Zoe glanced at Eva, who looked confused at the agent’s accusations. Eva met her gaze. There was a haunted expression in her eyes which only made Zoe worry more. It was the same look of utter hopelessness that Zoe had seen the first time they had met. She felt a chill shudder up her spine.
Unsettled, Zoe tore her gaze away from Eva, although she continued to cling to her hand. “Why am I not surprised?” she said. “I should have known the woman was no good.”
“Greta Strauss was my former lover. I haven’t had contact with her since 1938. I don’t know where she is, and I don’t know how to contact her now,” Eva answered, the strain in every line of her body apparent.
Zoe quickly glanced at Eva, a little surprised at Eva’s reluctance to tell them that they had hosted Greta to dinner in their apartment not that long ago. Eva appeared totally confused, and Zoe was certain she was not thinking straight at all. Eva fingered the ring on her finger. Feeling somewhat belligerent on Eva’s behalf, Zoe decided to keep her mouth closed and not contribute any information unless the agents asked for it.
“It isn’t my intention to re-open old wounds.” David loosened the knot in his tie. “I really don’t want to stick the knife in,” he said, staring squarely at Zoe. “I want to catch this woman and this is the best lead we’ve had in ages, so if you can help us, we would really appreciate it. We heard she was in your apartment recently.”
Eva took a deep breath, not relaxing one whit. “Greta Strauss, myself, and a few other friends were participating in Kristallnacht.” She avoided eye contact with Friedrich. “I decided to go home while the others continued and that was the last I saw of Greta.”
David sat back. “What happened after that?”
“After what?”
“After Muller beat you.”
“That has nothing to do with Greta or your investigation. It’s something I prefer not to talk about,” Eva replied tersely and stared at David. Zoe knew Eva was daring him to try and continue that line of questioning.
Don’t ask her or I’ll thump you, Zoe thought and glared a warning at David.
David seemed surprised by Eva’s reluctance. Nevertheless, his next question made it clear that he would no longer pursue the topic of Muller. “So Kristallnacht was the last time you saw her?”
“Yes, until recently, when she came to the Interpreter Division. She was using the name Wagner, her husband’s surname.”
David and Friedrich looked at each other. “I thought you said you last saw her in 1938. Now you say she came to your office and saw you?” David asked.
Zoe’s rage ratcheted up a notch at the two men, but at David in particular. It was plainly obvious to her — and she supposed to everyone else present — that Eva was in shock at the news about Greta, and therefore extremely confused. “You would be a little unsure of what you were saying if a bombshell was dropped on you,” she angrily interjected.
“Yes...no...I mean, I thought you wanted to know when the last time I saw her in Germany was,” Eva said, flushing in her embarrassment.
“No, the question was when you last saw Miss Strauss,” David explained. “How did she know you worked there if you had lost contact with her?”
“I don’t think she knew I was there. I just happened to be the German interpreter on duty at the time.”
“A big coincidence.”
“I guess so. She seemed as surprised to see me as I was to see her.” Eva sighed.
“Quite. What did she want?”
“Information about family law.”
“Why?”
“She wants to divorce her husband, or at least, that’s the story she gave me.”
“So you invited her to your apartment?”
“No...I mean, yes,” Eva faltered over her words again. “I was very shocked when I saw her and I guess I invited her to dinner.”
“What happened when she arrived?”
“We ate, we talked, and she left,” Zoe said, cutting off whatever Eva was going to say. She barely avoided saying she would have loved to have punched the living daylights out of Greta. Maintaining control was difficult, but she knew that an outburst from her would not help Eva at all, so she bit the inside of her cheek to stay quiet.
“And that was the last time you talked to her?”
“Yes. Zoe saw her at the office later when she came to meet me.” Eva smiled at Zoe for the first time since the questioning had started, and wrapped an arm around her shoulders. Zoe was tense, but she relaxed slightly in Eva’s embrace.
David turned to regard Zoe. “You were alone with Miss Strauss?”
“No. Debbie, the receptionist, was there when Greta came in looking for Eva,” Zoe said flatly.
“What did she want?”
