Super extra long chapter edition!
Chapter Twenty-One
Lacrimae Rerum
Aldbourne, England
July 1944
Karolina had two weeks before she flew to France and was determined to live as much life as she possibly could during that time. The more she poured over the papers regarding the liberation of Paris, the more she realized that her odds were stacked. She probably wouldn't be coming back from this.
She had thought the same when SIS had informed her of the invasion of Normandy, but something about the Paris plans – of which there were none, really, just a blind trust in Karolina's ability to figure it out as she went along – raised her hackles. There were no listed contacts to meet with when she arrived in the city. There was no planned hour or day in which the coup was to begin. 'Gauge the level of discord and act accordingly', Tar had written in the margins of the overview sheet clipped to the inside of the folder. It felt like a set-up. It felt like someone in the SIS was washing their hands of her.
There was no reason to share her fears with anyone. Ella hadn't been invited to partake in this assignment and had reacted poorly to not being able to tag along, but at the same time she hadn't seemed too despondent – Karolina had pretended not to notice the amount of time she was spending away from their room and in the company of Bill Guarnere. In the past she would have told Nixon, but now there was a silent iciness between them that Karolina couldn't seem to break down, and the rest of the men didn't need to know sensitive Allied intelligence. Solitude reared its ugly head once more, except this time there was sinister note to it, punctuated by her inability to share her worries.
The morning that the men and the two spies loaded up on a C-47 for a quick trip across the Channel to England, Karolina went on the hunt for Richard Winters. She had packed her trunk and dragged it down the stairs to the luggage pile that would be shipped across the water, and she wiped her hands on her pants as she surveyed the crowd of men in the street in front of her. No tall redhead to be seen. She turned on her heel and walked east towards the bombed-out café that served as the Officer's HQ.
The doors and windows of the building had long disappeared and now resembled an open bar of sorts, one that was occupied by men lounging against the stone steps and packing papers into boxes. She peered into the dim interior and saw Winters in the back corner, holed-up with Welsh, Buck, Nixon, a replacement from Fox Company, and of course, Speirs. Karolina stopped with one boot on the first step, immediately locked eyes with Ron and turned directly around and began to walk back to the hotel.
She didn't get very far.
"Hey!" Nixon's voice called behind her, and she quickened her pace. "Alright, slow down."
She didn't stop until he jogged after her and touched her shoulder softly. He looked annoyed and concerned, and she reflexively stepped away from him, as if the distance would lessen his discomfort. He grimaced but didn't close the gap between them. "What are you up to?"
Karolina stared over his shoulder at a crumbling church. "I wanted to brief Winters on an important matter," she said.
Nixon raised his eyebrows. "Does it have to do with Paris?"
"Keep your voice down."
He rolled his eyes and shoved his hands in his pockets. "You didn't feel like telling me?"
She hesitated. "I…" Didn't think you would care? Or, didn't think you would want to hear, after everything I've told you so far?
"Forget it," he said, his mouth a tight line. Karolina's stomach sank – what had she done now? "Come on, I'll go get him. You can talk in the café, away from the others." He turned his back to her and quickly walked away. She followed him at a distance.
Buck smiled when she reappeared in the café and intercepted her before she could reach the other officers. "Looking for me?"
She snorted. What a ridiculous man. "No, I am not," she said, and Welsh snickered behind him.
Buck slapped a palm to his chest. "You wound me."
Karolina weaved around him and stared directly at Winters, ignoring the predatory look Speirs was giving her. "Lieutenant Winters? May I have a word?"
He had the grace to hide his surprise. "Of course." Winters handed a rolled up map over to Nixon with a significant look, and motioned behind him at the back alley of the café. Karolina stepped ahead and passed Ron, feeling his glare on the back of her neck and trying her best not to betray her urge to turn around and sock him in the eye. That could wait until later.
Winters closed the door behind them and leaned up against the wall, taking the weight off of his injured foot. Karolina fished a cigarette from her sleeve and motioned towards his bandage. "How is that doing?"
Winter shrugged and looked down at his leg. "It's a pain in the neck, but it's fine." His gaze traveled up to her forehead. "I see the stitches are gone."
"I took them out," she said, lighting the cigarette. "They were itching."
"If Roe hears that, he's going to blow a gasket," Winters said with a knowing smile, and Karolina shrugged. "So, what's up?"
She crossed her arms and stared up at the blue sky as she exhaled. "I do not think I am coming back to the company after Paris. This is not because I am running away." She narrowed her eyes as Winters looked away guiltily. "Despite what Nixon tells you, I am no coward. I do not run away."
"He, uh, explained the situation," Winters said, his neck going red.
"Regardless," she continued. "This task has been given to me because the SIS does not want me anymore. When I leave England, I do not expect to return."
Now he was concerned. "Are you telling me that they're specifically sending you to Paris to be killed?"
She nodded slowly. "To be killed purposefully, or to be killed because the task seems impossible." She took a drag from her cigarette. "I have not decided what the true intent is behind this mission. But it is too difficult for one person to complete successfully, even too difficult for me."
The silence hung between them for a moment before Winters stepped closer to her. "Then you shouldn't be going, that's not right, that's cruel."
Karolina smiled a full smile, teeth bared, and Winters straightened up. Oh, these sweet Americans. "The British do not care about morality like you do," she said. "They love to do things neatly, and this is a very neat way to dispose of me. I am a weak point for them. Do you think when the war ends that they will admit that a German helped them win?"
Winters was blinking rapidly, absorbing all of this. "The point is that you need to make plans if I do not return," she continued. "You must destroy all of my belongings. You need to let Ella go and not try to stop her. She is more dangerous than she seems, and the British will want her disposed of as well. I want her to be protected."
He swallowed dryly. "We can do that," he said, nodding to himself. "But how will we know…"
"If I am alive, I will find you," Karolina replied, flicking the ash from her cigarette. "I found you before and I can do it again." Winters smiled softly at that. "But if not, if it has been months since you have heard from me, destroy everything."
Winters looked like he had plenty to say about that, but after a few seconds of struggle, he simply extended his hand out towards her. Karolina let out a breath and grabbed his palm firmly. He grimaced but nodded. "I can do that."
She squeezed his hand. "Thank you, sir."
As soon as the trucks took them from Uppottery and dropped them at Aldbourne, Karolina spent every moment of her spare time walking around the countryside, sitting in little meadows on a blanket and reading any book she could get her hands on, laying in the sparse sunshine and trying very hard not to think about death.
