CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
HAZEL
‘I should be happy about leaving.’
Hazel didn’t care who could see them. She stood on tiptoe and threw her arms around Harry’s neck, kissing him boldly on the lips. It would be the last time she’d ever see him, and engaged to be married or not, she was going to kiss him.
‘You should definitely be happy about leaving,’ she whispered in his ear, holding him tight. His body was warm against hers and she wished she’d been brave enough to kiss him days earlier. Perhaps then she’d have been able to spend more time with his arms encircling her.
‘If anything changes, if you ever want to find me . . .’
Hazel pressed a finger to Harry’s mouth. She couldn’t think about him once he’d gone. She didn’t need to be wondering what if and being miserable thinking of him if she ever made it home. All she wanted was the sweet memory of his kiss and the warmth of his body against hers when he held her.
Harry shuffled back a step and she hoped she hadn’t leaned on him too hard. He was still limping badly, and she was certain he was gritting his teeth and braving the pain so she wouldn’t worry about him.
‘Here’s my address,’ he said, passing her a scrap of paper from his pocket. ‘Memorise it then throw it away. Please.’
Hazel took it from him and stared at it, committed the address to memory immediately.
She stood still when he leaned back in, his lips soft as he stole one last kiss. He held his mouth to hers and they stayed like that, her tears trickling down to meet their lips. When he stepped back this time, he fanned his fingers down her cheeks and gave her a glimpse of his dimpled smile.
‘Goodbye,’ he whispered, fingertips brushing her arm before falling away.
She nodded, biting down on her bottom lip. ‘Goodbye.’
He limped away from her then and she stuffed her fist against her mouth, biting down on her own knuckles and staring at his back as he left. Harry never turned back, never looked at her one last time, and she held that memory of his smiling face in her mind as she fled back up to the attic. The men that had taken him were trustworthy, they were good at what they did, and so long as he managed to keep up, he’d be gone by nightfall.
There was nothing left for her to do, but the attic felt like her safe place. She lay down on the small bed up there and tucked her body into a ball. She’d been strong for months, and now she felt so hurt, it was like a knife had been embedded in her stomach.
Harry was gone, and instead of being overjoyed at him being safe, she was miserable. It was selfish and stupid, but it was the truth.
It was dangerous for them to have another shipment so soon after the last in the same location, and they were all starting to get nervous over the lack of contact from Rose, but they needed the weapons. It was too soon to know whether something had gone awfully wrong or whether the delay had simply been inevitable, but it wasn’t stopping any of them from worrying. And Hazel hadn’t received any information back that suggested something had happened. Which meant she needed to stop worrying and stay positive. Rose was alive, she had to be, and all her fretting wasn’t doing anyone any good.
She listened in to her radio, smiling when she picked up the soothing voice of the BBC presenter. She stretched out, eyes shut, hearing every word even though to someone else she might look as if she was asleep.
And then she heard something that changed everything.
‘Sophia!’ she screamed, forgetting her usual muted tones, the fact that she always spoke quietly and quickly, and only to her intended audience, not the entire house. ‘Sophia!’ Hazel scribbled down the words, the poetry that she was certain meant . . . She sucked back a breath and went through it one more time. It had only taken her minutes and she was certain of the meaning.
‘What is it?’ Sophia asked, breathless as she suddenly appeared at the top of the stairs, leaning in the doorway.
‘It’s happening,’ Hazel whispered, hardly able to believe it. ‘They’re going to be landing in Normandy soon. We have targets to attack, and we’re to disrupt as much as we can before and during the invasion.’
Sophia’s eyes widened. ‘You’re certain?’
‘Yes, I’m certain!’ Hazel said excitedly. ‘Tell the others. They must do as they’ve been instructed.’
Sophia turned and took a step down before spinning around. ‘I wish we knew where Rose was. I don’t feel right.’
Hazel knew exactly what she meant. ‘We need to stay safe, Sophia, in case there are urgent messages to be sent out.’
She nodded. ‘I’ll brief the others, you stay tuned in. And then rest a little. We need you well rested before all this starts to happen.’
Hazel doubted she’d ever be able to fall asleep now, but Sophia was right. Her heart skipped a beat as she carefully put her headset on, groaning when the transmission faded and she had to try to fiddle with her radio again. She needed Rose to ensure she could keep getting messages out, and most of all, she needed to know her friend was still alive.
