat.”
I rake his back with my nails, wanting to draw blood, wanting to hurt
him, but he doesn’t care, and all the while he softly kisses my mouth, my
neck, his fierce rhythm never letting up for a moment.
“That’s it, Liebling, get it all out. I can take everything you can throw
at me.”
I fall back, whimpering, because what he’s doing to me is taking over
everything else and I can feel myself tightening around him, reveling in the
way my flesh yields to his. He drinks in every expression that flickers over
my face. Hooking my legs over his shoulders he bears down on me heavily
and the sensation goes nuclear. I still don’t beg but he must see the
supplication in my eyes, the please don’t stop. It’s not fair that he can do
this to me until I don’t want to fight back. It’s not fair that I fight him and
yet I’m the one who ends up at his mercy and losing control while his body
conquers mine.
As I come I pull him closer and feel him shudder against me, his
rhythm stuttering as he pushes as deep as he can twice, three times, and
then stills. I can’t make myself let go of him. In the hazy afterglow I cling
to him, and he eases slowly off me until we’re lying on our sides, my cheek
pressed against his chest.
His hand sketches circles on my back while his other holds me to him.
I close my eyes, feeling more relaxed than I have in a long, long time.
“Are you having bad dreams, Liebling?”
It takes a few minutes to dredge myself up from this warm, sleepy
place. Does he think nightmares have been keeping me up? I don’t want to
answer, and so to deflect the conversation away from me I reach for the first
reproachful thing I have to hand.
“You think of her when you’re in bed with me, don’t you?”
Unruffled, he rolls onto his back and closes his eyes. “I wouldn’t say
I’m doing much thinking when I’m in bed with you. What I am thinking
about isn’t her or anyone else who isn’t you.”
I prop myself up on my elbow and watch him. “You as good as told me
you stole me because I remind you of her.”
“Johanna was a good-natured, beautiful girl who brought a smile to the
face of everyone who met her. She was nothing like you.”
“Schwein.”
He opens his eyes and looks at me. “Ja, I know. You have told me this
before. Liebling, you are nothing like her, and I am glad of this.”
I frown in confusion. “What? Why?”
He slides his arms around me and pulls me up onto his chest so I’m
lying on top of him. “Because I’m nothing like I was then, either. You’re a
hard young woman. You’ve faced difficult things and you have not
crumbled because you are strong. You’ve probably thought of a dozen ways
you might escape me.”
Just the one, actually, but it’s a good one. “You sound proud of me.”
“I am. So—” he reaches for his cigarettes on the nightstand and lights
one “—when I wake in the night and feel a twinge of conscience about
keeping you here against your will I am able to fall back asleep very
easily.” He smokes his cigarette, watching me narrowly. “I’m not letting
you go, you know.”
That Reinhardt is troubled by his conscience for even a moment I find
hard to believe. “You will when you tire of me.”
He looks at me steadily and says, with deliberate slowness, “Nein. I’m
not letting you go.”
I get that awful feeling that he’s able to read my mind. Smell treason.
Sometimes I forget that my lover is der Mitternachtsjäger. Pretending to
laugh, I say flippantly, “Are you threatening me or telling me you’re in love
with me?”
“I have no idea, meine Liebe. Do you?”
I stare at him. I was being provocative, trying to deflect his attention
from the guilt he might see in my face. He’s serious, though. How can he
possibly think that he’s in love with me, even with his twisted ideas about
devotion? I wonder if this is a new strategy to wrong-foot me, to gloat over
my captivity, and say quickly, “You won’t break me. I won’t let you.”
“I never thought I would, and I don’t want you broken.” He slides his
fingers into my hair and caresses the back of my head. “I like you as you
are, strangely. My churlish, ungrateful, bad-tempered girl.”
He smiles at the baffled look on my face. “I hardly expected you to be
pleased that I have kept you here against your will, even if I have kept you
out of prison. But you could have been tearful day and night. You could
have stopped eating. You could have pulled all the books off the shelves
and smashed every plate and glass in the apartment.”
“Verdammt. I didn’t think of that.”
He laughs, shaking me on his chest. “But here you are in my bed, and
though you do take vicious delight in scratching me and swearing at me you
are as sweet as any man could want.” His hand moves to stroke my cheek
and he speaks softly. “Sweeter, even. You’re strong, Liebling, and I know
how important that is. If you’re not able to fight then this world will crush
your body and your spirit.” His eyes are dark blue in the half-light. “Please
tell me if you’re having bad dreams or if something has upset you. I worry
if you’re quiet. I’d rather you call me names and fight me than slip away
where I can’t reach you.”
“Why do you even care how I feel? I thought all that mattered to you
was that I was here.”
He continues to stroke my cheek, a look in his eyes like I’ve never seen
before. “Because you are my shield maiden. No, more than that. You are my
Valkyrie, and I want you strong. If you are strong then there’s nothing that
can touch us. Touch you.”
My heart is racing, making me feel sick and confused, so I put my head
down on his shoulder. He worries that I might be taken from him, too. If not
love, he does seem to cherish something tender for me. It should make me
exultant, because his affection can only be useful to me.
I can feel him watching me, made uncertain by my silence, and I reach
for the first question that comes to mind. “I know so little about you. Tell
me something about you.”
“Like what?”
“When did you join the Party?”
He seems surprised by my change of subject, but goes along with it.
“About a year after I returned from the war. I’d read The Communist
Manifesto as a prisoner and started attending meetings almost straight away,
and then I was vouched for and made a member.”
I think about how he reads Neues Deutschland every morning, cover to
cover. The paper is State-run and seems to be popular at Stasi HQ. My
father always said it was stuffed full of propaganda and lies. “Do you really
believe in everything that they say? That they stand for?”
I hear the skepticism in my own voice and flinch. I’ve forgotten who
I’m talking to. But Reinhardt doesn’t seem perturbed and he’s silent for a
moment, considering his answer. “As much as I can believe in any political
party. I come from the military, not the government. In the days after the
war I saw how dedicated the Party was to anti-fascism and I liked that very
much. The Stasi was the ideal place for someone like me.”
I remember the Stasi motto: the Shield and Sword of the Party.
Reinhardt is the embodiment of it. Protective. Possessive. Strategic. I can
see that he’d naturally gravitate towards the security ministry. But I shake
my head, exasperated, as I’ve heard him speak about fascism before.
“The war was twenty years ago. Where is fascism now? Why must you
be our sword and shield when there is nothing to fight?”
“Oh? Do you think there aren’t people in Germany who miss the days
of the Reich and the Führer? The far right can be very alluring to some
people. Everything is always someone else’s fault.”
“But Reinhardt—”
He holds up a hand. “Yes, all right, I admit I see no imminent signs that
the next Hitler is about to rise. So, my little traitor, you question why we
need people like me at all? Remember that the West is as frightened of us as
our Party is of them, and both sides have the Bomb now. When in history
have two enemy powers wielded such weapons? It is the power of the gods
in our hands, and I can’t see that things will de-escalate on their own for
some time. So, I do my part to ensure that the West doesn’t learn too many
secrets about the East and feels emboldened to act against us. Their people
do the same on their side, and there is peace, of sorts. A cold war.”
I stare at him, still exasperated but bewildered now as well.
He smiles. “Why do you look at me like that?”
“Because you are a Stasi officer and I just questioned the very reason
you exist! Shouldn’t you be lecturing me on communism being the one true
way and the West being evil?”
Grinding out his cigarette in the ashtray beside the bed, he puts his
arms around me. “I told you. I’m a soldier not a bureaucrat, and you
wouldn’t listen if I did lecture you. I just want peace for Germany and not
to die in a mushroom cloud. And I want you. And here you are. Let’s not
talk about serious things right now.”
But I can’t let it go. Lying with him, being close to him like this, makes
me want to understand him. “Anything for peace? Anything at all? The end
justifies your means?”
He twists one of my curls around his finger. “Ja, Liebling, anything at
all. And I don’t apologize for that.”
I shake my head again, because I’ve just questioned the entire power
structure and ideology of East Germany to a Stasi officer, and he’s lying
here, supremely unruffled. “I can’t believe you let me talk this way. Aren’t
you going to lock me up?”
He pretends to consider this. “Not just now. I enjoy you too much.
Come here.”
Pulling me closer he kisses me, and then rolls me beneath him. He
watches me for some time, eyes speculative. “Know this, meine Liebe. If
you ever get away from me I will tear West Berlin apart looking for you. I
will tear West Germany apart. I hope you know that I can, and that I will.
Nothing short of death will keep me from coming for you.”
His eyes have hardened and turned gray. I don’t reply, and seeming
satisfied he’s made his point he kisses me and lies down, his heavy arm
over my waist. I watch his face, softened by slumber. The curve of his
mouth. The slight indentation on his long, straight nose.
Here is my remarkable man, just as vital, handsome and strong as I’d
always hoped he’d be, but presented to me in the shape of my enemy. Could
he tear West Germany apart looking for me? Could his spies find me even
in the West? If he’s telling the truth it means that to escape him once and for
all I will have to bring him down. Otherwise I will never be free.
Meine Liebe. My love.
When I was a teenager I used to ride the Berlin Ringbahn, the
overground train that circled the city, sometimes for hours at a time. I would
get on and watch the roads and buildings slip by, the steel lines caring
nothing for borders or permits. You are now entering the American Zone,
came the tinny announcement. You are now entering the Free Zone.
Caution: you are now leaving the Free Zone. I used to savor the sensation
of plunging headlong into another world and then out of it again, over and
over. I was at home in this zone, a foreigner in that one, but how powerful I
felt that I could bear this becoming and unbecoming dozens of times a day.
The lines are broken now and the trains run sad little semi-circuitous
routes on their own sides of the city. But I remember the rush that came
from being propelled from one world to the next, and I feel it again as I slip
from Reinhardt’s bed into the silence of the hall.
Except now I don’t savor it. I’m not a girl riding the Ringbahn but a
woman walking the tightrope of the Berlin Wall, a sheer drop on either side,
and at any moment I may plunge to my death.

OceanofPDF.com
 Chapter Eighteen
Evony

I wish I was a better liar. I wish I felt a rush when I got away with an
untruth and could gloat over the gullibility of others. I can’t lie to Reinhardt
with words so I don’t try. Instead, I keep my mouth shut and give him what
sings in my heart. He feels my desire for him as my fingers brush against
his gloved ones as we ride in the back of his car. The way I soften against
him when he pulls me close. My body is sincere. As long as he doesn’t
force me to speak he’ll never find out that I intend to betray him.
One wine-dark night he catches me in the hall as I head for my
bedroom, and he kisses me until I grow drunk on the taste of his mouth. I’m
pliant in his arms, my desire for him sounding in every soft breath I take.
But it’s not enough for him anymore. “Do you love me, Evony? I want
to hear you say it. Tell me you love me.”
Instantly my body tenses. Is it not enough that I want him? Why must
he ask for more? Or am I afraid to speak those words because of what I’ll
hear in my own voice? “Please don’t. Please, I can’t.”
His mouth is insistent on mine, and he murmurs between kisses, “Tell
me, Liebling. I know you do. I want to hear you say you love me.”
“I—” Just say it. It’s three words. You can speak three words to save
your life. “I can’t.”
“Why not? Why can’t you say it, if it’s true?”
I pull myself out of his arms and glare at him, my chest heaving. “Love
you? Do you think I’ve forgotten what you are? What you’ve done? You’re
a cold-blooded killer and you murdered my friends. You take people to
prison who just want to be with their families. Do you think I can ever
forget that? Why can’t you be satisfied with what I give you? Why must
you always want more?”
He watches me for a long time, a cold, hard expression in his eyes, and
I realize I’ve made a terrible mistake. Him believing he could win my love
was the only thing keeping me out of prison and I’ve just told him it’s
impossible.
“Get your coat.”
My throat works, trying to get the words out. Maybe it’s not too late.
He wants so badly for me to love him that if I say it now he might believe
me. But he’s not a fool. I spoke the truth just now and he heard it loud and
clear.
In the hall I drag my coat on, feeling numb. So this is it. Downstairs we
get into his car and he’s still not looking at me. He drives us in silence
through the empty streets. I don’t know where exactly Hohenschönhausen
is except that it’s near Stasi HQ. They don’t keep murderers and thieves
there. It’s a special prison just for dissidents and traitors and they’re treated
in special, cruel ways. What Reinhardt said before he put the silk stockings
on me comes back to me. It’s bleak, Liebling. The lights stay on all night.
There is no sky. No wind. No hope.
He slows the car as it goes over some railway tracks and I want to
reach for his gloved hand on the wheel and beg him to pull over. There’s so
much anger and confusion in my heart, but I can tell him how he makes me
feel. How I admire and fear him at the same time. That I respect his drive,
his passion, his cleverness, even if I despise the things that he does. That I
want him so much it frightens me. But if I start talking I’m afraid I won’t be
able to stop. I’ll confess everything—about Peter, about spying on him, and
I’ll end up betraying the only people who can get me away from him. I
won’t do that, even to keep myself out of prison. If it’s too late for me I
won’t drag everyone else down with me.
Stasi HQ is up ahead but before we reach it we turn left up a side street.
My stomach lurches, realizing this is the way to Hohenschönhausen, but a
moment later he’s pulling into a parking space in front of a nondescript
beige building that doesn’t look anything like a prison. Reinhardt gets out
of the car and waits for me to do the same.
 There’s a sign in metal lettering by the entrance: ministry for state
security. It’s not a prison, but it is a government building.
“Where are we?”
Reinhardt still won’t look at me and his face is set and cold. He unlocks
the door to the building and leads me into a vast open space filled with lines
of metal shelving, stacked with manila folders and archive boxes. All the
shelves are marked with letters and numbers that seem to mean something
to him, and he walks smartly along them and then turns down a row.
I follow, and suddenly he stops and reaches for a file. It’s a thick
manila folder stuffed with typed reports and photographs, and he searches
through them. I look between his face and the documents, trying to discern
what is happening. Is this when I discover he’s been onto me all along? Is
this my file? Is it Peter’s?
When he holds out a photograph my brain doesn’t know what to make
of what I’m looking at. It’s not of me or Peter. It’s of a group of people. A
family. I recognize the woman at the center of the glossy black and white
photograph.
I glance up at Reinhardt in confusion but he just nods at the picture.
“Look at it, Evony. Look at it carefully.”
It’s Frau Schäfer, the neighbor that Reinhardt took away in the night for
looking at the Wall and weeping. She’s with a man and two small children
on a street, the family she so desperately wanted to join in West Berlin but
couldn’t because the GDR wouldn’t let her leave. They’re getting out of a
car, a model that I don’t recognize. She’s smiling. The street…
I grab the photo with a cry. That car, that street. The signs above the
shops are in German but I don’t know the stores. The family’s clothes are
cut in unfamiliar modern styles. Herr Schäfer is carrying a newspaper with
a name I don’t know.
“This is West Berlin. When was this taken? How?”
In reply Reinhardt extracts a sheet of typewritten paper from the file
and hands it to me. It’s some sort of report written in a dense bureaucratic
style. All the names are written in capital letters, though I don’t recognize
them and I think they must be codenames. I still don’t understand and I’m
growing frustrated. “Just tell me what this means. Frau Schäfer is in West
Berlin?”
“Ja, Liebling,” he says softly. “She has been for quite some time now.”
I examine the page again, seeking to confirm what he says. My eyes
find the concluding note: “…unknown how LANGE reached the American
Sector. GDR operatives in the W. BERLIN refugee camp have been unable
to obtain intel about the defection from LANGE herself or those close to
her.”
Then after a line break there’s another note. “No further intelligence
regarding LANGE’s defection. GDR operatives assigned elsewhere.”
Written across the bottom of the page is OFFICE OF OBSTLT. R.
VOLKER, and it’s dated just over a month ago. I stare at the report for a
long time. I thought Reinhardt arrested Frau Schäfer the night I first saw
him, but it seems she escaped. Maybe he thinks I had something to do with
it.
Keeping my voice level, I ask, “Do you know how she reached the
West?”
There’s a small smile on his face, the sort he gets when he’s
particularly pleased about something. “Oh, Evony. Of course I know how
she reached the West. I smuggled her across the border myself.”
I stare at him. He did this? Der Mitternachtsjäger?
As if reading my mind, he says, “It is a very useful nickname the
people of East Berlin have given me. Midnight Hunter. I can go any place I
want, do anything, meet anyone. Nobody questions me. Nobody stops me.
My colleagues see only a zealous Stasi officer and my Oberst thinks I’m an
insomniac. The people see someone to fear. Or, usually they do. Some
reckless young women stare me down, unafraid.” He puts his forefinger
under my chin for a moment and smiles again. “I’m careful not to work to a
pattern and I deliver the best results in the Stasi. The cells in
Hohenschönhausen are teeming with traitors, thanks to me.”
“But why let Frau Schäfer go? No, not let her go. Help her escape. She
wanted to leave. Surely that makes her a traitor too?” I imagined it so
vividly—der Mitternachtsjäger coming for her in the night, cruel and
implacable, unmoved by her misery and tears as he took her to prison. If
he’s not that man, then who is he?
Reinhardt gazes at me a long time. “Everything I’ve told you, Evony.
Everything you know about me. Can’t you see why I would do this?”
“No, I can’t. Why do you have a heart for her and not for everyone else
in East Berlin?” But he doesn’t reply.
What Ana and Ulrich? Is this some sort of consolation prize, showing
me that he has a crumb of mercy in the hopes that I’ll believe he’s more
than just a ruthless killer? If what he’s telling me it even true. “That
photograph and that report could be fake.”
He takes the report back, slipping it back into the file with the
photograph. “I’m not going to demand you believe me. You will have to
decide for yourself.”
I’m too tired and overwrought for this. “You hate traitors. You call us
rats fleeing for the West.”
“Ja. That’s true.” His voice is heavy with disappointment and he puts
the file back on the shelf.
“Why one life over another? Why is Frau Schäfer saved, but Ana and
Ulrich are killed in cold blood?”
“I was getting to that. First I wanted to show you…” He glances at the
file as if he’s regretting the way our conversation has unfolded. “I want to
talk to you about Ana Friedman.”
My stomach turns over hearing him say her name. I’ve tried not to
think about her much these past weeks, both because I’ve missed her and
because I’ve felt so guilty. She knew the risks when we went down into that
basement but that doesn’t mean she deserved what happened to her at
Reinhardt’s hands. “There’s nothing you can say.”
“You’ve seen me do things that seem harsh and cruel. I don’t enjoy
killing people but I have to sometimes if they threaten me, or you.
Especially if they threaten you.” His eyes harden and I know he’s thinking
about Ulrich. I don’t know what to think about his death, either. I’ve lost so
much these past months and I’ll never get Ulrich and Ana back. I’ll never
get back Evony Daumler, either. Each day that passes I can feel her slipping
further and further away and as she slips away so does the hope that I’ll
ever see my father again.
Reinhardt shifts on his feet, his jaw working. “I’m not very good at
explaining my actions, or asking for forgiveness. I’ve never had to do either
before.”
That doesn’t surprise me in the least.
He’s silent for a few minutes, thinking hard. Finally he says, “I was
wrong to shoot your friend.”
I search his blue-gray eyes, wondering if he’s just saying what he wants
me to believe. “You don’t mean that.”
“I do.”
“What happened to ‘She deserved it because she aimed a gun at me?’”
“I was very angry that night. Hauptmann Heydrich was undermining
me and I was in a terrible temper. In fact, he’s still—” Reinhardt’s jaw
clenches again but he shakes his head. “I take my work seriously. I think in
absolutes, like the soldier I’ve been for a long time. But I should have told
Ana to put the gun down. I’m sorry.”
My chest feels very tight all of a sudden. Why does this even matter to
him? He doesn’t need to prove anything to me. I’m his prisoner.
His voice is low and urgent. “I mean it, Liebling. I’m sorry.”
So many things are churning in my head that I can only look at him,
unable to speak, unable to breathe. Is this even forgivable? Does he deserve
anything but my hatred for the things he has done?
He raises a hand to touch me, but then hope seems to die in his eyes.
“For what it’s worth.”
I hear myself say hoarsely, “Why are you sorry?”
Reinhardt runs his eyes over the shelves, as if trying to put his feelings
into words. “Because it could have so easily been you I shot that night. Ana
on the stairs. You beside me with the gun. East Berlin has always been a
battleground to me and there’s never been a single person in this city that
I’ve had love for. I haven’t felt how I feel about you in a very long, long
time.”
My face creases with tears and I bury it in my hands. The tears come
thick and fast and I realize that I haven’t grieved for Ana. The world has
moved so fast since that night. He puts a tentative hand on my arm and
when I don’t shrug him off he draws me to him. He holds me as I cry, and I
lean against him, taking strength from his body as I did after Ulrich
attacked me. I know I shouldn’t, but I do, because I think I understand what
he’s saying to me. All this time, we haven’t been people to him. We’ve been
the enemy.
I’ve worried that I’ve been starting to see him as a man and not my
captor. Maybe I’m becoming someone real to him, too.
He hands me his handkerchief and I wipe my face and say, “All right. I
believe you.”
“Danke, Liebling.” And he sounds like he really means it.
I gaze at the rows of files and archive boxes. All these Stasi records
filled with secrets about the people of East Berlin. Gossip. Overheard
conversations. Traitors. I think I understand what he was trying to tell me
just now when he showed me the photograph of the Schäfer family. They
were separated by the political turmoil between the East and West, just as
he was separated from Johanna during the war. He can’t think of people like
Frau Schäfer as his enemy because he saw his own pain reflected in her
eyes.
“I thought you were taking me to prison.”
Grim humor returns to his face. “Take you to prison because you
refused to tell me you love me?”
I wonder if he’s going to press me again to say it now. He hasn’t even
said it himself. What would it sound like, if he did? I can hear the words so
clearly. Ich liebe dich. I love you. “It seems like something you would do.”
Reinhardt laughs softly. “Remember what I told you? I’m not letting
you go. Not for anything.” He kisses me fiercely amid all these papers,
these secrets, and I think I can taste the words in his mouth.

