Chapter Sixteen

AVA

It had been months since Ava was last home, which meant that some time had passed since she'd seen her mother. Under normal circumstances they would never have been parted for so long, but with the Goldmans needing her mother's care, they'd had to devise a series of excuses as to why her mother chose to stay at the country house. They predominantly centred around her father preferring to know she was safe and well away from any bombing, which was why he liked to send his daughters back home whenever he could, too.

That afternoon, with her mother downstairs in the kitchen and Zelda gone for the day, Ava took food up to the Goldmans and invited them to come down to the top floor of the house and stretch their legs. They were never quite brave enough to ask them downstairs, but she knew how much any reprieve from the attic meant to them, especially David.

‘Do you have any news from Eliana?' he asked, looking relieved when she reached into her pocket and produced a letter.

‘I do. She made me bring this for you, and she said that you must read it out loud to your parents.'

He nodded and put it in his pocket. ‘Thank you. You wouldn't believe how much I miss her.' He grunted. ‘How much I miss everything.'

Ava didn't know what to say; she could only imagine how difficult it would be for him, being stuck up there without his sister, with only his parents for company.

‘I know it won't help your boredom, but I made you a promise, David, and I wanted to make good on it.'

His eyebrows lifted in surprise, as if he hadn't expected her to ever follow through with her promise.

She reached into the bag at her feet and lifted out a pistol to give him. ‘My father told me to give you this. He understands your need to feel safe, to be able to protect your family.'

David stepped forward and took it from her, looking over his shoulder at his parents who were stretching their legs properly by walking up and down the hallway.

‘Would you mind if I took the bag, too?' he asked. ‘I don't want to worry them any more than they already are, so it would be best to keep it hidden from sight.'

Ava handed him the bag. ‘Of course. But he said to tell you that there are six bullets loaded, and a handful more in the bag.' She cleared her throat and leaned a little closer to him. ‘He also said that if they find you, if anyone makes it up to the attic for whatever reason, that you are not to hesitate to use it.'

David's gaze was still trained on the gun, but when he finally looked up at her, she noticed a steeliness to his stare that she'd never seen before.

‘Tell him that I have no intention of hesitating. But I'd prefer to be of use elsewhere. He still hasn't found something for me to do?'

‘Other than typing the notes he's given you?'

David sighed. ‘Having a typewriter delivered and being asked to type his notes wasn't what I had in mind when I asked for a job.'

‘Yes, but it will be a factual account for after the war, of what has been happening here. To someone, one day, it will be important.'

Her mother came upstairs then with a tray of food, and when she disappeared up to the attic with David's parents, the pair of them started to walk. Ava noticed that he seemed less relaxed today.

‘Eliana is thriving, you know. She's loving her job, and she told me that it's the most surreal feeling, to be able to work among people and have no one recognise her.'

He smiled. ‘I can only imagine how she must feel in her disguise. I'm happy for her. Even though I miss her terribly, I'm so happy that she has the chance to live.'

‘Will you go back to your studies, if...' The rest of her question hung between them.

‘I hope so. The only thing I've ever wanted to be is a doctor – a surgeon actually.'

Ava smiled. ‘You know, I remembered something about you the other day, from my childhood. I remembered seeing you with a little dog, throwing a stick for him down by the river.'

‘Ahh, yes. He was a wonderful little dog. He belonged to my grandparents and they used to bring him with them when they came to stay. That's something else I can imagine, having a dog by my side one day.'

‘Well, I shall imagine you as a surgeon with a little dog at your feet, then,' she said with a laugh. ‘How does that sound?'

He laughed back at her, and she realised it was the first time they'd ever had such an easy conversation.

‘Tell me about you. About what you're involved in,' he said. ‘I overheard our fathers speaking.'

Ava was taken aback. ‘About me?'

‘Yes. Something to do with being worried that a certain young man might be taking advantage of you. I believe they were talking about the resistance movement.'

