“But not everyone can be trusted,” Alise told him as Niklaus unlocked the door to the cellblock. They walked past the guard station, where Niklaus nodded at the two S.S. men on duty, their gas masks on the desk before them, ready to be grabbed at a moment’s notice. Alise leaned over and whispered in one man’s ear, her fingers touching his face, and he smiled and handed over a key.
“I think I understand,” Niklaus said as the entered the corridor of cells. He approached the door to Juliana’s cell. The American girl with the deadly plague had spooked everyone since her arrival.
Alise continued on past it, towards Evelina’s cell.
“Juliana is back here,” Niklaus told her.
“Juliana is pregnant with a doubly supernormal baby,” Alise said. “As everyone keeps reminding me. Come here, Niklaus.” She inserted the key she’d gotten from the guard into the door to Evelina’s cell.
“What are you doing?” Niklaus asked. “She’s done nothing wrong.”
“She was born the wrong race. There’s probably even Muslim in her, look how dark she is. Open the door, Niklaus.”
His heart pounding, Niklaus pulled the door open. Evelina stood up, holding one of the fashion magazines in her hand. She smiled when she saw Niklaus and Alise.
“Am I moving back to my room?” Evelina asked. “Thank you, Alise.”
“Execute her,” Alise said to Niklaus.
Evelina’s eyes widened in fear, and she stopped walking toward them.
“You can’t mean that,” Niklaus said.
“Shoot her!” Alise ordered.
“No,” Niklaus said, his voice shaking.
“What did you say?” Alise’s eyes narrowed into angry slits. “Niklaus?”
“I can’t. I...she’s a woman.”
“Niklaus?” Evelina whispered, shaking now, wrapping her arms around herself as if cold. “Please...”
“For God’s sake! We don’t have time for this.” Alise rolled her eyes and took the Luger pistol from his belt. She fired three times, missing Evelina once and then hitting her in the stomach and the chest. Evelina screamed, and Alise fired again, blowing away the upper left corner of Evelina’s head. A gout of blood splashed across the wall behind her, and she fell to the floor, her eyes seeming to plead silently with Niklaus as she died.
Niklaus felt like he was drowning. It had happened too fast for him to stop it, and now it was done.
“Look at her brains all over the sink!” Alise cackled.
Niklaus ran into the room, dropping to his knees next to Evelina’s body. Horror filled him, and then agony, as it sank in that she was gone. He cradled her bleeding head in her body. A look of hurt and betrayal was etched into her lifeless face. He’d said he would watch out for her. He’d lied.
“Gross, you’re getting her all over you,” Alise said. “Let’s go tell someone to clean up this mess.”
As she turned away, Niklaus reached for his holster and found it empty. Alise still held his gun. If he’d had it, he would have shot her right in the back.
Instead, he knelt in the cell, clutching Evelina’s body, and he began to sob, mumbling curses down on himself and his wicked cousin.
Chapter Forty-Three
“They tell me you’re ready to deal.” Ward grinned as he approached the clear wall to Jenny’s cell. Behind him, the projection screen had gone mercifully blank, and the recorded screams had been silenced.
“I don’t think I have any choice.” Jenny spoke in a quiet, defeated tone. She was less than a month from giving birth, and she’d found no way to ever escape without using the pox. “It’s time to stop thinking about myself and do what’s right for the baby.”
“And that is?” Ward folded his arms, still grinning.
“I’ll do whatever you want, if you guarantee the baby’s safety.”
“Not a problem.”
“I just have a couple of conditions.”
Ward smirked. “And those are?”
“First, the birth has to be done in a very specific way. I can explain the details to Dr. Parker, but it has to be done right, or the baby will die.”
“As long as Dr. Parker agrees, and nothing violates our security.”
“Second...I need the baby to stay here with me. Live here with me, if this is where I’m going to live.”
“I’m not so sure about that, Jenny.” Ward’s face hardened, his smile gone.
“She’s my own baby.”
“And we have to think about her health and safety, don’t we? You could be deadly to her. Like you were to your own mother.”
Jenny wanted to snarl at him, but she kept herself looking calm. Nothing for me, everything for the baby, she reminded herself. “But I can’t just give her up.”