Bending down, Zelda placed the coffee service on a low table tucked between two wing chairs. Her precise movements masked a simmering frustration as she poured the scalding liquid into a cup and fantasized about pouring it over her employer’s head. “Sturmbannführer,” she murmured, before turning to his even more odious guest. “Hauptsturmführer.”
Voight barely acknowledged her, engrossed in his own thoughts, while Klaus offered a perfunctory thank you before forgetting once again that she existed. She resisted the urge to huff as she stalked back to Voight’s desk, sitting down and slotting her tablet into the keyboard dock with rather more force than was necessary. This modern machine nevertheless looked like something Hemingway might recognize, with its sleek lines and polished finish, space age technology in a body that’d remained unchanged since the typewriter itself was a cutting-edge invention.
She jabbed at a button and the screen flashed on, revealing icons set against the backdrop of the Reichsadler. Then, clutching her mouse in a death grip, she opened a new document. Word processing programs, with their brilliantly realized graphics, were new to her; American computers, in their clunky boxes, were still at the command line stage. Wondering if her sister’s boy toy could type, she watched him add cream and sugar to the gilt-edged cup. Voight could, but refused; he also took his coffee black. Lighting a cigarette, he regarded his colleague with a cool expression.
Klaus, in response, looked pained.
Nobody suggested that she have coffee, despite the tantalizing aroma wafting across Voight’s office; she was a glorified servant, invisible unless he needed something. He might treat her like a potted plant, but she could still use her ears and she’d learned a lot during these notetaking sessions. At the moment, though, she wasn’t listening to Klaus make small talk but dwelling on the catastrophe that’d been her weekend. Charlotte had spent all of Sunday sobbing, which she’d clearly managed to hide from Klaus or Constance would be dead. Constance was a holier-than-thou shrew with an axe to grind and Zelda might’ve taken matters into her own hands before Klaus got the chance but she’d unfortunately disappeared again.
Charlotte had been right to call that virtue-signaling prig a hypocrite; she talked a good game about morals, but the men who’d attacked Darlene had all grown up in Cambridge. Constance wouldn’t have minded Charlotte taking up with one of them, she probably would’ve encouraged it, because her issue wasn’t with the violence itself but its supposed justification. Constance probably thought Alex had been the victim in Longfellow Park, too.
Voight might order her around, and even scare her sometimes, but he never gave her the ick—or treated her any differently from the dozens of men under his command. He’d called her childish more than once, making her bristle, except that was something else she’d realized as Constance trashed their house: he was right, she had been acting like a child. So had Constance, selfishly pitching a tantrum when everything she wanted wasn’t handed to her on a silver platter. Charlotte had been their rock, but who did Charlotte have to lean on? Zelda, to her everlasting shame, hadn’t thought to ask that question. And as for their father, he’d be glad both daughters were alive—and disgusted with the girl he’d loved as a third, to see how little family meant to her.
Turning women’s sexual choices into political ammunition was essentially a sophisticated form of slut-shaming. Zelda herself had plenty of flaws that both Alex and Constance could’ve picked on, yet all either of them had thought to criticize was her not hating Voight enough. Most people, she’d discovered, would rather eulogize the purity of a dead virgin than acknowledge the fortitude of a woman who’d lived, condemning her survival as a betrayal of virtue rather than recognizing her courage in facing life’s trials. How Charlotte felt anything except revulsion when Klaus touched her, Zelda couldn’t begin to guess, and maybe she didn’t, but Constance should’ve felt grateful to her for protecting them all instead of blaming her for not changing the world.
And now here Zelda was, trapped in Hell with the Devil.
Voight stubbed out his cigarette with a sharp twist. “My office is drowning in these reports, most of which are trash. Like this one,” he continued, thrusting a folder into Klaus’s lap. “A man reported a prostitute, because she gave him a venereal disease.”
Klaus frowned. “A serious one?”
Voight all but threw another folder at him. “A woman informed on her husband, claiming he was insulting the Führer. We surveilled him and, after thousands of Reichsmark and man hours I can’t spare, discovered that she wanted him gone so she could move in some enlisted man.”
“Awkward.” Klaus took a leisurely sip of his coffee.
Voight grabbed a third folder from the stack by his chair. “Here’s another couple with marital problems,” he announced, scanning through the pages. “Two doctors, this time. The wife accused the husband of performing illegal abortions.” With an exasperated noise, he looked up. “I found out, this morning, that his only crime is being homosexual!”