She picked up her official uniform from the laundress on the corner - who at first refused to serve her, called her a Kraut and spat at her feet - and brought along extra money as a tip. The woman was a little more gracious after Karolina handed her the shillings.
She went to visit the horse she had met on her runs, and when the farmer who owned the stables saw her leaning against the pasture fence, he let her into the paddock with an armful of hay and a curry comb. She spent a peaceful hour chatting with him and listening to his stories of Ypres and the Somme and the good German boys who carried his stretcher when he was hit in the legs. She kissed the horse on the nose before she left.
She spent time with the men, sitting with them during meals and asking them about their friends and families and their favorite things to eat, their first kisses and how they would treat the replacements when the first shipment of new men arrived.
"Can't trust any of them unless they were at Toccoa," Bill said one day over peas and meatloaf. "Except you of course, doll."
On the fourth day, she went and found Nixon. He had commandeered what had been their little office in the stables and had set up shop, reclaiming all of his paperwork and maps and plastering them on the walls. She knocked on the door one afternoon when he had his head down and was reading over a thick pile of memos. He looked surprised and she tried not to let that hurt her.
"Hi," he said, pushing aside the papers.
She leaned against the door frame. Bumblebees were whizzing through the camellia bushes behind her, and the sun was warm on her back. She tried to memorize that feeling for later, when things wouldn't be so pleasant. "Do you hate me?"
Nixon sighed and pushed his chair away from his desk. "No, I do not hate you," he said bitterly. She raised her eyebrows, and he shook his head. "I don't hate you," he said again, a little more gently this time. "You just… really frustrate me, alright?"
She folded her arms across her chest. She wasn't very good at apologies, but she didn't have many more opportunities to make things right. "I do not hate you, and I am sorry that I told you all of those things and made you uncomfortable, and I am sorry that I make you uncomfortable now, but I wanted to tell you that I am going to miss you, probably, when I go, and I like you very much and you have been kind to me, and -"
He had stood up from his chair when she had started speaking, but then had walked towards her and grasped her shoulders. He was hugging her now. "Shut up," he said, so she stopped talking and very carefully rested her hands on his back. "Stop talking like you're not coming back. You always do that. I hate it."
"Okay," she said, and he held her tighter. "Thank you for not hating me."
"I said, shut up," he replied, and this time she did.
Ron was back where he began, back to square one: he was in Aldbourne, preparing for war, again, and he was suspicious of Karolina but still intent on following her wherever she went, again. But this time he was filled with a jealous rage that he could name, identify, and assign to a definite source: he didn't like the way Buck and Lewis were looking at Karolina lately.
Forget the fact that he shouldn't care about how anyone felt about Karolina if he disliked her so much. That wasn't the point – the point was that he recognized his own past feelings, his own thoughts, and his own motives in the way the other two men behaved around her. And that drove him crazy.
He had been walking down the street when he saw Karolina and Nixon standing next to the stone wall outside of their slapdash office space. He ignored them until out of the corner of his eye, he saw Nixon drape his arm around her shoulder and pull her towards him. Ron waited for her to shrug Nixon off, to step aside. Instead, she leaned in, wrapped an arm around his waist, and knocked him sideways with her hip.
His pulse throbbed in his neck as he watched Nixon poke her in the side, watched her try to squirm away through the laughter, and she was truly laughing, louder and freer than he had ever heard. Ron had never made her laugh like that.
And then there was Buck Compton. Compton had clearly started a campaign to win Karolina's approval through sheer physical closeness – at meals, he always tried to sit right next to her and engage her in conversation, and during PT exercises he ran right beside her, keeping up a constant stream of whispers in her ear that made her shake her head in disapproval. The Karolina he knew would have scowled and ignored the man, but now she just rolled her eyes and allowed him to prattle like an idiot schoolgirl, even smiling a little now and then. Something was changing. Something had to be going on.
And that's how Ron found himself standing in Nixon's doorway once again, except this time he had a few questions for the man himself. Nixon was working on a map of the new Normandy coastline when Ron made it to his front step, and the Nixon looked up at him with an incredulous, somewhat dismissive expression.
"Well," he said. "It's been awhile. Can I help you with something?"
Ron studied him. He was still drinking based on the circles under his eyes and the paleness under his beard. He seemed to be thinking of something else, something that was bothering him, and his eyes were distant, almost melancholy.
"What's going on?"
In the past, Nixon would have sighed and humored him and divulged the pertinent information he wanted. But Ron was met with a stony expression and a look of strong dislike. "What do you mean?"
"Karolina," Ron said.
Nixon raised an eyebrow. "Don't you hate her?" he asked petulantly. Ron stared at him, gave him the crazy eyes that normally reduced other soldiers to a babbling mess, but Nixon turned away and went back to his maps. "Leave her alone, Ron."
"She likes you," Ron said. "She talks to you."
"Not really, no."
"I saw you two together," he said, unable to keep the distaste from his voice. "You're obviously close now."
Nixon cocked his head. "Ah. There it is." He dropped his pencil to the desk and it clattered on the smooth wooden surface. "Is this when you threaten to eviscerate me?"
"Yes," Ron said.
Nixon rolled his eyes. "You know, with the amount of lurking you do around here, I would have thought that you'd picked up on patterns of basic human behavior, but I suppose not." When Ron didn't reply, Nixon leaned back in his chair. "She's getting ready for another mission, Ron. I think she's trying to soak up as much happiness as she can before she leaves."
Ron stiffened. So she was leaving again. He had sensed that something was happening between her and Nixon after her outburst, but he had been too stubborn and spiteful to investigate. Ron wanted to ask where she was going, what she was going to be doing, who she was going to be doing it with, but Nixon had clearly reached the end of his rope. The man stood up and grabbed his cap from the table.
"Ask her yourself," he said, reading Ron's mind. "We're going out tonight, we'll be at the pub." He paused and looked Ron in the eye. "And this time, you'd better tell her what you're really feeling. You may not get another chance." Nixon's face grew stormy then and he walked off into the afternoon sunshine, leaving Ron standing in the doorway.
He had made up his mind.
"On the pleasant shore of the French Riviera, about half way between Marseilles and the Italian border, stands a large, proud, rosecolored hotel…" Ella paused, frowning. "Def-eren-ti-al palms cool its flushed…" She dropped the book onto the blanket. "This is too difficult!"
Karolina folded her arms behind her head and kept her eyes closed. "Keep trying," she encouraged. "The word is 'def-fer-ren-tial'."
"What does that mean?"