∞ ∞ ∞
From that night I go to him willingly and we take to spending hours in bed,
ignoring meal times and likely scandalizing Frau Fischer. I didn’t know it
was possible to want a man this much, to crave his lips on my throat, his
heavy body on mine. To need him again and again like a drug. He shows
me things I didn’t know my body could do, orgasms that string on and on,
one after the other, as he bears down on a spot deep inside me with his
fingers until I’m weak and shaking. He pulls me up and astride him,
showing me how I can take the lead, my hands pressed against his chest as I
slowly ease down on his length. He watches me like he’s never seen
anything so beautiful in his life.
Even after the most intense lovemaking I return to my own bedroom at
night, making excuses about why I can’t stay as I extricate myself from his
arms. I can’t sleep here. I’m not ready. Please be patient. He takes me at my
word, kissing me before reluctantly letting me go. I worry that he’ll grow
impatient and go into my room later to find me gone, but he’s too pleased
by my surrender to seek me out, or even to question why I won’t spend the
whole night in his bed.
I don’t dare fall asleep in arms. He lets me go because it matters to him
that I love him, out of—what? Pride? Desire? Need for forgiveness? I can’t
tell, but this knowledge worms its way deep inside. It possesses me through
the long hours sitting in the cold Trabant and keeps me awake when I return
to my bed. Those three little words lay like a rich liquor on my tongue and I
can feel them waiting to trap me here in his arms, in East Berlin, forever.
In the mornings he lets himself into my room and kisses me awake,
warm from the shower and smelling like fresh cologne and shaving cream.
My arms wind around his neck and I smile up at him, lost in his blue eyes.
We greet each other like continents have come between us in the night.
I don’t know what to do, so I keep doing what I was before. I follow
him at night. I watch him covertly as he drinks his morning coffee. As he
rides beside me in the car on the way to Stasi HQ. As he works silently in
the evening over his reports. I daydream about going to his bed and slipping
my arms around his naked body. Murmuring those words against his mouth
in the heavy darkness. Reinhardt, I love you. Hearing him whisper them
back, fiercely exultant that I’m finally his, rolling me beneath him, pressing
me down into the oblivion of the mattress. It would all be over. The
heartache, the fear, the sneaking around and spying.
 I would be his. I want to be his. I admit it.
But the sight of my city always puts an end to this fantasy. The second
I see the Wall I feel the familiar hatred rise up, for this cruel division, for
the Party, for the people in power in the West and East who make their
citizens suffer for their ideologies. Loving Reinhardt means staying here
forever, and doing so would eventually drive such poison into my heart that
any shred of happiness I might find in his arms would be destroyed.
I watch him as he shares a cigarette with the border guards at
Checkpoint Charlie at one am, feeling like a jealous wife tailing her
unfaithful husband, except that what has come between us isn’t another
person, but this city and our roles in it. Stasi officer and traitor. I have what
I need to get myself out of East Berlin. He gave it to me himself, his
confession that he too is a traitor to the Party. But to save myself I have to
betray him.
Maybe he was lying about helping Frau Schäfer and others like her
escape to the to West. I only have his word.
And then, one night, I see what I’ve been waiting for.
It’s nearly midnight when Reinhardt finally leaves the apartment. I can
sense there’s something different about this night almost right away. He
walks a little faster, his glance up and down the street is a shade more
intense. I start the Trabi engine and follow him.
He goes not to a checkpoint or one of his other haunts, but to an
apartment building, and parks in a rear laneway in the shadows. I watch as
he goes inside, and comes back a few minutes later with a young woman, a
small boy clutching her hand. I don’t get a good look at her as Reinhardt’s
large coat is covering her head and body, shielding her from prying eyes.
She gets into the trunk of his car with the child and Reinhardt tucks the coat
over them. He puts a finger to his lips, a warning for the boy, and closes the
trunk quietly but firmly.
He drives to Checkpoint Charlie and the border guards recognize his
car, his face, and wave him indifferently through. I hang far back and watch
his taillights disappear into the West, and then I drive back to the apartment.
The next morning I wait for him to tell me what he’s done. He’ll want
me to know that he’s been merciful, to prove to me what a good person he
is. But he says nothing, merely dropping a kiss onto my mouth as I take my
seat, and then drinking his coffee and reading his newspaper as if this was
any other morning. I watch him through my lashes as I stir cream into my
coffee, my stomach roiling. I have what I need, proof with my own eyes
that Reinhardt is betraying the Party. Coupled with what I know about Frau
Schäfer’s escape I’ve got more than enough to secure my passage to the
West and to bring down der Mitternachtsjäger once and for all.
Today, at last, is the day. No more excuses. But I find I can’t look at
Reinhardt as we drive to HQ.
Sitting at my desk around eleven I hear whistling. I make myself wait a
few minutes before casually reaching for the stack of filing I’ve been saving
up and head for the filing cabinets. I don’t have to wait very long. Out of
the corner of my eye I see Peter’s freckled hands sorting through the mail.
“Have you found anything?” he asks softly.
I’ve rehearsed the conversation. I’ll tell Peter that Reinhardt has been
betraying the State to get citizens out of East Berlin. Peter will pass the
information onto his contacts and they’ll see that it reaches the ears of
someone high up in the Stasi. Perhaps Reinhardt’s Oberst, or even the
Chairman himself. Reinhardt will be arrested and I will be whisked away to
the safety of the West. I can feel the consequences of my actions spreading
like black ink across wet paper. Unstoppable, inevitable.
I open my mouth and hear my rueful, apologetic voice. “I’ve managed
to tail him several times but he hasn’t gone anywhere significant yet. Most
nights he just seems to talk to the border guards.” A red flush creeps up my
neck and I look away.
Peter thumps the handle of his cart. “He’s clever, setting up innocent
reasons for being out at night. But don’t worry, he’ll deviate from this
eventually and then we’ll have him. Any luck finding things in his
apartment?”
I don’t want to admit that I haven’t been brave enough to search
Reinhardt’s room so I shake my head.
Peter looks downcast, but then he gives me a smile. “Not to worry, you
will. And then I’ll be able to get you out.”
 His quiet assurance drives a nail of guilt through me. Why am I
drawing this out? Why not just say it now? Reinhardt needs to go to prison
and I need to get to out of East Berlin. But then, I still don’t know where
my father is. I take the stack of letters that Peters proffers and say, “There’s
someone I’m looking for. A friend. Could you use your network to find out
where he is?”
Peter looks surprised. “I can try. What’s their name?” I give him Dad’s
full name and date of birth. “When did he go missing?”
“January.”
“Do you know precisely when?”
I hesitate. I don’t like the idea of everyone in Peter’s network,
including possible informants, having information that identifies me. “I’m
not sure. We didn’t see each other at all that month.”
“All right. Sometime in January. But you really will have to give me
something in return. My people won’t act for nothing and they’re getting
impatient with you. But I know you’re doing your best,” he adds hastily.
I remember the sight of Frau Schäfer weeping in the street. It’s all I
have. Reinhardt would do whatever it takes to get what he wants. You have
to be the same.
I look into Peter’s expectant eyes. “Oberstleutnant Volker…has a lover
in the West. His housekeeper told me.” I want to kick myself. This is what
I’m telling Peter? I stopped thinking this was possible long ago.
Peter looks doubtful. “Well, we’ll look into it. Thank you, Evony. I
know together we’ll be able to get this done, and then we can get you out of
here.”
He walks away whistling, his cart squeaking. I want to slam the nearest
filing cabinet closed. The information that Reinhardt has betrayed the State
could have got me out of East Berlin and surely curried me enough favor
with Peter’s group for them to discover where my father is. It’s all I want,
and yet I told him that ridiculous rumor of Frau Fischer’s instead.
In the afternoon Reinhardt calls me into his office to dictate a letter and
when he’s finished I don’t leave. I go around the desk and stand before my
lover. I’ll tell Peter tomorrow. Let me feel Reinhardt against me just one
more time. I will drink my fill of him. What we have comes along just once
in a lifetime, if you’re lucky to find it at all, and we found it in the most
unlikely place, scarred by a Wall, by bullets, by razor wire. I sink down
between his thighs and reach for the belt on his trousers. He watches me,
transfixed, as I take him out and lick the length of him. I suck the tip of his
cock slowly, caressing him with my tongue and then take him into my
mouth. His hands slide into my hair, cupping my head, and he lets out a soft
moan.
“Evony, Liebling.” I can feel his eyes on me, wondering at my
audacity, my willingness. I’ve never done this before but I like it, having
him at my mercy for a change, and when I feel the fierce ache between my
legs I understand why he enjoys doing the same to me so much.
His breathing has become shallow and rapid and he’s hot and swollen
in my mouth when there’s a knock on his office door and the sound of
someone turning the handle. I start, because with Lenore outside I thought
we were safe from intruders. Reinhardt swears and pushes me beneath his
desk. It sits flush against the floor which means whoever’s entering won’t
see me hiding underneath.
Trapped in the cramped space I consider sitting quietly, waiting for
whoever it is to leave, but something wicked steals over me and I put out
my tongue and lick him, and then take him in my mouth again. Reinhardt’s
voice hitches and I expect him to push me away, but he doesn’t. As he talks
I slide the length of him to the back of my throat, pushing him as deep as I
can and rubbing him with my tongue. I tease him, lick him, suck him, while
he carries on a conversation about a Party delegation trip to Romania. I feel
myself growing very aroused, and my mouth works his length lovingly. As
I take him all the way down to my throat again and I hear him fumble for
his cigarettes, the flick of the lighter and then a long, slow exhalation. I
shake with silent laughter and his legs around me tighten in warning.
Finally, the person leaves. The door clicks, and Reinhardt pushes back
from his desk with a shuddering gasp and drags me up by the elbows. His
eyes burn furiously into mine. “You little minx.”
I lick my lips and smile up at him, not in the least sorry. He turns me
and pushes me facedown over his desk and rucks my skirt up, exposing my
behind. I’m half moaning, half laughing softly as he yanks my underwear to
one side.
“Is it amusing to you, trying your best to make me come while I’m
having a meeting?”
I feel the tip of his cock pressing against my sex, sliding through the
wetness that has gathered there.
I open my legs wider and look back at him, goading him, wanting him
furious so that he fucks me hard and fast like I need him to.
“Yes, Reinhardt.”
He growls, and then thrusts hard, and I have to cover my mouth to keep
from crying out so loudly that the whole of HQ will hear me. The tight
angle of his thrusts and being bent over his desk inflames me and I press
back against his hard, hungry strokes. Needing more of him. Needing
everything.
He fucks me with the fast, selfish strokes of a man who’s been driven
to the brink of madness. He wants me to feel what I’ve done to him, half
punishing, half admiring. There’s nothing gentle about the way he’s pinned
me down and I know I’ll feel this tomorrow. I want to feel this tomorrow.
He grips the nape of my neck, the weight of him trapping me exactly
where I want to be. The sensations build, white-hot and overwhelming, and
I bury my face in my arms as I come, struggling to remain silent, my climax
going on and on, pushed higher with his every thrust. I hear him smother
his own groan of release, and he presses as deep as he can, his seed spurting
as he comes.
We’re both out breath in the aftermath and he helps me woozily up.
“Mein süsses Mädchen.” My sweet girl. We perch on the edge of his desk,
limbs tangled, breaths merging. I rest the full weight of my heart against
him and close my eyes.
He’ll soon be in a cold cell in Hohenschönhausen. I flinch, and hide
my face in his shoulder. This knowledge will be a shard of ice deep inside
me once I am in the West, this lion of a man, put in a cage.
“What’s wrong, Liebling?” he asks, caressing my cheek.
I force a smile and shake my head, and after straightening my clothes
and giving him a final kiss I go back to my desk. Lenore is dabbing at a
damp patch on her skirt and frowning.
“I dropped a whole glass of water in my lap and had to go to the
restroom for paper towels. Can you believe it?”
I give her a sympathetic smile and slip behind my desk.
That night is my last night and I’m too restless to sleep, so I leave my
room yet again to tail Reinhardt. I think I just want to see him, be with him,
in this strange, watchful way. I climb up through the trapdoor at ten-forty-
five and pick my way carefully along the rafters to the empty apartment,
and the routine of it is soothing.
I’m careful to keep to the shadows cast by high walls and spreading
trees. The Trabant is parked two streets away and I’m fishing the keys out
of my pocket when a movement out of the corner of my eye snares my
attention. I look up and see the glowing red tip of a cigarette. Someone
exhales slowly, letting out a plume of gray-blue smoke that catches in the
streetlight. A voice speaks out of the darkness.
“Guten Abend, Fräulein Daumler. You are out very late.”

OceanofPDF.com
 Chapter Nineteen
Evony

Reinhardt steps out of the shadows, his manner ostentatiously casual as he

drops his cigarette onto the ground and grinds it out with his boot. His gaze
rakes me from the tips of my toes to the top of my head. But he’s not casual,
or even calm. There’s fury burning in his eyes.
“How long?” he asks.
How long have I been sneaking out to spy on him. I swallow, my
mouth dry. “Since you… Since we first went to bed together.”
He nods slowly, his eyes dropping to the pavement but not before I see
bitterness and disappointment flash through them. He believed what I told
him with my body. That I was his, always. I never wanted to look into his
eyes and see the painful knowledge that I’ve betrayed him.
“How did you find me out?”
“Too many rats in the roof. Interesting patterns in the dust in apartment
12E. Anyone else would think it was the Stasi and ignored it.” He takes a
casual step toward me, the white light from the streetlamp shifting over the
planes of his face. “But I’m the Stasi around here.”
He holds a hand out for the car keys and I hand them over. “Danke,
Liebling. Shall we go back inside?”
He grips me firmly by the upper arm, his hand like cold iron, and
marches me along the street back to the apartment. For a moment he slows,
peering up at the attics above the terraced apartments, tracing the path of
my escape route. He nods and says to himself, “Ja, very clever.”
Inside he gestures to the sofas. I sit, hands folded in my lap while he
stands before me. I remember that first night, sitting in this exact spot, cold
and afraid and feeling all the horror of the unknown. I feel it again now
because this isn’t me telling him I can’t love him because of the things he’s
done. This is a betrayal of the first order.
“Why follow me, Evony? You know why I go out at night.”
I don’t meet his eyes. “I only know what you tell me.”
“Where did you get the car?”
“I stole it.” I don’t care what happens to me anymore but I have to be
careful not to betray Peter and his group. I won’t drag them down with me
just because I was too stupid not to get out while I could.
I’m not sure he believes me, but he leaves the question of the car aside
and says, “If I wanted Frau Schäfer to be in prison she would be in prison.
Instead she is in the West, safe and happy with her family. Why didn’t you
ask for more proof if you didn’t believe me?”
“I wanted to see for myself. I had no choice.”
Anger flashes across his face. “You could have chosen to believe me.”
“Why should I? I have been your prisoner for months. You have all the
power and I have none.”
“Oh, you have no power? The girl who has betrayed me, lied to me,
made me think that she loves me so cunningly that I can taste it every time I
kiss her even if she won’t say it. And now I find she’s creeping out to spy
on me.” He crouches down on his haunches, his face close to mine as he
studies me. “Have I been mistaken and you have been pretending this whole
time? Do you want to spit in my face, Evony, and tell me you have enjoyed
playing me for the fool?”
I look away, feeling sick, wishing I hated him. It should be so easy to
hate him.
He watches me narrowly, his mind making connections. “You’ve been
distant these past weeks, so pale and tired. All I saw was a woman loathing
herself for wanting the man who stole her but really you were spying on
me. It was the spying that you hated. It manifests so similarly. I’ll make a
note for the future.”
There’s a hard, ironic edge to his voice, and I hear it in my own when I
reply, “Oh, I hated myself for wanting you as well. Don’t worry, you’re not
losing your edge. Not completely.”
 He pulls back a little and gazes at me with speculative, calculating
eyes. Reinhardt is retreating and Oberstleutnant Volker of the
Staatssicherheit is coming to the fore.
“The car. I don’t believe you stole it. Is there something you want to
tell me about, Evony? Or rather, someone?”
The bottom falls out of my stomach. He knows. How can he know?
His eyes light with preternatural cunning. “There is someone. But
whom can you have been in contact with? You are with me, always. Ah, but
you have been leaving the apartment at night. Have you been meeting with
someone as well as tailing me?”
Don’t say anything. He can’t figure anything out as long as you stay
silent.
“But there must have been a first meeting. Perhaps someone at—” He
breaks off, alarm flashing over his face. “Liebling, please tell me it isn’t
anyone at HQ.”
And just like that, sleek, predatory Volker is gone and I see Reinhardt
again. He takes my hands between his, engulfing them and squeezing
tightly. When he speaks his voice is soft and urgent, as if he’s trying not to
frighten a child or a cornered animal. “Evony, have you been spying on me
for someone at HQ? I won’t be angry with you if you say yes. I just need to
know.”
I don’t understand why he’s acting like this. Is it some sort of trick? I
shake my head, trying to look sincere. “No, I told you there’s no one. I’ve
been doing this by myself.”
He takes a deep breath and asks me again, and the first tendrils of fear
spread through my belly because I know my lover very well by now and
this isn’t what his trickery looks like. What is he afraid of? “I promise,
there’s no one HQ.”
He stands up, a hand to his mouth. “Scheisse. It’s someone at HQ.”
Panic thuds through me. How does he know this? “Reinhardt, there’s
no one. I stole the car and—”
But he’s not listening to me. “I should have told you about him. I
should have made you understand the danger but I didn’t think he would be
so brazen. Right under my nose.”
 He? Does he mean Peter? Why would someone who works in the mail
room be of any danger to me or Reinhardt? If he knows about Peter then
why isn’t Peter in prison?
The firelight is flickering in Reinhardt’s eyes. “Does he know who you
really are, or are you useful to him merely because you are close to me?”
He studies my face, his eyes fixing on the faint scar on my lip that hasn’t
quite healed. “Does he think that I hit you? Did you let him think that? Yes,
you’re clever enough not to correct such a misapprehension if it worked in
your favor.” He takes a deep, calming breath. “That is good, Evony. Good.
You are just an opportunity to him. All is perhaps not lost.”
I watch him thinking out loud, not understanding anything he’s saying.
“So, he approached you at HQ after the car accident, and when I took
you to bed you agreed.”
How does he know all this? It’s as if he’s reading my mind.
He crouches down in front of me again, his hands on my knees, his
eyes probing my face. “Tell me, is your contact a man or a woman? Another
secretary perhaps, who promised you passage to the West in exchange for
spying on me? Are you worried for your little friend? Don’t be, Liebling.
They’re well protected.”
Relief surges through me—he doesn’t know about Peter. But then who
was the “he” he was referring to, and how can Reinhardt not have the power
to root out a traitor at Stasi HQ?
He’s silent for a moment, watching me closely. “Did you tell them that
I got Frau Schäfer out of East Berlin? No, you didn’t, otherwise I would
already have been arrested. You know the truth but you have kept it to
yourself.” A smile warms his face and he reaches out to touch my cheek,
but I pull away.
“I didn’t do it for you.” But that’s a lie. I didn’t want the price of my
freedom to be his imprisonment, even after everything he’s done to me.
His hand drops back to his side. “I see you’re confused, Liebling. Let
me explain to you what has happened. I have an enemy at HQ and he has
been using you to get to me. No, don’t shake your head. It might be
disappointing, but it’s true. This friend of yours has been lying to you.”
 He lets that sink in a moment, and then continues. “There’s something I
need to know.”
“I won’t tell you anything.”
“Your loyalty is admirable, if misplaced. But put it aside for a moment
as I need you to tell me this. Does this person know who you are? Did you
give them your real name, or could they have discovered your true
identity?”
I search his face for cold cunning but see only concern. For me? Or for
himself? “Why does that matter?”
He brushes the backs of his fingers over my cheek, his voice gentle.
“Please trust me. Who do they think you are? Did you tell them you were
caught in the bakery raid? Did you give them your real name?”
Tears fill my eyes, because when he talks like this I want so dearly to
confide in him. I want Reinhardt, even as I hate and fear Oberstleutnant
Volker. Voice cracking, I say, “I can’t tell you anything. You’re my enemy
and you always will be, no matter how I feel about you.” I feel as bereft as
when Ulrich turned on me, only worse this time because this was my last
chance to escape and it’s my own fault I let it slip through my fingers.
“Evony, I am not asking as a Stasi officer. I am asking as Reinhardt. I
need to know what steps to take to protect you from him. Does your contact
know who you really are?”
Protect me? From what? I don’t understand any of what he’s saying.
Reinhardt sees my confusion. “I will explain in a moment. Just answer
me, please.”
I turn the question over in my mind. Does Peter know who I am? I
thought I was clever giving him Dad’s name but calling him “my friend”. A
resistance group would be unlikely to connect Heinrich Daumler, lowly
mechanic, with Evony Dittmar, Volker’s cosseted Stasi secretary.
I moisten my lips, giving myself time to think. “What will you do if my
friend does know who I am?”
His eyes darken with anger. I know that look. It’s the expression I saw
in his eyes as he tore Ulrich off me. I shake his arm, making him focus on
me. “Reinhardt, I don’t understand. Who is this enemy of yours and why
does he hate you so much?”
 Reinhardt gets up and goes to sit on the sofa opposite me. “I should
have told you about him so you would be on your guard. The night you all
tried to escape through the bakery tunnel I should have been there to stop
you, but another Stasi officer ran the raid himself, and botched it. His name
is Hauptmann Heydrich.”
Heydrich. I remember his cold, assessing eyes as he sat on the edge of
my desk in HQ. His false smile. His sharp interest that made me so
uncomfortable. I thought it was the instincts of a Stasi officer that made him
examine me so closely, but if Reinhardt is telling the truth he was assessing
me for my usefulness.
And—oh god. Peter is working for him? Is that what Reinhardt is
saying? Peter approached me not long after Heydrich. Why did that never
strike me as suspicious? A resistance member working within Stasi HQ that
just found me and told me he could get me out? It was too good to be true
because it was.
Reinhardt is looking at me with sympathy. “Liebling, I’m sorry.”
I realize I’m crying again and wipe the tears away. “Why are you
sorry?”
“Because it is painful to be betrayed.”
“As I have betrayed you?”
He merely smiles, a small, regretful smile. I wonder if he’s deciding
what to do with me. I don’t believe him when he says he’s going to protect
me. I know how he feels about traitors.
Blinking away fresh tears I ask, “Why does Heydrich hate you so
much?”
“Professional jealousy. Impatience. I may not always have been…” He
gives me an eloquent half-shrug that I take to mean that he’s made the
younger officer’s life hard in the past, but he doesn’t much care. I can easily
believe that Reinhardt looks upon Heydrich as an upstart and a sneak, and
perhaps he is if he really went behind Reinhardt’s back over the bakery raid.
To Reinhardt, Heydrich is an annoyance. A nobody. But look what nearly
happened. I was on the verge of handing the young captain everything he
needed to put Reinhardt in prison. Heydrich is dangerous.
 “For him, the quick way up is preferable to the hard, slow way. I’ve
always preferred the hard, slow way. It yields better results.” Reinhardt’s
eyes narrow on my face and then he stands up, straightening his jacket. “So,
do you believe what I’m telling you? That your contact is not your friend,
but your enemy and mine, and that they’re working for Heydrich?”
I consider this for several minutes. “I don’t know. It’s occurred to me
that telling me my contact is lying to me is your way of preventing my
escape.”
“A little elaborate, isn’t it? How long do you suppose it would take for
me to ascertain your daily movements from Fräulein Hoffman and the other
secretaries who work on our floor? There can’t be many people at HQ
whom you come into contact with.”
There’s something in that. He could probably find Peter quite easily if
he wanted to. I’m still chewing my lip when he continues.
“Here’s what’s going to happen. You will continue to tail me and feed
your contact empty reports. I talk to the border guards, I drive about the
city. They will eventually lose interest.”
I stare up at him, not able to believe what I’m hearing. Just like that, as
if nothing happened tonight?
“You will not tell me who your contact is. It’s better I don’t know. That
way I can’t be tempted to strangle him or her in the corridors as they pass
by.”
I believe that he would, too. I watch him light a cigarette with an
assured air, comfortable in the knowledge that the danger has passed. “The
important thing is that they don’t find out who you really are.”
But I don’t feel as confident as Reinhardt. In fact I’m certain, deadly
certain, that Peter is going to figure out who I am. If he works for the Stasi
then he’ll have access to files, identification papers, official photographs.
My father’s file. My file. My photograph will be in Evony Daumler’s
records.
I take a deep breath. “Reinhardt, I don’t think it’s going to be as easy as
that. I gave my contact my father’s name. They’re going to find out who I
am. In fact, if they are who you say they are, they probably know who I am
already.”
OceanofPDF.com
 Chapter Twenty
Volker