‘Taken advantage of?' She shook her head. ‘Noah has been very upfront about the risks involved, and I made the decision to do what he asked. No one is taking advantage of anyone.'

David stopped by the steps to go back up to the attic. ‘So he is putting you in danger?'

She didn't want to argue with him, but she also needed him to know that she'd chosen to be part of this world, and that Noah was very much one of the reasons she'd changed her perspective.

‘I'm choosing to help the cause, David, the same as anyone else in the resistance is doing. The same way that Hanna is choosing to help.'

His eyes were sad, and she knew that it would take her a long time to forget the way he was looking at her. ‘I'm just saying that I would want to keep you from danger, Ava. I don't like the thought of him taking advantage of you, especially when it's clear you have feelings for him.'

‘We're not romantically involved, it's a professional relationship and nothing more,' she said firmly. The last thing she wanted was for anyone to know how she felt about Noah, not when she was engaged to Heinrich, even if it was only David who'd figured it out. ‘But I appreciate your warnings. Thank you for thinking of me.'

David nodded, but she wasn't certain she'd convinced him.

‘I'll see you again soon,' she said, as he began to climb back up to the attic.

He turned and looked at her. ‘Keep asking your father if there's something more for me to do,' he said. ‘Tell him there's only so long I can stay cooped up here. And Ava, please stay safe.'

‘Perhaps he'd rather protect you than let you risk your life?'

David smiled, albeit sadly, before disappearing from sight. Once her mother had come back down, they secured the attic staircase and went downstairs to the kitchen. But Ava was deep in thought, and it appeared her mother was too, because they took their dinner to the table and ate in relative silence, as she thought about the Goldmans moving about two floors above them.

‘Is your sister keeping well?' her mother finally asked.

‘Yes, Hanna's fine.' Or at least Ava thought she was. They hadn't seen much of each other in the past couple of weeks, since she'd been seeing more and more of Noah.

‘And Eliana? She's adjusted to the change?'

Ava nodded. ‘She has.

They continued eating, but she noticed that her mother pushed her stew around on the plate a lot, doing more moving than eating.

‘I overheard some of your conversation with David earlier,' her mother eventually said.

Ava waited for her to continue, setting down her spoon.

‘I don't want to interfere, but he's right about no young man asking you to do things, using his relationship with you to—'

‘David was ill-informed. That is not the case,' Ava replied, bristling. ‘There is nothing for you to worry about.'

‘But if it were the case, you need to remember how careful you must be. Your father's involvement – well, he's always tried to be as careful as possible, to do things that could easily be blamed on another.'

Ava's mother set her spoon down, too.

‘If whatever this man has asked you to do is something that will lead straight back to you? It's not only you who's in danger, whether you're in a romantic relationship with him or not. You'd be endangering all of us, the Goldmans included.'

Her words washed over Ava, and she knew her face was reddening as her mother watched her. How typical of her mama to say the one thing that she knew she couldn't argue with.

‘I know what's at stake,' Ava eventually said. ‘But thank you for the reminder. I shall keep what you said close to my heart.'

They both picked up their spoons again and resumed eating, although Ava found each mouthful hard to swallow. Because, despite what she'd just said, and despite understanding the risk, she'd already agreed to do something for Noah that would very much be something that only she could be blamed for, should the deceit be discovered. Her world had changed after her first afternoon with Noah; and when he'd asked her to access the diary, to obtain information that only a few people would know about, she'd realised there was nothing she wouldn't do to help him.

‘Ava! There you are,' Hanna said, rushing to her and helping her off with her coat, at the same time giving her a panicked look. It had been a week since she left the country house, and the first night she'd returned to the apartment to find her sister there. They were more likely to see one another as they bumped around in the dark, hurrying down to the cellar during an air raid. ‘Heinrich has been here waiting very patiently for you.'

Ava shot the same kind of panicked look straight back at her sister. Heinrich is here?

