The Land Beneath Us (Sunrise at Normandy #3) - Sarah Sundin Page 0,3

working the closing shifts.” Miss Mayhew strode to her and held out a ten-dollar bill. “Tomorrow morning, go downtown and buy an outfit or two.”

Leah edged back. “No, ma’am. I refuse to take charity ever again.”

The librarian pursed her lips. “It isn’t charity. It—it’s a loan until your first paycheck.”

That much money would buy a suit and shoes and a haircut too. “I promise I’ll earn it. Every penny.”

“I’m sure you will. I’ve known Miss Tilletson since library school, and she said you were smart and diligent.” Miss Mayhew gazed around the room. “I would rather have hired a library school graduate. You aren’t qualified to help with cataloging or research or acquisitions, but you can serve as a circulation librarian.”

Leah tucked the money into the deepest corner of her bag. “I know the Dewey decimal system, I read all Miss Tilletson’s library science books, and I plan to go to library school after I earn the tuition.”

Miss Mayhew’s smile twitched between pity and disbelief. “Yes. Well. Why don’t you set your . . . bag in this drawer, and I’ll show you our operations.”

“Excuse me, ma’am.” A tall blond soldier nodded to Miss Mayhew. “My sergeant told me to read the field manual on service of the 75-millimeter howitzer. Do you have it?”

“Yes, sir.” She turned to Leah. “Have a seat, Miss Jones. I’ll be right back.”

“Thank you.” Leah sat behind the circulation desk and set her bag in the drawer—beside a heart-shaped cardboard box with a tag that read “To Myra. Love, John.”

Her mouth watered. What would it be like to have an entire box of candy to herself?

She tipped open the lid. She just wanted a look. A smell. About half the chocolates were gone, but a dozen remained, round and glossy, with pretty swirls on top.

Leah’s fingers strained for the chocolates, but she closed the box and the drawer. Tonight she’d pretend her father had brought her candy. He’d want her to have occasional treats.

But most of all, he’d want her to find her sisters.

The bookshelves called to her. If she could discover a picture or a snippet of information connected to one of her memories, then she’d know where she came from. And maybe she could find a Greek surname that sounded like her memory.

Ka-wa-los.

When her parents died, she’d only been four, too young to pronounce her name properly.

With a name and a city, she could locate the first orphanage she’d been sent to, the last place she’d seen her twin baby sisters. Every night she prayed that they were safe, that they had each other, and that one day she’d find them.

Only then would Leah belong.

2

CAMP FORREST

SUNDAY, JUNE 20, 1943

Clay laced his hands behind his head to stretch his aching shoulders. It felt good to rest for a day and to know he’d treated Bertie King properly.

In the camp library, he reviewed the medical guide. Cut the clothing away from the wound, stop the bleeding, apply a field dressing. If the medics had been delayed, Clay would have improvised a ring splint. Then after the medics administered a quarter grain of morphine, King could have been transported to the hospital for surgery.

How would Dr. Hill have treated this case? The physician’s kind face came to mind, but Clay shoved aside memories of his former mentor back in Kerrville, Texas. Ellen Hill had destroyed that relationship as well. The doctor’s daughter had only dated Clay to catch the eye of his older brother Adler. She’d caught it, all right.

Did she ever regret that before she died?

Clay shook his head to clear the pain. Movement behind him, and Clay reached for the newspaper at the table’s edge to slide over the book.

It was the librarian, not a Ranger, and Clay relaxed.

Not Miss Mayhew. A petite brunette in a light green suit parked a cart by the rack beside him, where newspapers hung over dowel rods like sheets on Mama’s clothesline. The woman pulled a newspaper off the rack and set it on the bottom shelf of her cart.

Then she spotted Clay and smiled. “Hello, Private Paxton.”

Clay froze. He knew her? Round face, dark eyes, olive complexion, Midwestern accent. Had she transferred from the PX? The mess? He rarely forgot names.

She fingered the curly black hair above her collar, and her smile wavered. “I’m Leah Jones. We met last week on my first day here. I got a haircut and a new outfit.”

She certainly had. Last week Leah Jones looked like a twelve-year-old street urchin in a