"Polite, submissive," Karolina replied. "Things you are not." She had rolled up the legs of her pants and the bottom of her shirt to feel the sun on her skin. They were sunning themselves in the old cow pasture that had been used as a training ground before they had been sent to Normandy. Now little pink and yellow flowers were blooming near the barbed wire fences and birds had moved into the trees, filling the air with their high-pitched calls.
"How can a plant be obedient?" Ella huffed. "Non ha senso."
"Keep going," she said. "Or, if you do not want to read, tell me what is going on with you and Guarnere."
Ella threw the book into the grass and flopped down beside her. "I like him," she said, her voice a content hum in Karolina's ear. "I first I thought he was annoying, because he kept trying to flirt with me, but then we started fighting and I enjoyed that."
She was going to miss Ella so much. "That is weird," Karolina said.
"No it's not!" Ella replied. "You and Speirs are weird."
"No we are not," Karolina said, opening one eye. "We are not anything."
"That is why it's weird! You like him and he likes you but you hate him and he hates you and it does not make sense, you should kiss him."
"Okay, get off of my blanket," Karolina said, pushing Ella into the high grass.
"Excuse me, this is my blanket!"
"Not anymore," Karolina said. "It's my blanket now." Ella tried to climb back on, but Karolina kicked her in the rear and the girl toppled over with a huff.
"How German of you," Ella said, and then threw a handful of grass on Karolina's face, and Karolina threw back her own handful of grass, and then they were rolling around, pinching each other and battling for command of the blanket, squealing and laughing and screeching and Karolina was laughing harder than she had in years.
"Tregua!" Ella said, holding up her hands.
"Nein," Karolina replied, sitting on top of Ella's back and bouncing slightly. "Noch nie!"
"Fine, you win," Ella gasped, and Karolina fell off of her and onto the blanket, which was now covered in blades of grass, and Karolina thought about her copy of Walt Whitman and whether or not Winters had found it in his trunk, and she wondered if he would burn that, too, when she never came back, and the sunny mood that had infected her was gone in an instant.
"What's wrong?" Ella said, picking grass out of her hair. "Is it Paris?"
Karolina crossed her legs and played with the frayed edge of her sock. "Yes, but no," she said. "It will be hard, being alone again." A lie, but only a small one.
"We will miss you," Ella said, and that we hit her harder than anything, because there were going to be people noticing her absence in Aldbourne when she left, people she also liked very much and wanted to be safe. Karolina leaned back her head and closed her eyes – she didn't believe in God, but she believed in something, and she asked it to keep everyone safe while she was gone. When she was gone forever.
"I will miss you, too," she replied, and Ella rubbed her shoulder.
That night, they went to the pub for the last time. Karolina's two weeks were up – she had one more full day, and then come Saturday morning at 0400 she was due on a Jeep to Uppottery. Ella was determined to fix up Karolina's hair into something beautiful, so she sat for thirty minutes without moving while Ella yanked and rolled her unruly, fizzy mane into victory curls.
"Going to make everyone jealous," she mumbled under her breath while she operated on Karolina's head. "More jealous than they already are."
"Is that a good thing?" Karolina had asked, but Ella shushed her and continued her work.
An hour later, she had painted her red lipstick onto Karolina's lips and stood back to survey her work. "Not bad," Ella said to herself. "Bill did say that they all liked the red lipstick, so…"
"Excuse me," Karolina began, but Ella shook her head and zipped up the back of her dress and led her down the road by the arm.
Karolina was having the strangest sense of déjà vu. "I hope no one gets stabbed tonight," she said offhandedly, and Ella erupted into a fit of laughter, and soon she joined in. She was feeling lighter, more buoyant than she had in a long time, and she wanted to laugh more, to dance, to drink and enjoy the banter and pretend that for once, she was a normal person and allowed to do those things. The girls synched their steps and clicked down the road to the pub, ignoring the catcalls of the men who passed by in trucks and the glares of the local women who were also on their way for a drink and a dance.
Inside it was crowded and smoky as always, packed to the brim full of men and a handful of local women doing their best to fend off multiple offers of drinks all at once. Bill Guarnere perked up his head when Ella and Karolina entered and weaved his way through the crowd. He slipped his arm around Ella's waist and she slapped his hand away.
"Ouch! Evening, ladies," he said, rubbing his skin. "Don't you look stunning?"
Ella simpered and Karolina grimaced.
"Everyone's been asking about you," Bill said, parting the crowd for them and elbowing a few ignorant soldiers out of the way. "They wanna celebrate your send-off properly. We didn't get to do it last time, ya know."
"I remember," Karolina said.
The men of Easy had commandeered the middle of the pub, squeezing tables together until they were all bunched up into an island in the crowded room, and they cheered when Karolina and Ella made it into their inner circle. Malarkey stood up and offered Karolina his chair and she took it with a smile.
"What're ya drinking?" Johnny Martin asked as he leaned across the table.
"We're doing shots!" Luz announced, and Karolina groaned as he slid down glasses of whiskey onto the table, splashing the liquor everywhere. "Oh c'mon, Karolina, you can do a shot."
"Just because I can does not mean that I want to," Karolina said as Skip slid a shot towards her.
"Cheers, doll," Bill said, clinking his glass against hers. "It's go down easier if you just do it quick."
"Prost," Karolina said with a grimace, and then she reared back and took the shot. It was awful, but the men goaded her on and Ella cackled beside her and she smiled and shook her head when she sat the glass down on the table. She scanned the room and spied the officers hiding away in the back, at the same table they had taken before the Invasion. Winters was sipping his soda, Nixon was deep in conversation with Welch, and Buck was staring directly at her. When she met his eye, he winked. She turned around quickly, and she could have sworn that she heard him laughing from across the room.
Ella wiggled her eyebrows. "I saw that," she said, taking a sip from the beer that Guarnere had brought them. She smiled as she swallowed. "He is coming this way." Karolina glared at her and Ella sniggered.
"Doesn't this look cozy?" Buck's voice echoed behind her, and Karolina turned to see him beaming down at her. He quirked up an eyebrow and placed his hand on the back of her chair. "Think you're up for a dance?"
"Yes!" Ella said before Karolina could open her mouth. "She's dying to dance."
Karolina could have slapped her, but Buck was already dragging her chair backwards. "Hey!" she protested, but he grabbed her hand and lifted her out of her seat, looking pretty proud of himself as he led her towards the dance floor. Wolf whistles echoed behind them as the men watched them go. "It's always the officers…" Malarkey whined.
