The Rules in Rome (15 page)

Bastien noted that Gracie used
friend
in her explanation, rather than sticking with
contact
or
source
. It was unwise to get too attached to other spies—but he wasn’t one to talk, not after he’d searched prisons and then paced away most of the night when Gracie had gone missing, not when that afternoon he’d been more interested in kissing her than in finding out why she’d been early. “You know where she lives?”

“Yes, but I’m nervous to go alone. I can’t explain why—it’s just a feeling. I was . . . I was wondering . . . if you’d go with me?”

Bastien had a quick internal debate. He didn’t want Gracie’s contact to know who he was, but she had helped warn the churches, and Gracie’s eyes were pleading with him.
So much for a nap.
He fastened his belt around his tunic, shoved his feet into his boots again, and followed her.

“This is the contact expecting a baby?” he asked after they’d left the hotel.

Gracie nodded. “And she had pains on Monday after traipsing all along San Lorenzo. She loves Rome, and she likes to walk. Maybe she overdid it again.”

“I don’t know that I’ll be much help if a baby’s on the way. I was nearly thirteen when my youngest brother was born, but I wasn’t there. My sisters and I were sent to my grandmother’s house.”

“I don’t know anything either, but at least she wouldn’t be alone. She’s mentioned a midwife, so maybe she can tell us where to find her.”

Bastien was relieved there was a midwife somewhere because he wasn’t
sure any of the German military doctors would offer their assistance.

They walked about fifteen minutes, then Gracie led him into an apartment building. As they entered, an SS enlisted man hurried out with an MP 38 slung across his shoulder. Beads of sweat dotted his forehead, and three parallel trails of blood were etched across his left cheek.

They climbed two flights of stairs, and with each step, it felt like an ounce of lead was being lodged in the bottom of Bastien’s stomach. Gracie’s face was tense, and her frown grew deeper the closer they got. Whatever he was feeling, she seemed to be feeling it too.

Outside the door, Gracie knocked. There was no sound from within, so she knocked a second time. After a long pause, Bastien tried the doorknob. It turned beneath his hand and opened into an eerie silence.

“Hello?” No one answered Gracie’s call. She stepped past Bastien and turned down a hallway. “Her room’s over here.”

Bastien stayed near the entrance. If he was honest with himself, he was afraid of what he’d find. But women in childbirth usually made some sort of sound, didn’t they? Or was the woman far enough along for the baby to come? Bastien couldn’t remember if Gracie had said.

The apartment was as silent as a tomb. He walked toward the balcony, and as he passed the bathroom, he saw a frying pan on the floor.
Odd place for a frying pan.

He stepped into the bathroom and stopped, stunned. Gracie’s contact was in the apartment, but she wasn’t having her baby. She would never have her baby.

Gracie’s friend lay on the
floor, one arm at her side, the other above her head, stretched across a cascade of dark hair. A line of bullet holes ran from her left shoulder to her right hip. Stepping around a pool of blood, Bastien bent to feel her neck. Her skin was still warm, but there was no pulse. He hadn’t expected to find one, not with that many holes across her chest and swollen abdomen. He closed her eyes and swallowed back the bitter taste of bile before rising and stumbling into the flat’s main room.

Bastien could piece together what had happened. The guard with the marks on his face would soon return with someone to help him deal with the body.

“Concetta?”

Gracie appeared at once from the hallway.

“It’s time to go,” he said.

“Just let me check the other rooms first.”

He shook his head, not sure how to soften the blow. “I already checked them.”

She seemed to sense something was wrong. “And?”

“She’s dead.”

“What?” Gracie’s eyes opened wide, and her mouth fell open, showing the same shock he’d felt on seeing the slain woman. She tried to push past him to the bathroom.

“No, don’t look.” He reached out to grab her and usher her toward the door, but she dodged his arm and got around him.

“Otavia?” Gracie’s face drained of all color, and she swayed to the side before catching herself on the bathroom’s door frame. “Otavia!”

Gracie reached a trembling hand toward her friend and looked like she was about to kneel next to the body. Bastien knew she’d be covered in blood if that happened, so he wrapped an arm around her waist and kept her on
her feet. “We’ve got to go. Now. Whoever shot her will be back soon.”

“But . . . but we can’t just leave her—”

“We can’t help her anymore.” He manhandled Gracie toward the door, and by then she was crying too hard to say anything else.

They’d made it to the second-floor landing when Bastien heard the door on the main floor crash open and the strike of military boots across the tile floor. Gracie’s face was covered in tears, and her breaths were coming in
sobs. He pulled her away from the stairwell and down a hallway, knowing she’d cause suspicion if the guards saw her.

“You’ve got to stop crying.” Yet even as he said it, Bastien sensed she’d need more than a few seconds to turn the tears off.

