Unhinge the Universe Read online

  No, of course not. Hagen wiped his face, not surprised his hand came away sweaty. He forced himself to breathe deeply and evenly, but the bone-grinding pleasure of this—even just the echoes—kept him wide awake although he should by all rights be out cold by now. “Funny thing is . . .”

  “Funny thing is?”

  “Can’t decide what feels better.” And he couldn’t. With a gun to his head, he wouldn’t have been able to decide which role he preferred.

  John leaned down, and his soft laugh whispered across Hagen’s lips an instant before John captured his mouth in a lethargic kiss. After what must have been a full minute, John lifted his head enough to break that kiss.

  “That’s the beauty of it, Hagen.” His lower lip grazed Hagen’s. “Like it one way, like it both ways.” Another soft brush of lips, and John spoke again, but by the time it made it to Hagen’s ears, John had already claimed another long, long kiss.

  And still, the words and their truth echoed in the stillness:

  “We don’t have to choose sides.”

  John heard plane engines again.

  They were closer this time, the aircraft tearing across the sky and right over the château. It was low enough—or at least large enough—to rattle the furniture, especially the chair still tilted beneath the doorknob.

  No bombs fell, though. The blessings of wartime.

  As the plane faded into the distance and John’s heart slowed, he became aware of the warmth beside him. Hagen was on his stomach, one arm under the pillow, one slung over the edge of the bed.

  It wasn’t dawn quite yet. The world was still and silent now that everything had stopped rattling. Servants were probably up and busy in the main house, and one or two might have been elsewhere in this one, but the air was still calm and warm with the collective slumber of everyone under one of the Madame’s roofs. No rush to get up, then. No need to move out of this room or away from Hagen.

  So John moved closer to him. This might very well be the last time they’d be like this (strictly speaking, it was the first time they’d been like this, too), so ruining the moment was not what John wanted. He gently traced the line of Hagen’s shoulders, not quite touching, but with his fingertips close enough to pick up the warmth from that strong body, down the slope to the small of his back. Flawless, unblemished; he should be photographed like that, a resting youth in the tradition of all the shepherd paintings cluttering up the salons of gentlemen and ladies who liked such a thing. Sleeping Amor. Young Spartan in Repose.

  John blew a breath across Hagen’s naked shoulders, and Hagen’s arm twitched—nowhere near the source of disturbance his sleeping mind likely thought it was. John grinned and was tempted for a moment to roll on top of him and repeat what he’d done last night, clutch Hagen’s hands as he fucked him from behind this time.

  But it was too risky—they’d get carried away again, just like last night, when they’d both fallen asleep without parting. What would have happened in the case of an alarm? Or if the driver had interrupted them, or listened, or . . .

  “Hey.” He traced his fingers across Hagen’s shoulders. “It’s going to be dawn soon.”

  Hagen stirred, turned his head toward him, blinked with sleepy eyes, and dropped back to the mattress. “I fell asleep,” he muttered in drowsy exasperation.

  “So did I. No harm done.” This time. He didn’t envy Hagen the new world of clandestine meetings and circumspection he’d shoved him into, but he assumed Hagen would be able to navigate these waters. Even where he was going. Hagen had been careful so far (minus this morning’s lapse), and John doubted that would change anytime soon.

  Hagen turned on the mattress and smiled. “I think I prefer this to getting kicked out of bed at midnight.”

  “Not if there’s a court-martial in the balance.” John pushed out of bed to get dressed because the alternative was to tackle Hagen, kiss him all over, and end up either fucking or getting fucked. And the latter—yes, wouldn’t do a thing about the soreness he felt from last night. One thing to have such an enthusiastic, strong lover who got carried away, another to sit a whole day in a Jeep speeding over French country lanes.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Be careful about this. All of this.”

  Hagen frowned at him. “Of course.”

  “Especially in the camp.”

  Hagen shook his head. “I wasn’t going to—” He stopped, then looked puzzled, maybe even hurt. “You think I’d . . .”

