II

Japan in the springtime was breathtaking. Its skies wiped clear of clouds and roads lined with flowering cherry trees, pink and white blossoms dusting the pavement like snow.

The Axis Tour of 1955 marked Luka Löwe’s fourth drive down this very stretch of asphalt. But it was the first time he’d really noticed the beauty of the trees. Maybe this was because he was going a touch slower than normal, keeping pace with the racer beside him.

Felix Wolfe. This was how the rest of the competitors (and officials and the Reichssender) knew him. But—as Luka had discovered so abruptly in a washroom at the Rome checkpoint—he was a she. Adele was her name, and a beautiful one at that. It rolled off the tongue so easily, and Luka loved saying it. He couldn’t, mostly, because of Adele’s secret (the one he swore to keep), but at night, when it was just the two of them camped out under the stars, he said it as often as he could: Adeleadeleadele. Until his tongue was tired and the sound of the name lost all meaning.

But it was still beautiful.

Beautiful name. Beautiful girl. Beautiful world full of cherry trees.

Luka was not driving as fast as he had during the previous years, but something inside him felt like it was flying. The joy of getting a red bicycle times ten. Ever since discovering Adele’s secret and agreeing to keep it, ever since forging an alliance with her, this emotion had been building inside him. Up, up, up, to the point of bursting.

He couldn’t not feel it. He tried everything he could not to show it, but it was almost impossible to stop the twitch of his mouth—smiles the mere thought of Adele conjured. Whenever Luka sat down in front of the Reichssender cameras, though, he imagined his father was watching. That kept the filmed grins to a minimum.

There were no cameras on this stretch of road. Hardly any other racers either. (Most had stopped for rations over an hour earlier.) Nothing to stop him from grinning ear to ear like a sloppy drunk as he rode alongside this girl, who was so very different from any of the fräuleins he’d known in Hamburg.

Adele revved her engine just enough to pull a few meters ahead, one hand free, gesturing to the side of the road. Then she slowed her Zündapp to a halt, parking it in a fairy-tale landscape of spent cherry blossoms.

He didn’t need to break, but a deep part of Luka wanted to. They were on the outskirts of Osaka, a little over five hundred kilometers from the finish line—hours away after weeks of riding—and he was far enough ahead of the other racers that a short pit stop would do no harm. Even Adele was a good ten minutes behind him in cumulative time. Luka would have to part ways with her soon, pulling ahead just enough to make sure his entrance into Tokyo was a triumphant one.

Everything would change, once he won. The Reichssender would be all over him, and Adele Wolfe would be forced to melt silently back into her Frankfurt life. It might be weeks, months before he’d see her again, which was why Luka decided to pump his brakes.

He parked his own Zündapp just a meter from the road, unclipping his helmet and uncramping his legs. Adele stretched her svelte frame as she hopped off her motorcycle, removed her own helmet, and gave her short Hitler Youth hair a shake. Luka couldn’t help but stare (beautiful girl, moonstruck thoughts) and wonder how he’d ever thought those bold cheekbones and comet-trail eyebrows belonged to a boy.

Adele caught him staring and grinned at him through her racing goggles. The smile was contagious. Luka couldn’t help but return it.

“You wanted to stop and smell the sakura?” he asked.

“They are pretty.” Her gloved fingers reached up to the nearest branch, twisting a flower free. Its petals quivered as she held them up to her nose. Inhaled. “Not much of a smell, though.”

Luka watched the blossom, so close to her lips, and wished he could be in its place.…

Adele blew an extra-hard breath out, which sent the cherry blossom tumbling to the ground. “You got any of that jerky left? All I have are protein bars.”

Luka knew he did, somewhere in the depths of his panniers. He turned to unbuckle them.

“I could use a little extra fuel before Tokyo,” Adele explained.

Tokyo. If Luka shut his eyes, he could feel it: the cheering crowds and smooth tarmac. The ripple of his Zündapp’s wheels as he rolled over the finish line, repeated his triumph of 1953.

Luka Löwe. Double victor. Hero of the Third Reich. Tough as leather, hard as steel. Worthy.

He was so busy imagining this scene, digging through his possessions for the jerky packet, that he didn’t give a second thought to the footsteps behind him—SMASH. PAIN. Bluuuuuuuuuuur.

BLACK.

When Luka woke, the cherry tree branches smeared above him: a windless pink haze. His temple throbbed, and when his hand ventured to the back of his skull, there was a stinging that made him string together several non-mother-approved words. The fingertips returned weeping red.

He hadn’t known a head could hurt this much.

When Luka finally stood, the spinning above him moved into his stomach. And back up again. He was still wiping bile from his lips when he found himself looking for Adele. (Was she okay? Had she been attacked, too?) But there was no fräulein behind him. No motorcycle either. Just tender-colored blossoms, crushed by the tread of Adele’s tires. Luka stood still for several minutes, taking in the emptiness of the roadside. Trying not to move. Trying not to vomit again.

He hadn’t known a heart could hurt this much.