I smoke three cigarettes in a row without saying anything. There’s an

unfamiliar emotion knotting my gut.
Fear.
Somewhere along the way between wanting to possess her and just
wanting her I forgot the risk that comes from too strong an attachment to
another person. That they might one day be ripped from you and you’ll be
left bleeding. That she might be left bleeding. I can’t even tell myself that
she knew the risks when she returned my kisses and shared my bed. I chose
this life for her. It’s my duty to see that she comes to no harm.
It’s not myself I fear for. It’s Evony.
People like Heydrich are dangerous, more dangerous than they first
seem. He’s not as clever as I am. He’s not nearly as patient. Patience and
cunning make a Stasi officer. But he is ambitious, and covetous of my
position. And he hates me. I remember the anger burning in his eyes as I
told him he’d never advance in the Stasi and I made him salute me. Maybe
if I hadn’t taken such delight in humiliating him after the bakery raid none
of this would have happened. But I never feared retribution. I know how to
look after myself, and I didn’t know then how much this young woman
sitting quietly before me would come to mean to me, and how the old fear
would stir again. That I could lose her. That I might be unable to save her.
My one thought now is to keep her safe and remove Heydrich as a
threat. How much does Heydrich know? How much does he suspect? The
fear rises afresh in my chest as I look at Evony’s tense, lovely face. It’s not
her that Heydrich wants, ultimately. It’s me. But he will tear her apart on his
way to me and once he realizes how much this will devastate me he’ll make
me watch as he grinds her into the dirt. The perfect revenge.
If he knows. I think through the possibilities, and it’s bad, but it’s
perhaps not yet dire. “It may be all right. Your contact may know who you
are, but they don’t know that I know that they know who you are. They
don’t know that I know about any of this.”
Evony presses the heels of her hands into her eyes, as if she’s unable to
bear this convoluted train of thought. “I can’t do this tonight. If you’re not
going to throw me into prison then I’m going to bed.”
As she moves past me I catch her around the waist and she looks up
into my narrow, heated gaze. “You are the most confounding, devious
young woman I’ve ever met and I assure you in my line of work I’ve met a
great many.”
Her eyes go wide, and then understanding dawns on her face. “You’re
proud of me.”
I laugh softly. “Yes, my clever girl. All that you did, right under my
nose, for weeks? And do you know why I’m not angry?” I press my lips
against her ear and whisper, “Because with all the evidence you had against
me you never betrayed me.”
She softens in my arms and a shiver goes through her. “But I’ve been
working with your enemies.”
“And yet you never told them a thing.” I kiss her hungrily. I know I’m
right. She had everything she thought she needed to get away from me and
yet she couldn’t do it.
“It wasn’t for you,” she says desperately, pulling away. “I was waiting
until I heard something about my father.”
I run my thumb over her swollen lower lip. “Sweet girl, you mustn’t
tell me lies, and you must forget about your father. I’m sorry, but he’s gone.
He’s fled, or he died that night. I searched the prison records and I didn’t
find him.”
“You looked for him? You never told me that.”
“Of course I looked. And if I’d found him I would have told you
because it would have been one more weapon in my arsenal to make you
stay. You wouldn’t leave East Berlin if your father was imprisoned here.”
 Evony considers this, and then shakes her head unbelievingly.
“Honestly, are there no depths to which you won’t sink?”
“None. And do you know why? Because you’re mine. Because I’m
going to keep you, no matter what.” I take a deep breath, searching her
eyes. I wanted to coax the words from her first, the same way I coaxed her
lips to mine, her body to yield beneath me. But I can’t wait any longer.
“And because I love you.”
She whimpers and her fingers tighten on my lapels. “But I’m trying to
escape you. I’ve tried again and again to get away from you. I’ve sneaked
behind your back, nearly betrayed you, almost had you thrown in prison.
Why do you love me?”
“Because it’s not me you’re trying to get away from and it hasn’t been
me for a long time. It’s East Berlin you hate. It’s the Stasi you hate. I’m
what you want.” My voice is whisper-soft against her mouth. “Come to my
bed, Liebling. There’s no reason why not now. I want you in my arms all
night. I want you as mine.”
“You want me, the traitor?”
“I want my Valkyrie. My battleground flower. My indestructible girl.
Your love is hard won.”
“I haven’t said that I—”
But I stop her lips with my own. I won’t have her telling me she
doesn’t love me. I don’t want her lies. I will have the truth from her lips,
and soon. But for now I’ll have it from her body.
I scoop her up and carry her to my bedroom. There’s no biting, no
scratching, no swearing at me. Her lips are soft and panting as I undress her,
her breasts heavy in my hands, her curved hips warm and soft to my touch.
I pick her up and settle her naked in my lap as I sit on the edge of the bed,
stroking her, plucking her nipples. Her clit is swollen and slick to the touch
as I rub it in tight circles, watch her face flush, her eyes close. She tips her
head back, offering to me the long, creamy column of her neck.
When her cries reach a crescendo she reaches down between her legs
and fumbles at my trousers. Her movements are clumsy because I don’t
stop stroking her hard nub of pleasure and she’s close to coming. When she
frees my cock she strokes its length in her small hands, pressing her face
into my shoulder, lost in the sensations coursing through her. Then, licking
her lips she raises herself up a little and positions my length at her sex. She
bears down slowly, inch by inch, piercing herself slowly, tight and delicious
around me. I hold her waist, watching the movements of her hips as she
starts to rock. Her arms wrap around my neck and her mouth is against
mine as she rides me harder and faster, eager to come, needing to work out
all her stress and confusion on my hard length.
Whimpering my name over and over, she reaches her climax, her body
locking around mine and skin heating like a furnace. She stills and goes
limp, but I haven’t finished with her. Still inside her, I lift her up and turn
around so that she’s on her back on the bed. I thrust hard, deeply, needing to
feel her all the way to the hilt. She holds onto my uniform jacket, watching
me with desperate eyes as I pound her hard, keeping a tight hold on myself
even though I’m on the verge of coming as I can see she’s close and I want
to break with her.
“Reinhardt, I—”
She wants to say something important but she breaks off and kisses me
instead. Then she moans, long and loud, and I let my body go, finishing
with long, hard strokes as she tightens and clenches around me, the
sensations breaking over us.
When I withdraw she clings to me tightly though she hides her face in
my chest as if overcome with shyness. I hold her close, stroking her cooling
skin. And I smile, kissing her temple. She loves me. I’m still wearing the
uniform that she hates so much. This is how I know.

OceanofPDF.com
 Chapter Twenty-One
Evony

After we make love Reinhardt undresses slowly, watching me with a soft

half-smile on his face, as if he’s thinking pleased and secret thoughts. When
he’s naked he pulls the covers back and tucks us beneath them, settling me
in his arms. I know I should go to my own room but after all the worry it
feels so good to be held by him.
Ich liebe dich. I love you. Those words on his lips make me weak with
hopelessness and longing. They wind like satin ribbons around my heart;
beautiful, but binding just the same.
How is it I love you back?
It’s so easy to lose myself in the bliss of his mouth, his body, because
he’s right. It’s not him I want to flee, just all that he represents. I couldn’t
bear the thought of him being imprisoned in exchange for my freedom.
Being close to him, desired by him, protected by him, it’s the most alive and
cherished I’ve ever felt in my life. Reinhardt is strange, powerful and
addicting, and no matter what I tell myself I should feel I can’t hurt him,
and I can’t get enough of him.
He falls asleep, but I lie awake for a long time, fretting over what’s
going to happen to me. I’m still no closer to finding my father and I’ve lost
my escape route to West Berlin. No, not lost—this group Peter told me
about must never have existed. What would Peter have done with me once
I’d given him everything he needed about Reinhardt? Handed me off to his
captain and then gloated over my stupidity, I suppose.
This is what you wanted to happen, an insidious voice says. You wanted
Reinhardt to find out about your spying and put a stop to it, didn’t you? You
wanted a reason to stay with him in the East.
 I roll toward him and kiss him as he slumbers. His cheek, his lips, his
chin. I ease myself under his arm and he responds sleepily, tightening his
arms around me and burying his face in the nape of my neck. How right I
was to be afraid of this because it is blissful to fall asleep this way with him,
held close and loved.
But I can’t stay in East Berlin, not even for him. I’m back to square one
and I’m going to have to think of a new escape plan. This time I’ll just have
to be sure it won’t involve sending the man I love to prison so there’ll be no
reason to back out. My eyes trace the lines and planes of Reinhardt’s face,
the curve of his lower lip, softened by sleep.
No reason at all.
In the small hours of the morning I’m yanked out of sleep by a cry of
alarm. Reinhardt has sat bolt upright in bed, his chest heaving and his body
drenched in cold sweat. I touch him and he jumps as if he’s forgotten I’m
there.
“Reinhardt, what’s wrong?”
He pushes a hand through his hair, squeezing his eyes shut as if he’s in
pain. “It’s nothing. Go back to sleep.”
He gets out of bed and I watch his broad, naked torso retreating. He
pulls a dressing gown from the hook on the door and leaves the bedroom
without looking back.