  “Look, I’m just making sure this—you and I, I mean—doesn’t get out.”

  Hurt. Definitely hurt. “And you really think—”

  “I don’t know what I think, Hagen.” John pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed. “A week ago, I didn’t think I’d fuck a damn Nazi, and now—” He dropped his hand, looked at Hagen. The comment had hit a mark John hadn’t intended to aim for. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—”

  “Go to hell,” Hagen snarled. He swung his legs over the opposite side of the bed, letting the mattress, the one still warm from both their bodies, stand between them like a line in the sand. He grabbed his trousers off the bureau. “Perhaps you’ll let me dress before you chain me?”

  John wanted to protest, apologize again, but the damage was done. It had been impossible to get under Hagen’s skin in the beginning. Now it was easy, too easy, and guilt twisted and knotted beneath John’s ribs.

  “It’s for appearance’s sake. We both know that.”

  Hagen shot him a look that denied any knowledge of anything whatsoever.

  John dressed, but he figured it might even be more merciful to let Hagen get on a ship in a huff, affronted and hurt in his pride. Easier for Hagen to let the whole thing go. There was simply no space for it in the middle of a war, not when taking into account who they were and where their paths would lead them from here.

  Being a combat trooper, Hagen dressed quickly, and was done well before John. He stood there, face schooled into impassiveness, while John was still wrestling with buttons. Maybe just to give his hands something to do, or maybe to remind John he knew damn well who they both were, Hagen adjusted the Iron Cross on his chest. Tugged at it, then harder, grimacing like the medal was cutting into his palm or threatening to stab right into his heart, before he let it go. A memory flickered through John’s mind of grabbing onto a medal not unlike that one and ripping it free, of the sound it had made when it hit the floor. The decorated major had flinched, and John was sure he’d felt triumphant in that moment, but now . . . now he couldn’t even place that feeling of triumph in the same space as that deliberate swipe at the man’s dignity.

  When John took Hagen’s wrists to chain him again—in front, so the man could eat breakfast—Hagen glanced at him, and John did not like the expression in those blue eyes, though he wasn’t sure if it was more hurt or anger.

  John went back into the small room to give the bed a slept-in look (any maid worth her money might still discover it’d been faked, but by that point, they’d be long gone), then came back out, packed what little they’d brought, and opened the door for Hagen. “After you.”

  Hagen gave him a look, quick and vaguely hostile, and then stepped out into the hall. All the way from their shared quarters to the dining room in the other house, the only sound was the steady rhythm of their boots on the hard floors. Didn’t matter why they were silent, John supposed. They couldn’t risk talking at this point. A captor making small talk with his captive wouldn’t look good.

  The dining room was empty. All the chairs that had been occupied last night were neatly pushed up to the table, which was bare, at least compared to the eviscerated carcass of a meal that had been there when they’d arrived. A few neat place settings were laid out in front of the chairs, and a pair of candles—the sticks alone probably equal in price to the Jeep outside—flickered in the center.

  The extravagant hardwood chair at the head of the table, traditionally the place of the mistress or master of the house, was conspicuously empty. />
  “The Madame regrets she cannot join you for breakfast.” The butler’s stiff British accent was somehow different this morning. John couldn’t put his finger on why, but the combination of the empty head chair and the slight difference in the butler’s demeanor unsettled him. Like those details were a pile of snow covering a sharp rock lying in wait to puncture a Jeep’s tire. The barbed wire around that sharp rock was the Englishman’s strained smile as he gestured at the table. “Please. Sit down.”

  John hesitated. His enthusiasm about a warm, home-cooked meal, likely his last one until God knew when, had soured in favor of the urgent need to get back out into the cold, onto that bumpy road, and away from this place.

  The butler took a step toward the doorway. “Please, get comfortable. The maids will be in shortly with coffee and a small breakfast.”