Hazel stirred. She stretched out an arm, surprised to see darkness surrounding her. How long had she been sleeping? She’d doubted she’d be able to get even a wink of sleep, but she’d obviously been more tired than she’d realised. She went to sit up, swinging her legs down, and froze.
There was thumping. Then a bang. She stayed still, listening to her own breath pushing in and out. What was going on down there? Was that what had woken her up?
Hazel carefully put her feet down, not making a sound. She padded softly across the floor and listened at the door, wishing she hadn’t shut it properly. She didn’t dare turn the knob. Something was wrong. Something was happening down there that shouldn’t be.
She kept her ear tight to the timber. And then her blood ran cold, her skin instantly turning to ice, every tiny hair on her body standing to attention.
The muffled bang was unmistakable. She stifled a scream, the silent call for help caught in her throat.
They’d been found. There was no other explanation. When she heard another bang, this one louder, followed by screams and shouts, she knew they were under attack. Suddenly gunfire exploded downstairs, and Hazel leapt into action. She grabbed for the radio, pulling it apart. They couldn’t take the radio; it was the only piece of equipment that was truly crucial. It might need fixing, it might not be reliable, but it was still a valuable radio and she wasn’t going to let anyone get their hands on it.
She hastily took it apart, knowing she couldn’t take everything with her. It wasn’t pitch-black yet, so she was able to see enough, but the truth was she knew the machine so well that she could have figured it out with her eyes closed.
Hazel turned, scanned the room and decided to hide some of the pieces. She ran to the window first, cringing as more gunfire echoed out from downstairs. She pushed the flimsy curtain aside, looked down and gasped when she saw the commotion. There were Germans everywhere. She definitely wouldn’t be able to get the radio out, because her chances of getting away from the chateau herself were . . . She dashed back to the radio pieces. She knew it was unlikely she’d get away. The only positive was that the Germans were wasting their time here instead of preparing for the landings, which meant the intelligence must have been correct. They couldn’t know where and when it was happening!
Hazel stashed one part under the pillow on the bed, then another piece high in the wardrobe, standing on tiptoe to reach it. After scurrying over to the bed and pulling it out, yanking hard with all her might, she packed the rest of the radio in her satchel. She pulled up two loose floorboards and stuffed the satchel inside, then replaced the boards and hefted the metal legs of the bed back across the floor. The noise would have alerted anyone to the fact someone was up there, but they’d have eventually come looking anyway.
Hazel glanced around the room, knew there was nothing else she could do. She could have taken the pieces of the radio and strewn them outside, getting rid of them individually, but she had to believe that someone would survive, that one of her own would come frantically looking for the parts she’d hidden. If Rose returned and they were all gone, she would be able to transmit at least.
She pushed the curtain aside again, praying that no one would see the movement. The only light now was from the moon, sitting high in the sky and illuminating the roof for her. She pushed the window open and climbed up, the narrow opening almost too small to squeeze through. The roof was steep and she had no idea how she was going to safely clamber down, but her only other option was to open the door and walk down the stairs into certain death.
She looked down and wished she hadn’t. It was like the night she’d jumped from the plane into France, only then she’d had a parachute to stop her from falling and smashing all her bones.
She heard shouting and loud footsteps, knew they were coming upstairs. Hazel fought the urge to freeze and await her fate, half sliding, half scrambling down the first part of the roof. Her feet crashed into something hard, the jarring feeling shooting up her legs and through her body, but she didn’t pause. A gunshot echoed out, a bullet whirring too close to her for comfort, and she glanced up, knowing they were on to her whereabouts.
Hazel scurried as fast as she could, staying low, sliding down the next part of the roof and then wriggling. She dropped, hands scrambling for the downpipe as she slid the rest of the way. It gave way, breaking and sending her spiralling to the ground, and she landed with a loud thump on the grass below. The wind came out of her with a big gasp and she struggled to inhale again, but she didn’t have time to stop and feel sorry for herself. She rolled over, used her hands to push herself up and staggered away, running towards the wooded area, arms pumping as she sprinted for the trees. She saw others, knew she wasn’t alone, but they were shooting back, retreating but probably trying to find somewhere safer to position themselves. She had nothing. No gun, no knife, nothing. Her training had taught her to kill a man with her bare hands if she had to, and she’d already proven to herself that she had the guts to do it, but nothing was going to help her against men with guns, men who were hunting her and every other Resistance member.
There was no way she was getting out of this. She was as good as dead. If they caught her, she’d never say a word, which meant days of pain before they’d finally kill her.