∞ ∞ ∞
I wake just after seven and he’s there, smiling as if nothing happened,
wearing a white shirt and his hair damp from the shower and neatly
combed. He trails kisses down my naked body, his eyes warm with pleasure
that I’ve stayed the whole night. When he reaches my sex he hooks my legs
over his shoulders and licks me with aching tenderness. I push out every
thought but this; his warmth, his love, his tongue on me. I bury my hands in
his short hair, trying to indelibly print this moment on my heart.
At breakfast he resumes last night’s train of thought once Frau Fischer
is out of the room. “They don’t know, Liebling. That’s the most important
thing. Heydrich and your little friend think they’re one step ahead of us but
really we’re one step ahead of them.” He takes an appreciative sip of his
coffee, clearly in his element. Subterfuge. Schemes. He thrives on this stuff.
The fact that we may both end up in prison doesn’t seem to faze him.
I look up at him, my breakfast before me forgotten because my
stomach’s churning too much to eat. “When should I turn in my first report,
Herr Oberstleutnant?”
He ignores my sardonic tone and leans down and kisses me. “No need,
my little double-agent. You relay everything directly to me.”
He’s so confident that I can’t resist goading him. “What if they sweeten
the deal? What if I tell my contact that I know that they know who I am.
Then they’ll know that I know that they know, but you won’t know. I could
become a triple agent.”
But Reinhardt just shakes out his newspaper and peruses the print. “Ah,
well, you know how I enjoy a challenge, meine Liebe.”
Over the next few days Reinhardt is calm and focused while I quietly
go to pieces. I want to avoid Peter but Reinhardt insists that we do nothing
different, and surely I’ll be curious to know if he’s learned anything about
my “friend” Heinrich Daumler. Next time I hear Peter’s whistling I go to
the filing room and he tells me that he hasn’t managed to trace my father. I
pretend to be disappointed and hint that I may have discovered something
of interest to the group and I will keep him informed.
Then I go and report to Reinhardt. He smiles broadly as he listens,
clearly loving every moment of our deception together. He comes round his
desk and tries to kiss me, but I put a finger to his lips.
“This isn’t amusing, or fun. We wouldn’t be in this mess if you hadn’t
humiliated Heydrich.”
“But Liebling, how I enjoyed it so.”
Later when I’m taking some papers to another floor I find myself
walking past Heydrich’s office and I slow down, thinking about the bakery
raid. What if he never gave Reinhardt and his Oberst a complete report
about what happened that night? What if it was too embarrassing for him to
reveal to his superior officers just how many dissidents escaped and where
they fled to? He might have handed in an altered report that didn’t make
him look quite so incompetent.
If I’ve learned anything from Reinhardt it’s that the Stasi are overly
fond of record-keeping. Perhaps Heydrich has kept the real report to
himself in case it has intel that might come in use later on.
There’s no secretary sitting outside his office. A frosted glass window
shows no movement behind it. I knock on his door, just to be sure no one’s
in there, and when I try the handle it’s unlocked and go inside, heart
pounding. If Reinhardt knew what I was doing he’d be furious, but no
matter what we feel for each other I need to keep doing everything I can to
get out of East Berlin.
I love you. My eyes close briefly as I remember last night. He loves me
because I’ll never stop fighting, and that knowledge gives me the strength
to do what I need to do.
With my back against the door I scan the room. It’s not as large as
Reinhardt’s office and doesn’t have as many windows, but it’s furnished in
the same minimalist way, with buttery pine furniture and a studio portrait of
the Chairman on the wall.
If Heydrich is keeping documents about the raid then they might be in
his desk. I hurry over and try the drawers, but it seems Heydrich is a
cautious man as they’re locked. I crouch down and fish a bobby pin out of
my hair and stick it into the lock. I used to practice this on an old bureau in
our apartment for fun and could open all the locks within minutes. There’s
something different about this lock, though, or I’m wound too tightly to
concentrate as the minutes tick by and I’ve made no progress. Every time
someone passes along the corridor outside the hairs on the back of my neck
stand on end. Do I have any legitimate reason for being in here if I get
caught? Is there anything that I can say to excuse this?
While I’m worrying over this, the lock clicks and the drawer slides
open. I scrabble hastily through the contents hoping to find something
resembling an intelligence report like the one Reinhardt showed me in the
Stasi archives. But all the documents seem to be reports, filled with
codenames and words that mean nothing to me, and I start to despair that
this is a waste of time.
 Then a date at the top of a page catches my eyes, a week before the
raid, and I pull out the document and start to read.
Apprehended man in late forties as he was exiting abandoned bakery
on Pieterstrasse at approx. 0415hr. While he was in custody, inspection of
the building revealed a tunnel that had been dug under the Wall as a means
of escape to the West. Man, codename CARSTON, at first denied that
anyone else was involved. Threats against his family were successful and he
agreed to provide information about the group who intend to use this tunnel
as a means of escape in exchange for allowing him to defect with his
daughter. Have secured time and date of group’s intended use. Will
apprehend CARSTON and his daughter on the night along with the other
attempted escapees.
The report continues, dated several days after the raid.
Raid unsuccessfully executed. CARSTON is in W. Berlin with a number
of other defectors who evaded border guards. A young woman killed by
Obstlt. Volker has been erroneously reported to CARSTON as his daughter
by one of his fellow defectors. This error is to remain uncorrected lest it
prove useful in the future. The true whereabouts of CARSTON’s daughter
are unknown, though she is suspected of being at large in E. Berlin.
When I finish reading I stare at the pages without moving. My father
was the one to betray everyone in our group in exchange for allowing the
two of us escape to the West. It can’t be true. How could he have done such
a thing to all those people? To Ana, to his best friend Ulrich? I remember
how agitated he was that night, how he changed our plans at the last
moment, wanting me to go with him to the bakery instead of with Ana. I’m
not losing you at the eleventh hour. You’re my daughter and I want you with
me. Is that so hard to understand?
He must have suspected that Heydrich would go back on his word and
try to take us prisoner. Who told Dad that Reinhardt had shot me rather than
Ana? How could they have confused us? But then, we were always spoken
of in the same breath at meetings. Ana and Evony are digging tonight. Ana
and Evony are leaving next, go quickly girls, get home safe. Maybe
whoever it was who saw Ana die always assumed that I was Ana and she
was me.
 Dad thinks I’m dead. He’s in West Berlin right now and he thinks I’m
dead. A fat tear plops onto the typewritten page and ripples the paper. All
this time I’ve spent puzzling over who sold us out while losing sleep over
worrying about my father, and it was him all along. I fold the report into a
square, shove it in my pocket and slam the desk closed, not bothering to try
and relock it. Forgetting that I should take care not to be seen or heard I go
out into the hall on shaking legs—
And run straight into Peter.
He’s got his hand on the mail cart. I stare into his eyes, my mind frozen
with grief and surprise. I’m close enough to count every freckle on his face.
He stares at me and then at Heydrich’s door like he doesn’t comprehend
what he’s seeing. Then understanding blazes in his eyes. Before he can ask
any questions I push past him and go straight to Reinhardt’s office, bursting
in without knocking.
Reinhardt looks up, startled, and when he sees the look on my face he
gets up from his desk and comes toward me. “Liebling, what’s wrong?
What’s happened?”
I point in the direction of Heydrich’s office with a trembling hand. “It
was him.” Reinhardt looks where I’m pointing and then back at me,
confused.
I’m know babbling but I can’t get my thoughts to line up properly. “It
was Dad. Dozens of people. His friends. I was ready to go to prison for
Peter and a group of people I’d never even met and yet he looked us all in
the eyes day after day and he lied to us. He always said that I should be
careful, that anyone could be an informant, but I never thought he meant
him.”
It’s the betrayal that I can’t fathom, that he thought he and I could live
happily in the West knowing all the people we’d been closest to were in
prison. It would have been freedom bought at too dear a price. Why
couldn’t he see that? Did he think I could have been glad that we were
together knowing what he’d done?
“Liebling, I don’t understand what you’re saying. What has your father
done? Who is Peter?”
 I grab Reinhardt’s arms and look up into his bewildered face. I can’t go
another heartbeat not knowing if he’s lied to me as well. “This is the only
opportunity I’m going to give you to confess. If you’ve ever lied to me and
I find out later I will kill you.” I’ve never so much as baited a mousetrap but
I know with thundering certainty that I will pick up a gun or a knife and
murder Reinhardt if I find out he’s been deceiving me.
He doesn’t tell me I’m being hysterical. He doesn’t insist on knowing
what I’m talking about. His hand covers mine and he speaks softly. “Evony,
I’ve told you before that I’ve never lied to you.”
But I’m still not satisfied. “Did you know about any of this?” I take the
report out of my pocket and thrust it at him.
Reinhardt unfolds the paper and reads it, his face darkening by
increments. “Where did you get this?”
“Did you hide any of this from me? Did you know?”
He looks at me steadily, the clear afternoon sunshine lightening his
eyes to blue. “No, I didn’t. I suspected there was something Heydrich
wasn’t telling me about the raid but I didn’t know the informant was your
father. I’m sorry.”
Informant. The word makes me sick. I know I’m a hypocrite, sleeping
with the enemy, loving the enemy, but I’ve never sold out my friends or
family to the Stasi and I never would, no matter how much Reinhardt
cajoled or persuaded me.
But then, he’s never tried. He’s never been interested in the others. Just
in me.
Reinhardt holds up the report. “Evony, I know you’re upset but you
need to tell me where you got this.”
“Heydrich’s office. I broke into his desk.”
For a second Reinhardt looks like he’s about to explode. Then with
effort he reins himself in. “Did anyone see you?”
“Peter. My contact. The mail room boy. He was walking past and he
gave me such a strange look—I think he knows what I was doing there.
He’s going to tell Heydrich.” I let go of Reinhardt’s arms. Now that the
adrenaline is wearing off I’m starting to feel afraid. If Peter didn’t know
who I was before he’s certainly going to realize now.
 “Heydrich is in Leipzig. It will take him some time to get back here
and confirm which papers you took.” Reinhardt passes a hand through his
hair, thinking. “I’m taking you home, now. Get your coat.”
As I leave the office he picks up the phone and calls down to Hans and
tells him to meet us with the car at the rear of the building. Lenore looks up
from her typewriter as I hurry past and yank my coat off the stand, her
pretty face an oval of surprise. “Is everything all right?”
I shake my head, hands tight on the woolen fabric. “I’m—I’m not well.
Herr Oberstleutnant is taking me home.” I look at her, hesitating, feeling
like I should thank her for her friendship these past months because I have
an ominous feeling I’m never going to see her again. But there’s nothing I
can say without alarming her so I give her a last look as Reinhardt strides
out of his office and takes my arm, and then we’re heading down the
corridor, away from the elevators. He takes us down the rear stairs and into
the laneway behind HQ where the black Mercedes-Benz is waiting.
I want to talk in the back of the car but as soon as I open my mouth
Reinhardt hushes me and grips my hand tightly. We ride in silence, his
gloved hand holding mine.
As soon as we’re inside his cool, empty apartment his puts both hands
on my shoulders and turns me toward him. I haven’t seem him look so tense
since Ulrich nearly strangled me to death.
“Evony, I know you’re upset but I need you to listen to me. Go and
pack a bag, a small one, only essentials, and then come straight back. Can
you do that for me?”
“Why?”
“I’m taking you to West Berlin tonight.”
My mouth falls open in surprise. I wasn’t expecting this. I thought he’d
ask more questions, pace up and down, find some way to fix this.
But it’s too late. They know who I am and it won’t be long until they
guess I’m loyal to Reinhardt. That he’s been harboring a fugitive in his
apartment. And, once they start digging, they’ll discover that he’s been
helping others escape to the West.
Hope and happiness flares in my chest. He has to escape too—we can
go together. It’s the perfect solution. “Then you’re coming with me. You’re
in as much danger as I am.”
He shakes his head. “Liebling, I can’t.”
“Why not? We’re both in danger and we can both defect.”
He strokes a finger down my cheek, a regretful smile on his face.
“They will not welcome me in West Berlin. I’m a Stasi officer. They’ll put
me in prison just to be safe, or they’ll quietly hand me back to the East
German authorities in exchange for political prisoners.”
I gape at him. “They wouldn’t. Surely that’s against…against human
rights conventions?”
He muses on this. “It is. But if the West Germans are quick about
handing me back, who is to know? Will the East Germans protest, or will
they agree to the deal? I know what I’d do in their place.”
“Not everyone is as opportunistic as you, and if they are then it will be
because of the intelligence you can give them on East Germany. You must
know so much that will be useful to the West.”
Reinhardt grimaces as if he finds the notion abhorrent. “Perhaps. But
I’m not going to trust my life in the hands of enemy authorities. I’ve lived
that life before.”
As a prisoner of war, he means. He’s got a soldier’s instincts, but this is
a cold war, not a hot one. Defection isn’t the same as surrender but I can see
from his stubborn expression that he thinks it is.
I look up into his face, eyes supplicating, unwilling to let go of the
sliver of happiness that I’ve glimpsed on the horizon. Both of us together, in
the West. “Come with me. Please, Reinhardt.”
Pain flickers over his face and I realize with a jolt that he’s saying
goodbye to me. This is the end of everything between us. He can’t keep me
safe any longer so he’s doing what he said he’d never do and letting me go.
He’s giving me my freedom at last, and I don’t want it.
I take a deep breath. Pleas aren’t working. I’ll try and make him sense
instead. “Reinhardt, when I disappear they’re going to discover it was you
who helped me escape, and that you harbored a traitor for months in your
apartment. Frau Fischer knows we’ve been sharing a bed and Lenore’s not
oblivious to what’s been going on. What happens when they’re questioned?
What happens when the border guards tell your Oberst that you go across
the border at night and match the dates to unexplained disappearances?
They will find out that you’ve been unfaithful to the Party and you will be
sent to prison for the rest of your life.”
Reinhardt watches me unemotionally, as if none of this is news to him
and I realize that it isn’t. He came to the same conclusion in his office
before he told me to get my coat. “I’m always aware of the risks, Liebling.
There are things in this life for which it is worth suffering the worst of fates.
You happen to be one of them.”
“Don’t be sentimental. It doesn’t suit you.”
“Do you think I was a happy man when I met you? Do you think happy
men steal women off the street because they’re haunted by their pasts? I
have held the sweetest flower in my hands when I have held you, and for
that I would suffer worse fates than anything these people could ever do to
me.”
“It is a needless fate when the West is a matter of miles away.”
He shakes his head. I don’t understand, and I’m not ready to give up.
My mind races over the possibilities. Would life in prison be a severe
enough punishment for a high-ranking Stasi officer turned traitor? The State
sometimes liked to make examples of powerful people they thought they
could trust. The dreadful realization slams into me. I take hold of his jacket
in a white-knuckled grip.
“Reinhardt, they won’t put you in prison will they? You will be
executed.”
He shrugs and digs his cigarettes out of his pocket. “Perhaps.”
I gape at him. “Don’t you dare be offhand about this. They’ll drag you
before a firing squad and shoot you. They won’t even give you a proper
trial. You know how it works.”
He turns the unlit cigarette in his fingers slowly, as if he’s choosing his
words. I wait, still holding fistfuls of his jacket.
“Then I will die knowing that you’re safe. They will not have you.”
“No, Reinhardt—”
But he cuts me off. “Evony, I’ve told you this before. Being a soldier
means I’m not afraid to die. On a battlefield, on the street, in the shadow of
the Wall. I have accepted it, but more than that I have expected it.” He
reaches out and smooths my curls back from my face. “Though I didn’t
expect to find such sweetness at the end. I have no regrets, Liebling. They
can’t take my love for you, even if they take my life.”
I’m shaking all over. This can’t be the hard, ruthless man I know who
would stop at nothing to get what he wants. How can he give up now when
I need him the most?
He smiles at me, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. “Don’t take heart, meine
Liebe. It may not come to the firing squad. They’ll have to catch me first.”
They will catch him. The Stasi have soldiers and informants all over
East Germany, not just in East Berlin, and Reinhardt is a conspicuous man.
“But I love you,” I say in a choked voice. “Why do I have to lose you
now when you’ve finally found a place in my heart? Why did you make me
fall in love with you if I was only going to lose you?”
He casts the cigarette aside and wraps his arms around me. “So you do
love me, Evony.” He kisses me, and I taste my own salt tears on our lips.
When I close my eyes I see him stripped of his uniform and hands bound
behind him as he’s dragged before a firing squad, and my eyes fly open.
“No. I’m not going without you. I’m not leaving you here to die alone.
I’m staying.”
He takes me by the upper arms, holding tightly, his eyes boring into
mine. “Evony, listen to me. Your father is in West Berlin. There is nothing
for you here but me and I will not be here for long. I can’t protect you from
them and I will not see them take you away. If I go with you the West
German authorities could think you’re a spy as well. I can’t control what
might happen to you if I go with you, and if we both end up back in East
Berlin as prisoners it will be worse than dying for me. Don’t you
understand? Some things are worse than dying.”
He’s thinking about Johanna, how she suffered and died in the death
camp and he couldn’t save her. The remembered pain is filling his eyes.
That’s why he’s always admired my strength, because he’s believed that if
the worst happened I’d never give up. I’d find some way to survive and he
wouldn’t have to live through my death or capture as well. Maybe he’s felt
all along that this could never last between us, that he’s been living on
borrowed time ever since he was taken prisoner during the war; borrowed,
painful time, because if he’d died in battle he would have been spared the
horror of knowing what Johanna went through.
I shrug out of his grasp, angry now. “I’m not her and you’re not in the
Wehrmacht. They are not our enemies in West Berlin. What about all those
times you said I was yours forever even when I spied on you and lashed out
at you? How could you love me through all of that but not now?”
“I do love you now. That is why you have to go without me. I can face
whatever happens to me here as long as I know you are safe over there. If I
am taken prisoner and die not knowing for certain that you are safe I will
die tormented. Do you understand why?”
He’s imagining being trapped in prison and not knowing my fate.
Being taunted with it by those holding him. “Of course I understand, but
that doesn’t make it any easier for me to leave you behind. Am I supposed
to just live the rest of my life without you?”
He holds me closer and presses his forehead against mine. “You are
young. You will recover. Remember that you are stronger than I am, my
Valkyrie. It took me a long time to learn to think for myself but you have
never lacked a will of your own. You’ll make your own way in the world. I
am a selfish man and I want to think of you out there, free, not in prison.
Let me have this one comfort, at the end.”
At the end. He can’t die. He can’t. I thought I would be able to leave
him when the time came but I see now that I was fooling myself. “And if I
won’t? What if I refuse to go?”
I see the muscle in his cheek flex as his jaw tightens. I know that
expression. It means I’ll do whatever it takes. I thump my fist against his
chest and curse, tears running down my cheeks. I cry onto his uniform
jacket, the one I’ve always hated. I’ve fallen in love with him and I can’t
help but wonder what we might have been without the regimes, without the
Wall, without firing squads and watchtowers. We might have been nothing,
because the Fates may not ever have put us in each other’s path as they did
on that freezing January night. But in another place, another time, we might
have had everything.
“I don’t want to be anywhere if it means being without you,” I whisper
thickly through my tears. “I don’t understand why you would choose the
certainty of death in this country over the possibility of a life with me over
there.”
He strokes my face, his expression pained. “The West is a foreign land
to me, in every sense.”
“It’s still Germany. You always said you loved Germany, divided or
united. That means loving West Germany, too.”
He doesn’t say anything, and I think hard, trying to come up with a
way to convince him. For weeks all I wanted was to get away from him,
and then for weeks I just wanted to find my father and make it to West
Berlin. Now he’s offering me everything and my heart is breaking.
“Please, Reinhardt. Please, can’t we just try?”
He sighs, but he doesn’t say anything. Sensing that I’m beginning to
wear him down, I say, “There must be some way of ensuring you’ll be safe.
Even if we have to lie. Can’t we change your identity? Can’t we hide
somewhere until we get Frau Schäfer to vouch for you?”
“You’ll never give up, will you?”
I’m a fighter. He knows that. “Never. I won’t give up until I’ve
convinced you to come with me.”
Sounding resigned, he says, “All right, Liebling.”
I look up at him, hope flaring in my chest. He looks unenthusiastic
about it but I don’t care. Reluctant is better than dead. “Really? You’ll come
with me?”
He wipes the tears from my cheeks as if he can’t bear to see them. “Do
you really want me to?”
I throw my arms around his neck, happiness singing through me. “Yes,
yes of course I do.” He’s wrong about the authorities in the West. They’ll
welcome him and all the intelligence he can bring them about East
Germany and he’ll tell them even if he finds it distasteful because it will
mean we can be together. “We’ll convince them you’re not a spy. We’ll do
whatever it takes.”
He looks down at me for a long time, his fingers stroking through my
hair. Then he kisses me softly. “Go and get ready. Put on warm clothes.
Pack a small bag of things you need to take with you and I’ll go and change
out of this uniform. We’ll have to hide somewhere until it gets dark.”
 I run to my room and open my handbag, eager now that we have a plan
to stay together. I look around and there’s not really anything that I need to
take with me. It would be foolish to take a lot of luggage in case we’re
stopped so I’ll have to leave my clothes behind. I change into a sturdy pair
of boots and put a warm sweater on over my blouse, and as I’m sorting
through the contents of my handbag the door opens and Reinhardt comes in
behind me. My eyes meet his in the vanity mirror and I see he’s still
wearing his Stasi uniform. There’s something funny about the expression on
his face.
“Reinhardt, I thought you said you were going to—”
He reaches around and clamps a pad of cotton wool over my mouth
and nose. When I rear back against him he presses more tightly and I
struggle to push him away but his arms are holding me like a vice. I stare
into the mirror at him, not understanding what is happening. Something
sharp and astringent fills my nose and I feel light-headed.
Oh no. No no no. He’s tricked me. He never had any intention of going
to the West with me, he just wanted me out of the room long enough to get
chloroform and cotton wool. I hold my breath, squirming in his arms. I have
to stay conscious. If I pass out I’ll never see him again. I make angry noises
in my throat, like a bee buzzing against glass. My lungs start to burn and I
can’t help it—I breathe in, and the sharp, cold anesthetic floods my lungs
and a wave of dizziness rolls through me. Through blurred eyes I watch
Reinhardt’s face in the mirror. He angles his face away from mine so he
isn’t overcome himself by the fumes. But I can still see his eyes. They’re
bleak with pain, as if he hates having to do this but is determined to see it
through, my ruthless man who told me again and again that he’ll do
whatever it takes to achieve his goals. Why didn’t I listen to him? As we
stood in the living room just now and he stroked my hair he wasn’t showing
me that he loved me. He was saying goodbye.
My body grows heavy in his arms. I still struggle, but my movements
are becoming weaker and weaker. As unconsciousness begins to overtake
me he sinks down onto the bed with me cradled in his arms. His voice
seems to come from a long way off. “I had to lie. You nearly convinced, me
but it wouldn’t have been right. I have to know that you’re safe and if I go
with you, you won’t be.”
I feel his lips on my forehead, his soft kiss, the murmur of his last
words. “Es tut mir lied, meine Liebe.”
I’m sorry, my love.
This is our farewell, me struggling to remain conscious as the
chloroform overcomes me while he holds me in his arms. I’m drifting on
vaporous waves, bobbing in currents that I can’t control. The drug works its
way into my brain, whispering that everything will be all right, that I should
just give in, stop resisting.
But as I slip into darkness I know that’s a lie, too. Nothing will be all
right ever again.

OceanofPDF.com
 Chapter Twenty-Two
Evony

The sound of an engine. The heat from the sun, bathing me in its warm
glow. I rise upwards into consciousness through deep, cold waters and I’m
chasing toward awareness—and then I remember. A whimper, a pained,
despairing sound escapes me. I don’t want to open my eyes because I know
what I’ll see. West Berlin. I’ll finally be on the other side of the Wall and
I’ll hate it even more for who it separates me from.
Someone touches my hand and I jerk away. It will be a stranger ready
to welcome me to the West with a smile. They’ll tell me I’m one of the
lucky ones who managed to get out.
“Evony.”
It’s a man, maybe a doctor, and they’ll be kind and professional and ask
if they can call anyone on my behalf. Maybe Dad’s already here, waiting
behind a door or a curtain to call me Schätzen and pretend everything’s all
right. I don’t want a doctor, or Dad, or anyone else in the world. I only want
Reinhardt, the man I love.
I feel the chair I’m sitting in rock from side to side. I’m moving, sitting
in a leather seat. I finally drag my eyes open and see the world is rushing
past the window. The road ahead is an empty, lined sparsely with trees.
There are fields beyond, some empty, some dotted with cows. I frown,
because this isn’t West Berlin. This isn’t even East Berlin.
The dashboard, the black hood of the car is familiar. It’s Reinhardt’s
Mercedes. With a cry I turn to my left. And he’s there, impossibly,
beautifully there, in a crisp white shirt rolled back to his elbows and his
large, strong hands on the wheel. He’s smiling, the sun falling over the
lower half of his face, making his eyes very bright and blue.
 “If you didn’t open your eyes in another ten minutes, Dornröschen, I
would have tried kissing you awake.”
Dornröschen. Sleeping Beauty. I reach out and touch him and he’s
solid and warm. I stare out the windscreen at the unfamiliar landscape and
then back at him. The chloroform must have muddled my brain as it’s
taking longer than usual to kick into gear.
Then all my questions gather and come out in a bewildered rush.
“What’s happening? Where are we? What time is it? Is this West Germany?
Why aren’t we being processed as immigrants?
He reaches out and takes my hand and I wrap both of mine around his,
clinging tightly to the man I thought I’d never see again. How is he here?
Where even are we?
“We are in Poland. You have been unconscious for about—” he glances
at his watch “—fifteen hours. I had to hide us until the early hours of the
morning but we are, as you see, driving, and I have no intention of us being
processed as anything if I can help it.”
This information only makes my confusion worse. Poland is in the
East, even further from West than East Berlin. “Poland? Fifteen hours?”
“Ja. Oh, and we are married.”
He touches a gold band that’s glinting on my ring finger, and I see
there’s one on his as well. I stare at our rings for a long time, watching the
way the sunlight gleams on their shiny surfaces. My husband. There can’t
have been a ceremony but he must have forged or obtained the papers
somehow.
This is all too much for me to take in. “Pull the car over.”
“Why?” His tone is light but there’s a hard look in his eyes. He’s
already made up his mind about this, whatever this is.
“Reinhardt, pull the car over.”
He frowns, but a moment later he reluctantly turns the car off the road
and alongside a farm fence. I sense him readying himself to grab me if I try
to hurl myself out the door. As soon as he’s put on the handbrake and cut
the engine I throw myself at him, locking my arms around his neck and
pressing myself as close to him as I can get. The steering wheel digs into
my hip. He gathers me close so that my legs are across his thigh and I’m
cradled against him, shuddering with fury and relief.
“You bastard. I thought I’d never see you again.”
His large hand strokes through my hair. “Shh, Liebling, it’s all right
now.”
I look up at him, tears running weakly down my face though I’m not
actually crying. I still don’t understand what’s happening but all I care
about is that we’re together. “I thought you were going to smuggle me
across the border to the West and leave me there. I thought you were going
to let them kill you. Why did you have to do it like that? I was so
frightened.”
He wipes the tears from my face, his expression rueful. “I intended to
do just that.”
“What made you change your mind?”
“Because when I came down to it I couldn’t let you go.”
He kisses me softly, and as if I really am Sleeping Beauty awakening
from a long sleep my mind clears. He couldn’t let me go. We’ve left East
Berlin behind us. We’re together.
“I had the plan all laid out. I was going to take you someplace safe until
it got dark and then drive you across the border. But when I gathered you
into my arms to take you to the car I just couldn’t do it. So I injected you
with Veronal and I put my escape plan into action.”
There’s a plaster at the bend of my elbow and I run my finger over it.
So it wasn’t just the chloroform that knocked me out. I had no idea that he
had an escape plan, let alone hypodermics and powerful drugs in the house.
“What plan?”
“A way to disappear if there’s an invasion or a revolution and it’s
suddenly dangerous for me to be in East Berlin. Weeks ago I saw to it that
you were part of that plan, too.”
I look up at him angrily. “Then why didn’t you tell me about this plan
last night? Why didn’t we even discuss this as a possibility?”
“Because it’s a last resort, only to be used if there are no other choices.
This plan is dangerous. You would be far safer in West Berlin.”
 Frustrating man. How like him to consider something and then dismiss
it out of turn without even telling me about it. “What is this plan?”
“Look in the glove box.”
I open it and take out two East German passports, both ordinary
citizens’ passports, one with his picture and the name Franz Bauer, and one
with mine and the name Alisz Bauer.
“We are two East German tourists on holiday,” he explains.
“In a Mercedes-Benz?” It doesn’t seem wise to try and fly under the
radar in such a conspicuous car.
He smiles. “All will become clear, meine Liebe. How are you feeling?
I’m sorry, I had to give you a lot of Veronal. I wanted to make sure you
were asleep when we went across the border into Poland. It was four in the
morning and the guards assumed you were asleep.”
I picture us at the border, me posed in the front seat as if sleeping,
Reinhardt whispering to the guards as he hands our papers over, asking
them not to wake his sleeping wife. He’d know just what to say to them to
put them at their ease; perhaps share that he doesn’t have much time off so
we’re driving through the night and that he never needed much sleep
anyway. Perhaps he offered them a cigarette and asked them about their
shifts, commiserating with them about the boredom of working an East
German–Polish border. He’d strike just the right balance of courteousness
and unconcern.
“I could have pretended to be Alisz Bauer just fine,” I say, feeling
stubborn and annoyed about being out of it for so long.
“Ah, but then I couldn’t have looked fondly at my sleeping young wife
and made them all think of their own girlfriends and wives and the holidays
they wished they were setting out on.”
I’m having trouble taking all this in. Yesterday I was a Stasi secretary
desperate to find my father and escape to West Berlin. Now I’m posing as a
young married woman with my fugitive lover. There are so many questions
crowding on my tongue but I ask the one that seems the most important.
“Where are we going?”
He hesitates. “You may not like it. You may wish I’d left you in West
Berlin.”
 I sit up straighter. “Just tell me.”
“We’re not going to the West. We’re going further into the Eastern
Bloc. To Bulgaria.”
“Bulgaria? But that’s a thousand miles away—that’s the other side of
Europe. I don’t even speak Bulgarian. Wait, you do, don’t you?” I
remember coming into his office that time and hearing him speaking in a
foreign language to the Bulgarian delegation. How I’d served them coffee
and Reinhardt had looked at me as if he was wondering how I tasted, and
I’d flushed because I was starting to imagine what it would be like if I let
him find out.
“Ja.” And then he speaks a sentence of something unintelligible and
clearly not German.
“Pardon?”
He smiles. “I said that once we reach Bulgaria we’re going to become
Alexsandr and Lina Lyubomir, and you are my East German wife. I can
pass as a Bulgarian who’s been living in East Germany.”
“But why Bulgaria?”
“It was the first place I thought of, and the only place I considered. The
only place I could see us being…” He hesitates. “My grandmother was
Bulgarian and I spent every summer with her and my grandfather in their
little seaside village. I was happy there.” He grimaces as if he can’t quite
believe he’s made such a sentimental decision.
But to me it’s everything, because he chose Bulgaria as he thinks we
could be happy there. He wants us to be happy, and he wants us to be
together.
“Reinhardt,” I moan in relief, burying my face in his chest. “Do you
know how frightened I was? I thought I’d never see you again.”
His arms tighten around me and he murmurs into my hair. “I know,
Liebling. I know. I’m sorry I did that to you. I didn’t think there was any
other way to keep you safe.”
I look up, beseeching him, “Promise me you’ll never do anything like
that again.” When he hesitates I hold up my hand and show him the
wedding ring. “I’m your wife now, remember?”
“I promise never to drug you in East Berlin in order to smuggle you—”
 But I’m not going through that again, sliding into unconsciousness
without any control over what’s happening to me. To us. “No. We both
decide our lives from now on. We’re in this together, to the end, no matter
what. I can’t face losing you again.”
He looks at me for a long time, as if he doesn’t dare hope that I feel this
way. “Do you really mean that, Liebling?”
I reach up and touch his cheek, roughened by morning stubble. “I’m
not your prisoner anymore. I’m your partner, your equal. This will only
work if we both decide our fates, not just you.”
“I’ll still fight for you, scheme for you, protect you.”
“We’ll protect each other,” I insist.
A smile touches his mouth. “All right, my Valkyrie. We’ll protect each
other.”
I take a slow, deep breath, because for the first time it’s not us against
each other, it’s us against everyone else. And between us, I feel we’re
unstoppable. “I love you, Reinhardt.”
He kisses me, holding me tight against him as if he’s afraid I’ll slip
through his fingers. “Ich liebe dich. Immer.” I love you. Always.
I think ahead to what’s in store for us on our journey there. It will be
dangerous as the Stasi must be after us by now.
“What’s the name of this village?”
“Sozopol, on the Black Sea.” He smiles, a soft smile of remembrance.
“It’s beautiful there. So much sunshine, little stone cottages. The sea is
warm and there is always fresh fish. The stray cats sit on the dock waiting
for the fishermen to come in at sunset and they are all sleek and well fed.
It’s quiet. Peaceful. At least, that’s how I remember it. No doubt my
memories are colored by nostalgia.”
Reinhardt, hardened as he is by life, is taking a chance on the place he
loved as a boy. I cup his cheek, hoping that I’ll see him smile like that again
soon.
He talks me through his plan to get us to Bulgaria, enumerating all the
dangerous places that we’ll be passing through. There are multiple borders
to traverse before we even get to Bulgaria and we can’t take the most direct
route lest we give our final destination away.
 “Right now we’re headed for Szczecin, a city on the route to the north
coast of Poland. I want them to believe we’re intending to defect to the
West via boat to Malmo or Copenhagen.” He’s silent for a moment,
watching me. “We could do that, you know. I have enough dollars and West
German marks to bribe a sea captain to take us to a Western port. You could
see your father again.”
My father. I don’t know how to feel about what he did. Now that the
initial shock over his betrayal has passed I find I’m not as angry as I
expected to be. Mostly I feel confused and disappointed. What would I say
to him if we were face to face right now? I take a deep breath and let it out
slowly. I have no idea what I’d say.
Going east with Reinhardt means giving up not only my family, but
any plans I had for my future there. I think about Ana and her dream to go
to a Western university. I never wanted that for myself. All I’ve wanted is to
be with the people I love. And now, that person is Reinhardt. “Could you be
happy in the West?”
“I will be happy if I’m with you, Liebling.”
“Where would we be safest? Will we have peace in our lives if we
make our home in Bulgaria?”
His hand strokes through my hair and he’s silent for a moment,
thinking. “No matter where we go there is a risk. We could get into the West
under our aliases but they will eventually find out who I am and they will
coerce me into providing secrets about the Stasi in exchange for money and
a place for us to live. I will have to accept because they will see to it that I
am too notorious to find employment, and we’ll need their protection
because the Stasi will send assassins to silence me.”
I stare at him in horror. I hadn’t thought of assassins. “And in the East?
I suppose we risk being recognized as traitors and sent back to East Berlin.”
“Exakt.”
So there’s danger everywhere. It seems like an impossible dream that
we’ll ever be happy. It will be a miracle if we have even our freedom at the
end of this journey, but I want more than just existing. I want to love. I want
peace for us.
 I think of fishing boats bobbing on the sea. A small stone cottage and a
garden. Peace that we can find only in a place far, far away from East Berlin
or any other big city in the East or West.
“I want us to be together, and I want us to be happy,” I whisper. “I
think Sozopol might be our best chance at both.”
He kisses me fiercely and I feel the full force of his love behind it. I
breathe him into myself, my dark lover who became my heart’s song in a
cold, gray world.
“I will get us there, meine Liebe. It won’t be easy, for they will be
hunting us and if we are to make a home in the East then I will have to
make us disappear. The things I will have to do may not be pleasant. Are
you ready for that? Will you stay by my side, no matter what?”
He means we will be hunted like he once hunted me on the streets of
East Berlin, and that he may have to hurt people. Kill people. I’ve seen with
my own eyes how ruthless he can be when I’m threatened.
“I’m with you, my love. No matter what.”

