Page 37 of Kristoff

Danuta only gasps at the sight before she starts to work the ties on his hands. “Who? Your bastard son?” she demands, and he nods.

“I assure you my father was married to my mother when she gave birth to me.” Kristoff walks in the open door. Blood covers his shirt and his arms. I press myself against the wall, unsure of where to go. “He was also married to her when he cut out her tongue and beat her to death.”

I sink to the floor, grappling for something to keep me upright. The dizziness is getting worse.

“Kristoff. You can’t do this. He’s your father. You have a duty,” Danuta rants at him, waving her gun at him.

Kristoff walks to her as though the gun won’t end his life if she raises it just a hair higher and pulls the trigger.

“You speak of duty? Your duty was to your sister. To raise her and care for her and protect her. And what did you do? You sold her! You gave her over to Andrei, so he could make money off of her, and you could be rid of her.”

I watch my sister, waiting for her to deny his accusations. He can’t be telling the truth.

“You don’t know anything.”

“Your parents left you both a trust fund. And once Magdalena turns twenty-five, she’ll inherit a million dollars. Just like you did. But if she dies - the money’s yours.”

“No. Kristoff, there’s no money.” I shake my head and push myself back to my feet.

He stiffens at my voice but doesn’t turn to me.

“There’s no money, right Danuta? You would have told me,” I say, knowing after seeing her eyes frantically look for a place to run, that Kristoff is telling me the truth.

“I don’t understand.” I stumble and grab my side. The bleeding has slowed, but the pain is there - so much pain. Kristoff looks at me then, seeing the damage done to me and his face hardens.

Before I can explain, before I can plead, he pulls his hand back and whips his knife at my sister, striking her square in her chest. She staggers back, a look of shocked horror frozen on her face as she falls to the ground.

I scream and try to run to her, but Kristoff holds me back. She’s dead. She probably was before she hit the ground, his aim was spot on - straight to her heart.

Air won’t come to me, I can’t get it inside my body. Crumbling to the ground, Kristoff sets me against the wall. “Don’t look, baby. Don’t look,” he says and leaves me, pulling another knife from his pants.

I can’t see past him. Kristoff blocks my view of Andrei, but it only takes a second for me to know what’s happening. A strangled cry and then it’s over, blood pours down to the floor, pooling around the chair, over Kristoff’s boots. Like a river, it heads for my sister and mingles with her blood now flooding around her body.

She’s dead. My sister didn’t save me.

Kristoff wipes his knife off on his father’s suit jacket and re-sheaths it. He steps to me, squats down.

“It’s over now, baby. All over.” He sounds soothing. Like I should be happy. I should be calm.

I look at my sister, lying lifeless and limp. So much blood.

My stomach rolls and I fall to my side just as the contents are emptied on the floor. A fire burns in my side and I whimper, but I have no more energy for screaming.

Sleep. I want sleep. Long hours, days, months even. As long as it takes for time to rewind and for all of this to go back to normal.

Back to when my sister was just a CIA agent too busy to talk to her little sister. Back to when I was scrounging around places I shouldn’t have been to try and get a story. Before I bought plane tickets to England. Before I heard of Andrei Dowidoff.

“It’s okay, I have you,” Kristoff says, but I’m too far away to respond. Playing in the darkness.

Dark is good.

It hides me so well.

I think I’ll stay here for a while.

17

Dr. Morrow waits for me in my office. He’s helping himself to a glass of vodka from my wet bar when I enter.

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