“What do you think she was there for?” Zoe asked, ignoring the strangled cough that Eva let out, trying to cover a chuckle. “She was there to see Eva.”
David continued writing in his notebook. “She came to see Eva?”
“Yeeessss,” Zoe said, hissing the word in frustration.
“And?”
“And what? Eva wasn’t in the office; she had gone down to the filing room.”
“Okay, so Eva wasn’t there and Miss Strauss saw you.”
“Yes.”
“You’re not being very forthcoming, are you, Zoe?” David asked, his impatience obvious, although he was clearly attempting to cover it with a neutral demeanor.
“That’s Miss Lambros to you, Mr. Harrison, if you continue to take that tone with me. We’re not the enemy. I should think you would have figured that out after Muller.”
Friedrich cut in, probably to avoid Zoe and David coming to verbal blows, and asked, “Zoe, did Greta say anything to you?”
Zoe grimaced. “She wanted to speak to Eva. Since she wasn’t there, she gave a phone number to the receptionist to get Eva to call her.”
“She gave you a phone number?” David interrupted, glaring at Eva.
“Yes, she left a phone number,” Zoe said, hoping to deflect David’s ire.
“Didn’t you think a phone number left by your ex-lover would be important?” David asked a very flustered Eva, who merely looked away.
“I forgot,” she murmured meekly.
“You forgot?” David was incredulous. “We are looking for anything to catch this woman and you have her phone number in your possession and you forgot to tell us. What were you thinking? Do you still have it?”
Zoe inhaled, about to blast him, but Eva patted her thigh and she deflated, contenting herself with giving him a look of dislike.
“Yes,” Eva replied. She went into the bedroom, returning momentarily with a piece of paper that she gave to David. He took it and jotted down the number in his notebook, then indicated the phone with his fountain pen. Eva nodded.
David dialed the number, waited for a few seconds, and then hung up. “That’s the German Community Club,” he said, his frustration apparent.
“I guess I would have had to leave a message for her to contact me,” Eva replied. “Can you answer some of my questions? Why are you after Greta? You said something about war crimes. I find that hard to believe.”
“Do you know Dr. Kurt Gutzeit?”
Eva sat and starred at the investigator for a long moment. “Yes,” she finally said, “I know of Dr. Gutzeit.”
“Evy?” Zoe asked, concerned that Eva was even paler and looked ready to pass out. Zoe wondered how much more Eva could take with each new question and revelation.
Eva took a deep breath. “I’m all right.”
“You don’t look all right.” Zoe directed her hostile gaze at the two men.
“I know of Dr. Gutzeit,” Eva repeated, ignoring Zoe’s protective attitude.
“Dr. Gutzeit was at Auschwitz. The woman you know as Miss Greta Strauss was his assistant. She also assisted a Dr. Weber, who did studies on mind controlling drugs, and a Dr. Mengele, now known as the Angel of Death.” David handed Eva a sheet of paper and she began to read, scowling as she
did so. All of a sudden, the blood drained from her face, leaving her white to the lips and shaking. Zoe looked at her with concern. Eva handed her the paper, the tremors in her hand almost making her drop the sheet.
“Oh, God,” Zoe whispered as she read about the SS doctors and assistants who had performed so-called medical experiments in Auschwitz. “My God.”
“Greta Strauss assisted in those experiments,” David repeated.
Eva swallowed audibly and her appearance still appeared sickly. Zoe imagined her heart was racing. She leaned in and whispered reassurances to Eva, who merely nodded and kept her downcast eyes on her lap. David cleared his throat.
“What do you want from us?” Eva finally asked.
“Help in catching her,” David responded. His attitude was suggestive of waiting for an explosion.
The explosion came moments later from an enraged Zoe, who could not hold back another minute. Expletives in Greek peppered the air, surprising Friedrich and David. She continued in German, “You two are insane! Absolutely insane. You’re...” She stopped her abuse for a moment, unable to think of the word she wanted in German, which only frustrated her more. “Assholes!” she finally exclaimed. “The last time you wanted Eva’s help, you nearly got her killed! You nearly got us all killed! Incompetent assholes!”