∞ ∞ ∞
It’s strange and enthralling to see Reinhardt switch into his hunter mindset.
We are the hunted now, but he’s thinking like a Stasi officer so that we can
stay one step ahead of our enemies.
“They’ll all be looking for us, not just Heydrich. My Oberst is probably
getting a dressing down from the Chairman himself for not knowing there
was a traitor right under his nose,” Reinhardt says with a grim smile. “They
won’t play fair, but neither will we.”
He almost seems like he relishes the challenge of having the whole of
the East German secret police force after us. “What will happened if they
catch us?”
He’s silent for a moment as he drives, his eyes on the road ahead and a
grim cast to his profile. “They will take me back to East Berlin. My
execution will be kept out of the papers but the whole of the Stasi and Party
will know my fate.”
 “And me?” I can see that he doesn’t want to answer, but I press him.
“Just tell me. I need to know what could happen. What would you do to me
in Heydrich’s place?”
He glances in the rearview mirror, and the tiniest flicker in his eyes lets
me know that he is worried for me. Deeply worried. “It wouldn’t be worth
putting you on trial. Too embarrassing for the Party. Your fate would be a
bullet in the head and an unmarked grave.”
We drive north on our sham journey toward Szczecin. In a town called
Myślibórz I watch him use a call box on the street, the door jammed open
with his foot as he smokes a cigarette and talks. Beyond I can see the steep
red tile roof of a cathedral rising into the blue sky. When he gets back into
the car he’s got a small smile on his face, and we drive on.
There’s nothing to do but watch the road ahead through the windscreen
and the road behind in the rear view mirror. And think. There’s been little
time since the night of the bakery raid for me to consider all that has
happened and what I want. Or rather, little opportunity to consider that I
might have a say in my own future. But I’m choosing it now. I look at the
gold ring on my finger. I’m married, in name if not in oath. Reinhardt. My
husband.
I turn to him. “I want to stop taking the pill.” The birth control pill, the
ones he thrust at me after telling me about Johanna.
He doesn’t say anything but I feel the tension in the car thicken.
Finally, he asks, “You want children?”
Does he really dislike children so much? Indifference would be
understandable, being the workaholic that he is. But seeing me with Frau
Fischer’s grandson in my arms all those weeks ago seemed to provoke a
visceral response. It was one of shock. Intense dislike. I can sense that same
hostility now. “I want your children. I want us to have a family.”
“Let’s just get to Sozopol first.”
But I keep looking at him, trying to discern what he’s thinking. I’m not
his captive anymore. I won’t be silenced. I’m sure there’s something he’s
not telling me. Is he already a father, or did he lose a child? Was Johanna—
And then I remember what he said the night I first learned he had lost
the woman he loved, after Ulrich nearly killed me. When the prisoners
arrived at the camp an SS officer assessed each one, and either pointed
recht and they were put to work, or links, and they were gassed
immediately. She was sent to the left.
“Reinhardt,” I say softly. “At the camps, why was Johanna sent to the
left?”
He flinches like I’ve struck him.
A memory from the schoolroom comes back to me. Something I read
in our history textbook. “Prisoners were only sent to the left if they were too
old or young or infirm to work.” I take a deep breath. “Or if they were
carrying infants.”
I don’t want to push him about something so painful, so I sit silently,
watching him as he drives. But my hands are clenched in my lap and I will
him to speak. This isn’t going to work if he won’t confide in me.
Finally, after several miles he replies in a low voice. “The last letter I
got from her in the prisoner of war camp… She got pregnant when I was on
leave in Berlin, just before I was sent to Africa. The birth certificate, I think
that was how she was found out. The registry office looked into her
adoption records and discovered she was a Jew.”
So he knew she was carrying his child while he was a prisoner of war.
His worry was for both of them, not knowing what was happening to his
fiancé and his child on the other side of the world. Not knowing for years.
Sending letter after letter but hearing nothing back. Imagining the worst
fates for both of them. “Reinhardt, I’m so sorry.”
“When I started working for the Stasi I requested a copy of the child’s
birth certificate. The father was listed as unknown. She must have realized
she was going to be found out. I think she was protecting me.”
I open my mouth to say something but he cuts me off. “It was a long
time ago. Let’s not talk about it.”
I don’t want to let it go. He hasn’t talked about this in twenty years and
while I understand his pain he can’t go on letting his past haunt our lives. I
see that his face is tight and closed so I let it go, for now.
Late in the afternoon we stop in a town a few miles south of Szczecin.
He directs the car down a narrow, lonely laneway and I sit up a little in my
seat, suddenly curious. He pulls in behind a neat little orange Skoda. I
recognize the make, a Czechoslovakian car that I’ve seen occasionally on
the streets of East Berlin. It has East German plates.
Reinhardt gets his handkerchief out and starts wiping down the steering
wheel and the ignition. Catching on, I start to do the same on my side with
the sleeve of my cardigan, removing my fingerprints from everything I’ve
touched.
He gets out of the car and goes to the Skoda and removes a set of keys
from the top of the front wheel. This must be the result of the phone call he
made earlier, asking an agent to arrange this for him. Reinhardt puts a
holdall of my clothes and a small case of his own into the trunk of the
Skoda, and then gets to work with a screwdriver taking the plates off the
Mercedes-Benz. Holding them with his fingers covered by his handkerchief
he throws them far into the trees. Then he moves to get into the Skoda.
I stop him. “You didn’t do a very good job of wiping your prints—you
closed the trunk with your bare hand. And they’ll find those plates. You
should have buried them.”
He smiles at me and gathers me into his arms. “Well spotted. You
would have made an excellent informant.” We kiss in the deep silence of
the laneway, his mouth coaxing mine open and sending sparks through my
body despite where we are and what we’re doing. Disappearing together.
Running away.
I’m out of East Berlin, I remember with a fierce thrill. And I’m never
going back.
Reinhardt breaks the kiss and strokes a forefinger down my nose. “As
for the trunk and the plates, I know.”
He wants the car to be found. He wants the Stasi to know that we were
in it and think that we were scared enough to not do a very good job of
trying to conceal the fact. But I grab his hand as he goes to get into the
Skoda again, another thought occurring to me. “The agent or informant or
whoever arranged this car for us will hear about your betrayal. They’ll tell
the Stasi what to look for.”
He smiles again. “Not everyone I know loves the Stasi, Liebling.”
I give him a pert look and I want to reply that he has an answer for
everything, but it would be churlish to complain about this in the
circumstances.
The orange Skoda isn’t as roomy as the Mercedes-Benz but it’s got a
better engine than most Eastern Bloc cars and when we get back to the main
road Reinhardt puts his foot down. A Trabant couldn’t reach half this speed,
and neither could a Wartburg, which Dad and I drove in once to go to—
But thinking about summer trips and Dad makes my eyes fill with
tears, so I lean forward and open the glove box and fish out a map.
We’re heading southeast now, towards Bulgaria. I trace the route with
my forefinger along the network of roads, over rivers, through mountain
ranges. The map is in Polish but I use the legend to work out the distance. A
thousand miles.
Reinhardt notices what I’m doing. “We won’t take the most direct route
through as there are too many borders to cross, which means too many
opportunities to be recognized. I think we will head into Ukraine and then
down into Romania, and then Bulgaria. It will take longer, but it will be
safer for us.”
I consult the map and see that this will add several hundred miles onto
our journey. I’m impatient to get to our destination, to see for myself what
Sozopol is like, but I know it’s better to be safe.
The sun starts to lower in the sky and we drive into a town. Reinhardt
turns in at a sign that reads hotelarski and parks the car.
He leans over and kisses me, and murmurs, “Herr und Frau Bauer, ja?”
I nod, repeating then names to myself several times as if they’re a
protective incantation. My stomach starts to knot as we head inside and I
keep my face as neutral as possible while Reinhardt converses in German
with the hotel clerk, a bored-looking young woman who doesn’t even
bother to read what he writes in the register before handing over our key.
Living in East Berlin has made me oversensitive about these things. Your
name, your papers, these are what define you and they must be scrutinized
at every opportunity. Apparently in rural Poland they’re not so important.
It’s a small, old fashioned hotel that’s seen better days but it’s
surprisingly cozy once we reach our room. The wallpaper has faded and the
carpet doesn’t match, but there’s a fire laid in the grate and once it’s lit it’s
quite cheerful in the small room. Reinhardt lays down on the bed with his
feet hanging off the edge, not bothering to take his shoes off. He’s tired, I
realize. I don’t think he’s slept since he smuggled us out of Germany.
I take a bath, as hot as I can bear, trying to blast the last of the Veronal
grogginess out of my system. When I brush my teeth I see that Reinhardt
has put my birth control pills into my washbag.
I chew my lip, looking at them. I haven’t taken today’s yet. Wrapping
myself in a bath robe I take them into the bedroom. Reinhardt’s still fully
clothed and lying on top of the blankets but when I sink down next to him
he slides an arm around me and opens his eyes.
“What have you got there, meine kleiner Flüchtling?” My little fugitive.
“My pills.” It’s not that I want to cause him pain but I can’t let things
go that are important to me.
He frowns up at me, a hard look in his eyes. “I said I didn’t want to talk
about it.”
“You also said it was a long time ago. But I think it still haunts you,
what happened to Johanna and your child. I saw your face when you saw
me holding Frau Fischer’s grandchild. You’re having nightmares about it,
aren’t you?”
He reaches up a hand to caress my cheek, looking at me for a long
time. He’s not used to this, someone questioning him, pushing him, but I
hold his gaze, and finally he gives me a tired smile. “You’re not my captive
anymore, are you?”
“No. I’m not.”
He gives me a wry look, and then subsides into silence, thinking. When
he speaks his voice is soft and far away. “I dream about her sometimes, on
that train with our child, bound for the camps. It’s a nightmare but it really
happened to her. Lately it’s not her face I see. It’s yours.” He pulls me down
into his arms and rolls onto his side. We’re nose to nose, gazing at each
other as the fire crackles and pops in the grate. “I would die for you, do you
know that? I wouldn’t hesitate.”
I think of the firing squad back in East Berlin. “You were very nearly
going to.” You still might.
He searches my face, and I can see the struggle going on behind his
eyes. This is already a difficult undertaking for both of us and what I’m
asking him will only increase his worries tenfold. Because I can see now
that he doesn’t hate the idea of children at all. He loves it, but he’s afraid of
that pain all over again.
“It will be dangerous enough, Liebling, even once we get to Sozopol.
What if I can’t protect you both?”
Both of us. Me and his child. I don’t know how to answer that because
I don’t know what lies ahead for us. We might find haven at Sozopol, or
merely more fear and flight.
He takes the pills from me, examining the half-used blister packet, the
foil glinting in the low light. “I took you in spite, in greed, in anger. I meant
to possess you, consume you, bend you to my will. But I took the wrong
girl if I wanted that. I took the girl who stared me down. Who talked back.
Who defied me. Who scratched and plotted and fought. She was nothing
like I expected and yet she is exactly what I needed.”
He looks at the pills again, and then sits up and throws them into the
fire. Together we watch the blister pack bubble and curl in the flames, and
then finally disintegrate into ashes. Lying back down he pulls me tightly
against his chest. I can feel his heart thumping hard beneath my cheek.
“And she’s far more than I deserve. It’s not a second chance if we’re
afraid. I will just have to learn to be as brave as you are, my Valkyrie.”

