The Last Time I Saw Paris (28 page)

Claire slid behind the tree, her heart thudding in her chest. The girls were noisy, splashing in the river. You could almost hear them from the house. Crouching low, she slipped backward off the crest of the hill, then threaded along the base, submerged in the grass. Scrambling over roots and rocks, she circled the yard toward the tree line.

A shout echoed and Claire dropped to her stomach, her breath held. After a long moment she peered through the grass. The soldiers came out of the house. They conferred with the officer and turned toward the barn.

She scurried on hands and knees toward a fallen tree near the edge of the forest, cursing as her shins scraped against a splintered branch. Breathing fast, she scanned the clearing. Two soldiers disappeared into the barn. The officer faced the house. The remaining soldier was gone. Claire measured the distance with her eyes.

A shrill cry behind the house and her body froze. The girls. They’d come back. A burst of sobs, frightened and thin. A smothered crying in the yard, then a scuffle. Claire recognized the high-pitched sobbing. Anna needed help. Anna needed her.

A current of heat ran through her, a sensation so fierce Claire wondered at it. Rage pulsed inside like her body would explode. She stood, pulled back her shoulders and strode toward the soldiers.

They turned to her, fingers pressed against triggers. Anna was a sobbing pile in the middle of the yard. A soldier towered over the girl, his hobnailed boot raised to stomp. The officer leaned against the truck; the two remaining soldiers stood at the edge of the clearing, facing the river.

“Bonjour.”
Claire hurried into the clearing, hips swinging. Her voice was low and welcoming as if a handsome neighbor had come to visit.

The officer spoke a command. Except for the soldier standing over Anna, they converged around Claire. She stopped and arranged a pose. One foot forward, hands on cocked hips, a half smile pulling at her lips.

The officer was trim, in fighting shape, dark hair combed back in a perfect wave. Bored eyes and thin lips turned down in a displeased sneer. He barked a command in German. Claire didn’t respond. He backhanded her across the face. She spun backward, slamming face-first into the hard ground.

Darkness crept around the edges of her mind but she fought for consciousness. She looked up at the officer through the hair that had fallen over her eyes, forcing down her anger. He spoke to his men, his tone disinterested. The solider guarding Anna laughed and leaned back against the truck’s grill. His gun was pointed at the little girl, his gaze on the show.

Claire pulled herself to her feet and straightened her rumpled dress, frowning at the marks on her dress and knees. She rubbed the back of her hand across her aching mouth and tasted blood and soil on her tongue. With as much poise as possible, she spit out a wad of dirt. Her eyes flicked over the edges of the yard. Where was Marta?

The officer spoke again, his voice commanding.

Claire smiled at him through the pain. She knew only one phrase in German. From Albrecht von Richter. Perhaps useful. She licked the blood from her lips and took a step forward.
“Ich will dich.”
I want you.

The officer studied her with cold eyes. The soldiers at his side smiled, nodded. The soldier to her left reached for her. He spoke over his shoulder at the others, pulling her toward the barn.

“Nein.”
The officer glared.

The soldier frowned but released her.

Claire smiled at the officer, lifted the hem of her dress up to her thighs. She took a step back toward the barn.
“Ich will dich.”

A quick command and the officer sent a soldier into the barn. After a moment of searching, he reappeared, a shrug. The officer sheathed his Luger in the holster at his hip. With the flick of his head, he and the other two soldiers shoved Claire inside. The man watching Anna shouted, the complaint clear in his tone. The soldiers walking into the barn laughed back over their shoulders.

Claire walked over to the hay piled loosely next to the empty stalls and patted the surface with a hand. The officer took a step closer, still not committed, hand firm on his holstered gun. As the other two soldiers watched, Claire pulled off her dress over her head and let it drop onto the ground. In one movement she kicked off her underpants.

He examined her, his lip curving back like a cat eyeing a trapped mouse. It was plain how much it pleased him, the white skin, the taut body, the curve of her hips, the tawny swirl between her legs.

She ran her hands through her hair, let her fingers slide down her cheeks, over her breast, down past her stomach. “I remember the taste of dirt,” she said, her voice low like a promise.

His forehead wrinkled as he tried to understand. He moved closer.

