The Truth About Us

After settling onto her bed, she pulled out her laptop and typed the P.I.’s name into the search engine, then waited, drumming her fingers against the mattress in nervous anticipation as the results loaded. His business page turned up at the top of the page, but as she scrolled down, her heart leaped as she read.

Several articles boasted similar headlines. Private Investigator Found Dead—Body recovered from the bottom of a reservoir.

A chill curled in her toes, shooting through her entire body. The date on the article was from ten years ago, around the time her grandmother would’ve been digging up their family tree and supposedly uncovered “the secret”.

She swallowed as she clicked on the article, scanning for the facts.

Late Thursday night, the body of a middle-aged, Caucasian male was pulled from the reservoir in Newberry Township, Virginia. Police identified the body as missing Private Investigator Greg Lawson. Authorities have ruled Lawson’s death a homicide and continue to investigate...

Found dead? Homicide? GG had mentioned the evidence he found was gone. Never had she imagined it was because the guy was murdered.

Abby’s head spun. His murder couldn’t possibly have to do with her grandmother...could it?

With trembling fingers, Abby shut her laptop, unable to continue reading. A creeping sensation pricked her spine, but she tried her best to ignore it and, instead, focused on easing the anxiety swirling in her chest, stealing her breath.

Lawson was a private investigator. He probably worked on hundreds of cases. Surely, he had a list of enemies. Nothing indicated his death had anything to do with their family secret, and sure, the guy’s card had been found in her grandmother’s car. But Abby had no concrete proof this Lawson guy was even the man she hired. She could’ve hired anyone.

Right?

So why did her grandmother have his card? And why did the timeline fit? If it was all a coincidence like she wanted to believe, why was there an invisible dagger twisting inside her stomach?

Abby dropped her head into her hands. She wanted to believe Lawson’s death had nothing to do with this. Though she’d like to think this whole secret thing was some scavenger hunt from the grave to make her grief more bearable—a puzzle to solve or a distraction—deep down, she knew otherwise.

Lawson was murdered, and Abby couldn’t shake the feeling it had to do with whatever her grandmother hired him to find, which meant he discovered something someone didn’t want him to know. And in order to keep him quiet, they killed him.

CHAPTER SEVEN

April 11, 1943

I remember how the Krakow Ghetto woke before dawn. It was March14, nearly a month ago. Yet that life, the one in which I enjoyed the safety of my home, even in such tumultuous times, felt like a lifetime ago.

Sometimes, at night, I still hear their voices—the Gestapo commanding, “All Jews outside. Hurry!”

The streets filled. Men, women, and children all gathered together, the crowd so huge by ten o’clock we were sweating in the streets. Children cried for a drink of water. A couple of elderly men were clubbed for breaking rank. By noon, the sun was so hot on our backs, we were drenched in sweat and grew weary, our expressions—our spirits—growing grimmer by the minute.

When the orders came to leave and the gates to the Ghetto opened, a ripple of excitement ran through the crowd. Along with my parents, and my two younger sisters, we walked with the mass of my people—cousins, neighbors, teachers, bakers, shop-owners, bookkeepers—out of the metal gates and in to the streets, down a road, and past a field where cattle cars waited.

Gestapo gave orders to load the cars. Eighty-five people per car. We packed in like sardines, given little more than some bread and a few pails of water as they inspected the bars on the windows to ensure everything was properly sealed, that no one could escape. They informed us before closing the doors that if less than eighty-five were in the car upon arrival, one person in every car would be shot. Like a lottery, they would choose the lucky winner.

The doors closed with an ominous thud, a piercing wail of the whistle, and off we went as the wheels ground into the tracks. Though we had been tired and hungry and scared, in those moments, most of us were simply relieved to be on our way. Rumors had circulated of work camps for months. Some tales were darker than others, but many of us denied such stories of camps where Jews were being slaughtered by the hundreds. Such horrors could not exist in such modern times. Could they?

After two days, the heat in the cars became intolerable, stifling and reeking of body odor, urine, and excrement as people had no choice but to relieve themselves where they stood like caged animals. By the time the cars stopped two days in, we had run out of food and water long before. Hope soared. We prayed that we had finally reached our destination. Surely things would be better once we had.

One of the men by the window strained to see outside. He described what he saw. Metal gates with high tensile fence and barbed wire, multiple buildings, and guards. Then he read the sign, “Auschwitz.”

We were relieved. Some even cheered.

How stupid we were. Or naive. Or both. We should’ve fought. We should’ve run as fast as our legs could carry us the moment they opened those doors, even if only to be shot...

The ominous grinding of the door rumbled as light filtered in, blinding us. We were ordered outside. Men and boys to the left, women and children to the right. It wasn’t until then that we saw the smoke. It burned our nostrils as we lined up, stoking the fire of fear in our hearts.

Off in the distance, SS. Officers stood guard, weapons poised, their message clear. If you try and run, you will be shot.

I surveyed our surroundings, noting the row of guards surrounding a ditch with rising flames. Off in the distance, more smoke. Dark and thick, it curled from the long chimneys of a large brick building. The choking scent of burning flesh filled the air.

Fear wrapped around me and squeezed as several Jewish prisoners dressed in baggy, shapeless clothes approached, yelling at us to move and separate as instructed.

I glanced over at my mother and sisters as they shuffled to the right, along with the crowd. My mother’s tear-filled eyes met my father’s and an understanding, some unspoken truth, passed between them. She blew me a kiss—the best she could offer in our situation—then scurried into the throng of women with the girls. It was the last time I would see my mother and sisters. Her air-kiss, this simple sign of affection, was the last I would ever receive, and I would think about it and how I didn’t reciprocate for days and weeks to come.