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I flick on the light.
It’s Karol, holding a knife. A big knife.
It takes me a second to react. I am caught so off-guard that I assume I’m seeing things at first. But the adrenaline kicks into high gear, and I lunge.
Karol’s not particularly big or strong, so tackling him is easy. I get him on the ground and kick the knife away, all while he’s struggling like it will do him some good.
Abby sits up, rubbing her eyes. “What the hell is going on?” she asks, lifting the upset puppy to the bed.
Fedor and Bogdan appear in the door.
“What… what happened?” Fedor asks, looking from the knife, to me on top of Karol, to Abby.
Bogdan crosses the room and pulls Karol to his feet, pulling his arm up behind his back. Karol winces with both pain and annoyance. “Can you explain what you were doing in Abby’s room, Karol? With a knife?”
Karol, the mild-mannered staff member who’s been with Bogdan all his life, turns to us, baring his teeth. “Did you think I was going to be your slave forever?” he spits. “The girl’s father offered to pay me more than you ever would. It was my way out. My way out of this… indentured servitude.”
“What?”Bogdan asks quietly. “You’re no indentured servant. You could always leave whenever you wanted.”
Karol screws up his face, his hatred palpable. “I’m tired of being taken advantage of, waiting on you rich people like you’re above me. Madden offered me enough money to make me a rich man. I was going to leave and never be seen again. I’d be a fool to pass that up.”
Abby gets out of bed and approaches Karol. But Bogdan is careful to keep him out of her reach. If there is any punishing to do, that’s best left to us guys.
“You… you were going to kill me?” Abby asks in a small voice.
Karol narrows his eyes at her. “Don’t be so naïve, silly girl. It doesn’t suit you.”
Bogdan pulls Karol’s arm up higher, and he screams from the pain. But it also shuts him up.
“Karol, I don’t understand. I thought you were happy working for me. For us,” Bogdan says, vacillating between incredulity and anger.
And confusion.
Karol grins wickedly. “You are a bigger fool than I thought. I’ve detested you and your family for years. I’ve been looking for a way out, and when I approached Madden, he was all too happy to make a deal with me.”
“Oh my god,” Abby says, her hand flying to her mouth.
Bogdan is crushed. I don’t think I’ve seen such sadness in his eyes since he lost his sister. I mean, Karol is like family to him. At least that’s what we thought all these years.
He looks at Fedor and me. “Can you guys take care of him? I don’t think I can do it.”
Fedor takes Karol and leads him out of the room. I follow just behind.
We’ve addressed many a problem like this before by ‘taking care’ of the matter.
Never thought Karol would be one of those problems, though.
* * *
17
ABBY
I getto the bathroom just in time to lose everything I had for tonight’s dinner.
Karol.
I never would have guessed.
