She quickly looked around, hoping to catch sight of Adelaide, but there was no one there. The plan had been that she would lure Wolfgang away under false pretenses and his men with him, then meet them once he’d left. It had been an ambitious plan, and one that involved deceiving him into believing there were British soldiers holed up in the opposite direction to where they were going, and Cate hadn’t liked it any more than Elise had. And their backup option, if Adelaide couldn’t get away from him, was that she’d discard her red scarf on the tree by the meadow she had often disappeared to with Wolfgang. That would be Addy’s signal that she wasn’t coming, that she’d had to stay with him instead of coming back. It was the worst-case scenario; or at least it had been, because none of them had imagined that she could ever betray them. Not sweet, quietly spoken Adelaide, who’d been the one to save them all in the first place. But part of the plan had also been that she would tell them when she was leaving, so they could time her. Instead, she’d just slipped out without anyone knowing, and had never come back.

“Come on, let’s go,” Harry said.

“I’ll be the one giving orders,” Elise snapped, pushing past him to lead the way. “You’re the one who landed on my doorstep in the first place, and you suggested Addy go to that godforsaken Nazi, so forgive me for not wanting to hear the sound of your voice just now.”

Jack’s fingers brushed past Cate’s then, their knuckles grazing, and despite how angry she’d been with him she caught his hand and held it for a few steps, needing someone, something, to take hold of. She knew Elise wasn’t really cross with Harry, she needed someone to blame and he was an easy target for her to be angry with.

Because if Adelaide had done the unspeakable . . . Cate shuddered. It didn’t matter what anyone said, she wouldn’t, couldn’t, believe it.

“Are you all right?” she asked, not sure if she was imagining the strain on his face.

Jack said nothing, giving her only a tight smile in reply.

“Jack?”

“I’m in pain, that’s all,” he said. “Something isn’t right inside me, hasn’t been right since I started bleeding on our walk here.”

She nodded. “We just need to get you to that boat. Even more reason to get moving.” Cate refused to think about all the things that could be wrong with him, even as her mind started to race. But it was a flash of white that distracted her in the end.

“Elise, look! There’s Oscar!”