She took a deep breath and fixed her smile, hurrying into the sitting room to find him with Eliana. She glanced at Hanna and saw the tight set of her face, and then noted the high colour on Eliana's cheeks.

‘Heinrich! What a lovely surprise,' she said as he stood. ‘I wish I'd known to expect you. I would have come home sooner.'

‘I went to your office but was told you'd already left for the day, so I came here,' he said, as his eyes ran up and down the length of her body before fixing on her face. ‘But you weren't here, either.'

‘Well, first of all, I see you've made the acquaintance of my delightful cousin,' she said, stalling as she tried to put a story together in her mind. ‘But yes, you're quite right that I left work a little early. I had some errands to run, for my father.'

Heinrich frowned. ‘That's strange, because your father—'

‘Papa!' Ava exclaimed as her father entered the room, holding two drinks that she presumed were for himself and Heinrich. ‘I went and visited your old friend Otto, at the hospital, and I managed to find him some fruit as you'd requested. I know you said not to visit him until later in the week, but I was able to leave early today so I went straight there. I'm sorry I didn't tell you.'

She smiled sweetly at Heinrich, but he seemed more interested in her father and watching his response.

‘Thank you, Ava, although you would have saved us all some worry if you'd simply told me you were going today.'

‘Sorry, Papa,' she said, before going to sit beside Heinrich, forcing herself to take his hand. ‘And I'm sorry for any worry I caused you, too. It's very unusual for me to go anywhere other than home, work and to the grocer's, as you well know.'

She noticed the way Heinrich was looking at her blouse, and she glanced down to see that she'd missed one of the buttons. Heat rose in her cheeks, and she turned away from him slightly to do it up. But when she turned back, he simply smiled and took her hand again, and all she could do was pray that he didn't smell another man on her skin, for it was all but impossible for Noah's aftershave not to have clung to her hair or her clothes.

She looked over at Eliana, who was showing great interest in some of her mother's knitting she'd left behind the last time she'd been at the apartment. And even though Ava was almost positive that Eliana didn't know how to knit, she certainly made it look like she knew what she was doing, her head bent as she avoided having to so much as look at the devil seated so close to her.

‘Speaking of the grocer's, I hear your cousin Elly here is working there.'

Ava nodded and glanced up at Hanna, wishing she'd known what had already been discussed. But they all knew the story they were to tell, which meant that nothing she said would contradict what her sister or even Eliana herself had already said.

‘That's right. We all have to help where we can, and I'm told Elly has fitted right in.'

‘Herr Müller, I didn't know you had a sister in Munich,' Heinrich said, as he took a sip of his drink. ‘I thought your family were all in Berlin.'

Ava's eyes flitted to her father, who sat back in his seat, smiling broadly. ‘Most of them are, but one of my sisters went against my family's wishes and married a man not of their choosing. We saw little of them over the past two decades, but when my sister was killed, I was hardly going to turn away my niece.'

‘It's been so lovely spending time together,' Ava said. ‘Although between our work schedules, all of us here are like ships in the night.'

Heinrich nodded, but she shifted uncomfortably as he looked at her father.

‘And you're well, Herr Müller?'

Ava noticed that Eliana stopped knitting, and that Hanna went stiff in her chair.

‘It's very kind of you to enquire about my health, but I'm as fit as an ox. Other than a bad cold that very nearly went to my lungs, I feel like a man half my age.'

Ava placed her hand on Heinrich's knee and smiled at him, hoping she was able to distract him. ‘Heinrich, it would be so lovely to see your mother and sister. Do you think they'd have time to meet you and I for lunch one day? I'd love to discuss the wedding with them.'

With those words, he finally softened into the seat beside her, as Hanna rose to pour him another drink.

‘Where were you?' her father asked, his eyes never leaving hers as she shifted uncomfortably before him once Heinrich had left. ‘Were you with him?'

