“I just received a call, from a schoolmate in Salzburg. He said Gestapo agents are coming back here to search for missing treasure from Vienna.”
The pounding in her heart resumed. “When are they coming?”
“He didn’t know.”
The Gestapo agents wouldn’t find Luzi’s space etched into the wall, but if they searched the grounds, they might find the heirlooms buried in the forest.
“Where is Max?” she asked.
Hermann took off his corduroy cap, his blond hair clumping to his head. “Hiding in the mountains.”
“He wouldn’t tell anyone.”
Hermann shifted his hat. “Not unless something much bigger were at stake.”
She reached for the post. Had they forced Max to talk for Luzi’s sake?
Her mind raced, trying to determine what to do. “We have to move the things.”
“They’ll search every crevice in this place.”
She turned slowly toward the chapel, an idea brewing in her head. “Can you help me with one more project?”
“Of course.”
Annika didn’t recognize either man who stood on her doorstep, each dressed in the brown shirt and red band that required no introduction.
The other agents who had visited from Salzburg had been somewhat polite—apologetic, even, when they insisted on searching for Max—but the agents this morning offered no apology. It was quite clear that they and the men waiting outside in their black vehicles, four of them parked in the courtyard, were going to search the estate whether or not she wanted them here.
If she could keep them in the forest, searching, Luzi would be safe inside.
“You are hiding things,” the senior agent said. Not a question, a proclamation that he clearly believed to be truth.
Annika steadied her voice. “Your agents already searched the house.”
“Where is Herr Dornbach?” the younger man asked, a trickle of grease seeping down his jaw, pooling at his collar.
“Max Dornbach,” the elder clarified.
“I don’t know,” she said. “Perhaps in Vienna.”
The younger one moved closer. “Are you Luzi?”
She blanched. “No, I—”
How did they know Luzi’s name?
“She’s the caretaker’s daughter,” the elder said as if she hadn’t an actual name. Then he turned back toward the other cars and curled his arm up like a hook, as if he’d caught a fish.
The men tumbled out of the cars and began scouring the property. Two more of them stepped toward the house, ignoring Annika when she said their men had already searched every room in the castle. They started in the kitchen, pulling out drawers and rifling through the cabinets as if she’d hidden treasures in the flour or sugar bins.
Luzi, she prayed, would be safe in her hiding place.
As the agents stormed into the dining room, she feared the worst had come to Max. If so, he could no longer protect his things... or the child who belonged to him.
Would these men search until they found Luzi? The Nazis, it seemed, would stop at nothing to find those who eluded them.
What would they do to Annika if they didn’t find her?
