Cruel Summer

Chapter 1

A/N: Right off the bat, I'm warning you about the tags and about the fact that in the first several chapters of this book and until Meg gets to Thorpe Abbotts, there is talk of, implications of, and memories of sexual assault, abuse, and marital abuse. That being said, if it makes you uncomfortable, please do NOT read it. I'd love to hear your thoughts as we start off the story and where you think this is going, how you think it's going to come together, and any questions you may have! Thank you!

When Rolfe Schneider finally rolled off of Marguerite Lewis and abruptly turned to go to bed, she was still shaking. For a moment, it was all she could do to just lay there and stare up at the ceiling, coming down from her painful disassociation. It was better that she just lay there and take it, pretending to be a good wife, an obedient and subservient piece of property to her husband—than to be a human being with a will and spirit of her own.

The fire in her legs would eventually subside—the pain inside of her would dull and she would continue on every day, like she had for the last three years of her life. Anyone could do it, it was just acting, after all.

Except most acting wasn't liable to get you killed.

In the back of her mind, she remembered what it was like to go up in the air—to ride in her father's personal plane with her brother. She scarcely remembered what it was like to be just Meg , to be safe and whole with her family. It had been so long since she had sold herself in pursuit of a cause to protect her people.

Now? She wasn't even sure who her people were.

It felt like she was flying through a storm, no end or eye of the hurricane in sight. There was no way out, just the feeling of falling, of crashing, of failure . And failure was a death sentence for her.

Even the simple act of inhaling was tortuous for the woman with bruises painting along that pretty throat of hers. It took a moment of just staring there at the ceiling before she could bring herself to get out of bed—to walk the distance between the bedroom and the bathroom. As she crossed the floor, pain shooting down from her pelvis and into her thighs, Meg wished she had tears left to cry.

But the first time that it happened—back in 1937, when she was with her mother—Meg had sobbed for what felt like days. And her mother told her that she couldn't afford to be weak. Couldn't afford to shed tears over the monsters that stole away her body and her safety.

She hadn't cried since then. And she wouldn't cry now. Not when the silence was a thick poison in the air, wrapping around her and threatening to drag her under the waves where she would surely never be seen again.

Meg washed the bodily fluid and other scum from her body, an ache building in her muscles. There was no escape, no way to get out, no way for any of this to end. She wondered, as she stood there in the cold water, listening to the bombs go off in the distance, if she had ever had a different life than the one she had right now. It felt like a dream, or a dream of a dream—something so far out of reach that she would never be able to find again.

And when she stood bared in front of the mirror, unable to even recognize herself in the mirror, she wanted to scream, wanted to rage. She wanted to punch and crack at the mirror—at the image of the dutiful Nazi wife. Because that wasn't who she was, not at her core. But she was starting to lose grasp on the person that Meg Lewis used to be.

Was there any part of her that was real? Who was she?

A pitiful and pathetic wife who was property . What had she become in service to her country? To her people? What were the facts?