“I’m trying.” Her voice shook with emotion.

The hallway was straight, without any alcoves to hide in, and he didn’t want to break into one of the nearby apartments. That might be loud, and even if it wasn’t, he’d have some explaining to do if the residents were home. Depending on the patrol’s size, Bastien might be able to finish them off with his Luger before they shot back, but he didn’t want to risk a firefight with Gracie around, so he did the only other thing that came to his mind.

“Play along,” he whispered. Then he pulled her closer and kissed her. He kept one arm around her waist and used his free hand to hold her face, hoping to hide her tears and her birthmark. He kept one eye half open as the men raced up the stairs. The patrol consisted of three soldiers, and he recognized the scratch marks on one of their faces.

One of the men paused, watching Bastien and Gracie.
Make him go away
, Bastien pleaded. Gracie trembled in his arms, whether from grief or fear, Bastien couldn’t tell. The soldier yelled something to Bastien before following the other men up the stairs. Bastien hoped Gracie’s German skills weren’t good enough to understand the man’s crass comment. He wished his kiss could somehow ease her pain, but seeing the murder—the double murder—had left him shaken, and he hadn’t even known Otavia.

Gracie hadn’t resisted his kiss, but the second the guards were gone and Bastien released her, she increased the distance between them. He wanted to hold her again, to comfort her, but when he reached for her, she stepped away and started down the last flight of stairs. He walked beside her all the way to her apartment, hoping the people they passed wouldn’t notice the tears that silently slid down her cheeks. She didn’t say a word to him the entire trip to her apartment. When they arrived, she kept her eyes on the floor, still sobbing, and shut the door to her room in his face.

* * *

Gracie leaned against the door and tried to control her weeping. She waited until Ley’s footsteps faded down the hallway before she collapsed to the
floor. Her cries echoed around the room, and not wanting her neighbors to hear, she moved to the bed and buried her face in her pillow.

A picture of Otavia’s body was stuck in Gracie’s mind. She and her baby deserved life, not a horrible death.
And what if the soldiers found her because I involved her in Ley’s mission?
Overwhelming guilt joined the suffocating grief. It wasn’t the first time she’d lost someone she loved, but what if this time it was her fault?

Gracie cried for a long time before turning to desperate prayer.
Father in Heaven, I never meant for Otavia to get hurt. I came to Rome to help, not to cause more harm. Please forgive me. And please don’t let me hurt anyone else.

* * *

Zimmerman’s hopes for a better week were dashed when the man he’d sent to arrest the women came back with three scratch marks across his cheek and no prisoners.

“I held her there for almost two hours, waiting for the other woman to arrive. I turned my back for an instant, and she attacked me. I had no choice but to kill her.”

“A good soldier doesn’t let his guard down, not even for a moment,” Zimmerman said.

The man stared at the floor. “I’m sorry, sir. Call of nature.”

Zimmerman shook his head.
Excuses.
“My source seemed to think both
women lived there. You shouldn’t have left until the second one returned.”

“I’m sorry, sir. I panicked and went for reinforcements.”

Why would he need reinforcements to handle a corpse?
Zimmerman cursed under his breath and kept his eyes away from the picture of his wife and son. A pregnant woman had tipped the churches off, and now she was dead. Zimmerman had wanted punishment for the women but not execution. Something inside him ached for the slain woman. Yet something else within him demanded revenge on the two women who’d thwarted his raid and lowered his standing with his superiors.

“Was there anything different in the apartment when you returned?” Zimmerman asked.

The soldier didn’t answer.

“Well?”

“I closed the door when I left, sir. It was open when I came back.”

Zimmerman swore again. “Left open by the other woman, no doubt. She won’t be returning, not unless she has a death wish. Did you see anyone else?”

“Just an old woman outside when we came in and a couple on another floor kissing.”

Life was strange like that: death on one floor, love—or lust—on another.
“You’re sure the woman outside was old and not in disguise?”

“Her wrinkles were deep enough to stall a panzer, sir.”

“And the couple?”

“The man was a Wehrmacht officer, sir.”

Zimmerman frowned. “Did you question any of them? Ask them if they saw a woman leaving the apartment?”

“No, sir,” the young soldier answered.

Zimmerman leaned back in his chair, disappointed. The young squad leader’s face still bled from the marks the dead woman’s fingernails had left. Zimmerman had thought he could trust the man with a simple arrest, but the soldier had failed him.
I should have requested Möller or gone myself.
He was going to have to supervise everything directly from now on.

* * *

Gracie went to Ley’s suite the next afternoon, just as she’d done nearly every day for the past two weeks. She’d been miserable all night and all morning, crushed by grief. Otavia was the most beautiful person she’d ever met,
inside and out. What if Gracie was somehow responsible for her death?