“That is a crime,” Klaus pointed out, unruffled by Voight’s agitation.
“I personally don’t care what a man does in his own bedroom,” Voight snapped, “and I don’t see how it’s relevant to the security of the Reich.”
Klaus favored him with a flat look. “That’s because you’re a libertine.”
Voight’s eyes widened fractionally. “Excuse me?”
However informal the SS might be, when it came to the chain of command, most men still didn’t insult their superior officers. But Klaus only nodded as he poured himself more coffee. “You drink scotch like water, think Pervitin and tobacco are food groups, and you worship a Jew.”
In response, Voight gestured rather pointedly at Zelda.
“You think she hasn’t noticed that you snort lines for breakfast?” Klaus’s tone was still sanguine, but his eyes glittered with disapproval. “If she hasn’t walked in on you bent over that desk with a mirror, she’s heard the gossip. Your predilections aren’t exactly a secret.”
“Are you planning on denouncing me?” Voight challenged. “If not, we should move on.”
Klaus’s shrug was an elegant gesture, his expression unreadable. “I suppose.”
“I’m not the only Catholic from München.” Voight’s voice was tight.
“Regrettably,” Klaus agreed, “this is true.”
Voight held his gaze for a long moment, his lips pressed into a thin line, before relaxing into his chair with a slight sigh. “It’s a moot point, regardless,” he observed, crossing one leg over the other. “Until I have more staff, we’ll have to decide that the vast majority of the population is loyal. I might have to investigate each tip that comes in, but there’s no rule about timeline. Meaning all the couples hoping I’ll effectuate a cheap separation will just have to wait.”
Klaus grimaced at the other half a dozen stacks of folders, all decorating a massive Persian rug. “Some of this information might be valuable, whatever the informants’ motivations.”
Voight’s scoff showed what he thought of that. “The idea that someone, somewhere is crouching over Radio Moscow doesn’t keep me up at night. Catching Bill Smith before he kills again does.”
“One might lead to to the other,” Klaus replied. His words carried a certain sibilant hiss, matching eyes that also belonged on a snake: curious, but utterly lacking in emotion. “Regardless, communism is a threat to the Reich.”
“Direct your own men how you please.” Voight stated brusquely. “Our social welfare programs aren’t firmly established, here. Once they are, and our new citizens understand more about what the Reich has to offer, in this and other areas, interest in communism will naturally wane.”
“That seems a bit laissez-faire.” Klaus’s tone held the faintest hint of accusation.
Voight’s gaze sharpened. “I believe in the Reich.”
Klaus examined the grinning death’s head ring on his finger. “Sometimes, I wonder.”
Voight, at the end of his patience, tapped his fingers on the arm of what’d once been Longfellow’s reading chair. “If we made thought a crime, Klaus, the only man left in the Reich would be you.” He glanced at Zelda, then, whose fingers still rested on the computer’s round keys. She hadn’t typed a single thing; this hadn’t been the kind of conversation, so far, that either man wanted recorded. “Fraulein Wahl,” he directed, his voice flat, “please serve lunch.”
Pausing briefly to suppress her instinctive protest, Zelda reluctantly acquiesced with a nod. Rising from her seat, she strode across the expanse of Voight’s imposing office, her movements hindered by the restrictive pencil skirt she wore. Neither Voight nor Klaus uttered a word as she traversed the space, the rhythmic click of her heels resonating loudly in the stifling silence. As badly as she wanted to see Voight’s next move, she was also afraid she might vomit. Her fingers sought solace in the cool touch of the polished brass knob, a glimmer of hope at escaping before the first punch was thrown. With a tentative pull, she swung the door open, anticipation tingling in her veins. Yet, instead of freedom, she was met with an unexpected intrusion: Gretchen.
She’d had her ear pressed to the keyhole, and she wasn’t the least bit embarrassed about being caught.
“You’re supposed to be in the mailroom!” Zelda hissed, pushing her out of view.
“I want to know what’s going on!” Gretchen insisted, with a longing glance toward the gossip.
Zelda pulled her down the hall. “You can help me with lunch.”
Gretchen stomped her foot. “But I don’t care about lunch!”