Buck swung her around and caught her with a firm hand to her mid-back. "I promise no funny business," he said seriously, but there was a spark in his eye that Karolina didn't entirely trust. She realized that he was a skilled dancer after a few turns, and she felt herself relaxing and gave him a little nod. He did have a girl back home, after all. Theoretically, she was safe.
"You dance fairly well," she said, and he scoffed.
"'Fairly well'? I'm a prodigy, honey," he said. "Won UCLA's swing dance competition two years in a row. We could give it a try?"
Swing dancing. Now that took her back. "I used to go to the wild clubs in Berlin, in secret," she said. Why are you telling him this? "Snuck out a night, went to the jazz dives when they were forbidden. I was a good dancer myself."
Buck drew her an inch closer. "Really? I never would've guessed." He twirled her, and the dress Ella had leant her fanned out prettily. Buck tightened his grip on her when she returned to his arms. "Wish I could have seen that. I'd love to take you out dancing."
She raised an eyebrow. "Where? California? Or Berlin?" He laughed loudly and the neighboring couples turned to stare at them. Karolina flushed, but she had to admit it was nice to envied, to be wanted. It was so foreign.
"Wherever you want," he said, but then he sobered up a little. "Oh, Christ."
"What?"
He wrinkled his nose and glared over her shoulder. "Nothing, let's keep dancing," he said, but she turned to look at what had caught his attention, and there stood Speirs on the edge of the dance floor, sending Buck a look that insinuated a very painful death if he ever got his hands on him. Ella smiled defiantly and stood up from her chair, placed a hand on Speirs' arm and whispered something in his ear. The man went dark red.
"Ignore him," Buck said, swallowing. "Keep dancing. Don't let him spoil it."
Karolina found herself agreeing. "He is going to kill you," she said conversationally. Buck rolled his eyes and pulled her in until she was flush against his chest and then dipped her quickly. Karolina leaned her head backwards and sent every ounce of I-am-going-to-skin-you-alive energy towards Ella, who just crossed her legs and smiled smugly.
Buck pulled her up and she saw that his expression had changed – far from being upset, he now looked devilish. "I don't like the way he looks at you, like he owns you," he said. "You can do whatever you want."
No, I can't. She didn't say it aloud. "He has a temper. If he is angry, it's because of you."
"You know what will really make him blow his top?" he whispered in her ear.
Karolina stepped back and gave him a look of warning. Her heart was beating in her throat. "Don't you dare—"
But Buck didn't listen – she already saw his eyes on her lips, and she leaned away. He shot one last defiant look at Speirs, cradled her face in his hands, and kissed her fully on the lips.
Her mind went blank as she processed that his face was touching her face and that it wasn't unpleasant, and her limbs froze in place. "Holy shit!" someone said – Skip? Luz? – and then she found her arms and pushed Buck backwards, breaking away from him. She stood there for a second and looked at the red lipstick on his mouth - which he touched softly with his fingers, grinning like he had won the lottery - and then she reached back and punched him straight in the eye.
Buck's head whipped sideways and the men behind her exclaimed with loud shouts of secondhand pain. She looked over her shoulder at the table of men and they scooted their chairs backwards, clearly unwilling to be the next target of her wrath. Ella stayed in her seat, swirling the drink in her hand and smiling widely, enjoying the drama.
Buck straightened up, his hand plastered to his eye, but he smiled knowingly. "Interesting. I actually liked that," he said, and Karolina gave him a withering look before she elbowed her way through the crowd and exploded out of the bar.
She was fuming. It had felt like a violation, and no one had ever really kissed her before, and she resented that people had seen him do it, and now other men would assume that she was the type of woman who let men kiss her whenever they wanted. The night had deepened outside and she didn't know what time it was, but she was going to stalk back towards her room and throw every one of Ella's personal belongings out of their window. Someone grabbed onto her wrist, and she swung around to slap another soldier who thought they could put their hands on her but stopped her hand. It was Speirs.
He looked as if he had a fever. There was a maniacal glint in his eye and he was out of breath. She had never seen him so incensed, and her gut instinct told her to step away, to give him some space, but he latched on to her other wrist and held her in place. They were in the middle of the road but he didn't seem to mind, and so she stood there, frozen, while she watched his face morph from fury to despair to a crazed intensity.
"Did you want him to kiss you?" he said finally, and it didn't sound like a question.
"No," she said, and he nodded to himself, dropping her wrists and reaching for his side arm before turning away. Karolina snatched at his bicep before he could get out of reach. "Do not hurt him."
Ron looked at her as if she were out of her mind. "He touched you," he said, as if he were speaking to a child. "Without your consent."
"I agreed to dance with him," she said. She tightened her grip on his arm, sliding her hands down to his wrist. "He was making a joke. To provoke you. He is a fool."
Ron stared at her. "Do you..." He sighed and ran a hand across his hair, his body radiating frustration. "Jesus Christ, do you?"
"Do I want him to live? Yes," she said with huff. It wasn't what he was asking, she knew, but she didn't want Buck to die just because she didn't want him. Ron looked down at her hands and slowly set his free one on top of her fingers. "I am sorry."
He stared off into the forest on the side of the road. "I should be apologizing. I didn't know. That you were leaving, I didn't know that. I just saw them... acting differently, I saw you acting..." He turned to look at her face. "You're going to Paris."
"Yes," she said with a nod, and then her voice caught in her throat, and she reached up to feel her neck, that strange tightness, and she realized that her heart was beating like crazy, and she looked over at him and her palms began to sweat, and she could feel her pulse in her jaw and oh mein Gott, was war los...
Ron had gone very still, so still that she noticed a freckle in his eye. She felt possessed, as if she had left her own body and was watching from somewhere vaguely above her head. She felt her arm move as she reached up, carefully placed her hand against his cheek, felt the stubble of his day-old shave and stepped closer, and Ron was frozen, his eyes wide as she leaned in and looked closer at his irises, which were both green and brown, and beautiful. And then he snapped.
His hands were around her waist, heavy and warm and he leaned his forehead down to hers. She could smell his aftershave, and she pushed forward and gently pressed her lips to his. She stayed there for a second before pulling back, reading his stillness as disgust, and she could feel the heat of her blush on her neck and looked down at her feet.
Ron blinked. He took a deep breath. And then he grabbed her hand in his and dragged her over towards the alleyway between a neighboring cottage and an old barn. Karolina stumbled in her heels, and he slowed down slightly so that she wouldn't fall.
They reached the shadows and he stopped and turned to look down at her. "I am sorry if -" she said, but then his hands were in her hair and he pushed her backwards until she met the wall. He wrapped a hand around her waist.