“That wasn’t—” David began.
“Shut up! You two are Keystone Cops!” Zoe screamed. She got up and walked towards the balcony, her temper still boiling, needing to compose herself somewhat, since cursing was getting her nowhere. A moment later she returned, still agitated but no longer quite so close to knocking the men’s heads together. “Oh, yes, we know how you are really good at getting in place to capture Nazis,” she snorted.
“How were we supposed to know that Mrs. Jenkins told Muller and Rhimes to come up here and then let them in to your real apartment?” Friedrich asked, aggrieved by what he clearly felt was an unfair accusation. “It wasn’t our fault we were in the wrong apartment.”
“Involving Eva was a stupid idea to begin with!” Zoe said. She and Eva exchanged a meaningful glance.
Eva stood, put her hand on Zoe’s shoulder and leaned in. “Zoe, we have to help.”
Zoe was not sure who to be angrier with. She was incredulous at Eva’s words, and furious with David’s suggestion that Eva place herself in jeopardy again. She was about to say how foolish the idea was, but she caught the look in Eva’s eyes and the words remained unsaid, swallowed by resigned acceptance. Eva’s previous shell-shocked appearance had changed. She looked far more in control of herself and her emotions.
Eva turned back to David. “We will help you.”
“Greta is extremely dangerous,” David said. Zoe snorted again, and he shrugged a silent apology at stating the obvious. “Can you call her and get her to come over here?”
“Why not get her to meet me at the office?” Eva asked.
“It’s too crowded. I’ve seen that office. It’s packed to the rafters with refugees most of the time.” David paused. “Can you tell her you’re interested in restarting the relationship?”
“A bit hard to do when I’ve told her I had a lover and I’m very happy,” Eva said, squeezing Zoe’s hand.
David appeared stumped. He turned to Friedrich with a questioning look.
“What if you told her that you’ve changed your mind? Women do that, don’t they?” Friedrich asked.
“I’m not the kind of person who changes her mind about the woman I love, Friedrich,” Eva responded. Zoe liked him, and Eva did, too, but he did have a tendency to put his foot in his mouth.
“Greta doesn’t know that,” Friedrich persisted as he sat down next to Eva on the sofa. “You could say that...that Zoe is cheating on you and you have decided you want to be with Greta instead. You can invite her to the office, have Zoe there, have a mock argument so she can see you really are fighting—”
“Isn’t that rather melodramatic?” Eva asked.
“What about if you invited Greta to your office, allowed her to kiss you and Zoe accidentally walked in?” Friedrich suggested.
“And then I kill her,” Zoe piped up, grinning in a bloodthirsty fashion. “I like that plan.”
Eva smirked at Zoe’s enthusiasm. “I don’t think they want her dead, love.”
Friedrich persisted, “So, do you think that would work?”
“It could. Then what?”
“You bring her back here and we’ll be waiting,” David said, tapping his fountain pen on the notebook and blotting the page with ink.
Zoe turned back to David, slightly calmer though still displeased with him. “You will remember what apartment number it is, won’t you?”
David sighed. “We’ll be here waiting.”
“Okay,” Eva agreed. Zoe nodded, although she was not entirely convinced of the wisdom of the plan.
“We’ll come by tomorrow to finalize the plans, and then you can ring Greta and set it up,” David said.
They agreed on that arrangement and Eva saw them out. She closed the door quietly and leaned her shoulder against it, letting her head droop. Zoe’s arms wrapped around her waist, her cheek resting against her back.
“If they botch it up, I don’t know if we can get out of this one,” Zoe whispered. She and Eva had been lucky to escape with their lives when Muller and Rhimes were captured. She was terrified of what would happen, even if they did succeed. The emotional toll it was taking on Eva, even before they put David’s oh-so-brilliant plan into action, was making Zoe heartsick.
“They won’t,” Eva whispered. “I hope to God they don’t.” Eva turned around in Zoe’s embrace, her arms coming up to squeeze Zoe more tightly to her.