  Out in the countryside, rationing wasn’t nearly as punishing as inside cities, but the opulence suggested very different means, especially since none of the food in this place had likely ever been part of a ration book–regulated portion. John thanked the butler and settled, while Hagen sat down opposite, placing his handcuffed hands on the table, chain rattling against the highly polished wood as if in challenge.

  Before John could comment, the maids came in with tableware and silverware, offering tea and coffee, while the makings of a respectable peacetime breakfast took shape. Fine white bread, butter, cheese, ham, sausages, poached eggs, and other delicacies. Hurray for the black market.

  The butler lingered, maybe to be absolutely certain that his guests didn’t make off with the silverware, or maybe truly to ensure they had everything they needed or could possibly eat. And the first sip of that coffee made it very clear that, despite all the terrible ersatz and other improvisations, bean coffee could still be had by those with the means and the contacts.

  The hostess’s absence and the butler’s strangeness still didn’t sit right with John, but what the hell? He had brought a Nazi into the house. SS, for that matter. This was a war and Hagen was the enemy. And this was the best damned coffee he’d had in a while, so fuck everything else.

  Hagen’s chains rattled with every motion, occasionally clicking the plate hard enough that John worried it might chip. From across the table, Hagen glared over his coffee cup and deliberately dragged the chain along the edge of the plate.

  Go ahead, his eyes challenged. Do something about it.

  John did the only thing he had the energy to do: lowered his gaze and focused on the poached egg he was halving with the edge of his fork.

  After breakfast, they prepared to head out.

  John stayed behind Hagen on the way out of the lavish house, pushing him ahead, with the driver leading, but he could tell from the stiffness in Hagen’s shoulders that he didn’t trust anything or anybody anymore. Lots of good reasons for it, too, though John hoped that Hagen would eventually come to accept an apology. The pride of young men was easily ruffled, but better humiliated than dead.

  The driver poured more fuel into the tank and checked the wheels while John thanked the hostess—via her butler, again—and then they left the house. The other two Jeeps were gone already, twin sets of tire tracks the only evidence remaining that they’d been there at all.

  On the way out to the Jeep, his boots slipped a few times on the snow that had frozen solid last night. Potholes in the narrow road gleamed blue with sheets of ice, and level ground that didn’t appear to be iced over was treacherous and slick. Even more than the hostile soldiers who’d left earlier and the Nazis who might be out there in the war-torn countryside, the ice made him nervous. Boots and tires didn’t give a damn about standing orders, and if there was an order in place now to shoot SS on sight, the last thing any of them needed was to be stuck in a ditch or a snowbank somewhere.

  Hagen slid into the backseat of the Jeep. The morning sun glinted off the edge of his collar insignia peeking out of his coat. As John sat beside him, he wondered if it was wise to keep Hagen in an SS uniform under the circumstances. If only for his own safety until he could be handed off to a POW camp. But they had no other uniforms, and all three men needed every layer they had to protect them from the cold. It might be wise to remove at least his insignia, but he was pretty sure that would be against the Geneva Conventions, and he didn’t think Hagen would remove them of his own free will. Hagen was a proud man and, jaded though he was with the Third Reich, an officer.

  Well, hopefully he’d be safe as long as John was there.

  You betting his life on this?

  The Jeep bumped and slid through and around the frozen potholes. The snow-covered, skeletal trees up ahead drew closer, looming taller and taller until their interlocking branches closed over the road and covered it in sharp shadows that reminded John of bent prison bars.

  The road wasn’t so flat out here. As they headed down the mountainside, John nervously drew back against the seat, his heart skipping every time the vehicle lost its traction for even a split second. Twice, it fishtailed badly enough that they almost rammed into a snowbank. The third time, the snowbank came at them too quickly, and he had visions of rocks and barbed wire under the pristine white shell just before the rear wheel slammed into it.

  The driver spun the tires, spraying snow behind them but gaining no ground.

  “Damn it.” He glanced back at John. “We’re, um, we seem to be stuck, sir.”

  “So we are.” He eyed the snowbank, then the driver. Finally, he gestured to Hagen. “Make yourself useful, Kraut. Help me push this thing out.”