"Stop apologizing," he said hoarsely. He tilted her chin up towards his face and kissed her.
When she had lived in Berlin, she would listen to the stories the girls would tell when they came back from their dates, stories about shy boys and gentle kisses stolen on buses and taxis and the delicate way the boys would hold their hands and stroke their hair and kiss them lightly on the cheek, as the Reich said was proper before marriage.
This was not that. This was rough - his stubble scratched her upper lip and cheek, and it hurt but the pain was fine, she didn't mind the pain - and urgent in the way he was invading her space, and his hand was gripping her hair, holding her head back, and she felt her hands separate and weave around his waist, hanging on to him tightly. This kissing made the back of her knees tingle and her chest feel hot, this kind of kissing was possessive and needy and a far cry from what the magazines had told her to expect, from what actors did in the movies. She pressed herself closer to him, part of her brain telling her not to and the other part saying fuck it, fuck it, fuck it, you're going to die anyway, you're going to die alone. Ron grabbed her and pulled her closer, if it was possible, and he broke away only to press his lips below her jaw, and Karolina heard herself making sounds she didn't think would ever come from her mouth, sounds that would probably embarrass her if she were capable of caring.
"Don't leave," he was mumbling against her skin. "Don't leave again, don't leave me..."
She closed her eyes. Her heart felt as if it would burst. "I do not want to," she whispered, and she realized with a shock that she was telling the truth.
He pulled his face away from her neck and smiled at her and it was victorious. He traced her cheekbone, her jawline, the bridge of her nose with his index finger, his eyes flickering over every freckle and scar, his lips pressing against the thin white line left behind by the stitches. "You're mine."
She tried to swallow and found that she couldn't. She was breathing as if she had run a mile, and she ran her hands up his chest and into his hair. It was so soft, softer than she thought a man's hair would feel.
He traced the pulse point in her neck. "Say it."
"Du bist mein," she whispered.
He seemed to understand - Ron pressed his face into her hair and held her tighter. "If he touches you again, I'll kill him." She stiffened, but he didn't budge. "You're not going to Paris. You're staying here, with me."
She stood on her tiptoes and looked him in the eye. "Kidnap me, then."
He hummed to himself and pecked her softly, a far cry from the violent kisses before. "Don't tempt me." He placed his hand on the side of her throat and rubbed his thumb over her skin. "We could go to Ireland. The isles up in Scotland. They wouldn't find us."
She closed her eyes. "They will always find me," she said. She had to tell him her fears, her suspicions about Paris and her imminent death, but when she opened her eyes, he looked happier than she had ever seen, and she couldn't. "Why did you hate me so much?"
He sighed. "I didn't. I wanted you, even when I didn't like you. I had to have you, I think about you every day." Ron stopped and ran a hand through her hair, combing out her curls. "You're one of my kind," he said, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. "I wanted to be like you."
She wanted to touch his lips, so she did because she could, and he smiled. "I wanted to be like you, too."
"Fate," he said, and then he ducked down and kissed her slowly, and this time she was ready, and they stayed there in the dark until Karolina began to shiver from the cool night air. Ron took off his uniform jacket and draped it across her shoulders and walked her back to her billet with his arm around her waist. He kissed her again by the front gate, holding her against him.
"Tomorrow," he ordered. "Meet me in the pasture after lunch. And then we're taking a train to Wales."
She smiled against his lips. She felt lightheaded, giddy, and she could see that he didn't want to leave her, so she let go of his hands dashed up the front steps of the cottage and closed the door.
Karolina thought she had done a great job of silently sneaking in past a sleeping Ella and taking off the dress and crawling into bed, but once she had settled and the room had gone quiet again, she heard the box springs shift as Ella rolled over.
"You're welcome," Ella said into the darkness, and Karolina sat up and immediately began throwing pillows across the bedroom. Ella began to laugh, open and clear and joyful, and Karolina buried her face into her pillow and smiled so widely that her cheeks hurt.
Karolina woke up the next morning and pressed a hand to her chest. She felt as if she was going to burst, and there was a curious welling inside her ribcage, one that made her take a shaky breath and want to scream.
Calm down, Shutze. But she couldn't. She wanted to throw on her clothes and go find Ron and roll in the grass with him. She felt her cheeks with the back of her hand. Definitely hot, feverish even. Was this how she was going to feel from now on? If so, she was doomed.
She looked up to see Ella had gone, once again rendezvousing with Bill Guarnere, and Karolina let an indulgent smile spread across her face at the thought. Everything seemed less trite, more frivolous. She got out of bed and looked at herself in the mirror. Her face was irritated from Ron's stubble, and she patted the redness with her fingers. Her eyes were brighter and there was a hint of a smile on her face.
She had a free morning. A walk was not out of the question - who cared if it was misty and cool outside? She had to get rid of this nervous energy that made her want to bounce around the room. Maybe Nixon was awake. Maybe Nixon would like to walk with her.
She turned to get her pants out of her trunk, and then she really looked at the clothes and papers piled inside from the previous day's packing and was hit with a pain in her stomach that made her sink down to the floor. Oh, Christ, she didn't want to go, she didn't want to leave, things had become so wonderful, impossibly good - her friends liked her and Ron was hers and everything was going well for once in her life. She rested her forehead on the floor and took a deep breath to stop the shaking. She was falling apart.
"I don't want to go," she said to the floorboards. "Please. I don't want to go."
She counted to ten and pushed herself up with her palms to look out the window. The mist was clearing. She dressed quickly, doing her best to ignore the trunk, and tied up her boots and nearly ran down the stairs of her billet and out the front door.
The morning was crisp and bright, and she nodded to the Easy men she passed on the street, who gave her wary, appraising looks. At first she was confused, but then she remember Buck, who she had forgotten in the swirl of emotion and touch and goodness, and she groaned internally. She should probably forgive him.
"Hey," a voice said behind her, and she turned to find Nixon following her up the road, dressed in PT gear and sweating from a run, or whiskey, or both. "What are you doing-" he began, but then he stopped in his tracks and stared at her.
"What?" she asked. He didn't reply, just tilted his head, his eyes narrowing. "What!"
He stepped closer. "Did you..." He began to smile. "You didn't. Oh Christ, no, you did..."
She pursed her lips. "I don't know what you mean."
"You're cheerful," he said in an accusatory tone. "You're never cheerful. You look lit up inside."
She avoided his eyes and turned to look down the road. "Were you running? You never run..."
Nixon grabbed onto her arm. "Did he finally do it?" he asked, a shit-eating grin on his face. "Oh my God, he did."