“Of all the things I’ve tried to forget, I still remember that specific taste.” Slowly, Claire reached out, resting her fingers on his chest until she felt the heat from his body through the fabric of his uniform. Her fingers trailed down his torso.

He struggled to keep his breath calm. His fingers clenched the gun handle.

“When I was real little, I remember Pa’s big hand picking up a fistful. He’d let it slide out between his fingers, like he could feel what would grow from it.”

He looked at her questioningly. Claire smiled. She moved her hands toward his belt and began to unbuckle it. He held completely still, watching her hands.

“Like he was caressing it.” Claire slid her fingers between his legs and rubbed the tightening fabric.

A muffled grunt escaped his closed mouth.

She leaned in, murmured into his ear. “Then the drought came and the winds started. The dirt came alive. It didn’t lay there nestled with growing things. It howled and wailed. It flung itself at the world.” Claire looked into his eyes as she took a firm grip on him, cupping him in her palm.

He watched her, enthralled, his eyes half-closed. His tongue flicked over his lips.

“It baked in the sun, then peppered us until the livestock went mad. It burned and stung our eyes, tore at our skin, and filled our ears and noses with grit.” Claire gripped him harder with her right hand then unbuttoned his trousers with the other. “And even inside at night when the dirt settled into the parched ground to rest, we could never forget its presence. Because everything tasted like dirt.”

His breath whistled from his mouth. Grunting, he dropped his pants and grabbed her with both hands, shoving her back into the hay.

Claire looked into his eyes and pulled his hips toward her open legs. “You could say all the things I’ve done in my life were so I’d never have to taste dirt again.” Her left hand slipped down his side. Her fingers reached for the cold touch of steel.

The Luger roared. His heart exploded as a bullet tore through his chest. He collapsed on top of her. Claire jerked the pistol free, pointed at the soldier next to her and fired. He grabbed at his chest and fell backward. She pointed at the soldier ducking inside the doorway and fired again.

A flash from the doorway and the officer on top of her spasmed; the impact of a bullet knocked the wind from her chest. Gasping, she pushed him off and rolled beneath the raised wall between the stalls. She peered back at the officer. He stared at her, blinked once. His mouth hung open, sneer gone. Then his bored eyes stared at nothing.

She crawled across the stall, Luger clenched in her hand. She held her breath and listened. A soft groan from the soldier by the wall. A gurgle faded to silence.

Willy used to take her hunting on Sundays when their parents went to church. He was the cowboy and Claire always the Indian. She had better aim.

Claire heard the faint squeak of a rusted hinge. The soldier was in the empty tack room, looking for another way out. There wasn’t one. Gritting her teeth, she slid under the partition into the next stall. She inched forward on her knees to the doorframe and gripped the Luger with both hands. The barrel, motionless, was pointed at the tack room doorway. A slow breath in. Breath out. The air hissed over her tongue as she tightened her finger on the trigger slowly, deliberately.

A torso came into view. Feldgrau. A wide, black leather
koppel
belted around a thick waist. She aimed at the eagle on the metal buckle, swastika clenched in its talons. The gun barked in her hands and the uniform burst open in grey and then red.

The soldier outside shouted. Anna screamed. Claire raced to the door and peered out, her form hidden in the shadows.

He faced the barn, his rifle pointed at the wide doors, half his body shielded by the cab of the truck. The little girl was prone on the ground beneath his boot, her cries muffled into the dirt.

Claire rushed to the dead officer; his white buttocks peeked out between his long shirt and lowered trousers. She wrenched the shirt from his body. Blood ran down her arms as she wadded the shirt into a ball around the pistol gripped in her hand. She pressed the shirt against her stomach, felt the blood drip down her legs.

The soldier cursed. Anna wailed.

Claire sucked in a deep breath and dropped to her knees. She crawled into the farmyard, moaning, her hand clenched to her stomach, dragging her legs behind her. She kept her gaze on the dirt in front of her, body clenched as she waited for a bullet that didn’t come. Just outside the doorway, she collapsed, body limp, her eyes open to slits.

The soldier pointed the rifle at Claire. His face was twisted in hate, his boot poised over Anna’s head to stomp. Inside the bundle of bloody fabric, Claire pulled the trigger. The pistol jerked in her hand; he fell behind the truck. Dirt and rock chips exploded from the ground in front of her face from the impact of a rifle bullet.