The kitchen greeted them with a grumpy cook. Ignoring the older woman’s dour expression, Zelda perched herself on a stool, resigned to wait. If lunch took an hour to arrive, she reasoned, that wasn’t her fault. Meanwhile, Gretchen leaned against the counter, swaying to music only she could hear. In her never-ending quest to seduce every man in the building, she dressed—and acted—like Betty Boop. Zelda sniffed and Gretchen turned, gesturing at her feet. “Those look good on you,” she said, referring to the cutout wedges Zelda wore.
Voight had said the same thing; she’d wanted to kick him, too. Instead, smiled brightly. “I appreciate the loan,” she lied. Gretchen, much to her everlasting dismay, took the same size shoe but her idea of sensible workwear was stilts. If she’d wanted to be this much taller, Zelda thought, she would’ve stood on a table.
“They’re Dior,” Gretchen cooed, impressed with her own terrible taste.
“Patent leather,” the cook volunteered, “is Satan’s own invention.”
“How would you know?” Gretchen challenged, wrinkling her nose.
The cook sighed as she sliced vegetables. “I was young, once.”
Shrugging, Gretchen turned her attention back to Zelda. “That skirt’s cute and all, but it’s too long.”
Zelda’s façade slipped a little. “What am I supposed to wear?”
Gretchen threw her hands up. “Something that’ll attract a man!”
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“Who,” Zelda spluttered, “am I supposed to attract?”
The cook began loading tea sandwiches onto a tiered server, and Gretchen helped herself to one, munching on a mouthful of cucumber and cream cheese as she considered the question. “According to my mother, offices like these are ground zero for eligible bachelors.”
“That’s like looking for eligible bachelors in the Seventh Circle of Hell!” Zelda protested.
Gretchen blinked. “Is that a club?”
“Does the Sturmbannführer want scones?” the cook asked.
The Sturmbannführer was single, came the unwelcome and intrusive thought. And he hates scones, Zelda wanted to shout. “He wants the salmon,” she said, more snippily than she’d intended.
Gretchen, who did like scones, issued a lovelorn sigh. “Like Klaus.”
The cook, handing Zelda a rolling pin, grunted.
“He’s so handsome,” Gretchen continued. “He should’ve been an actor—or a model! Although feldgrau is such a becoming color.” Producing a compact, she examined her lipstick. “Probably because it’s really blue, and with those eyes of his…and he’s rich! Not regular rich, private plane rich.”
Zelda, who didn’t care, flattened bread.
“He speaks five languages! German, English, French, Spanish, and Japanese.” Stealing a scone, Gretchen broke it apart and handed some to Zelda. “Your sister is so lucky.”
“She seems to think so,” Zelda replied doubtfully.
“No other girl exists for him,” Gretchen lamented, her tone reproachful. “He rejects all of my advances, it’s so frustrating! Although,” she admitted, “if he didn’t, I wouldn’t like him nearly as much.”
“Meine Ehre heißt Treue,” Zelda retorted dryly. It was the SS motto: My honor is my loyalty. A pang of longing squeezed her chest; she used to have friends who saw that stupid cult for what it was.
Gretchen brightened. “Does Klaus have friends?”
“Other than his violin?” Zelda couldn’t help but chuckle.
Leaning against the counter, the cook fixed her with a scowl. “Tell the Sturmbannführer that he gets full tea and nothing else, until he requisitions me the ingredients. That’s the last of the chocolate, that Gretchen is devouring. I need more salmon, too, unless he plans on catching and curing his own.”
“Full tea is a wonderful lunch,” Zelda assured her. “I appreciate your hard work.”
“I’m glad somebody does,” the cook grumbled, only slightly mollified.
Upon returning to Voight’s office, Zelda froze in place. Klaus’s voice carried a chilling calmness as he described desacrating a synagogue. “I told Lauchert that we should convert it into another brothel,” he concluded, “just like we did out west.” Lauchert, Klaus’s commanding officer, was nearly as fanatical. Zelda had encountered him only once before, and she was glad he wasn’t present.
Voight, seemingly unfazed by the conversation, helped himself to a sandwich, acknowledging Zelda’s return with a brief nod. She lingered in the doorway, unable to tear herself away from the unsettling exchange between the two men. Gretchen hovered beside her, her expression a mixture of curiosity and discomfort, before shutting the door and returning her ear to the keyhole.
After a minute, Zelda joined her.
“How,” Voight inquired, “are you enjoying your new office?”