"Lewis," she said, mortified. "Enough."
"Do you like him?" Nixon asked. She looked down at her boots, and then glared up at him from under her lashes, and Nixon hollered so loudly that everyone on the street jumped. She grabbed on to him and dragged him down a lane, away from curious eyes. "Holy shit. Holy shit. Christ, my stomach hurts." He paused and rested his hands on his knees. "No more stalking, no more obsessing, Christ Almighty!"
Karolina was horrified. "Stop it, will you?" She kicked him in the leg and he yelped in protest. "Stop!"
"God, you two were forged in the depths of hell for each other," Nixon said, smiling as if he had been freed from prison. "You'd better keep this quiet."
"Well, I am trying, but if you continue to scream in the road..."
He pelted her with questions as they walked to breakfast, and she dodged every one of them. What had he said? "Nothing unusual." Did he threaten to kill Buck? "Of course, I can tell he has wanted to kill Buck since Carentan." Did he kiss her? "..." DID HE? "Enough!"
Ella was already feasting on what looked like gravy over biscuits in the dining hall when they entered. She sent Karolina a knowing smile and raised her eyebrows. "Sleep well?"
"No," Karolina answered shortly, and Ella chortled with a mouthful of biscuit. "This looks disgusting."
"Well, go get some and if you do not like it, I will eat yours," Ella said matter-of-factly. She took a gulp of coffee and patted the seat next to her, and Nixon plopped down in the empty space. They put their heads together and began to whisper conspiratorially, both with shit-eating grins that Karolina couldn't stand. She sighed and headed towards the food line.
Luz was standing with Perconte near the end of the queue and she said hello as she fell in behind them. They both looked her up and down appraisingly. "What?" she said, putting her hands on her hips.
"Nothing!" they both said, too quickly. Luz laughed nervously. "Just, you know, wondering who you're going to punch next."
"Anyone who touches me without my permission," she said bluntly.
Perconte widened his eyes. "Well, now that you mention it, could I..." Luz began.
"No."
He laughed to himself and shook his head. "One of these days, Lina, you'll see the light."
"Not in a million years," she said, but knocked his shoulder. He grinned at that and handed her a metal tray.
They shuffled down the line and stopped as an orderly came and lifted away the pan of gravy away from the hot plate. "What was wrong with that?" Perconte exclaimed. "It's half-full!"
Then man behind the biscuits shrugged. "New batch coming," he said, and then he looked Karolina squarely in the face. She ignored him until a few seconds had passed, and then she met his gaze - fair skin, brown hair, a little dumpy-looking. He held it for a minute before turning and disappearing into the kitchen behind him, and she furrowed her brow as a suspicious feeling crept up her back. She reached into her pocket to hold her knife, to reassure herself. Don't overreact. Just a bitter KP worker.
"Oh great, now the biscuit guy is gone," Luz said, throwing up his hands. "Fuck me, I guess!"
Karolina rolled her eyes. A blonde man came back with a pan full of fresh gravy, and a lumpy pile of bread and sauce was heaped on her plate and shoved at her from behind the counter. She placed it on her platter and grimaced. Ella would definitely be receiving this meal.
She returned to the table to find that Nixon had stolen an entire coffee pot from somewhere, and he and Ella were deep in a conversation that came to an abrupt halt as soon as Karolina walked into earshot. She dropped her tray onto the table and scowled. "Please, continue your discussion."
"Okay," Ella said breezily, reaching over and pouring Karolina a cup of coffee. "I was just telling Nixon that I saw you and Speirs disappear into an alleyway, so I should be the one to win the bet."
She stiffened, and Nixon widened his eyes at Ella. The Italian shrugged and flipped her hair over her shoulder. "What? Are we going to keep it a secret now?"
"Uh, yeah," Nixon said. "That's usually the nature of bets..."
"What. Bet." Karolina said. She could feel the heat creeping up her neck, and she took a glance around the dining hall to make sure no one else could hear them.
"Nixon and me had a bet on when you would fall for Speirs," Ella said.
Nixon glanced at Karolina from the corner of his eye and made himself busy with his coffee. She leaned her elbows on the table and rested her face in her hands.
"He said before Normandy, I said after," Ella said. She grabbed Karolina's biscuits and pulled them towards her. "So, you owe me twenty dollars."
"Absolutely not," Nixon replied. "I specified a time and date, and that was the deal. You never gave me a time or a date, so the bet is invalid on your end."
Ella cut into the biscuits, took two massive bites and rolled her eyes. "Wrong," she said, then coughed. "Coffee?"
Karolina slid hers over. She deeply resented the idea of a bet being made against her, that these two could have possibly known what she was thinking and feeling months ahead of time. "I hate you two."
"I love you -" Ella said, and then coughed again, harder this time. Nixon frowned and patted her on the back, but she waved him away and took another sip of coffee. "Ugh."
"Slow down," Karolina said. "Take a breath between bites."
Ella swallowed hard, her forehead furrowed. "Sorry," she said, clearing her throat. She lifted the cup of coffee to her lips, and Karolina saw her hand tremble slightly. Ella swayed in her seat a little and lost her grip on the mug - she dropped the coffee onto the table, sloshing the liquid over the tray of biscuits and gravy.
Karolina half-rose from her chair and placed her hand on Ella's shoulder. The girl coughed again, so hard that she splashed the food onto her lap, and she pushed back her chair with her hand around her throat and took a few steps before she staggered onto the ground. Her head hit the floor with a thunk that made Karolina's stomach turn over.
Nixon was out of his chair immediately. "Get a medic!" he yelled to the men in the hall, who had halted their breakfast, stunned, and then everything was swirling around them, people were yelling and running, and Ella was still laying on the floor, not moving. Karolina climbed over the table and fell to her knees beside her, lifted her up so that she rested against her chest and wiped the hair out of the girl's eyes.
Her neck was turning blue.
"Ella," Karolina said. "Look at me, look at me." The girl's hands went to her throat as she gasped for air, and then she began to shake, to convulse in Karolina's arms, and a thin line of blood ran from her nose and over her lips. Ella's eyes were wide, never breaking away from Karolina's, silently pleading for help, and she was trying to speak, trying to say something, but there was no air.
Nixon backed away and stood up. "Drop the food! Don't touch the fucking food!" The clatters of trays and coffee echoed throughout the room. He strode down the aisle before turning and coming back again, panicking. "Where's the goddamn medic?"