  Hagen glared at him, but obediently got out of the vehicle.

  The engine idled, and the soldier watched them in the rearview as they went around to the back. John had visions of the man’s boot on the accelerator, ready and waiting for the chance to speed off and leave them there.

  The Jeep didn’t move, though. Hagen and John stood behind it, braced against the frozen ground, and put their hands on the back.

  “Kraut?” Hagen said under his breath.

  “You want me to make him think we like each other?” John glanced at him. “Shut up and push.”

  “Fahr zur Hölle.” But Hagen pushed, and so did John.

  The engine revved. Snow and rocks sprayed their legs, one snapping just right against John’s kneecap to make him curse in several languages. They tried again. This time, the Jeep gained a precious inch, and the driver accelerated harder. More debris flew. Another inch.

  Finally, with a rooster tail of frozen mud pellets, the vehicle lurched forward and onto the road. John’s heart leapt into his throat; he was sure they were about to be left behind, but after a few yards, the driver stopped.

  He and Hagen exchanged glances. They brushed off, went around to the side, and got back into the Jeep.

  The Jeep began to move again, slowly and carefully around the treacherous switchbacks. On one side of the road, snow-dusted trees leaned away from the steep upward slope. On the other side, same thing, except the hill went down, rocks and dead trees jutting out from the underbrush. John tried not to look that way, especially whenever the Jeep slid toward that side of the road. More than once, the Jeep grazed the snow banked along the edge, and John white-knuckled the door beside him as he forced himself not to imagine what would have happened had that thick, frozen ridge not been there. It snowed all the time back home, but Indiana didn’t have mountains like this, and John didn’t imagine he’d breathe easily until he was back on flat terrain.

  They continued down the mountain. Here, the forest was denser all around. More undergrowth. More hiding places.

  From the corner of his eye, he thought he saw movement. When he turned, there was nothing. Still, he couldn’t shake the odd feeling creeping down the length of his spine. The frozen air seemed to tense. His skin felt taut, as if it had suddenly become too small around his body.

  Just my imagination. Nerves, that’s all.

  Another flicker of movement.

  He turned his head.

  It wasn’
t his imagination this time.

  As the Jeep rounded the tight curve, the rifle’s muzzle tracked it, and John didn’t think, he just did.

  “Get down!” He lunged at Hagen, shoving his head and shoulders down and shielding him as much as possible.

  Two shots cracked the stillness. Something punched John hard in the shoulder. Two more shots. Glass splintered. Something wet sprayed the side of his face and sleeve, landing on his coat with the dull percussion of rain splatting on a tent.

  He was dizzy. Disoriented. Something deep in his shoulder felt hot, heavy; the promise of excruciating pain.

  Then the Jeep bounced violently, jarring John, and he realized they were out of control. He glanced up. The windshield was a white spiderweb. The driver slumped over the wheel.

  Scenery blurred.

  Another gunshot.

  The Jeep fishtailed, spun, and John instinctively ducked to protect himself and Hagen. Everything stopped with a sharp, violent impact, and John was weightless.

  Hagen? He wasn’t under John.

  Nothing was.

  Another impact. Tumbling. Something snapped.

  One last impact, and everything was still. He couldn’t focus his eyes. He was on his side, and he tried to get up, but the something that had snapped was inside his leg. Upper leg. Shit. That wasn’t good.

  Fierce, hot pain radiated from his shoulder, but it was the eerie silence above him that made his heart pound.

  Hagen? Hagen, where are you?

  He blinked his eyes into focus and looked up the slope he’d fallen down, but it wasn’t Hagen he saw.

  Red snow.

  He followed the streaks and smears down the hillside and right to his own arm, and below him, a red pool slowly expanded from beneath him, eating its way through the snow.

  John tried to call out, but he didn’t have any air left in his lungs. The world spun around him. Was he falling again? No. Not falling. Not moving. But spinning. Somehow?