“Hide, Anna, behind the wagon!” Claire rolled to her knees, aimed at the dodging boots she saw under the floorboards and pulled the trigger once, then twice. The third time and the chamber clicked. Empty. She fell back inside the door listening for his shots.

The dead soldier inside the barn door was slumped on top of a gun strapped to his back. Claire kicked him over and wrestled it free. Longer than a rifle, the wide barrel was slitted along the side, a line of bullets in the assembly over the handle and trigger.

Claire pressed the butt against her shoulder and cocked the trigger. Leaning out the doorway, she squeezed the trigger. Bullets spewed in a roar that sounded like tearing canvas. The recoil knocked the air from her lungs; she fell backward to her knees.

The truck engine churned to life. Claire charged into the yard and pointed the machine gun at the soldier through the windshield. He jerked the wheel as the truck lurched forward, accelerating toward Anna.

Marta broke from the trees, screaming. Anna looked up at her sister then stumbled under the rusted iron toe of the wagon. The truck hit, then skidded down the side of the wagon bed. The heavy boards groaned as they were splintered by the force of the metal fender. The truck broke loose and tore out of the yard.

Claire dropped the gun, running. Anna was crumpled in a pile under the shattered but still standing wagon; shaking and crying; her little fist balled and stuffed in her mouth. Marta crawled under the wagon and pulled the girl to her. Claire dropped to her knees and hugged them both.

“Are you hurt? Are you hurt?” Marta said, holding Anna too tight for her to reply.

Anna looked up at Claire, her cheek was bruised, and tiny teeth marks dented her pudgy fingers. “You’re not wearing any clothes.”

Claire’s legs gave way and she crumpled into Marta. They both slid to the ground, Anna tucked between them. She felt their bodies against her skin, inhaled the smell of dirt and blood and tears. She gave herself a couple of breaths to stop shaking, then stood, pulling them to their feet.

Claire stared down the road. “Marta, go pack your bags. Quickly. They’ll be back.”

Claire pushed the girls inside the house then turned back toward the barn. She retrieved the empty Luger and wrapped her discarded dress around her. Gritting her teeth, she kneeled next to the officer and rummaged through his pockets. There was a tin of bullets and a wallet. She flipped open the wallet and found his identification, the unsmiling photo of a woman and a thick wad of Occupation reichsmarks.

His skin was chalky, his eyes blank. Blood was everywhere. She started to shake, then doubled over and vomited. After a breath, she reached for the bullets and the money, covered her face against the smell of blood and gunpowder, and ran.

In the kitchen, she dunked a cloth into a full bucket and scrubbed at the dirt and sticky blood that was starting to dry on her skin. She could hear Marta talking to Anna, shoving things around in the other room.

“Claire?” Marta waited in the doorway, cases in one arm, Anna in the other.

Claire pulled a dress over her head, slipped on shoes. Wrapping up the rest of the food in a cloth, she reached for her bag.

With the girls waiting by the door, Marta’s eyes on the road, Claire glanced around the house. Nothing could be left behind to reveal identities. No signs of Grey. No signs of the moments they shared. Not a word of the stories that Captain Walker told. Just dead Nazis in the barn.

She led the girls out of the clearing, toward the forest.

“Where are we going, Claire?” Marta said.

“There is only one place where I know people who can help us. Help you.”

“Paris,” Marta said, her voice soft and grim.

“Paris.” The city Claire loved, where she found beauty and self-worth. The city where Marta’s life was destroyed. The world had gone mad.

Claire reached down to the dirt, squeezing a handful in her fist. The faint smell of rich, peaty earth, it crumbled through her fingers onto the ground. Another glance at the farm, and she led the girls into the trees.

 

 

T
he forest was shadowed, the sun slipping below the treetops when they heard the whine of an engine. Claire’s shoulder throbbed. Without looking she knew it was bruised. The price of firing a machine gun. Her other arm ached from carrying Anna for the last few hours, but the girl finally slept, her cheek red and swollen. Claire winced as she set Anna onto the ground next to Marta, motioned for them to remain still and crept to the edge of the trees overlooking the road.