Karolina forced open the girl's mouth, tried sticking her fingers down her throat, but Ella convulsed again and began to foam at the mouth, her eyes bloodshot. "Fuck, no, no," Karolina kept saying, and Ella's eyes glanced between Karolina and Nixon, tears running down the side of her cheeks. Karolina held on to her as the girl's limbs twitched and flailed, and her mind could not process this, no, this couldn't be happening, not to Ella, who had never done anything wrong. There's nothing you can do. She pushed the thought away. The foam was turning pink, was running down her chin.
Roe came running into the hall, his footfalls shaking the wooden floorboards. "Outta the way," he yelled, pushing men aside and dropping his bag down next to Karolina. He grabbed on to Ella's shoulders and turned her head towards him, lifted her up and tilted her head back. "Hey, cherie, I got ya, I got ya, it's okay..." Roe looked up at Karolina, and the expression on his face confirmed her fears. Arsenic.
Arsenic poisoning is perhaps the cruelest punishment one can inflict on their enemy. It is quick, painful, and the victim is mentally aware throughout their death. It causes the windpipe to close and the stomach to bleed, and there is no cure, no way to stop Death once his hand is wrapped around their throat.
The biscuit. The new gravy. It had been meant for her. And she had given it to Ella.
Ella grabbed onto Karolina's hand. The fear in the girl's eyes was going dull, going inward to a place Karolina couldn't follow. She held on tightly. "It's okay, it's okay..." She heard herself repeating the words. Roe placed a hand on her shoulder, and she shrugged him off. "It's okay, it's okay. You are okay. It's okay."
Everyone had gone quiet. Karolina had been rocking Ella back and forth, hadn't even noticed, and she was so still. Karolina couldn't look. "It's..." The words died on her tongue. The silence rang in her ears.
The men had their hands over their mouths. "Lina," Nixon said, bending down and placing a shaking hand on her back. "Lina, she's go -"
"No."
Not possible. No, there wasn't a world without Ella in it. Not after everything they had been through. Not after what they had survived.
"Lina," Nixon said, his voice breaking, and she finally looked down.
Ella's face had turned blue, her eyes were open and bloody with burst vessels, and her mouth was slack. Karolina held on tighter. "No," she said to herself. "No." Her hands and feet began to tingle, and she sat back, cradling the girl to her chest. Karolina's face was cold. She was crying.
Roe sat back on his heels and spoke to Luz, who she noticed was standing next to Nixon, shock plastered over his face. "Go tell the team to get a stretcher in here," he said quietly. Luz nodded silently and disappeared into the crowd.
Nixon held onto Karolina's shoulders. "We need to let her go."
Not possible.
Men came with a stretcher, took Ella from her arms, and Karolina smoothed Ella's hair out of her face. "Please," she heard herself saying. "She is my friend. Please, don't." But they lifted her away from the ground and carried her out of the dining hall, and Nixon wrapped his arms around Karolina as she rocked back and forth on her knees.
"She's my friend," she said between breaths. "She's my friend."
She had destroyed their room. She blinked, looked down at her hands and noticed that they were bleeding, dripping red splatter over the carpet. Someone was pounding on her door, but she was frozen where she stood, looking at the mess that surrounded her.
The mirror over the dresser had been shattered, the beds ripped apart, her trunk kicked over, vases smashed, and the contents of tabletops swiped to the ground. Her throat felt raw, and then she realized she had been screaming, screaming so loudly that she had probably distressed the neighbors. She looked down at the gun in her hand. Where had that come from? It felt cool and comforting, and she scratched the back of her neck with it. Now her blood was on her cheek and neck. She closed her eyes.
"Karolina!" It was Nixon, and there was someone else, too, judging from the sound of the boots on the stairs. "Open the door!"
No.
She sat down on her destroyed day bed and pressed the metal of the gun to her face. It felt comforting on her hot skin.
The door rattled in its frame.
She wished they would leave her alone. Your fault your fault your fault YOUR FAULT YOUR FAULT. Her face crumpled, and she pressed the muzzle of the gun under her chin. She had told them. She had tried to warn them. You're not safe when you're around me.
The door burst open, and Karolina turned to see Nixon and Buck freeze in the doorway. Nixon's eyes went immediately to the gun in her hand.
"Lina," he said slowly, softly. "What are you doing?"
She stared at him, her hand steady. Nothing made sense anymore. His English didn't translate in her head. She readjusted her grip on the gun, and then Buck stepped into the room. She narrowed her eyes.
"Hey," he said soothingly. "Why don't you put that down?"
"Gehen Sie weg."
"I don't speak German, honey, remember?" He took another step into the room and she stood up. He quickly retreated. "Okay, okay, it's fine. I won't come any closer."
"Lina, please," Nixon said, stretching an arm out towards her. "Give me the gun."
She heard other voices, other people outside of the window, and tears prickled in the corner of her eyes. "Jeder verlässt mich, und es ist meine Schuld, meine Schuld ..."
Buck backed out of the room, and Nixon put his hand on the iron railing of Ella's bed, Ella's bed, oh God, oh God, oh God... "I'm not leaving you," he said. "I love you. Please put the gun down, Karolina, don't do this."
The floorboards squeaked, and Karolina looked towards the door. It was Ron. He was pale and his eyes were livid, and he walked right into the middle of the room, pushing past Nixon. Her resolve faltered as she took in the pain on his face.
"Drop it," he said quietly, his voice shaking. "Now." She blinked, and suddenly the gun felt so heavy in her hand, and she stared at him as she placed the gun on her destroyed bed.
He was across the room and in front of her in a second, and he grabbed on to her arms as her legs went out from under her. He sank down to the floor beside her. "Why would you do that," he said, his voice angry but frightened. "Why would you do it." He held her in his lap, and she turned her face into his shirt, and she was shaking, holding on to him as if he would slip away from her, too.
She heard Nixon stand. "I'll go get Doc," he said, and he walked out of the room and shut the door quietly behind him.
"Look at me," Ron said lowly, and when she didn't turn, he shook her a little. "Look at me!" She lifted her face, and he cupped her cheek, his hand firm. "Don't you ever, ever, do that again. Do you understand me?" She gulped and felt the rawness of her throat. There was pain behind his eyes. "Do you?"
"Yes," she whispered.
He wasn't letting go. "You're not going anywhere," he said under his breath. "Not without me. I won't allow it." He was so scared. It was the first time that she had seen him look scared.
"It was meant for me," she said.
His eyes narrowed. "Who was it?"
"Pale, brown hair, bad skin, overweight," she replied. "In the kitchen. He looked right at me. I should have known." She pointed to Ella's bed. "They sent me that. It was on my bed."