She looked at the floor. There was no point in lying. ‘Yes.'

‘Ava, you're playing a dangerous game here,' he said, and she watched as Eliana and Hanna quietly left the room, clearly not wanting to be drawn into whatever argument she would be having with her father. ‘If Heinrich suspects anything, if he finds out, you will have put all of us at risk, do you understand that? For a young man who will discard you as quickly as an unwanted pet as soon as you're no longer useful to him.'

Ava didn't need to be told what a precarious position she'd put Eliana in, but she hadn't known that Heinrich would call on her unannounced like that. Especially when the last time she'd seen him, he'd been preparing to go away for a week or longer – she hadn't even known he was back in the city.

‘I think you're wrong about Noah, I think—'

‘You think he would risk his life to save you, if Heinrich discovered your duplicity?' her father muttered. ‘Because I can answer that for you: he won't.'

She disagreed, but didn't dare say her thoughts out aloud to her father, not when he was angry.

‘Whatever he's asked you to do, whatever you've agreed to, Ava, it had better be worth it.'

She stood and watched her father go, downing his drink before slamming it to the table as he passed, leaving her alone in the sitting room. That was when she began to shake, her body trembling violently as she sat down on the sofa that had once been filled by Heinrich, remembering the curious way he'd looked at Eliana, while she imagined what he'd be capable of if he ever figured out who she was.

Whatever Noah had planned, it couldn't come soon enough.

Later that night, as the air raid siren wailed endlessly, and she lay on a temporary mattress down in the cellar between Hanna and Eliana, the family who'd taken over the Goldmans' apartment merely inches from them, she couldn't stop thinking about what had happened earlier that day, what she'd so brazenly done.

Noah had asked her to look for anything in Goebbels' diary that pointed to a meeting with Hitler, to commit to memory anything that was discussed in her presence or in the diary notes that she typed every day for her boss. She'd been carefully searching for weeks now, for anything that could be of value to Noah, and it was the reason she'd gone to visit him instead of coming straight home that night.

He'd told her little about what they had planned, and she hadn't even tried to guess, afraid to know.

Hitler was to meet with his top military aides at the field headquarters in Rastenburg, East Prussia, the following month. She'd been privy to the information owing to her elevated position typing Goebbels' personal diary each day, and she hadn't hesitated in sharing the information with Noah – she'd gone straight to the café where they were to meet, leaving a note beneath her napkin as he'd instructed her to do, saying she had to speak with him. He'd eventually caught up with her and given her an address as he passed, and after pausing to sit in the sun and walking some more to ensure no one was following her, she'd gone to him, eagerly telling him what she'd discovered.

He'd asked her to repeat everything numerous times, before leaving her and asking her to wait, but when he came back he was smiling from ear to ear.

‘Ava,' he'd said, as he'd cupped her face and looked into her eyes. ‘There are very few civilians involved in this coup. And yet it is you who has given us the piece of information that we needed. This is what we've been waiting for.'

‘What should I do now?' she asked, as he pulled her close to him.

‘You keep your eyes and ears open, in case anything changes, even the most minute detail. You come to the café after work if you need to tell me anything else.'

She nodded. ‘I will.'

Then, she'd basked in Noah's attention, excited by what she'd done, believing that no one could ever catch her or know of her involvement. But now, as their basement rattled from bombs falling above, she wondered if she'd simply been naive. And she couldn't stop thinking about the way Heinrich had looked at Eliana, the way he'd questioned her father. It had terrified her.

But the rational part of her brain told her that if Heinrich truly suspected anything, he'd have already returned with his SS friends to take them all in for questioning. Because she had a feeling that he wasn't intimidated one bit by her father any more, and the fact that the man she was engaged to marry could feel superior to her own papa sent shivers of terror through her that would make it impossible for her to sleep. The only thing worse was imagining what he'd do to Noah if he ever discovered someone else had already been to bed with his fiancée.