The Rules in Rome (32 page)

Bastien tried to focus on
something other than the overwhelming pain in his left leg. It was worse than when he’d been shot in the Via Tasso,
much worse, and Zimmerman seemed to be enjoying every moment of it.

“I should have listened to Ostheim,” Zimmerman said. “He felt something was off about you. I brushed it away as jealousy.”

Bastien covered his shattered knee with his hand to slow the bleeding. He concentrated on each breath, attempting to block out the pain as he waited for his chance.

Zimmerman stood over him, tall and triumphant. “So, Dietrich, what really happened outside Leningrad?”

Bastien squeezed his eyes shut. It was a wonder no one had picked up on that before—a miracle he’d lasted as long as he had. He’d done his part to end the war, worked as hard as he could to help Lukas. If he only knew Gracie was safe, he could die in peace.

“You don’t deserve to wear that Iron Cross, not anymore.” Zimmerman leaned closer and gripped the decoration hanging around Bastien’s throat.
He paused, fingering the award, and then he yanked.

As Zimmerman pulled the medal away, Bastien brought his right hand up and chopped it into the side of Zimmerman’s neck. With his other hand, Bastien grabbed the knife he kept in his holster and plunged it into Zimmerman’s throat. Zimmerman struggled for a few seconds, but Bastien caught the wrist that gripped the pistol and held it so Zimmerman couldn’t aim. The Nazi officer kicked Bastien’s injured leg, and the pain shook him to the core, but it had been Zimmerman’s death struggle.

His body hit the floor.

Bastien trembled from the last influx of pain, feeling weak and sick. He took a few deep breaths and stripped Zimmerman of his pistol belt to use it as a tourniquet around his leg. He stuck Zimmerman’s Luger back inside the holster. He might need the extra weapon. He found his own pistol too and retrieved his knife, Zimmerman’s car keys, and a handkerchief. He tied one of his handkerchiefs around his knee and tied Zimmerman’s around the hole in his calf, hoping that between the bandages and the tourniquet, further blood loss would be minimal. He left Dietrich’s Iron Cross lying on Zimmerman’s chest. Perhaps he’d earned it. The man had, after all, proven
his loyalty to the Third Reich, maybe at the cost of his soul.

Bastien tried to stand, but he couldn’t put any weight on his left leg. Even the gentlest of movements caused agony. He hobbled to the stairs and clung to the railing, slowly easing himself down one step at a time. He would never have guessed that walking down a flight of stairs could be so difficult, so excruciating.
You have to turn in your report. And you have to find Gracie. Make it that far, then you can quit.

When he reached the bottom stair, he pulled out his pistol. The landlord cowered in the corner. “I need you to drive me,” Bastien said. But he wasn’t
sure where. South, to the front line? To the Via Tasso? To Gracie’s other apartment?
“And I need you to help me walk.”

The landlord hesitated. Bastien lifted his pistol, and the man hurried over. Bastien slung his left arm around the man’s shoulders, and together they made it across the entryway. Zimmerman’s car was parked nearby. Bastien had noticed it on the way in, but he’d dismissed it as unimportant. German personnel vehicles were common sights on the streets of Rome, but he cursed himself for not being more cautious.

“You’ll have to drive,” Bastien told the landlord.

“Where shall I take you? The hospital?” The man looked ready to bolt, but he eyed Bastien’s pistols and helped him into the passenger seat.

Bastien was torn. Should he escape and fulfill his mission or rescue Gracie? He wasn’t sure where she was, but he gave the man her other address. Surely she would have headed there if her other contact missed their meeting.
But is she still there?

As the man drove, Bastien dug through what looked like confiscated black market material in the back of Zimmerman’s car and found an American first-aid kit. He pulled out a morphine syrette and jabbed the needle into his left leg. Even with the morphine, each pothole aggravated his leg and left him in so much pain that he was tempted to look for another syrette, even if it left him unconscious.
Hold on a little longer
, he told himself.