“At Weston Jesuit?” Klaus meant the school of theology at the far end of Brattle Street. “Tremendously. While we were removing certain decorations, we even stumbled across a nest of Jews.”
Voight made a noncommittal sound.
Klaus changed topic. “I heard, from Bittrich, that we’re now at six home invasions.”
“We’d have seven,” Voight clarified, “but for the fact that one Stabsgefreiter Becker came home unexpectedly. He shot one of the attackers dead, the others escaped in the confusion.”
“His family?” Klaus prompted.
“He has a wife.” Voight spoke quietly, his voice strained with the stress of the investigation. “Four months pregnant, and a stepdaughter. All fine. But this means eighteen dead, nine of whom are children. Ten, if you count the other pregnant woman.” In the tense silence that followed, Zelda heard the distinct creak of his chair as he rose, the muffled footsteps crossing the room, and the soft clink of glassware as he reached the sideboard and began fixing himself a drink. “I need some men from Einsatzgruppe C for surveillance,” he added. “Bittrich authorized me to take them but I’m asking, first.”
“How many?” Klaus’s tone was guarded.
Zelda heard another creak as Voight returned to his chair, followed by the flick of his lighter. “Fifty.”
“We have operations of our own,” Klaus protested.
Voight scoffed incredulously. “You can’t seriously be claiming that a handful of Torah students cowering in some basement somewhere pose any kind of real threat.”
“They do,” Klaus countered firmly, “if they’re aiding this man. And they most certainly are.”
“If the Americans were this well organized,” Voight observed, “we wouldn’t be here.”
“Fair point,” Klaus conceded. “Take a platoon, then. Heinz can command them, he’s got field experience and he won’t mind reporting to you. But, in the meantime, we should make the public aware of these crimes in more detail. Not simply to warn them of the risk,” he urged, “but to unmask these so-called resistance fighters for the vermin they really are.”
“That’s your department.” Voight’s statement carried a distinct lack of enthusiasm.
“You should take more interest in propaganda,” Klaus advised, irritation creeping into his tone.
“What’s the point,” Voight replied mildly, “when you publicize my faults so well?”
The door blew open as Klaus stormed out, his features a mask of controlled fury. The whole hall seemed to freeze as everyone halted mid-stride, throwing up their arms in surprised salutes. He ignored them all, his gaze fixed straight ahead, through the front door and out into the sunshine.
Zelda took a deep breath, as the tension slowly dissipated. Returning to Voight’s office, she found him standing at his desk, his expression grim. But as their eyes met, something unspoken passed between them, a fleeting moment of shared understanding. Zelda smiled, and to her surprise, Voight’s lips curved into a small, almost imperceptible smile in return, as if sharing some secret joke.
“That was fun,” she said, her tone light.
“Insufferable Prussian.” Voight gestured. “Here, have a sandwich.”
“A brothel?” she inquired. “Are they planning on using the pews?”
Sitting down heavily, Voight pinched the bridge of his nose. “Seeing the bigger picture, to Klaus, is weakness. He charges ahead like a bull, heedless of the damage he leaves in his wake. His reckless methods might yield short-term gains, but they’ll come back to haunt us all.” He grabbed his drink, tossed the last of it back, and grimaced at the glass. “Conviction is worthless without strategy. And, on that note, there’s something I need you to research.”
Her voice quivered with suppressed anger, hands trembling slightly as she spoke. “No.”
He looked up, startled. “No?”
“It’s bad enough that I have to wait on you hand and foot,” she insisted, despite her better judgment. “But I draw the line at actively spying on my own people.”
His expression soured, a fleeting glimpse of irritation flickering across his features before settling into a cool, discerning gaze that seemed to dissect the world’s shortcomings with ease. The same knot tightened in her stomach, a familiar sensation that transported her back to their first meeting, when his backhanded blow had sent her sprawling. Whatever peace they’d established since then was as complex as a spider’s web, and as fragile. When he spoke, however, his voice remained calm. “Even if they’re murderers?”
“You’re a murderer.” Zelda’s tone was defiant.
She didn’t know what she’d expected, but he returned to work without a word. Taking a deep breath, she lowered herself into the opposite chair, uncertain of what to do next. He didn’t acknowledge her, only studied his tablet with a slight frown as the silence between them stretched. “You’d be more likeable,” he said after a minute,” if you kept your thoughts to yourself.” His tone was still neutral, but laced with a hint of reproach.