Zoe reached up and tenderly stroked Eva’s cheek. Her next words were in stark contrast to that caress. “I’m going to kill them if they do. That’s a promise.”
An unknown period of time of solitude followed. They attempted to strengthen and comfort each other through the hugging that continued long after Zoe’s promise.
***
Eva was disgusted by what she had read about Greta, a woman she had thought she knew but quite obviously did not. Details of the horrific experiments that Greta had assisted in were making Eva sick to her stomach, bringing back horrible memories from her own incarceration and brutal treatment from the Schutzstaffel doctors in Aiden intent on “curing” her of her lesbianism.
For both their sakes, Eva tried to clamp down on the rising panic she was feeling. She was not sure how she could pretend to show affection to Greta and not think of what had been done to her and many others by Hitler’s Third Reich in general, and the Schutzstaffel in particular. Somehow she needed to focus and not let those memories interfere with what she had to do. She felt Zoe’s arms around her and swallowed hard at the flush of emotion that washed over her. She turned in Zoe’s embrace. “I’m sorry,” she said, stroking her cheek.
“What for?”
“For what I’m about to do to you,” Eva replied and let her tears fall. She did not want to hurt Zoe, but a pretend rift between them appeared to be the only way they could get Greta back to the apartment and spring their trap. “I don’t want to do it, but I can’t think of another way than to pretend we fight.”
Zoe looked into Eva’s eyes and put her hand on Eva’s chest. “I know I own your heart,” she said softly. “Just don’t let her kiss you too much.”
Zoe’s voice broke, and Eva could tell she was already experiencing pain. “I promise,” she responded. She cupped Zoe’s face in her hands and kissed her passionately, causing Zoe to moan as the kiss deepened.
“And not like that,” Zoe said a little breathlessly when they parted.
“I reserve those for only you,” Eva reassured as she hugged Zoe. It was going to be difficult to fool Greta, and she was not an actress, but she would have to do it. She had to, for all those who had not stood a chance when they were sentenced to their deaths.
Chapter Fifty-Eight
“You’re going
to do what?” Father Haralambos asked incredulously. He was sure he had not heard Eva correctly. Eva sat on the sofa, her hands folded in her lap, with Zoe nearby looking extremely uncomfortable. He cleared his throat. “All right, tell me again why you are going to help these two try and arrest this Greta person.”
“The authorities can’t arrest her because they don’t know where she is,” Eva explained once again. She looked at Henry, who had arrived back home and grimaced. Father Haralambos noted that Henry, who was sitting next to him, had a perplexed look on his face.
“I see. So once again you become the bait?” Henry asked.
“Something like that,” Eva muttered.
“I think those two boofheads need their heads read,” Earl said. “This is a really bad plan if you ask me.”
“Uh-huh.” Father Haralambos scratched his head. “And Zoe is okay with you being the live bait?”
“Hell, no,” Zoe muttered. She put a hand over her mouth. “Sorry, Father H.”
“We don’t have a lot of options open to us,” Eva said.
“Really? Why don’t they use the resources of the government to track this woman down? Surely the police can find her.”
“I don’t know.”
“Eva, my child, it’s not that I don’t want you to help them, but—”
“Father, I know, but this is the only way. She has to be caught.”
“What’s so important about Greta?” Henry asked. “I haven’t had the chance to go back to the office, so fill me in.”
Eva paused for a moment. “Greta assisted in medical experiments at Auschwitz.”
“Mengele,” Henry said quietly. “She worked with Mengele?”
A collective gasp went around the room at the revelation. Father Haralambos jerked involuntarily, but his years of experience in the priesthood enabled him to maintain a neutral expression.
“She worked with Dr. Josef Mengele and his...partners, Dr. Kurt Gutzeit and Dr. Bruno Weber,” Eva went on, “experimenting on twins and other prisoners. The figures don’t really tell the full story, and I don’t think we will ever know it, but Greta assisted those butchers.”
“This woman was your lover?” Earl asked his disbelief painfully apparent. He shot a quick glance at Zoe, who was scowling.
Where Shadows Linger (Intertwined Souls Series Book 2) Page 44