Woman on Fire by Lisa Barr

Author:Lisa Barr
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2021-12-17T00:00:00+00:00

Twenty-Two

BERLIN, 1938

ARNO BAUM KNEW that Anika was not expecting him to come to the apartment that night. He was supposed to be spending the evening with his family, his wife and their two daughters. Not his mistress and their son. But he couldn’t sleep. The pressure, the worries, the constant fear. The dire political situation was worsening by the day. Jews were being targeted everywhere, and the Berlin branch of his family’s bank had been seized by the Nazis the week before. He’d gotten word that the Munich branch was next. He had tried everything in his power to protect his banks and his family. But bribes and payoffs were no longer enough to pacify those monsters. He had to get his family out of the country immediately. But what of Anika and the boy?

Tossing and turning, sweating between the sheets, Arno got out of bed, put on his clothes, and snuck out of the bedroom while his wife was sleeping. He needed to see Anika, to feel her beautiful body wrapped around him one last time. He yearned to forget his problems for a few stolen moments. And then, he would tell her tonight that he was leaving.

As he drove to the apartment in the Prenzlauer Berg neighborhood, his heart ached with a pain so profound that he could barely drive. His best friend, Otto Dassel, a top executive at Hugo Boss, was secretly working on securing safe passage for him, Evelyn, and their girls to Switzerland. Otto . . . he thinks, how he got caught up in this Nazi mess I will never understand. The goal was to pay the Nazis’ mandated “flight tax”—25 percent of all his earnings—and leave Berlin by week’s end if all went according to plan. Tonight, he would urge Anika to take the boy and leave Germany right away as well. It didn’t matter that she wasn’t Jewish. None of it mattered. She was his mistress; the boy was his. Anyone who lived in her apartment building knew about them—the Jewish banker, his celebrity mistress, and their bastard son. Anika was in danger. People throughout the country had lost their minds and their hearts. He had no doubt that someone would turn them in. They needed to move fast. Arno patted his coat pocket, which was thick with cash. She would have more than enough to get out safely.

When he arrived at the apartment, Anika didn’t answer the repetitive knocks at her door. He didn’t like to intrude on her, even though he had a key. He respected her space. She was that kind of woman. But it was late; perhaps she was already in bed. Changing his mind, he used his key and quietly opened the door, entered the foyer, and stopped cold when he heard laughter and Beethoven coming from the guest room at the far side of the large apartment. His stomach lurched the moment he perceived a man’s voice above the music. Anika was not his wife. He had no claims on her.

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