“Alina, you already have the cast on,” he said very gently. “Henry has arranged this for us only because of that film. There is no other way.”

“But we could...” I started to protest, but my voice trailed off. We could... What? There was no more plaster, and no way to get our hands on any more. If we took the cast off, we’d have to think of another way to smuggle the film out—and this one thing had been difficult enough to arrange. Tomasz reached to touch my chin, lifting my gaze back to his.

“Saul can’t go on his own, Alina.” His gaze flicked behind me, then he added softly, “He’s broken, my love. He’s barely holding himself together.”

“But...what if you never find me?”

“Alina,” he said, very softly. “Don’t you know by now?”

“Don’t say it,” I choked, and I shook my head fiercely. “Don’t you dare say it when you’re putting me into this truck and sending me off by myself.”

“But, Alina,” Tomasz whispered, and he lifted his hand to press the pad of his forefinger against my lips. “It is the only truth I live by. Everything else is gone. We are made for each other...meant to be together. It doesn’t matter what happens in this life or the next, Alina. We’ll always find our way back to each other.”

“But what if you can’t find me?” I wept, and he brushed my tears away and he said very quietly, “Just promise me one last thing...” he said now, his eyes flicking briefly to the crate behind me. “Take good care of Saul.” Tomasz tucked his forefinger under my chin, prompting me to meet his gaze. “Promise me, Alina. He is a good man—a better man than I am. Think of the people he can help with the skills he has. You must take care of him for as long as he needs you to.”

I never could say no to Tomasz, especially not that day. I could tell by the stubborn set of his jaw and the fierce determination in his gaze that these things he was asking of me meant the world to him.

First, I had to walk away from him—and if that wasn’t already an impossible ask, then, I had to continue his work in helping Saul to escape.

“Promise, Alina?” Tomasz asked me one last time. I closed my eyes, because I couldn’t look at him while I did so, but then I nodded. “Good girl.”

He reached forward and kissed me again then. This kiss was different from any other we’d shared. It was a plea, a promise, and a farewell. When we broke apart, he was softly crying, and my heart was threatening to pound its way through the wall of my chest. I wanted to beg him to find any other way, but I knew it was pointless to do so—and besides, there was no time left for cowardice.

I crawled into the crate then, and as I’d feared, it was tiny, barely a foot wide and the width of the truck across. The scent of the pine and of dust was overwhelming. There would be enough room for us both to sit, and enough room for us to stand at a crouch so we could turn around if we needed to. I sat behind Saul and closed my eyes. Just then, I felt Tomasz reach inside to press two fingers gently against my lips.

“What is your name?” he asked me. “Your new name.”

My mind was blank and I began to panic all over again.

“I don’t know, Tomasz. I already don’t remember. I can’t do—”

“Hanna Wis´niewski,” Henry called impatiently. “Repeat in your mind until it sticks, Alina. Learn it.”

“You learn it too,” I said, frantically clutching Tomasz’s hand before he could withdraw it. “You’ll need to know what name I’m using so you can find me. Right?”

“I have already memorized it, my love. Your name is Hanna Wis´niewski,” Tomasz whispered. “Travel safely, Hanna.”

“I will,” I said, as bravely as I could, given I was only just holding the sobs at bay. “I’ll see you at Buzuluk.”

And then Tomasz and Jakub sealed the door, and Saul and I were trapped alone in the darkness.

“Are you okay?” I whispered to Saul.

“Do you think this is how they feel?” he whispered back. I could hear the rising panic in his voice.

“Who?”

“My family in that grave,” he said, his voice a little louder now. “The suffocation...the darkness...it would feel like this, wouldn’t it?”

Every muscle in my body tensed. For a minute, his words sent me into such a spiraling panic that I almost convinced myself that I was in a grave—but I forced myself to push down the panic and return to the present reality.

One breath at a time, Alina.

Breathe in. Oh! I found some air!

Breathe out. That will be the last of me. Now I will suffocate.

Breathe in. Oh! There is a little more air after all.

“No.” I choked out the words he needed, even if I didn’t believe them myself at the time. “I don’t think this is how they feel. I think they are freed from feelings like this. I think they are waiting for you on the other side, and they are safe and at peace.”

I felt him relax then, even though his only answer was a muffled sob.

CHAPTER 34

Alice

As Zofia and I begin our second trip toward Trzebinia, she chatters as she drives—falling automatically into tour guide mode. I keep zoning out as she’s speaking. All of this information really is interesting—but the truth is my mind is elsewhere.

I’m thinking about these wide-open days ahead of me, and the fact that I have absolutely no idea what to do with them. And even more disturbing, Mom’s words on the phone last night are swirling around my mind, giving me all sorts of crazy ideas.

Sometimes you have to smash the damn door down.

“What’s the plan?” Zofia asks me, when we turn off the highway into the little town. I sigh and lean back in my chair. I’m about to say I don’t know, but then it occurs to me that in all of the places we visited yesterday, only one revealed a lead.

“To the clinic again, please,” I say.

* * *

I ask Zofia to stay in the car this time, hoping that Lia will be more open to me if I go in to the clinic alone.

“Cousin to cousin?” Zofia suggests with a grin.

“Something like that,” I say. I’m sick with nerves remembering how determined Lia was yesterday that she couldn’t help me, but I force myself to march into the clinic. Lia actually groans when she sees me in the reception area, and I hold up my hands as if that will placate her.

“Come with me,” she says abruptly, and she swipes the headset from her head to throw it onto the desk.