Yet now, as she passed the guard in Ley’s hotel lobby, she was also embarrassed. She’d lost control of her emotions yesterday. She should have been more logical, more professional. Before leaving her apartment, Gracie had checked her reflection in the mirror Ley had given her, so she knew her eyes were puffy and red. She kept her head down as she walked, hoping the guard wouldn’t notice.

When she arrived and knocked on his door, Ley didn’t kiss her like he usually did. No one was in the hallway to see them, so he didn’t even bother smiling. He had every right to be disappointed in her, but she’d hoped for something different—compassion, understanding, forgiveness. Instead, she couldn’t read his face at all.

As she came inside, she saw what she assumed was his most recent report on the table. She sat in front of the blank pages he’d left out for her and squared her paper in awkward silence. She knew she needed to say something, but she was afraid she’d start crying if she brought up what had happened the day before.

Ley sat across from her. “About yesterday . . . I want to apologize. I was desperate and didn’t know what else to do. I know you’ve never asked for any of my kisses, but my timing yesterday was exceptionally bad.” His voice was
scarcely above a whisper, as was his habit when speaking of their mission.

Gracie squeezed her eyes shut. She understood why he’d kissed her like that. She’d been furious at him the evening before, then confused by how compelling his mouth could be after something as horrible as Otavia’s murder, then angry at herself for reacting the wrong way to everything. “I . . .
I owe you an apology too. And gratitude. Thank you for saving my life.”

“Are you all right?”

Gracie shook her head. “It’s wrong for her to have died like that. And I worry about her family. How long will it be before her husband finds out? What will her mother do when she sees all that blood? And I keep wondering if her death was somehow my fault.”

He glanced at his scarred hands resting on the table, then pulled them into his lap. “Taking responsibility for someone’s death is a heavy burden, one I don’t recommend shouldering without absolute proof that it was your fault.”

Gracie sniffed, and Ley handed her his pocket handkerchief and went to the wet bar to fill a glass for her.

“Most people would probably offer you a stiff drink,” Ley said. “I’m just going to give you water and some advice.” He set the glass in front of her. “Your contact was playing a dangerous game. We all are. She knew the risks. You haven’t done anything with malicious intent, nor have you been careless while in Rome. Don’t go down that road.”

Gracie nodded, not sure she’d be able to follow his advice. Several times the previous night, she’d woken to a vivid image of Otavia’s torn body. She took a few sips of water and started encoding Ley’s report, hoping it would distract her. It did but only until she finished.

“Have you eaten today?” he asked after she’d burned his original report,
her scratch paper, and her transposition keys.

Gracie couldn’t remember eating anything, but food seemed so trivial. “I’m not really hungry.”

“That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t eat. I know it’s hard to lose someone you care about, but that doesn’t mean you stop taking care of yourself. Especially out here in the field. Drawn-out grief is a luxury we don’t have.”

Gracie knew he was right. She couldn’t let Otavia’s death consume her. Nor could she just shrug it off, though that was the most professional way to act. And if she didn’t act the way she was supposed to, the way she’d been trained to, she wouldn’t survive.
I didn’t think it would be so hard when I agreed to do this.
Gracie looked up and met Ley’s eyes, wondering if he’d ever had second thoughts about his role in the war. “Did you always plan to be a spy?”

“No. The idea took a few years to fully form.” Ley’s leg made the table vibrate as he thought. “When my family was trying to leave Germany, one of my father’s friends knew a father-and-son team from Great Britain, and they got us out by yacht. The son was about my age, and he mentioned how useful someone like me could be if war broke out. He offered to put me in touch with British intelligence. And don’t get me wrong, I hated the Nazis even then, but I had my family to take care of first. It was only after I knew they’d be all right without me that I started looking for how I could best be of use.” Ley described himself as if he were describing a tool. “I grew up with the enemy, so OSS seemed like a good fit. The rest just happened. You?”

Gracie was glad he’d opened up to her, at least a little, and decided to do the same. “Eight months ago, becoming a spy was the farthest thing from my mind. But I wanted to get out of Utah, so I let some OSS recruiter talk me into it.” Gracie caught herself holding her left ring finger with her
right hand. “A year ago, if you would have asked me what I’d be doing in 1944, I would have told you I’d be getting married.”

“And I suppose you had a ring on that finger and a groom picked out?”

Gracie nodded.

“A nice Mormon boy?”

“Yes.”

“What happened to him?”

“He joined the navy, and his submarine went down with all hands.” Gracie paused for an instant, forcing her emotions back down her throat. Ley opened his mouth, but she cut him off, afraid he would tease her about her religion again. “You can ridicule me all you want about being a good little Mormon girl, but don’t make fun of him.” She’d never met anyone as wonderful as Michael. It didn’t seem fair that he’d died at the bottom of the ocean, with no light and no air and no hope of escape.