He directed the landlord to the back entrance of Gracie’s ground-floor apartment. Two motorcycles were parked outside. He prayed that Gracie and whoever Zimmerman sent were still there, rather than at the Via Tasso, or that she’d somehow escaped. Bastien had the landlord help him to the door. The old Italian man opened it for him, but as soon as Bastien was inside, the landlord slammed the door shut and ran for the car. He was behind the steering wheel before Bastien could get his pistol out. He cursed and let him go.

Using the wall for support, he pushed down the hallway and noticed the smell of smoke. With each forward hobble, it grew stronger. By the time he reached Gracie’s door, he knew for sure.
Why does it have to be fire?
He forced himself forward, told himself not to look at his hands, not to think of the fire when he was nine. He reached for the knob, but all he really wanted was to turn and run.

The doorknob to Gracie’s apartment was warm but not so hot he couldn’t turn it. Smoke seeped from the crack under the door, and when he pushed
the door in, thick black clouds billowed out. The smoke was so thick he couldn’t see a foot ahead of him.

“Gracie?” What had happened to her apartment, and what had happened
to her? He wanted to leave when nothing but the crackle of flames answered him, yet something told him he had to go inside. He couldn’t let Gracie share his brother’s fate.

Bastien prayed for courage. Then he tied his last handkerchief over his mouth and got down on his hands and right knee and crept into the hot room. The smoke made his throat and eyes burn, and dragging his left leg was almost unbearable.

He stumbled into an SS officer, who stared lifelessly at the ceiling. He looked familiar, but Bastien didn’t spend more than a second looking at
him. He could see and hear the fire to his left, where the kitchen had been.

Not far from the corpse, he found her. “Gracie!” he shouted. He felt for a pulse and thought he located one, but it was so weak he couldn’t be sure. He pulled her toward the door, but she barely moved. It took him a few tugs to realize she was tied to one of her chairs. He used his knife to cut the rope around her legs and waist, freeing her from the chair, but left her hands cuffed. He could worry about the chain later. For now, it was useful. He threaded her arms around his neck and shoulder and crawled for the door.
He couldn’t see the door, but his injured leg had left a blood smear he traced back to the hallway.

He wasn’t sure how he found the strength to drag Gracie out of the apartment and through the hallway. His arms trembled and then collapsed as he pushed into the fresh air of the back alley. He rested for a few seconds, then took a closer look at Gracie. The side of her face was bruised, and so was her neck, and there were soot smears around her eyes, mouth, and nose. Her face was tinted blue, but as he watched, she began to cough.

Someone would notice the fire soon, but his adrenaline was gone, and he was feeling the morphine. He couldn’t carry Gracie any farther, the car was gone, and he wasn’t going to leave her. So he stayed where he was, praying she would wake up soon. Seconds turned into minutes, and gradually her eyelids flickered, and he felt her muscles tense.

* * *

Gracie heard a sharp crack and struggled to open her eyes. She’d never had such a horrible headache, and her throat was itchy and dry. She coughed, gasping for air, and felt someone holding her. When her eyes finally focused, she realized she was in the dark alley behind her apartment, in Ley’s arms. “Adalard?”

The faintest of smiles pulled at his lips. “Not anymore.”

She struggled to piece together what had happened. Her mind was a swirl of confusion, but she gradually remembered the fire, remembered looking for the keys, remembered her certainty that she was going to die. “How . . . how did I . . . Did you get me out?”

“Yes,” he whispered. His face was smeared with sweat and soot, and he had blood all over his uniform.

She held up her wrists. The handcuffs were still there, but the chain was broken, no longer connecting the cuffs.

“I shot one of the links out.”

That was the sound I heard.
She nodded, but that made her head swirl again. “You should have left without me.”

He grunted. “We can leave now. Let’s go.” But he didn’t move.