Ron reached over and picked up the heavy card stock. He held it up to the light, trying to decipher the thick, Germanic handwriting. "What does it say?"
"'Kapitulieren. Submit."
He dropped the card onto the floor and wiped the blood from her face. She was so tired. "Where's Ella?"
Ron sighed. "In the medical tent. They cleaned her up." He shifted slightly. "They made her look like herself again. I think a local woman lent her cosmetics."
"She's Catholic," Karolina said. Her head hurt so badly. "I want a mass for her. She deserves a mass."
Ron nodded. "I'll take care of it." He rubbed the side of her arm and dropped his face into her hair.
Footsteps on the stairs again, and then Roe was kneeling beside them. "Got something for you," he said, flicking a syrette, and Karolina stuck out her arm without hesitation. She flinched when the needle pierced her skin, but she settled into the warmth running through her veins, and then everything was dark for a long time.
Nixon watched Ron pick up Karolina and lay her down on the bed, careful to make sure her head hit the pillow, and then watched him stand there and rub a hand across his face. He turned towards Nixon, and the despair in his eyes radiated throughout the room.
Nixon turned and walked down the stairs and Ron followed. The small crowd that had gathered when Karolina had started screaming - so loudly that Nixon had thought she was being attacked, killed by whoever had tried to kill her this morning - had dispersed, and Nixon took out two cigarettes, lit them, and handed one to Ron. The man took it silently and dragged long and hard before exhaling.
"I'll go speak to Father Michalis," Nixon said. "I think there's a little Catholic church not far from here. I'm sure they would be willing to make accommodations, considering the... circumstances."
"She can't leave like this," Ron said, not hearing anything Nixon said. "They can't send her to France like that."
"They can and will," Nixon said, thinking of how much he wanted to knock Tar's head against a brick wall until it went soft. "I hate it. But they have the power here."
Ron was quiet for a while, and then he threw the cigarette to the ground. "They're going to kill her too, aren't they?"
Nixon stared at him. "They're going to try. The Brits, the Nazis - everyone is going to try."
Ron stared up at Karolina's window. Things were eerily quiet now. "Let them try," he muttered to himself.
She didn't cry when she helped put Ella into her favorite navy dress, ignoring the cold, stiff feeling of the girl's warm, tan skin. She didn't cry when the men of Easy carried the casket into the small chapel, with Bill Guarnere acting as the lead pallbearer, a look of disbelief on his face. She didn't cry when she kneeled on the cold stone floor and recited the prayers she had learned in Latin and German when the rest of the men spoke in English, and she didn't cry when they lowered the box that held Ella into the deep hole in the ground. She picked up a handful of dirt and sprinkled it over the casket lid while she gripped Ella's rosary tightly in her other hand, and then she left the church, holding onto Nixon's arm with Ron walking quietly behind her. Her hands and face felt numb. Only a strange throbbing in her heart let her know that this was all real, that it wasn't some horrible nightmare that she had dreamed up on her own.
She returned to their room, which had been cleaned and rearranged, and began to pack her things. Bile rose in her throat as she folded clothes absentmindedly. Tar had extended her departure time to the afternoon but hadn't come down for the funeral. He had a sent a large box instead, one that contained a proper German woman's uniform - dark grey jacket with a dark grey skirt that fell to the knees, grey leather gloves and skin-toned nylons, and a pair of regulatory brogues. She traced the Reichsadler that was pinned to her jacket pocket with her fingers, and she walked to the window, opened it, and threw up into the bushes below. It was her old uniform. They had gotten the bloodstains out somehow, but it was hers. It even smelled the same.
I'll never put you in a German uniform again. Liar.
Tar had also included a dissembled MP40 submachine gun, which did not fit in with her uniform, but she was thankful for something to defend herself with, at least. She locked her trunk, pulled off her black clothes, and numbly dressed herself in her new-old uniform.
It was funny how she hadn't forgotten the way the buckle didn't quite work, or the correct way to button down her sleeves. She remembered every single detail of the way it fit - the scratchiness of the iron shirt was familiar, the stiffness of the outer jacket one that she was used to. She placed her cap on her head, picked up the box of gun parts, and left her billet.
Was it insane to walk down an English street dressed in a Nazi uniform? She didn't care. She had a message to send to anyone who was following her, targeting her - this is where I come from. She would be considered dangerous. She wanted Ella's killer to know fear. They would know what it was like to fear her.
The roads were empty. Things had gone quiet after Ella's death. Skip told her that Bill wouldn't leave his bunk. Nixon said that Easy Company had been given a few days off of training for the shock to wear off. She held the box under her arm and strode towards the officer's headquarters.
Welsh and Buck were smoking outside when she walked up and they froze when they saw her standing at the gate. Their eyes were startled before they recognized her, and then their faces went blank. They stared as she walked past and entered the house. She didn't offer them a greeting.
Conversation paused when she opened the door and stepped inside. Winters, Nixon, Ron and Roe had all been sitting around the hearth, their heads together and speaking quietly, but now they looked at her with incredulous expressions. Ron stood up and pursed his lips, shoving his fists into his pockets. She had known that it would kill him to see her in a Nazi old uniform.
"When I first arrived, you wanted to know what I was," she said. She dropped the box onto the table in front of her and let it hit the table with a bang. Welsh and Buck walked through the open door behind her and she looked over her shoulder at them. "I had many secrets. Things I would kill if someone discovered." She took off the lid of the box. "Well, here I am. This is what I am."
Nixon stood up. "You're not a Nazi," he said quietly.
"No?" Karolina replied as she picked up the handle of the gun and screwed the barrel onto it. "You do not think so?" She twisted the muzzle onto the barrel. "I went into it willingly. No one forced me to kill people, but I did it anyway. That's who I am." She snapped the bump stock into place and held the gun by her side. "No secrets anymore. Secrets robbed me of Ella. Secrets are worthless now."
"Karolina," Winters said hesitantly.
She stared at the fire that crackled behind the grate. "I have been hiding who I was because I was afraid, because I wanted to forget, to be forgiven for what I have done. But I cannot forget. This war will not let me forget." She looked up at Ron, who nodded at her, who seemed to understand. "I know what I am. I know what I do. I embrace it. I want you all to accept it. Because I cannot survive if I stay the way I was. I have to be who I am, when all of this first began. That is how I will beat them, because I know them - I am one of them. I will crush whoever did this."
The men were silent. Welsh patted her elbow. "I believe you," he said.
"Good," she said curtly. "Now, I am going to go back to France. And I am going to kill them all."