OceanofPDF.com
 Chapter Twenty-Three
Evony

Crossing from Poland into Ukraine is one of the worst moments of my life.
Reinhardt has to stop the car a few miles from the border so I can get out
and be sick.
He strokes my hair back from my face and hands me his handkerchief
to wipe my mouth, his expression perplexed. “You’re not…already?” He
glances at my belly.
Pregnant. It’s been only two days since we burned my pills and I’m
fairly certain morning sickness doesn’t begin quite so quickly. “It’s not that.
I’m nervous. You know I’m a terrible liar.” I keep repeating our fake names
and dates of birth to myself as if there’s going to be a quiz. I’m Alisz Bauer.
I’m on holiday with my husband, Franz. There’s nothing strange about us at
all.
Reinhardt seems perfectly at ease but then he’s spent years surrounded
by guards and soldiers of one sort or another. Uniformed men who are
deferential to him, salute him, follow his orders. A very different experience
to the average East Berliner.
“You needn’t speak to the guards. You can read a magazine and pretend
to be very bored with the whole thing. It’s what they’ll expect.”
“They’ll still have guns and dogs and uniforms. They might have heard
there are fugitives from East Berlin at large. They might have a description
of us.”
“Ja, possibly. But no one is going to expect us to be trying to get into
Ukraine. This is an inner Eastern Bloc border near a small city and the
guards are going to be very bored. No excitement, and nothing for us to
worry about.”
 All the same, before he restarts the engine he produces a pistol and
counts the bullets. Pushing the clip back into place he stashes the gun over
his head behind the sun visor. Noticing my white face he murmurs, “Just a
precaution, Liebling. We shan’t need it.”
As the border looms ahead I grab a magazine out of my bag, bought
specially for this purpose. I bury my nose in the pages and pretend to be
absorbed in recipes for casserole. There’s no queue at the crossing and
Reinhardt pulls smoothly up to the barricade and hands our false passports
out the window.
I glance over so the guard can get a look at my face. He’s younger than
I am and has the smooth chin of someone who probably hasn’t started
shaving yet. But despite his youth he’s still dangerous, and he has a rifle
slung over his shoulder and the sight makes the back of my neck prickle. I
feel an insane impulse to glance up at the sun visor where the handgun is
hidden and immediately look back down at my magazine.
A moment later I feel the car accelerate through the barricade. I hold
my breath, straining to hear shouts, gunshots, the sound of a car giving
chase, but nothing happens. I drop my magazine into my lap and bury my
face in my hands.
“Are you all right?”
I look over at Reinhardt, my expression pained. “How many more of
those?”
He takes a hand off the wheel and feels for mine. “Just two, and then
we’ll be in Bulgaria. Not long now, I promise.”
It takes us just a few hours to drive southeast though Ukraine and then
we pass uneventfully, though stressfully for me, through the Ukraine–
Romania border and stop for the night a few miles to the south.
The next day we’re back in the car first thing as we have most of
Romania to traverse. As we drive I want to ask Reinhardt to describe
Sozopol in detail but I don’t dare. It feels like tempting fate to picture us
there too vividly. Do we deserve our happy ending, a Stasi officer and his
captor who’s not only forgiven him but fallen in love with him? I want so
badly to believe that there is hope for us. Germany has made us bleed,
inside and out, and all we have left is each other.
 In the afternoon we arrive in a large town just north of the Romanian–
Bulgarian border and buy tourist paraphernalia like magazines and cans of
sticky orange soda. I’m examining several postcards when beside me I feel
Reinhardt stiffen. Without looking up from the German-language
newspaper he’s perusing, he murmurs, “Liebling, will you do as I say and
don’t ask any questions?”
I look up at him, my heart pounding in my throat. His expression is
neutral but a wave of fear sweeps through me.
“Put the magazine back and walk with me. Slowly. Nothing’s wrong.”
He means pretend like nothing’s wrong, because we’re being watched.
Even though he’s affecting a relaxed stance I can feel the tension rolling off
him. I dearly want to peer around the town square for the danger he’s
spotted but I school my face carefully blank. Is it the Stasi? Is it the
Romanian secret police? Romania has its own spies and a regime that’s
controlled by the Soviet Union. If the East German authorities have alerted
them to the possibility of fugitives then they will work with the Stasi to
capture us. It could even be Heydrich himself, following us from country to
country, hotel to hotel, dogging every mile, every step we take. Reinhardt’s
betrayal must seem like all of his Christmases have come at once and I can
imagine the sharp-eyed, smiling captain gloating over the thought of
bringing in his hated superior.
We walk along a row of shops and Reinhardt seems to scrutinize the
wares for sale. I understand what he’s actually doing—using the reflective
glass to look for someone tailing us.
The shopfronts end and Reinhardt takes my hand and murmurs softly,
“Next left.” We continue to stroll as if without a care in the world. We reach
the street, still walking, and then he squeezes my hand and we duck quickly
down the side street. There’s an alleyway parallel to the main street and we
turn down that, half walking, half running. A kitchenhand is having a
cigarette at the rear of a restaurant and we go in at the kitchen door.
Reinhardt calls brisk apologies in Russian to the surprised kitchen staff and
we go into the restaurant itself. There are a handful of diners and a surprised
waiter, but Reinhardt ignores them and takes us upstairs where there’s more
seating. The room is dark and silent and clearly not open for dining at this
moment, but when the waiter follows us up Reinhardt pretends not to
understand and he and the confused man converse in stilted Russian about
the menu for several minutes.
While they’re busy I think what I can do to help us lose this tail. I’m
wearing a bright green scarf and I take it off and surreptitiously stuff it
behind a pot plant. Then I pull the pins out of my hair so it’s hanging down
my back, take off my cardigan and stuff it and my handbag into an empty
shopping tote. It’s not much but it might help. There’s nothing to be done
about Reinhardt’s white shirt and tan trousers. He hasn’t even got a coat he
can put on.
Finally the waiter gets angry and we have to go back downstairs. I stop
Reinhardt before we reach the front door. “We shouldn’t leave together. If
there’s someone following us they’ll be looking for a couple.”
“I’m not letting you out of my sight.”
“You know that’s not the right thing to do. It’s safer if we split up.” I
know nothing of the sort, I’m only guessing, but the flicker in his eyes tells
me I’m right.
Finally, he says, “All right. The pond on the outskirts of town as we
were coming in. Head there and hide in the bushes, and don’t come out until
you hear me. I’ll whistle.”
I nod, feeling sick but determined, hoping that this isn’t going to be the
last time I see him and we get out of this town alive and with our freedom.
He seems to be thinking the same thing as he pulls me close and kisses
me hard. “Be careful, Liebling.” But the kiss is more than just a kiss, and I
feel something heavy drop into my tote.
“The safety’s on,” he murmurs in my ear, and I realize he’s given me
his pistol. “Flick it off as soon as you get into the bushes and shoot anyone
who tries to come near you.”
I nod and then head outside, walking quickly up the street. My neck
prickles with awareness, the weight of the gun in my bag feeling like a live
bomb. Is there someone following me even now? Reinhardt could have
been mistaken and someone might have been watching us out of boredom
or curiosity. But when it comes to spy craft and surveillance I trust his
judgment, and it’s better to be safe.
 A cold breeze is blowing and I push a hand through my curls to get
them out of my face. As I do I glance over my shoulder, and my heart thuds
painfully. There is someone following me, a man in a dark brown coat
about forty meters back. It’s not Heydrich, but didn’t I see someone very
like this man in the town while we were buying postcards? Don’t I
recognize that gray hat? I walk faster, and the pond and the scrubby park are
just a short distance away. Do I dare turn now? The road curves a little and I
take my chance, hoping I’m hidden from view for a moment, and dive into
the bushes. They’re thick and woody evergreens and they scratch my face
and bare arms, but I plunge in deeper and crouch down, breathing hard. I
can’t see the road. I can’t see anything in fact, so hopefully no one can see
me.
There’s nothing but silence for several minutes and then I hear
someone moving through the long grass and I go weak with relief. I nearly
stand up and call out for Reinhardt before I remember. Whoever it is isn’t
whistling, and I clamp my hands over my mouth, horrified that I nearly
gave myself away. Whoever it is walks up and down for a moment, as if
they’re looking for something. Or someone. Maybe it’s just a dog walker
but I feel in the pit of my stomach that it’s the man in the brown coat.
Silence falls, the minutes ticking on and on. What if Reinhardt’s been
caught? What if there was more than one person on our tail? The gun is
shaking in my white-knuckled hands, and then I remember that I haven’t
turned the safety off. I turning the weapon over in my hands, looking for the
button, when I hear it. Whistling. I nearly let out a sob of relief.
“I’m here,” I call in a cracked whisper, and then I’m plunging through
the bushes, see Reinhardt, and fall into his arms. He takes my bag and holds
me for a moment.
“It’s all right. Come on.” He kisses my temple and I let go of him. We
walk quickly across the scrubby field, away from the road and the town. “I
took so long because I had to drive around the backroads and park on the
far side,” he explains. “I don’t think I was followed.”
“I think I was.” And I tell him about the man I saw.
“Yes, that’s who was watching us in the square,” he says grimly.
 “But why would someone be following us? If the Stasi are after us why
wouldn’t they just arrest us?”
The car’s parked beneath the branches of a spreading oak on a narrow
lane, and we get in before Reinhardt answers. “Because Heydrich is waiting
for us to defect, not merely to run. He wants to be sure that he’s got me on a
serious charge before he makes his move. We’ve confused him by traveling
east.”
The flesh at the back of my neck creeps. So he does believe that it’s
Heydrich who’s after us. “But we’ve fled East Berlin together. Surely that’s
traitorous enough.”
He turns the ignition and starts driving. “For you, yes. But he doesn’t
understand why I’ve gone with you. If he arrests me now I might come up
with all sorts of plausible reasons why we’re together. I could say that you
have valuable intelligence and this has been a long, elaborate interrogation;
I’m using you as bait to catch your escaped friends; or I’m not travelling
with you, I’m pursuing you. He knows how much I’m trusted within the
Ministry and how it could come down to my word against his. It’s not you
he wants to arrest. It’s me.”
“Is he here, do you think? Was he in that town?”
Reinhardt glances into the rearview mirror. We’re the only car on this
winding road. “I don’t know.”
I chew my thumbnail, thinking. “We can’t keep going into Bulgaria
now. That man will be reporting into Heydrich right now if he is who you
think he is.”
Reinhardt thinks, a muscle in his jaw flexing. “This is a Soviet aligned
border on both sides. The security will be minimal.”
I gape at him. “You can’t be serious. After what just happened? They’ll
be waiting for us. Heydrich himself might be there.”
“Then I’ll wring his goddamn neck,” he growls.
“Murdering Heydrich isn’t going to stop the rest of the Stasi from
coming after us.” He doesn’t want to double back, I realize. We pass
through a small town in silence and then get onto a main road that winds
through some hills. On a bend, Reinhardt pulls the car to a halt, peering
through the trees.
 “What is it?” I ask.
He nods at the next bend. There are some people in the road ahead.
“That’s a roadblock.”
“Are you—”
But Reinhardt’s already reversing the car in a tight three-point turn and
racing back up the hill.
“Do you think it was for us?” I ask.
“Maybe.”
My heart is pounding hard again and I’m starting to feel dizzy from the
adrenaline pounding through my body. Nowhere’s safe. We’re pinned
between that roadblock and the town. Reinhardt accelerates, and I look over
at him. There’s a gleam of hard determination in his eyes.
“What are you thinking?”
“I’m thinking about that black car we passed a few miles back.”
Fear clutches me anew. “Are we being followed?”
“No. There was no one in it. I want us to do something very brazen,
Liebling. Are you willing?”
I don’t want to do anything of the kind but I know it’s either this or
capture. “Tell me what I need to do.”
We leave the Skoda behind an abandoned barn and walk with our bags
along a lane. I wait a little ways back from the road while Reinhardt goes to
investigate the black car. He puts the gun into my hand again before he
leaves and I look at it with distaste. Could I even use it if I needed to? I’ve
never even fired a gun in my life, let alone at someone.
Reinhardt’s gone a long time, and I feel my belly rumble despite the
anxiety of the afternoon. It’s been a long day already. There’s a can of
orange soda in my bag and I drink half of the warm, sickly sweet beverage,
hoping the sugar will even out my nerves.
Eventually I hear a car engine, and I stiffen. It’s a black car, and I
breathe with relief when I see Reinhardt behind the wheel. I jump up and
put our bags into the trunk, but he doesn’t let me close it. Instead, he opens
his case and I watch as he changes into his Stasi uniform. “You brought it
with you,” I say as he fits the cap over his head. It’s him, I think with a
shiver. It’s der Mitternachtsjäger.
 “Ja, Liebling. I thought it might come in useful.” He takes a length of
rope from his case and holds it up. “I think you ought to be tied up for this.”
My eyes go wide. “Tied up for what?”
He smiles his sinister hunter’s smile. “Tied up for our little ruse. Hold
out your hands?” He binds my wrists and then stands back and examines
me. “You certainly look the part of a little fugitive.”
I don’t know what he means until I glance into one of the car’s side
mirrors. There are scratches on my face and arms from the bushes, a leaf in
my hair and dirt smudges on my white blouse. Yes, I have the look of being
hunted down by a Stasi officer, and I realize what his ruse might be.
We drive in silence. When I glance at Reinhardt I see his face has taken
on that hard, determined expression I remember from the night of the
bakery raid, and from the night that Ulrich nearly killed me. He’s willing to
commit murder to get us out of this but I pray that it won’t come to that, for
his sake and for the sake of whomever we encounter.
Except Heydrich. Maybe I won’t feel too bad if he shoots Heydrich.
We approach the roadblock and a guard holds up a white gloved hand,
signaling for us to stop. Reinhardt puts the car into neutral and gets out,
slamming the door. He points to one of the guards, and then to me. “You.
Watch her.” The guard, a boy of about nineteen with a rifle in his hands
looks curiously in through the window at me. I pull a little on the ropes
binding my wrists and scowl at him.
Reinhardt addresses the soldier with two stripes on his arm. “I am
Oberstleutnant Maier of the Staatssicherheit. There is a border crossing up
ahead, ja? I need to radio East Berlin immediately.” He doesn’t take out any
ID but I guess that he’s hoping his authority and uniform will do the work.
There’s some frowning among the guards, so Reinhardt repeats what he
said in Russian and points to me. “Prisoner. Plennyy.”
The guards seem to understand this and salute him, and Reinhardt gets
back into the car. As we’re waved through the checkpoint I risk at glance at
Reinhardt’s face and it’s stiff and closed. The face of a Stasi officer on
important business, unwilling for anyone or anything to stand in his way.
Once we’re several hundred meters away from the checkpoint his face
clears and he puts a hand on my leg. “First hurdle down. Good, Liebling,
you did well. But the next will be more complicated.”
I don’t feel as confident as he is and I wonder if I’m going to throw up
again. “What if Heydrich himself is at the checkpoint? What if they have
our description?”
“It’s a risk, but remember what I said—Heydrich is expecting us to
defect. That roadblock might have had nothing to do with us, or it could be
that we’ve been followed despite my precautions. My Russian isn’t good
enough to find out the answers we need, but my Bulgarian is. There’ll be
Bulgarian guards at the next checkpoint.”
We drive in silence for several minutes, and then Reinhardt clears his
throat and says, “I’ll need to bring you with me when I get out of the car
this time. There’ll be a radio inside the checkpoint and I need you to cause a
distraction—don’t run, don’t give the guards a reason to shoot you. Shout at
them, try to kick them perhaps. But don’t try too hard or they’ll hurt you.
Just do enough so that their attention is diverted from what I’m doing with
the radio.”
I nod, my mouth too dry to reply.
“I don’t want to ask you to do this but it’s the only way.”
“It’s fine. I want to help.”
“Wishing you were safely in West Berlin?” he asks with a tight smile.
Am I? Away from all this tension and fear, all this risk? “No. I’d rather
be fleeing with you than be safe in West Berlin without you.”
He reaches out a hand to caress my cheek, his eyes on the road ahead.
“That’s my brave girl.”
The border crossing looms and he pulls the car to a stop. Once he’s
helped me out of the car he holds me tightly around the upper arm and the
barrel of the gun digs between my ribs. I try not to think about the fact that
the safety’s off and his finger is on the trigger.
With the air of a man who’s had a very trying day he marches me up to
the checkpoint office and pushes me inside. He locates the highest ranked
officer and waits to be saluted. The young man’s eyes go wide at the sight
of Reinhardt’s uniform and decoration, and he snaps to attention with a
smart salute. Reinhardt returns it and begins speaking rapidly in Bulgarian.
After a moment I’m thrust into a chair and two guards stand over me while
Reinhardt is directed toward the radio. He puts the earpiece to his ear and
his broad back conceals what he’s doing. I hear him talking in German and I
look up at the two guards.
“Don’t point your guns at me,” I say to their uncomprehending faces. I
doubt they understand what I’m saying but that doesn’t matter. An angry
prisoner is obvious in any language. I stand up, shouting, and the two guard
put heavy hands on my shoulders and force me down again. The guard that
saluted Reinhardt was watching him, but he turns toward the commotion
I’m making. Good. But my exultation is short-lived as I’m back-handed
across the face. I lean forward, gasping, waiting for the blazing pain to
subside.
“Would you keep her silent,” Reinhardt growls over his shoulder, but I
catch his eye and I know he’s had time to do whatever he wanted to do with
the radio. I sit quietly as he finishes the last of his call, certain that he’s
speaking to dead air and not Stasi HQ.
A thrill goes through me. None of these guards seem to know who we
are. With the radio disabled, even if one of Heydrich’s men saw us in the
town they won’t be able to communicate with the checkpoint. This is going
to work. We’re going to make it.
There’s movement out of the corner of my eye and I glance over,
expecting to see another guard drawn by my shouting. But it’s not a man in
a Bulgarian or Soviet uniform. It’s the olive green and smart tailoring of a
Stasi officer. Ice water floods my veins as I realize who it is.
Heydrich. There’s a gun in his hand and it’s pointed at Reinhardt’s
back.
I open my mouth to scream but Heydrich steps forward and hits me up
the side of my head with the barrel of his gun. I reel back and the world
slides out of focus. There’s shouting, I see a gun raised. Two shots ring out.
Blood sprays in the air and someone calls out in pain. Reinhardt slumps to
the ground just a few feet from me, his hand pressed against his neck, blood
gouting from between his fingers. His eyes are wide with shock.
It’s like a nightmare. I open my mouth to shout his name but black
spots rush up. I fight for consciousness. Reinhardt needs me. But I feel
myself slipping away.
We were so close to finally being free. So close, but we didn’t make it.

∞ ∞ ∞
I wake up to a papery mouth and pounding headache. Lifting my head
sends shards of glass through my skull and I moan, my eyes closed against
the bright light in the room. I rub my forehead until a sound freezes my
blood. A low laugh.
“Ah, the elusive Evony Daumler. Not looking much like the pretty
Stasi secretary now, are you?”
I crack my eyes open and see him standing over me, smiling, gloating.
Hauptmann Heydrich. I’m still in the checkpoint office. All three of the
Bulgarian guards are standing behind him, watching us, and there’s a dark
pool of blood on the floor. So much blood, and none of the guards nor
Hauptmann Heydrich are bleeding. Where is he?
I wet my lips. Reinhardt said that if Heydrich caught me the most
logical thing would be to put a bullet in my head and bury me in a shallow
grave. If I’m still alive he must need something.
“Looking for Volker? I’m afraid he won’t be doing much of anything
anymore.” Heydrich nods at the bloodstain.
No. I start out of the chair but Heydrich pushes me back. He’s not dead.
If he was Heydrich would be showing me his body.
Guessing my thoughts, Heydrich smiles. “I don’t actually have his
body, not just yet. He put up quite a fight despite the bullet in his neck and
he managed to get away. He’s bleeding out in the woods and I’ll have his
corpse collected shortly.” He crouches down before me and assumes an
expression of cloying concern. “How does it feel to know he left you in the
end? That that’s what your love was worth to him. Saving his own skin.”
I watch him stonily. If Reinhardt ran it was so he could get help, not to
leave me behind.
“Don’t you want revenge, Fräulein Daumler, for all that he’s done to
you? He captured you. Used you. Left you. You don’t have to go to prison.
We could help each other.”
Does he really think I’m so gullible? “If Reinhardt’s dying then you
don’t need my help. You’ve got what you want.”
He smiles wider. “There’s a position that’s just come up at the Ministry.
Oberstleutnant. Newly vacated. I want Herr Oberst to know it was me who
captured Volker, and you have all sorts of riveting details to tell.”
Panic slams into me. Maybe he’s telling the truth and Reinhardt really
is dying in the woods. Maybe he’s already dead. My voice shakes. “Go to
hell.”
“As you wish. But I hope you know that there’s nothing to be gained in
protecting your lover any longer. If you speak I can see to it that you don’t
spend the rest of your life in prison.”
I look around the room, desperate, for answers. The guards are
watching me though they aren’t following the German conversation. We
should have talked about what to do if one of us was captured. What we’d
say. Reinhardt’s left me behind when he swore we were in this together to
the end. It’s the end, and I’m all alone.
I lift my head and look into Heydrich’s face. “All right. I’ll tell
you everything.”

OceanofPDF.com
 Chapter Twenty-Four
Volker

I’m going to kill Heydrich. I’m going to make it hurt and he’ll rue the day
he ever crossed me by the time I’ve finished with him.
This is my first thought upon regaining consciousness, and despite the
fact that I’m tied to a chair god knows where with a boy I vaguely
recognize from Stasi HQ pointing a gun at my head I swear by heaven and
earth that Heydrich will be dead before the sun rises in the morning. How
much he suffers will depend on whether Evony is still alive.
There’s a buzzing at the front of my skull and I feel like I’ve lost a lost
of blood. I don’t know how long I passed out for and I don’t remember how
I got to this strange barn. I peer at the boy, who’s got auburn hair and a lot
of freckles, and try to place him. He’s got his finger on the trigger, rightly
afraid of me. But none of that matters right now. Where the fuck is Evony?
It’s a waking nightmare. I’m unable to go to her when she needs me
most. Anything could be happening to her. Heydrich’s got her and he must
have guessed what I feel for her by now.
Think. Focus. I take a deep, steadying breath and try to remember the
last time I saw her. Passed out on the ground at Heydrich’s feet. Scheisse. I
need to get out of these ropes and I need to stop the bleeding. The bullet
didn’t hit an artery in my neck, otherwise I’d be dead already, but it’s still a
dangerous wound. I peer at the boy, finally placing him. “You’re from the
mail room, aren’t you? Let me have my left hand to compress this wound.”
“Do you think I’m a complete idiot?”
I stop twisting the ropes behind my back and go completely still. Then
I look up at the boy again, rage mounting by increments in my chest.
“You’re Evony’s contact,” I say quietly. I don’t know how I know. Perhaps
it’s his sneering tone, so like the way I’m certain that Heydrich would like
to speak to me.
The boy smiles. He’s younger than I thought he would be and
possesses all the arrogance of youth. Anger and loathing churn through me.
This person lied to Evony, gave false hope to Evony, right under my nose.
He’s here pointing a gun at my head while his master is doing God knows
what to the woman I swore to protect. I made a mistake taking us to that
checkpoint. Evony wanted us to go back, to find another way. She was
scared, but in my arrogance I thought my uniform, my authority, my
cleverness would get us through. If he hurts her—if he kills her—
I struggle to control my temper, for her sake. I don’t deserve her or her
love but somehow I’ve earned both and I will not have her snatched from
me at the last moment. I will get her back, and I will make everyone who
has hurt her pay dearly.
The one good thing about this situation is that this boy is here and
Heydrich isn’t. Heydrich must need something from her. Testimony,
information. He’s not confident that he can get me convicted even though
I’m his prisoner. If he needs something there’s still time.
I fix the boy with a hard stare. “Either you let me compress this wound
or you do it for me, or I bleed out now all over the floor. I doubt your
captain would be pleased if I died, do you? Not before he’s managed to
gloat over finally getting the better of me.”
The boy seems to consider this but then shakes his head. He doesn’t
want to get any closer.
All right. I’ll just have to do this the hard way, and quickly as possible
before I pass out again.
I watch him carefully for a few minutes, observing his body language.
The way his hand clutches the gun convulsively. The way he swallows far
too often. He’s hiding it well but he’s nervous. He’s not used to being out in
the field.
“What’s your name?”
“Peter,” he says without thinking, and then looks like he wishes he
could take it back.
“Peter,” I say conversationally. “I’m going to kill you, Peter.”
 The boy freezes and then re-centers the gun on my chest. So he’s at
ease in the corridors of HQ lying to Evony but he doesn’t like when things
start to get serious. No one has ever pointed a gun at me without me
returning fire and my temper rises that I’m not able to do so now. But I keep
my emotions out of my face as it’s more unnerving for him this way.
I go on in the same conversational tone, never breaking eye contact.
“It’s been a very long day, Peter, and there’s a lot still for me to do. Even so,
I promise you that I’m going to spend a few minutes of it wringing your
neck.” This isn’t an idle threat. I’m already anticipating the feel of his
tendons cracking in my hands. The sound of him choking his last.
“Shut up.”
“What were you before you thought you could get the better of my
Evony? His assistant? His driver?”
Peter’s face flickers, an almost imperceptible movement but I see it,
and I roar with laughter, putting more energy into it than I feel, making this
as unpleasant as possible for him. “You were his driver. All this—” I nod at
the gun, myself, the barn “—is rather out of your league. Did you hatch the
scheme between the two of you to trick Evony? Did the battered secretary
seemed like an easy mark?”
Peter rallies a little as I remind him of his apparent cleverness. “She
agreed so easily. That’ll teach you to beat up women.”
“I never laid a hand on her.” I pause, and then smile coldly at him. “Not
like that. I touch her in many other ways, and she likes it. She always has.
Do you know she was playing you the whole time? She’s far cleverer than
you or your captain; far stronger in her mind. Far stronger than me. The
agent I could have made of her.” I pause, pretending to think about it but
really watching him. He’s sweating visibly now and his gun hand is
dropping as he tries to figure out whether I’m telling the truth. If he was
smarter or more experienced he’d realize that it doesn’t matter one bit
whether I’m telling the truth as he’s the one holding the gun.
“She’s the reason it all ends for you today. She’s going to be your
undoing, because it’s for her that I’m going to take you apart.” All the while
I’m talking I’m distracting him from what I’m really up to. The ropes
binding my wrists behind my back are too well tied for me to twist out of
them, but the chair he’s bound me to is as rickety as the barn and I’m
loosening the slat in the chair back more and more as each moment passes.
Peter’s hand clenches again and he realizes he’s becoming distracted.
“You’re not any good at this, are you, Peter? You don’t want to be
here.” He should shoot me now and make it look like I attacked him but
he’s too afraid of what Heydrich will do to him. Idiot. The only person he
should be afraid of is me. He should at least have gagged me to prevent me
from getting inside his head.
“All her fear, all the pain that you and Heydrich have put her through,
I’m going to make you feel it, and then I’m going to kill you.”
The slat comes free. I smile again, my coldest, most unpleasant smile,
the one that sends a chill up the spine of the prisoners I interrogate. That
makes them lose all hope. It works on Peter even though I’m the one tied to
the chair. Finally, he looks around for something to gag me with and the
second he does I launch myself to my feet and head-butt him in the nose.
The cartilage cracks against my forehead and he howls in pain. A second
later I’ve shaken the ropes loose and my hands are free.
Peter raises the gun but I knock it out of his hands. He backs away, his
eyes wide with panic, blood pouring down his face, hands raised uselessly
to ward me off. “Evony wouldn’t want you to hurt me. She’d want you to
be merc—”
He dares invoke her name to try and protect himself? The world goes
red and I grab his throat and start to squeeze. Peter struggles but rage is
flooding through me, making me strong, making me pitiless. I remember
Evony’s pale face at every border crossing. Her cry of pain as the Bulgarian
soldier backhanded her across the face. I think of her alone with Heydrich
and the torment she’s undoubtedly going through at this moment when I
swore I’d never let anyone hurt her. All this inundates my mind and I barely
notice Peter’s flailing becoming weaker and weaker.
Finally he goes still, his eyes wide and staring and I let him fall to the
ground as floppy as rag doll. The muscles in my arms are shaking and black
spots fill my vision. I can’t pass out. If I pass out now Evony will die. With
every shred of willpower I possess, I force myself to move and go outside.
 The dilapidated barn sits alongside a narrow, unmade road. The sunset
is over my right shoulder and I turn to the north, one hand clamped to the
side of my neck. I don’t know which side of the border I’m on but
something tells me it’s the Bulgarian side, which means I’m heading toward
the border checkpoint where I last saw Evony. If I’m wrong… I don’t want
to think about the consequences if I’m wrong.
I’ve been walking through the woods for twenty minutes with no sign
of anyone, let alone a checkpoint office. The blood loss is taking its toll.
Adrenaline is keeping me going. Evony is keeping me going. The desire to
murder Heydrich is keeping me going. If he’s hurt Evony I will make him
suffer whole universes of pain.
There’s a gleam of a black car up ahead, a Mercedes-Benz. The
checkpoint appears through the trees and the barriers are closed. The guards
are sending cars back the way they came.
Looking down at myself I see bloodstains down the front of my
uniform and dirt and leaves on the trousers. I have to keep out of sight.
As I’m carefully approaching the checkpoint office I hear her through
the open window.
“Go to hell.”
Relief blazes through me. That’s my girl. I can picture the pale oval of
her face, stubborn, defiant, as she once looked at me. As no one ever dared
look at me. If anything happens to her I will kill everyone responsible and
then myself. There is no world, no life for me without her.
“As you wish,” comes Heydrich’s reply. He’s fighting to keep his voice
even but I can hear his frustration. “But I hope you know that there’s
nothing to be gained in protecting your lover any longer. If you speak I can
see to it that you don’t spend the rest of your life in prison.”
Silence stretches. I picture her glaring at him. But when she speaks
there’s despair in her soft, cracked voice. “All right. I’ll tell you
everything.”
I ease myself closer to the window and peer inside. The captain’s
standing over her, her head hanging in defeat.
But when she raises it her eyes are blazing. “I love Oberstleutnant
Reinhardt Volker. He is a loyal citizen of the GDR and is faithful to the
Party. I’ve been working with him all this time to expose you as sneaking,
undermining idiot who can’t capture two dozen defectors when they’re
handed to you on a plate. How does it feel knowing you’ll always be second
best, captain? How does it feel knowing that you’ll never measure up to a
man like Reinhardt even with all your half-baked schemes?”
He stares at her, the look on his face almost comical.
Evony keeps talking, barely pausing for breath. “You’re pathetic,
you’re a fool, and when we get back to East Berlin I’ll tell everyone how
you botched this as well and Reinhardt got the better of you yet again. Yes,
keep looking at me like that, the memory of your stupid face will keep me
warm on all the long nights I’ll spend in Hohenschönhausen. That’s were
I’m going and I’m not afraid.”
My heart swells with love and pride. This is my brave girl, who can
face a thousand trials, heartbreak, even death, and still hold her head high. I
lived half a life before I found her, this young woman who stands on the
precipice of death and ruin without flinching.
But she’s taken it too far. Heydrich knows that he’s lost and anger
floods his face. He raises his hand to strike her—
I don’t watch any more. I bolt for the door, not caring who might see
me. But as I burst into the room the sight that greets me is not the one that I
was expecting. Heydrich is yelling, and Evony has her teeth clamped to his
thigh. He got too close and she bit him. I barely have time to marvel at the
comical sight of Heydrich trying to free himself as the other guards are
rushing forwards to help him, none of them noticing me in the doorway. I
grab a handgun from one of the guard’s holsters while he’s distracted.
“All of you, stay where you are,” I call in Bulgarian. None of them pay
me any attention and I shout again and fire two warning shots into the floor.
They turn and look at me in surprise. Heydrich is screaming at them in
German but they don’t understand a word he’s saying. There’s a good
chance they don’t even know what’s going on. I keep speaking in
Bulgarian. “I’m Oberstleutnant Maier of the Staatssicherheit and this man is
in violation of East German law. If you comply you will face no
disciplinary measures. If you do not I will shoot to kill.”
 The clear orders from a superior officer in their own language works.
They all turn to me expectantly. I motion to one of them. “You, take her
outside. If anything happens to her it will be more than your life is worth.”
He crosses the room to help Evony up. I turn to Heydrich, and I’m
greeted by a terrible sight.
He looks like a madman on the verge of a breakdown, his face purple
and his eyes wild. He looks between Evony and me and reaches for the gun
at his hip, and with dawning horror I see what he means to do. He wants me
punished for thwarting him again. He wants me to suffer. And he’s just
realized how he can make it happen.
He draws his gun and the barrel swivels toward her head, each
microsecond ticking out with excruciating slowness. I’m going to watch her
be killed in lingering detail, each moment etched onto my brain as long as I
live.
“Nein!” I lunge forward. I’m not going to make it in time. Evony’s
staring at me, her eyes wide with confusion, unaware of what’s about to
happen but able to see from my face that it’s something terrible. A guard
crosses in front of me in an attempt to disarm Heydrich, but he’s too late. A
gunshot rings out.
I can’t see anything but I know she’s dead. He’s killed her.
I fight my way forwards, needing to get to her even though it’s too late.
I pull the guard out of the way.
Someone takes the gun from Heydrich’s hands. It’s twisted around.
Another shot rings out. The report is an explosion in my ears and Heydrich
looks down at himself, fumbling with his uniform. A dark bloodstain is
spreading down his chest.
Evony’s holding the gun. I don’t understanding what I’m seeing but she
seems to be in perfect control as aims the gun and shoots him again, this
time right through his heart.
“You bitch,” Heydrich says in wonderment, and falls to the floor, dead.
Evony’s eyes are wide and her face is flecked with Heydrich’s blood.
She remembers the gun in her hand, shakily puts the safety on and hands it
to one of the bemused guards. Then she stands up and walks slowly toward
me, staring as if she’s seen a ghost. She reaches out and touches my
uniform jacket, tracing the bloodstains with her fingers.
I pull her to me and hold her close. We both reek of blood and
gunpowder.
“Reinhardt,” she gasps in my arms, her eyes filling with tears. “You
came back.”
“Always. I’ll always find you.” I stroke the hair back from her face.
“He had the gun pointed right at your head. How did he miss?”
She swallows and takes a deep breath. “It was your face. I’ve never
seen anyone look so terrified and I suddenly knew what was about to
happen. I flung myself forward just in time.” She turns and peers at the
wall. There’s a deep bullet hole in the plaster.
I’m staring at it, seeing how close I came to losing her, when Evony
reaches out to touch my blood-soaked collar. “Reinhardt. You’re a mess.”
I look down at my uniform and see that she’s right. I start to laugh but
black spots fill in my vision. Suddenly I can’t bear the weight of my body
with my legs. She tries to hold me up but I’m too heavy for her and we sink
to the floor.
The last thing I hear is Evony’s frantic voice. “Quick, call for an
ambulance. Doctor. Vrach. No, not with that. The radio’s broken. Please.
Isn’t there a telephone somewhere? He needs a doctor.”