Feeling exposed, she stared at her lap. “Why is that?”
Voight’s fingers paused briefly on the screen before his eyes met hers again. “Because then I could imagine you thinking something pleasant.”
“As though it matters to you what I think,” she retorted coldly. She shouldn’t offend him like this and she knew that, but for some reason she couldn’t help herself—and then she was speaking again, digging herself into an even deeper hole. “Really, though, I shouldn’t expect much from someone who sees women as mere decorations for his ego. Did they teach you misogyny as part of your training, Herr Voight, or is it just a natural talent?”
“Women who claim to be equal with men,” he said mildly, “lack ambition.”
“And the fact that penicillin comes from mold,” she shot back, “has given you entirely too much hope!”
Pressing his lips together, he set his pen down with a deliberate clack. “I understand, Zelda, that you’re attempting to provoke me. I am, however, quite capable of exercising self-restraint.” He paused, a teacher debating how to reach a particularly backward student. “One can achieve more with manners than with vitriol, although this news might come as a crushing blow.”
Her expression darkened, her eyebrows knitting into a fierce scowl. “I'm not torturing people with my tongue.”
“Not for lack of trying!” he exclaimed, clearly annoyed. Leaning back in his chair, his arms crossed, his gaze turned searching. “What exactly is your issue with the Reich?”
She scoffed at the absurdity of the question. “Let’s start with the persecution!”
“Look around you!” He waved his hand in a broad arc. “The United States is a cesspool of moral decay, where men shirk their duties and indulge in debauchery, abandoning their families without remorse. Women are left vulnerable, preyed upon as they step outside their homes. National Socialism offers order and security, a return to values that once made America great.”
Her disbelief was palpable. “By enforcing conformity?”
“National Socialism seeks to revive the proud traditions and achievements of our own people,” he explained, as though stating something obvious. “It’s about preserving our culture and heritage, ensuring a future of excellence for generations to come.”
“Except for those deemed undesirable,” she snapped, not bothering to hide her disgust. “The Jews, the Roma, the Slavs—where do they fit into your vision of excellence?”
He rose from his chair, striding purposefully to the window where he gazed out at the meticulously manicured lawn. “Not all races are compatible,” he murmured. His eyes followed a pair of clerks as they refilled a bird feeder, his expression contemplative and almost resigned. “The SS draws recruits from over thirty countries, including several in Africa. We have over one hundred thousand Muslim officers and enlisted men. Hitler himself praised Islam as the ideal religion.”
She approached him, her steps halting, her mind racing with questions. “But why the SS?” she probed. “You’re not an occultist like Klaus, and I don’t think you truly believe in this race nonsense.”
Instead of arguing, he bowed his head and placed a hand on the window frame. “Have you read much,” he asked, “about the war?”
He meant what his ilk called the War of Liberation and she had, but she shook her head; she doubted that his books and hers had contained the same information.
“During the winter of 1941, the SS lost 43,000 men in front of Moscow.” He kept his focus on the garden, now abandoned. “The regiment Der Führer fought almost to the last man,” he added. “Out of two thousand, only thirty-five remained. But no Soviet got through and, in the end, we took the city.” Turning, he studied her. “Without that heroism, where would the world be?”
Instead of responding, she averted her gaze. She recognized the sincerity in his voice, the reverence for the ideals of duty, self-sacrifice, and the greater good. His words struck a chord deep within her, stirring a tumultuous mixture of admiration for his unwavering conviction and revulsion at his willful blindness. He’d chosen to embrace what he deemed worthy, ignoring decades of atrocities—and his complicity in them. But was she different? She wanted to survive, in a world increasingly consumed by darkness and chaos, and so did he.
“We swear a blood oath, not to retreat.” His tone was resolute. He’d done something to earn that ring on his finger, the SS-Ehrenring was awarded for conspicuous acts of bravery, but she’d never wondered what or how it’d affected him. “Not since the Knights Templar has there been, in any organization, such conviction and commitment,” he finished softly. “This is our lodestar, our spiritual calling. We stand fast until we win, or until we fall.”
She searched for the right words, wanting to tell him that she understood but unsure how. Tension radiated from his form, as the charged atmosphere between them crackled. “August, I….”
He spun abruptly as, behind them, the door banged open.
Gretchen frowned in confusion. “Am I interrupting something?”