Gracie sat up, and her headache sharpened. Her throat started itching again, and she coughed until her side hurt. She felt Ley’s hand on her arm and turned back to him as she caught her breath. “All right. How?”

“One of the motorcycles, if we can find keys.”

Gracie took Richter’s keys from her pocket and handed them to Ley.

“You’re driving,” he said as he picked out a likely key.

She felt a knot form in her stomach. “But you remember what happened last time I drove a motorcycle. And that was when I was fully conscious
and it was light outside.” Her brain still felt foggy, and each breath with her scratchy throat was an effort.

“Gracie, Zimmerman shot me in the leg twice. I can’t switch gears, can’t operate the kick start.”

She glanced at his leg. A holster belt acted as a tourniquet, and a few handkerchiefs served as bandages. Everything from the tourniquet down was bloody. As she turned to the motorcycles, her head pounded, and her throat grew even more dry. “Isn’t there some other way?”

He didn’t answer immediately. “You can go on foot. Take one of my pistols.” He reached into his tunic and pulled out a paper. “My report too. Wash your face and change your clothes as soon as you can, but don’t go near either of your apartments or my suite. I won’t be able to come with you.”

Gracie put his report in her pocket but didn’t move. “I can’t leave you.”

“Then I suppose we’ll die here.” He reached out and cradled her face in his hand. “There’s no one I’d rather spend the last moments of my life with.”

Shouts sounded from the front of the building. The fire had been discovered, and they didn’t have much time. Gracie didn’t want to get on a motorcycle again, but if Ley could save her from a burning building even though he was scared of fire and injured so badly he couldn’t walk, surely she could help him escape on a motorcycle.

She draped his arm over her shoulder, then they struggled to their feet. He winced as his left foot touched the ground, and he leaned heavily on her as he hopped toward the motorcycles. As they got closer, she recognized them as DKWs, the type Ley had borrowed on the trip to the countryside. She took him to the right side of the motorcycle, even though the kickstand
was on the left, so he wouldn’t have to put any weight on his injured leg.

He settled on the back of the seat, balancing with his good leg. “I’ll walk
you through it, Gracie. Turn on the petrol cap and push in the tickler.”

Gracie followed the instructions, trying not to think about how much her head hurt and how exhausted Ley sounded. He took the keys, picked one that fit, set the throttle, and switched on the ignition. “Try the kick start.”

The engine purred to life on her second try, then immediately stalled.

“I bet whoever was riding it left it in gear. Check it, will you?”

Gracie moved the lever from first gear up into neutral, then tried starting
it again. She climbed onto the motorcycle, and Ley’s arms slipped around her torso.

“You can do this, Gracie,” he said.

She gently let out the clutch as she gave it gas. It was a jerky start, but they were moving.

“Switch into second.” His voice guided her each step of the way, telling her when to slow, when to shift gears.

As they turned onto the main street, Gracie saw Möller out of the corner of her eye and panicked. She’d forgotten about him, but he hadn’t abandoned his post, and his rifle was aimed in their direction. She heard the shot and held back a scream. Ley jerked, and she almost lost control of the motorcycle.

“Are you all right?” she asked.

“Just keep going. South. Fast.” He tightened his grip around her waist.

She obeyed, driving past block after block of Roman buildings. Civilians, out after curfew, quickly got out of their way. She saw a few men in uniform, but they all seemed preoccupied, until a convoy of German trucks came into view. She rode onto the sidewalk and shot past them at
full speed, disregarding the shouts and the gunshots.

“Turn right at the next street. Slow down a little but not much because there’s a checkpoint just after the turn. Remember your countersteering. To go right, push the right bar forward.”

She took the turn quicker than she was comfortable with, but Ley helped her balance, and she kept the motorcycle upright. She repeated what she’d told herself every block.
You can do this. You have to do this.

They sped around the checkpoint and into Rome’s outskirts, but then she heard the sound she’d been dreading since Möller. More motorcycles. She felt Ley look behind them. “Keep going. Only two of them so far.”