OceanofPDF.com
 Chapter Twenty-Five
Evony

There’s a fresh breeze blowing against my cheeks. The scent of gentle

sunshine on clean sheets. The casement window is propped open by a
chipped and slightly rusted hook. There are no curtains and the fresh sea air
is blowing away the faint mildew scent of rooms that have been closed up
for too long. The space beside me in the bed is empty.
Sozopol. It’s exactly how Reinhardt said it would be. Sleepy, sunny,
pretty. Ordinary. There are guards here of course and portraits Zhivkov, the
Bulgarian leader, in the square and on some of the houses. But no one
seems to pay them much mind and the guards don’t button their uniform
jackets. From the living room window last night I watched the fishing boats
coming back to the docks, the twining cats lining up in the dusky light, tails
raised and expectant, waiting to be thrown the guts and fish-heads from the
day’s haul.
I’m so tired after the events of the last week that I should go back to
sleep, but I keep my eyes fixed on the window because if I close them I see
too much blood. Heydrich’s spraying against my face. Reinhardt’s seeping
unrelentingly through my fingers as I try to staunch the wound in his neck.
The remembered terror of that drive to the hospital. His gray, unconscious
face.
“You’re awake.”
I look over and see him standing in the doorway, one shoulder against
the doorjamb, hands deep in his trouser pockets. There’s a large white
plaster on the side of his neck and apart from a slightly paler cast than usual
to his skin he looks as he always did. Sleek and powerful. Handsome. His
eyes search mine. Perceptive eyes. Worried eyes.
 We barely talked after he was discharged from hospital. He held my
hand for most of the two hundred miles to Sozopol. Last night I stayed in
the car while he knocked on someone’s front door and I heard loud, excited
voices talking. Reinhardt brought us here and I went to bed almost straight
away.
He comes and sits next to me on the bed. “Tell me what’s wrong.”
I pluck at the sheets, not meeting his eyes. “Everything’s wrong. I don’t
know why we came here. Bulgaria is spoiled for us.”
Heydrich is dead by my hand but I haven’t even got time to deal with
that because we’re not safe here and I don’t know what’s going to happen to
us. Sozopol isn’t nearly far enough away from the havoc of that final border
crossing.
“Spoiled how?”
“We were supposed to get into Bulgaria without being noticed. After
what happened at the border—”
He covers my hand with his own, his voice gentle and reassuring. “It’s
all taken care of, meine Liebe.”
I look at him, perplexed. Reinhardt is resourceful and clever but surely
even he can’t undo the mess we made getting into Bulgaria. Not in less than
a day, and not without more upheaval. “But how?”
“By a few things. Bribes for the guards. An unmarked grave for
Heydrich. A Polish intelligence report that will soon arrive in East Berlin
detailing the captain’s defection to the West via Danish fishing vessel.”
Bribes. How much of our starting over money has he spent? And I
consider how it will look to the Stasi back in East Berlin that Heydrich
followed us in pursuit and ended up defecting. “Heydrich wouldn’t turn like
that. Not when he was so close to… Oh, unless he failed. Is that what you
implied in your report, that he lost us and couldn’t face returning to East
Berlin?”
Reinhardt smiles. “Implying. I’m working on the report now and I’ll
send it to one of my contacts in Poland to deliver to HQ.” He’s silent for a
moment, watching me. “It’s too soon to hope that we might get away with
our dramatic entry into this country. But looking at you, my beautiful girl,
whole and safe and by my side, I find that I have hope anyway.”
 He draws me to him and I put my arms around him. I feel it too. Hope.
We’ve battled our way here and we’re in one piece. We love each other. If it
comes to it we’ll keep fighting, but the gentle sea breeze that caresses us,
the soft buzz of bees in the spring garden, seems to herald the end of our
flight.
“What’s next Reinhardt? What now?”
“Now? Now nothing. You’re going to rest.” He looks at me closely.
“And you’re not going to feel guilty about what you had to do. If you hadn’t
killed Heydrich he would have killed you.”
Do I feel guilty? Part of me wishes that I didn’t have to shoot him, but
the other part is viciously glad I did. I didn’t know that this part of myself
existed. “I wanted him to die. That’s probably the hardest thing to admit.”
Reinhardt wraps an arm around my shoulders and kisses my forehead.
“It will never not be a difficult memory, Liebling. But it will begin to make
sense for you in time, I hope.”
That’s more comforting than platitudes or telling me I did the right
thing. I will always remember what I did, and why. I won’t forget any of
this, but it will mean I treasure every peaceful moment in our life from now
on.
“Where will we live?”
He smiles in mock astonishment. “Where? Here, of course. This is our
new home.”
I gaze around the beautiful sunlit room. Though it’s careworn and
musty the little stone cottage has charm, what I’ve seen of it. “But how?”
“Thanks to a very old friend of mine. That’s who I went to see last
night. Our grandfathers were friends and we knew each other as boys. I’ve
helped him out over the years when he’s needed it, and now he’s helping
me.”
I wrinkle my nose, suspecting the sort of help Reinhardt could offer.
“Shady secret police things?”
“In a way. His niece met an Italian at university and fell in love with
him. I helped with the papers to she could emigrate to the West and be with
him.”
 My eyebrows shoot up in surprise. “You know, Reinhardt, you’ve got a
stupidly soft heart inside that hard Stasi exterior.”
He smiles, and kisses me gently. “It’s not Reinhardt, it’s Alexsandr and
Lina Lyubomir.”
Oh, yes, our new secret identities. That will take some getting used to.
All this will take a lot of getting used to. But I’m ready to start trying.
“Would you like to see the rest of the house? It’s been standing empty
for some time and there’s a lot of work to be done on it.”
He helps me out of bed and I smile and take his hand. “But it’s ours?”
“It’s ours, and I’m going to do everything in my power to see that we’ll
be safe here.”

∞ ∞ ∞
Reinhardt wasn’t exaggerating. There’s so much work to do on the house
but in the days that follow I enjoy scrubbing floors, making curtains and
scouring the meagre shops for the things we need. The activity keeps the
worry from my mind. As in East Berlin there are shortages of things like
cooking pots and other household items, but there’s plenty of fresh food to
come by. We search the market for second-hand furniture and Reinhardt
turns out to be quite good at making shelves and rehanging doors. In the
evenings I learn Bulgarian from him, a German–Bulgarian dictionary and
the local newspaper.
As the days pass I feel myself slowly unbending. It was hard at first to
leave the house on my own. I was afraid that I’d come home to find that
Reinhardt had been arrested, or that I’d be arrested in the streets. But the
sleepiness of the town is soothing. So is lying beside Reinhardt in bed at
night and listening to his steady breathing. All I’ve wanted from my life is
to be with the people I love and to be happy with them. The West was the
answer at first because it was the place my father wanted, that Ana wanted,
and there’s still sadness in my heart that I can’t be with them. But I think I
can be happy here, with the man I love.
 Reinhardt smells of sawdust and varnish these days, and there are paint
smears on his shirt and wrists. We make love in the middle of the day in the
sunshine-filled bedroom, or on the new rug that he rolls out on the living
room floor. I haven’t taken the pill in weeks.
As we sit in candlelight one evening I say to him across the kitchen
table, “Please don’t join the secret police here.” The electrics are being
repaired and tangles of old wires hang from all the light switches.
Reinhardt looks up from the newspaper in surprise. Then he smiles,
and I see the ghost of the hunter in his eyes. He’s always there, lurking at
the edges. “But Liebling, I have to do something and I’m so good at that.”
“I know you are. Very good. But can’t you find something else that
you’re good at? Something that’s not so…cruel?”
He leans forward and kisses me softly. “For you, of course.”
But he’s agreed too readily and I’m suspicious. I scramble to add more
conditions. “Something that doesn’t hurt anyone, body or mind. Something
that helps people.”
Reinhardt smiles a wide, amused smile. “Would you like me to become
a fairy godmother perhaps?”
I give his chest a little shove. “Ha ha. I’ll settle for you doing
something that doesn’t hurt or terrorize anyone. Is that agreeable?”
He pretends to think on this for a moment as if it’s a great sacrifice.
“Well, all right.”
“You could get a job from the State,” I point out. “You could teach
History or Politics. You know enough about both.”
Grimacing, he says, “Mm, I don’t think so, meine Liebe. I would grow
bored, and you wouldn’t like me when I’m bored.”
I can imagine. I’ve already noticed that he doesn’t seem to know how
to sit still for very long. His mind is always ticking over with the next
things to do. I open my mouth to make more suggestions but he kisses me
into silence.
“I’ll think of something,” he assures me.
I reach for some of the newspaper and the language dictionary so I can
translate it. “Good, you’re going to need a job. Because I’m pregnant.”
 He freezes, and I see an old fear flicker in his eyes. I look at him over
the newsprint, my heart in my mouth.
He takes a deep breath. “Are you sure?”
I nod, tears prickling my eyes. “Pretty sure. I think it must have
happened almost straight away. I’m two weeks late and I’m never late.”
His hand reaches for mine and holds on as he searches for the right
words. “I just want you to be safe, Liebling. I’m happy, I promise.”
But. The unspoken word hangs in the air. He’s told me that if I’d died
by Heydrich’s hands he would have died as well. He would have taken his
own life rather than go through all that pain again. Childbirth has risk.
Children die young from disease, from accidents. I take a deep breath. “It
will be hard, and we will worry, but I didn’t come with you to live half a
life. I want to be in this house with you, loving you, and loving our
children.”
He nods, and when I return to my translating I can feel his eyes on me,
watchful.
As the weeks pass and my belly grows he’s by turns anxious and
curious. He never had this the first time, I realize. He never got to see
Johanna’s belly grow, or watch her demolish half a loaf of pumpernickel
bread at eleven at night, or sit shiny-bellied in a bath full of warm soapy
water. He puts his hands on my stomach, feeling for the baby and waiting
long periods for it to kick. He’s fascinated by every change in my body. I
watch his face sometimes and my happiness is bittersweet. I always
assumed that I would have this so I can just get on with things, but he never
did. It must seem like a strange dream to him.
Unexpectedly, Reinhardt gets into the art trade. It’s the last thing I
would have thought would interest him but he takes his keen eye for detail
and applies it to paintings and sculpture. He invests the last of the marks
and dollars we brought with us from East Berlin into his first pieces.
I suspect—no, I know—that not all the trading is legitimate. I know
little about art but the signatures on a few of the more beautiful paintings
catch my eye. Vermeer. Pissarro. Raphael. Such works were never on
display in the East but I remember a passage in a school textbook about
Nazi looted art.
 One day I find Reinhardt contemplating a painting propped up on the
mantelpiece. It’s about two feet across, a landscape showing some olive
groves and mountains in the background, except that the colors are vivid
oranges and blues instead of the expected greens and browns. The
brushstrokes are thick and haphazard, merely suggesting the scene, but it’s
not an ugly painting. In fact it’s very beautiful.
“Are you going to hang that there?” I ask. Occasionally Reinhardt finds
a piece he likes or he thinks I’ll like and puts it in our house. Nothing that
he believes was stolen, at my insistence. I don’t want to live my life
surrounded by stolen objects.
He puts his arm around my waist and caresses my swollen belly. At
seven months pregnant I’m becoming huge. “That, meine Liebe, is an act of
aesthetic violence committed by a degenerate seeking to undermine the
steadfast German spirit.”
I raise my eyebrows. “Is it? I thought it was just a painting.”
He laughs and kisses the top of my head. “Not to Hitler. This was
confiscated by the Reich, probably from a museum or a Jewish collector.
Hitler didn’t like Modern art.”
“And you’re selling it to the highest bidder.”
“Not this piece. This piece is going to the Louvre. An anonymous
donation.”
I look at him in surprise. “Not into the hands of a collector?”
“No. It’s too good for a private collection. This is one of my conscience
pieces.”
I don’t know what he means for a moment. Then I remember the other
smuggling he used to do, reuniting families who’d been separated by the
Berlin Wall. “Like Frau Schäfer?”
“Ja, like Frau Schäfer.”
I can’t say I’m thrilled by what my husband does and I suspect a great
many of the pieces that pass through his hands should be sent to a museum,
not just this one. But he did tell me he would land on his feet and I suppose
I should be glad it’s paintings he’s dealing in and not something worse.
There are no guns involved, no espionage. Most of his time is spent hunting
through old auction catalogues and papers, trying to determine provenance
and sniff out forgeries. It’s a different sort of hunting, and it suits him.
“Promise me we won’t get wealthy from you doing this. It feels parasitic.”
He nods at the landscape. “We shan’t. Conscience pieces like this don’t
come cheaply. Once I’m satisfied that you and the baby are taken care of
I’ll send something off to Paris or New York every now and then. How does
that sound?”
I think for a moment, leaning against him. It’s not honest work like
farming or teaching or plumbing, but for Reinhardt it’s quite good. We
regard the painting together for a while. How many more just as beautiful
are being lost to rich men who hang them up where only they can see them?
“It’s a shame to think of all these pieces disappearing into private
collections forever.”
Reinhardt digs a little book out of his pocket and shows it to me.
“Maybe not forever. These are all my sales, buyers and their addresses. If
the Wall ever comes down and there’s peace in Europe the authorities may
be interested in this.”
I flick through the pages and see the particulars of hundreds of pieces
of artwork and dozens of buyers. There are detailed notes about the
provenance of each piece and whether he suspects they were sold to him
legitimately or not. “So they won’t be lost forever. I knew you had some
conscience but you’re becoming positively burdened with one. When did
this happen?”
He gives me a dry look and caresses my belly with a large warm hand.
“Since I found out I was going to be a father.”
I’ve sensed a gradual change in Reinhardt since we left East Berlin. As
he said, happy men do not snatch women from the streets. I think that in
getting us out he’s laid a ghost to rest. He couldn’t save Johanna all those
years ago but he was able to save me. Her specter seems to be dissipating
and I hope that now her memory is at peace he can be, too.
“So you’re happy about the baby, Reinhardt?”
He regards me silently. “Some mornings I wake up and I don’t know
where, or even who, I am. This place. No uniform for the first time since I
was a boy. You getting so big with our child. I want to laugh because it
doesn’t seem possible.”
 “You don’t think you deserve it?”
He kisses me softly. “No. But I think I’ll try to. If I earn your love then
that’s all that matters. Yours, and Fritzl’s or Magda’s, or whomever this
little one will be. If I can make you both happy then I will have done better
than I ever thought possible.”
I snort with laughter. “Fritzl or Magda? We are not having a Fritzl or
Magda.”
Mock surprised, he says, “What is wrong with such good and sturdy
names? But tell me, Liebling, are you happy here with me?”
I look up at my husband who was once so fearsome to me. Who desires
my strength and has taken strength from me. Who gives me hope and all his
love. For so long there was the gray of the Wall in his eyes but it’s been
many months since I’ve seen that concrete scar reflected in their depths.
They’re the blue of the sea these days.
I smile, and go up on tiptoe to kiss him. “Yes, Reinhardt. I am.”

