Chapter 2: Espionage is a Dangerous Game

**Calvin’s POV

Captain Calvin Taylor looked up from the map he had been examining to the woman’s photo. She was staring off in another direction, completely unaware that she was being photographed. The question of what she had been thinking in that moment kept coming back to him.

The photo was black and white and yet somehow you know her eyes are green, her shoulder-length blond hair as soft as a baby’s. Her uniform was perfectly pressed and just as sharp as the look in her eyes.

He wondered how she had handled the switch from those forest green uniforms to the rigid grey of the Nazis.

Calvin lit a cigarette, and still staring at the photo, reminded himself that she would soon be getting on a boat to come home. And when it docked, he would be there to meet her, and he would have the photo tucked away in his pocket.

At the right moment he would ask Erika Engel what she had been thinking. She had no trouble lying to the Germans, but she would tell him the truth, of that Cal was certain.

*

The Nazis held many fanatical views. One such view was the way they revered wolves. Hitler and his inner circle were no strangers to the occult, and they had an almost religious zeal about wolves. From the top down, wolves were to be honored.

For this reason, Erika knew that there was no chance of being shot, even if one of the guards spotted her as she approached the intelligence compound.

As it turns out, when she arrived a delivery truck was rolling slowly through the main gate. The guards never saw her as she slipped up beside it. They kept the compound dark for fear of Allied bombers crossing the English Channel and pounding their emplacements.

The Germans knew they had a mole in their operation. Even if they hadn’t pinpointed her, if they had narrowed it down to one of the women, they would be closely watching the women’s barracks.

There weren’t many women. Most of them were glorified secretaries. She and one other woman worked in the map room.

All of them had access to valuable information such as detailed intelligence, often orders pertaining to troop movements. That was mostly what she had been sending back to England.

When the Normandy invasion took place, those boys on those boats were going to need to know where the Germans were most heavily entrenched so they could avoid those sections of beach.

Since the Nazis might be looking for a female mole, once inside, Erika made for the men’s barracks.

She found an open door and hurried down an empty corridor to the men’s shower area. There she shifted into her human form, naked, muddy, the taste of blood still strong on her tongue.

Erika quickly showered and then retrieved the clothes and bugout bag she had carefully hidden in the ceiling amongst the plumbing on the off chance that this very situation might arise.

She brushed her teeth, rinsed her mouth with cold water and dressed. Getting in had been as easy as a stroll in the park. Getting out was apt to be a whole different matter altogether, if not for the help of Corporal Peter Fischer. He would be in the kitchen this time of night, peeling potatoes for breakfast.

Erika stepped out into the corridor wearing her uniform—a grey knee length skirt and jacket over a white shirt and black tie. On her head was a cap that she hoped hid the fact that her hair was still damp from the shower.

She took a step and her heels clicked loudly, the echo carrying back to her a second later. She considered removing them but decided against it. It was better to appear confident, like you belong, when you were caught somewhere you were not supposed to be.

Erika moved easily through the barracks, steering clear of the rooms with the bunks. Men who had late night patrols would be getting the last hour of two of sleep for the day.

There had been no men in the common lounge when she’d come by the first time and luckily there were none now. What surprised her was the fact that she had encountered no guards. That could be good luck, but she doubted it.

Erika stepped out into the night and walked briskly to the mess hall. Her suspicions were confirmed. The mess hall was an above-ground building with windows. She peeked in the kitchen and found a man in a long coat and two guards speaking with Peter Fischer.

Peter was just a kid with no allegiance to the Nazis. He went where he was told and did what he was told. And if he was guilty of anything, it was for thinking as he was told.

But even that wasn’t enough for her not to dislike him.

He was often told to go to one of the nearby towns and secure several bottles of port from one of the local taverns for the senior officers. She had befriended him, and he had developed quite a crush on her.

Erika had encouraged this by touching his hand when he would open the door for her on nights when he ran these errands and let her come along. Her hand would linger on his and he would blush.

Later she would thank him for the ride with a peck on the cheek and he would blush even more.

Often, she would insist on being dropped within walking distance of the estate that Volker had requisitioned for himself, a palatial mansion about six miles from the base.

Peter never asked any questions about why she insisted on being dropped off along a dark stretch of country road, no house in sight.

The last time she had visited Volker, instead of merely giving Peter a quick peck on the cheek before stepping out of the vehicle, she had pressed her lips gently to his. She placed her hand on his cheek and as her lips lingered, she felt his body go rigid.

She could almost feel his face blushing under her fingers.

“Please be careful, Peter,” Erika had said. “If there is bombing, you go underground. If there are enemy soldiers with guns, you tell them you are a cook and not a soldier.”

His eyes were swimming from the kiss. His voice cracked as he said, “Are these things going to happen?”

“I don’t know. I just know that if they do, I want you to be safe.”

With that, she had departed the vehicle and hurried off into the night, knowing that Peter would not tell anyone she had been with him. Erika was knew that there were few people you could trust in war, but Corporal Peter Fischer was one of them.

This man grilling him was Gestapo. Peter would never volunteer information, but Gestapo agents were no more human than she was. And they could be far more deadly, more brutal than any wolf.

Erika wanted to shift to her wolf on the spot, crash through the window and tear those three men to pieces before they could hurt Peter, but that was out of the question. Volker had information that if in the hands of Allied forces, might save thousands of innocent lives.

Maybe Peter Fischer wasn’t innocent. He did wear the Swastika and had pledged his allegiance to Hitler, but she was convinced that he was as innocent as any German soldier. But he was also only one man . . . one kid. There were many that could be saved if she could get to Volker.

She would have to find another way.