“Two years and eleven months. Not three years yet.”
“You’re going to drive me insane, woman,” Marcel says, with rapid footsteps that sound like pacing. “I think you just like to torture me.”
“I’ve got to take this up,” Klara says.
I can hear her gathering up the tea tray. I sprint back up the stairs, before she can catch me.
I leap onto the bed and pull the covers over me, looking around wildly for a book.
When Klara comes in a moment later, she sets the tray next to the bed, then looks at me suspiciously.
“What are you doing?” she says in Polish.
“Nothing. Just waiting.”
“Why are you breathing so hard?”
“Am I? Guess I was excited. About the tea coming.”
Her eyebrows have disappeared under her bangs. She does not believe one word of this.
“Oh, thanks. Great tea!” I say hastily, gulping too much and burning my tongue.
Klara rolls her eyes and heads toward the door, taking the tray with her.
I drink all the tea, but I don’t go to sleep.
I’m way too amped from the night I had. It started out promising, since I actually got to leave the grounds for the first time in forever. But then I realized Mikolaj was taking me to meet some awful Russian gangster. If I thought Jonas was bad, this guy really made my skin crawl. I couldn’t understand anything they said during the dinner, but the callousness in his voice made it obvious exactly what kind of man he was.
Then he tried to touch me as we left—nothing gratuitous, not trying to grope me or anything. Mikolaj grabbed his arm like he was going to rip it right out of the socket. Instantly we were in some kind of Mexican stand-off, and I was pretty certain it was the last seconds of my life.
Then we left, and Mikolaj was like an ungrounded wire in the car, thrumming with electricity, and fully capable of shocking me to death if I dared touch him.
And out of nowhere he drove us over to the Yard. I didn’t even think about Bliss being there. I had almost forgotten the show even existed, living in the strange fantasy world of Mikolaj’s mansion. But the moment I saw Marnie and Serena on the stage, I knew exactly where we were.
My god, seeing something I created . . . it was so unlike performing in the ballet. It was like watching my own dream, full and vibrant and real. I couldn’t breathe.
I’d seen plenty of the rehearsals, but this was different, in full makeup and costume, lighting and stage sets. I could have cried, I was so happy.
I should have been sitting right up front in the audience, with my family around me. That’s what would have happened opening night, if Mikolaj hadn’t kidnapped me.
For a moment I was hit with a stab of anger. I remembered all the things I’ve lost out on these past weeks—my dancing, my father’s birthday, my semester of school.
I looked at Mikolaj, so furious that I might have shouted something at him. But he wasn’t looking at me at all—he was staring through the glass, watching the ballet. He had that look on his face, similar to when he was sleeping. The harshness and anger washed away. Calmness in its place.
And I remembered that I hadn’t actually missed out on dancing at his house. Actually, I’d been doing more than ever. While creating something totally unlike anything I’ve done before. Not the product of the old Nessa, but of the new Nessa, a girl in progress, one growing and changing by the moment, in ways I never would have if I’d stayed at home.
My anger washed away. We finished watching the show, and we drove home. I thought Mikolaj might come upstairs with me. Instead, he rushed away somewhere else.
And now I’m laying here, not able to sleep until I hear his car in the drive.
Because wherever gangsters go, it’s never safe.
There’s always a chance that this is the night they won’t come home.
An hour passes. Maybe more. Finally, I hear the tires rolling over the loose stones in the driveway.
I jump out of my bed, shoving aside the dusty canopy curtains.
I run down the stairs, my legs bare beneath the hem of my nightgown. Klara stocked the wardrobe and drawers with so many beautiful pieces of clothing. The nighties are the one thing that makes me laugh. They’re so old-fashioned, like something a little girl from the Victorian era would wear. I probably look like a ghost, running around this place.
When I’m halfway down the stairs, Mikolaj hears me. He turns around. I see long scratches running up his arms and across the back of his hands.
“What happened!” I gasp.
“It’s nothing,” he says.
“Where did you go?” I’m about to touch his arm to examine the injuries, but I freeze in my tracks. The people most likely to have injured Mikolaj are my own family. Which means he might have done something awful to them in return.
My mouth hangs open, horrified.
Mikolaj sees it. He says, “No! I didn’t . . . it’s not . . .”
“Did you hurt someone I know?” I say, through numb lips.
“Well . . . not that . . .”
I’ve never seen Mikolaj stutter before. My stomach is rolling over. I think I’m going to be sick.
I turn away from him, but Mikolaj grabs my shoulders, pulling me back.
“Wait,” he says. “Let me explain.”
He pulls me out of the entryway, over to the conservatory.
He leads me through the thick greenery. It’s almost winter outside, but it’s still warm and humid in here, the air rich with oxygen and chlorophyll. He pulls me down on the little bench where he was sitting when I first woke up in his house.
“Look,” he says, “I didn’t kill anybody. I did hurt someone, but he fucking deserved it.”
“Who?” I demand.
“That director.”
“What?” I stare at him blankly for a second. This is so far outside what I expected him to say that I don’t connect the dots.
“He’s fine,” Mikolaj says. “I just broke his arm.”
A loose interpretation of the term “fine,” but much better than I feared.
“You broke Jackson Wright’s arm,” I say blankly.
“Yeah.”
“Why?”
“Because he’s a thieving shit,” Mikolaj says.
I’m dumbfounded.
Mikolaj broke Jackson’s arm . . . for me. It’s the strangest favor anybody’s ever done for me.
“I don’t want you to hurt people on my behalf,” I tell him.
“People like that don’t learn without consequences,” Mikolaj says.
I’m not sure a jerk like Jackson is going to learn either way. But I don’t care about him, not really. There’s a different kind of dread swirling around inside of me.
I’ve been completely cut off in Mikolaj’s house. No contact with anyone I know and love. I’ve assumed that nothing awful has happened while I was gone. But I don’t actually know if that’s true.
“What is it?” Mikolaj says.
His light blue eyes are fixed on my face, steady and clear.
It occurs to me that in all the time I’ve been here, Mikolaj has never lied to me. Not that I know of, anyway. He’s been harsh and aggressive at times. Hateful, even. But always honest.
“Miko,” I say. “Is my family okay? Have you hurt any of them?”