OceanofPDF.com
 Epilogue
Evony

July 12, 1966

Dear Heinrich Michel Daumler,

It will be painful and confusing for you to read this after three years of
grief, but they told you the wrong thing. I’m not dead. It was Ana he shot
that night, not me, but perhaps you know this if the scandal of our flight
from East Berlin reached your ears. I’m buried far away from you, your
Schätzen, where no one will ever find me. The postmark is a red herring.
My husband smuggled this letter out of our country and into the West so
that it could reach you. He’s very clever, my husband.
I found out what happened that night, that it was you who betrayed us.
I’ve been saddened and confused about this for a very long time. I know
how much you love me. I love you, too, and that’s why it’s taken me so
long to write. Because I too have done something that I know you won’t be
proud of. For my part, I have no regrets. Each day that passes I love my
husband more and more. I love him for the life he has built for us. The child
we have together. When I look at Michel (he has your curls, though they’re
bright blond like his father’s hair is) I know how you must have struggled
with the decision. I don’t know if I would have done the same thing. I hope
I never have to find out.
Michel will be tall and handsome like his father, and very resourceful.
I’m happy in this little house with the man I love and our child. It’s a life I
never imagined when I lived in the shadow of the Wall. I always craved
something more and you tried to give me that, but the sacrifices you made
along the way weren’t yours to make.
What I’m trying to say, badly and haltingly, is that I forgive you. I
wonder if you forgive me. Did you ever run into Frau Schäfer on the streets
of West Berlin? She has a tale to tell, if you can get it out of her. Tell her
that he’s said it’s all right that you know.
Ours was a love that bloomed in an unlikely place, in an unfathomable
way. It’s been hard for him, to have a child. I’ve seen such fear in his eyes,
worry that we might be taken from him, that we might get hurt or sicken
and there’ll be nothing he can do to save us. But each day the fear ebbs
from his eyes a little more and the nightmares have left him alone for many
months now. When I tell him our family will soon get bigger I’m certain
that there will be nothing but happiness in their blue depths. My heart is
bursting just to think of it. When I’ve sealed this letter and put it into his
hands I’m going to tell him. It will be a girl, I think. Maybe she’ll be dark
like me, and I’ll call her Adalita.
I think of you often, and even though many miles and a great political
divide separate us I still love you, and I hold out hope that I will see you
again. One day. If the Wall ever comes down.
Yours,
Schätzen

OceanofPDF.com
 Author’s Note
The Berlin Wall stood for twenty-eight years, a symbol of the Cold War and
the ideological and political divide that existed between East and West. On
the night of November 9, 1989 thousands of East Berliners poured through
the checkpoints into West Berlin, sounding the death knell for the division
of Germany and the Soviet Union. The Wall was physically demolished
soon after.
When the Wall fell, Evony and Reinhardt’s eldest child would have
been twenty-six and able to choose for himself where to make his home
without the dangers his parents faced. I like to think he sought his
grandfather out, and that Heinrich and Evony were reconciled eventually.
I always wanted Evony and Reinhardt to have a happy ending and I
struggled a long time with how and where that happy ending should take
place. I felt that with all they’d been through, they deserved it. In many
Cold War narratives the West is held up as a golden land of safety and
opportunity but the reality was more complicated than that. High-profile
defectors were in danger of retribution from the East and have been
attacked and murdered even in recent years, long after the Cold War ended.
I wrote this book amid the Brexit uncertainty in the UK and the Trump–
Russia scandal in the United States. We’re living through a time of deep
political divides and hard choices.
I have benefitted from everything the West has to offer and I’m fully
aware of and grateful for my privilege and freedoms. At the same time I
couldn’t write an ending where the West offered Evony and Reinhardt an
easy solution to a complex and dangerous problem. Life just isn’t that
simple. What was most important to me was that they find a safe place
where they could make their home, and though they had to fight for what
they wanted they made it in the end. And besides, if I’d made things too
easy for them I don’t think Reinhardt would have believed me.
Brianna Hale

OceanofPDF.com
 Enjoyed MIDNIGHT HUNTER?
Want to be notified of the next release by Brianna Hale? Click here:
https://goo.gl/forms/y53oBiNzsCw6JV4n1

Read on for an excerpt of SOFT LIMITS by Brianna

Hale

“If you test my limits I’m going to test yours back, twice as hard. If you
push me you’ll find you run out of ground long before I do.”

Frederic d'Estang: performer, professional villain and my youthful crush.

He calls me chérie, ma princesse, minette.

And I call him daddy.

Adult, sexy and daring. Brianna Hale gets better and better - The Book
Bellas

*sigh* All the stars in the world for SOFT LIMITS -

AnObsessionWithBooks

Brianna Hale knows how to write a damn good love story ... her books keep
getting better and better - The Romance Rebels

As soon as I reached the end, I could have read it all over again - Wicked
Reads
This book offered something different ... it had a darker side - Warhawke's
Book Vault

Beautiful and dark in all the best ways - Honeyed Pages

This book is the perfect combination of vulnerability and dark fantasy -

Book Talk By Sarah

Brianna Hale just keeps getting better and better! SOFT LIMITS is so dirty
and sexy that I couldn't put it down - Reading Cafe

OceanofPDF.com
 Chapter One
Evie

I’m not paying attention when it happens. The laneway is deep with silence
and noonday shadows, and there’s a fresh breeze blowing. My eyes are
following tiny birds as they hop among the cow parsley and tangled
wildflowers, but my mind is far away, in a dark and bitter East Berlin
winter of razor wire and searchlights and snarling German shepherds. I
picture Mrs. Müller, not as I left her just now, a sturdy, gray-haired woman
in a cream blouse, but as a young woman of twenty with a pale, determined
face and clear blue eyes. She laid photos out before me of friends long
dead. Shot going over the Wall. Arrested by the Stasi. Arrested.
Disappeared. This one betrayed us—she was an informant and we didn’t
know it.
There’s a break in the hedgerow and I cut across the laneway, heading
for the stile. The path beyond leads a mile across the fields to my parents ’
country house, where I’m staying over the summer with my mother, father
and my sisters. All three of them.
Suddenly a car races around the bend. I freeze, turning toward this
black, rushing thing, as silent as it is sleek—Why is it so quiet?—but then
the driver slams on the brakes and the air is filled with the screech of tires
and smoking rubber. The car stops six inches from my legs and I’m finally
released from terror-induced paralysis. I scurry to get out of the way but my
feet tangle and I go down with a yelp. Papers and books cascade from my
shoulder bag. I stare at my burning hands pressed against the gravel, my
chest heaving.
A car door opens and rapid footsteps approach. Someone hovers over
me, saying something about the driver and not seeing me and asking me if I
am hurt.
“No, really, I’m fine, the car didn’t touch me, I just fell,” I say,
brushing gravel from my bare legs and scraped palms while simultaneously
trying to grab at loose pages that are fluttering into the hedge.
His hand catches mine. “Miss,” he says, in a voice that cuts through my
babble. He’s got an accent of some sort. “I will collect your papers. Are you
sure you’re all right?”
I look up, and recognition and dismay stun me into silence. The man
bending over me has dark, curly hair with a few silver flecks and slanted
green eyes above pronounced cheekbones. His mouth is full and slightly
parted. It’s a mouth I’ve seen thinned with anger, twisted into sneers and
plumped with self-satisfaction. It’s the mouth of a villain.
“Monsieur d’Estang,” I say automatically.
His eyebrows shoot up, and then his concerned expression becomes a
sleek smile. “Oui, mademoiselle.”
Oh, god. He thinks I’m a fan. Well, you are a fan. No—not really, not
anymore. “I’m not—” And I take a deep breath, because even I can only
bear making a fool of myself so many times in one day. “I think you are on
your way to see my father.”
Dad didn’t mention that Frederic d’Estang, the French Canadian
musical theater performer, would be coming to the house, but then he’s not
much in the habit of warning us about these things. As he’s a theater agent,
and a gregarious one, it’s not unusual for a star to pull into the drive while
you’re eating your toast or plump down next to you at dinner.
Monsieur d’Estang studies me for a moment. “You are Anton Bell’s
daughter?”
“Yes. Well, one of them.”
He puts a hand over his heart. “Miss Bell, I deeply apologize.” And he
continues to apologize in the most eloquent way for several minutes while
he helps me up and collects all my notebooks and papers. I try to get them
off him but it’s hard to get a word in while he talks on, and then he’s taking
my elbow and steering me toward the car.
“No, please, I’m fine to walk, it’s not far across the fields.”
 “But Miss Bell, we are going the same way, I believe.” His eyes are so
much greener in person and I feel like a mouse pinned by the jeweled gaze
of the cobra. He’s had more than twenty years ’ professional experience
convincing people of things with those eyes and I’ve only had minutes to
try and discover how to refuse them.
I fail, and get into the car.
The driver adds his own apologies to Monsieur d’Estang’s while I’m
buckling on my seat belt. It’s an electric car, he explains, which is why I
didn’t hear it. I mutter something about not getting many of these in the
countryside around Oxford.
“What were you thinking about so deeply when we nearly knocked you
down?” Monsieur d’Estang’s accent is unusual, a slight North American
inflection with a clipped Frenchiness about the vowels. It’s a very nice
voice, and surprisingly gentle for such a tall, sultry man. I think about all
the actresses and singers he’s been romantically linked with over the years.
He probably knows it’s very nice.
“Communists,” I say.
He looks amused. “Oh?”
“I mean, it’s just something I’m working on,” I say quickly. “East
Germany, Cold War.” Why can’t you say, “It’s a book I’m writing for a
client”? Is that so hard?
“Ah, so you’re a writer. That explains the daydreaming.” He glances
out the window and I glare at the back of his head. I’ll put up with being
pigeonholed as awkward and boring by my sisters, but it’s irritating from
strangers.
But it seems he was just checking where we were, as he turns back to
me. “What are you doing out here in the middle of nowhere?”
“What, walking?”
“No, I mean here in the countryside. Why aren’t you in London, or
Paris? Somewhere with a little more excitement.”
“University,” I say, waving my hand in the general direction of Oxford.
I’m working on a PhD in Victorian literature but he probably thinks I’m a
gormless undergrad. I’m dressed like a gormless undergrad, in scuffed
shoes and denim shorts.
 “During summer? Do they not allow you any holidays in England these
days?”
I’m about to reply when we turn into the driveway of my parents ʼ
house. It’s something of a spread, all white columns and twining ivy and
gray stone. There’s a fountain in the center of a circular gravel driveway.
Lisbet, just fourteen, is lying in the grass reading a book. My elder sister,
Mona, appears at the sitting-room window, and I see her peer at the car and
then turn and call over her shoulder, probably to our other sister, Therese.
I realize that if I stay where I am I’m going to get mobbed by the whole
family. Why are you in the car with Monsieur d’Estang? What happened to
you? You fell? Oh, Evie, how funny you are! Everyone, come and look.
“Well, thanks for the lift!” I cry, grabbing my shoulder bag and
jumping out of the car.
Lisbet looks up from her book as I scurry past. “Who’s that?”
But I just push into the house and run upstairs. It’s not until I’m
standing in my bedroom with my back against the door that I remember
I’ve left all my books and notes in Monsieur d’Estang’s car.

∞ ∞ ∞
“Drinks!”
My father’s voice is a roar up the stairs. I glance at my phone: six
thirty. He’ll have been banging around in the kitchen for the last hour and
will want everyone to come and have a gin and tonic before we eat. I pull
off my T-shirt and shorts and yank the first sundress I lay my hand on over
my head.
Lisbet, Mona and Therese are occupying all the good spots in the
sitting room when I go in, and they’re arguing about whether this year’s
Dancing with the Stars contestants were as good as last year’s. Monsieur
d’Estang is standing in the door to the kitchen, his back to us, talking to my
father.
“He was rubbish, Lisbet,” Mona is saying. “The producers wanted to
keep him on because he’s weird, and weird means ratings. Don’t look at me
like that, Evie said it.”
Lisbet turns her red-cheeked glare on me as I sink into the scratchy
embroidered chair by the fireplace. “Sorry, Betty-bun.” I did say that, but
mainly because I was miserable about Adam and it felt good to be nasty
about a stranger.
I wait for my sisters to screech at me about falling down in front of
Monsieur d’Estang’s car, but they don’t so perhaps he didn’t tell them.
Mum comes in through the French doors, pulling gardening gloves off
her hands. “Frederic, I didn’t know you were here.” Monsieur d’Estang
turns around at the sound of his name and breaks into a smile. My mother is
attractive and blonde, and her eyes are very blue. She kisses him on both
cheeks. “How simply wonderful. Are you staying the week?”
“Just a day or two, if I may. I have to be back in Paris on Monday.”
Lisbet’s voice rises in outrage in defense of her favorite dancer, and
Mona and Therese laugh.
“Keep it down to a dull roar, you lot,” Dad says, coming in. Then
cheerfully to Monsieur d’Estang, “I’m sorry for the dreadful gaggle of
women in this house. Everyone’s come home to roost for the summer
holidays.”
“Not at all,” Monsieur d’Estang replies, smiling round at us.
Mona and Therese give him coquettish glances. It’s so easy for some
people, flirting. I finger the scrape on my knee, trying not to think about
Adam. The scrape hurts. I press it harder.
“Have you all got drinks?” Dad asks. “Mona, Therese, Evie?”
They ask for gins. I ask for sparkling water.
“Go on, have a proper drink,” Therese urges me.
“I have to write later,” I say, accepting the water from my father. Out of
the corner of my eye I see Mona roll hers.
Therese looks up at Monsieur d’Estang. “Dad says you’ve been cast in
a new production. What is it?”
He turns to her with a smile. “I’m playing Rochester in a new musical
production of Jane Eyre.”
I look at him from beneath my lashes. Well, he’ll be perfect. Stormy,
dark features, penetrating eyes and high cheekbones. He’s in a crisp white
shirt now, but I can just imagine his broad figure in a frock coat and his legs
in leather riding boots. Musically he’ll be good too. His singing voice can
rattle windows with fury or caress with love.
Mona frowns at me. “You’ve read that book, haven’t you, Evie?”
About a thousand times. “Oh, that book. Yes, I should think
everybody’s read that book.”
“Evie loves that—” Lisbet begins.
“A musical adaptation, that’s different,” I say. “What made you
interested in the part?”
Monsieur d’Estang accepts a gin and tonic from my father. “It’s just
such a different sort of role for me. When I was a young man I was called
elfin and allowed to grow my hair out and play romantic leads. But then
someone noticed what an excellent scowl I have, and my face began to
harden with age, so they sheared off my curls, et voilà.” He sweeps his hand
in a little flourish. “I am a villain. And, I thought, typecast for life. So it was
a surprise, and a pleasant one, to be invited to play a romantic hero once
more.”
I’ve seen photographs of Monsieur d’Estang as a very young man, and
he was elfin, but very striking all the same. I think about the role and
whether you could call Mr. Rochester, so driven by his passions, so
contemptuous of the laws of society and the Church, a hero. “Some would
say Mr. Rochester is a villain,” I muse out loud.
He tilts his head to one side. “Oh, that’s interesting. Would you say
so?”
I’m not used to being asked to speak my opinion out loud in this house,
and certainly not about something as achingly dull, as Mona would say, as
nineteenth-century literature. “I don’t know,” I say, plucking at a loose
thread on the side of the chair. “Maybe.”
We all finish our drinks and are herded into dinner. The talk is
dominated by my father and sisters, particularly Mona and Therese. Mum
and I eat and listen, and Lisbet, who hates being left out of anything, tries
desperately to edge herself into the conversation.
“And what do you all do when you’re not summering here?” Monsieur
d’Estang asks us.
 Lisbet tells him about her dressage ribbons and Therese her law degree.
Then Mona brings up her upcoming audition with an opera production
company in London, and the talk inevitably becomes music-focused.
Finally Monsieur d’Estang turns to me. “You’re a writer, Evie. What
are you working on?”
Therese cuts across me. “She ghostwrites autobiographies for old ladies
and things.”
Thanks, Therese. You make it sound so interesting. She catches my
baleful look and opens her eyes wide in a well, you do expression.
“Now, there’s a thought,” Dad says to Monsieur d’Estang. “Your
Canadian agent emailed me yesterday and said he’s been trying to convince
you to write your memoirs. Get Evie to do it for you,” he says, laughing.
“She can cast a good sentence.”
Monsieur d’Estang gives him a tight smile. “Martin told you that, did
he?”
Oh, Dad, shut up, please… I’m counting the number of weeks until the
university opens again when Mona’s phone buzzes. An email has just come
in. She’s got the audition she was hoping for. “God, it was like, the most
perfect thing. I saw the director in a café so I went in and I just started
singing. No hello or anything, I just burst into the aria and then left her my
email address.”
Dad purses his lips, but his eyes are glimmering with amusement. “My
daughter. I have to work with these people, you know.”
Tapping a reply into her phone, Mona mutters, “What? It worked,
didn’t it? You understand, don’t you, Monsieur d’Estang?”
I’m fairly certain Monsieur d’Estang always had too much class to
make a twit out of himself like that, but he just smiles and says, “Anything
for a part.”
After dinner Lisbet goes straight to the living room and hunts through
the DVD collection for one of Monsieur d’Estang’s recorded performances,
which she’s never been interested in before. She chooses The Phantom of
the Opera. I know it well. The man who plays Raoul is romantic in a bland
sort of way. The Phantom, played by Frederic d’Estang, is manic, bold and
powerful.
 Lisbet’s mouth is open as she watches him on the screen. I’m familiar
with the sensation she’s feeling: She’s in the early throes of her first proper
crush, an innocent, naïve infatuation that will cycle from daisy-plucking to
wistful diary entries and back again.
Little idiot, I think, and stalk upstairs.

OceanofPDF.com
 Chapter Two
Frederic

“Now, Frederic. About that memoir.”

I accept the tumbler of whisky from Anton, but my heart sinks. That
again. Martin promised he wouldn’t talk about the book deal he’s
negotiating with the Canadian publisher with anyone. I know what he’ll say
if I complain. Anton isn’t just anyone, he’s your British agent. I suspect he
told Anton about the book so there’d be someone else to nag me to do it.
“What about it?” The casement windows are open and the scent of
daphne is wafting in on the night air. I was just starting to relax but now I
feel on edge again.
Anton sinks into the armchair next to mine. His youngest daughter—
Lisbet, I think her name is—is watching Phantom on the television on the
other side of the room. She’s cross-legged on the carpet, and I would find
her rapt attention sweet if I couldn’t hear myself singing.
Anton gives me an arch look. “I sense you’re not keen on the idea.”
“I’m not,” I say heavily.
“It would sell.”
“That doesn’t make it a good idea.”
Anton grins. “Tell that to Martin. No, but seriously, why don’t you like
the thought of a book?”
If I tell Anton the truth, he’ll ask a hundred more questions that I can’t
answer. What can I say instead? “I don’t know. Who wants to read me
banging on about my stage career for four hundred pages? I did this, I did
that.” In a way that’s the truth, or at least a secondary truth. And I’m too
young to publish an autobiography. I’m forty-one. I haven’t done
everything that I want to do yet. “And it’s not like I can even write.”
 “Then hire someone to write it for you.”
I grimace. “That would be worse. I’d have to read someone putting
words in my mouth.”
Mona comes in and plops herself on the sofa behind her sister. Bored
and hot, she seems to cast about for something to do. After a moment she
scoops up a handful of Lisbet’s long hair and starts working it into a
complicated braid.
Anton sips his whisky, thinking. “Do a biography then. Third-person.
Someone interviews you and the people who know you best and writes it
up. All the dirt along with all the bragging. I’m sure any biographer worth
their salt could dig up a few dozen people who hate the very sight of you.
It’s what’s called a balanced view, I hear.”
“People in the theater world who hate the sight of me? Oh, easily. The
problem with a biography, though, is how do you end it? I’m not dead.”
Anton waves this away. “Oh, that’s the writer’s problem. They’ll figure
something out, and it doesn’t need to be flashy. Marianne Faithfull’s book
ends with a recipe for chicken.”
It’s not the writer’s problem. It’s mine. I have no idea what happens
next.
Mona’s been half listening to our conversation, it seems, because
suddenly she turns to us. “Honestly, get Evie to do it. She knows your
career back to front and she’s read every character you’ve ever played. She
could probably write half of the book off the top of her head.”
Anton gives me an appraising look.
More to put an end to the conversation than anything else, I say, “Have
you got anything she’s written?”
Mona thinks for a moment. “Good question. All her ghostwritten books
must be at college because I haven’t seen them here. She’s so private about
that stuff. There’s probably something on her hard drive…” She makes an
exasperated face, as if asking her sister about this is more trouble than it’s
worth. Then she brightens. “I know! Give me your email address and I’ll
send you a link.”
Anton digs his phone out of his pocket. “I’ve got his address, Mona.
I’ll send it to you now.” Once he’s done this and laid his phone aside he
looks back at me, thoughtful. “Why is Martin so keen for this to happen?
Why now?”
I consider whether to tell him. I should tell him, as he’s going to find
out sooner or later. But an irrational fear grips me. You have to get on the
stage in this country in a few months ’ time. Do you really want to speak it
aloud? I thought I was immune from silly theater superstitions, but it seems
I’m not.
“Wants his cut, doesn’t he?” I say, forcing a smile. “Been talking about
getting a holiday house for the last year. Then he comes up with this book
idea.”
Anton grins. “That sounds like Martin.”
Once I’ve finished my whisky I head upstairs. It’s very still outside, not
even the slightest breeze stirring the net curtains on this hot, sticky night. I
check my email on my laptop and see that Mona has sent me a link. I click
through and frown at the screen. I’m not sure what I’m looking at. There’s a
list of pieces and their characters and word counts. A name catches my eye.
That’s curious… I click through and start to read.
Two hours later I sit back, bewildered and amused. Evangeline Bell.
Who would have thought?
Closing the laptop, I ponder things for a moment. The book’s a pain in
the ass but it’s not going to go away. Maybe, with Evie, I’ve found a way to
make it a worthwhile project after all.

SOFT LIMITS is available now in Ebook and

Audiobook

Also by Brianna Hale

LITTLE DANCER

PRINCESS BRAT

OceanofPDF.com
 Acknowledgments
Thank you first and foremost to Huw, who’s with me through the good, the
bad, the tears and the laughter, and who’s always got my heart.

Thank you to Antje who read this book countless times and through several
versions, one of which brought us together as friends and resulted in many
jaunts around London and Paris together. Thank you for all your sensitive
feedback and corrections. Thank you for correcting my German, too, and
any language errors that still exist in the book are all my own.

Thank you to Melinda for your invaluable insight and feedback.

Thank you to Marcin for telling me all about growing up behind the Wall.

And thank you finally to the Berlin crew, who let me tag along on their
weekend and without whom I would never have had the inspiration to write
this book.
 About the author
There's nothing Brianna Hale likes more than a large, stern alpha male with
a super-protective and caring streak, and when she's not writing about them
she can usually be found with a book, a cocktail, planning her next trip to a
beautiful location or attending the theatre. She believes that pink and
empowerment aren’t mutually exclusive, and everyday adventures are
possible. Brianna lives in London.

OceanofPDF.com