Page 43 of The Virgin's Dance
Pain.
Boh jerked away from him, keeping in character, but twisting away. She saw Lexie’s eyes open with shock, and then Kristof staring at her. Boh risked a glance down. Blood was spreading across the belly of her costume.
The knife wasreal.
Boh kept it together—she had to get the knife from Kristof’s hand or she was dead, for real. Kristof had frozen, but luckily, Lexie improvised and tore the blade away from him, her character berating him. Thank God for you, Lexie, Boh thought and played out the scene. As she spun around, she saw Pilot was out of his seat, his big eyes terrified, but subtly she shook her head at him. She “died,” and then she was being carried off the stage by Lexie and a stunned Kristof.
“Go finish the ballet,” she hissed at them, “I’m okay, I’m fine.”
How they managed to complete the ballet without breaking, Boh would never know. She quickly grabbed a wrap and put it around herself to go take her final curtain call. She felt the sting of the slash but knew it wasn’t deep, that it looked worse than it was.
Kristof was trembling violently, and as they finally left the stage, he fell to his knees, clutching Boh’s hand. “I didn’t know, I didn’t know …” he kept repeating, almost hysterical, and Boh believed him. Someone else had swapped the fake knife for a real one. Someone wanted her dead.
Liz, Nell, Celine, and Grace gathered around them, Liz calling over the paramedic on duty. She took Boh to her dressing room and made her undress, showing her the wound. Boh winced as the medic cleaned it. It was an eight-inch slash across her belly, but as she’d thought, it wasn’t deep. “You might need a couple of stitches in the deeper parts, but otherwise—”
“I honestly feel fine.”
They were interrupted by an anxious Pilot bursting into the room. His eyes went immediately to the bloody wound. “Jesus …”
“Baby, I’m fine, honestly. It’s just a flesh wound.” She could see he was about to melt down and got up to kiss him. He was shaking so badly she made him sit down, then perched on his knee as the medic smoothed butterfly stitches across her belly. “Sweetheart,breathe.”
“What the fuck happened?”
Boh sighed. “Someone switched out the prop knife for a real one.”
Pilot gaped at her. “What the actualfuck?”
The door opened and Romana and Grace came into the room. They both looked as shocked as Pilot. “You okay?”
Boh nodded. “I really am. Lexie … is she okay?”
“Fine. Shaken, but fine. Who would do this?”
Grace’s face set. “We don’t know for sure … but no one can find Serena.”
They sat in silence for a moment as the implications set in. “Where’s Kristof?”
“Believe it or not, he himself called the police. He told Liz and Nell that he had been faking his drug tests, that he believed he had been dosed with something other than coke by someone, and that he deserves to be jailed for what he has done.”
Boh gaped at Grace. “You’re kidding?”
“No. For what it’s worth, I think he’s devastated about what happened. He keeps asking how you are.”
Boh pulled her leotard up as the medic finish her work. “I want to see him.”
“No,” Pilot stood up, shaking his head. “No way.”
Boh put her hand on his face. “Baby, it’s okay, I’m fine. We need to talk to Kristof—he may know something.”
Kristof Mendelev was a broken man. What had he become? He told the police everything as Liz Secretariat listened, then, before they took him to the station for further questioning, he tendered his resignation to Liz.
“I’m sorry,” he said, his voice cracking. “I was arrogant and I paid the price. Please, tell Boh I hope she’s okay.”
“Tell me yourself,” Boh said as she came in, flanked by a furious Pilot Scamo. Kristof nodded, relieved that she did indeed look fine as they had told him.
“Boh, I don’t know what the hell happened. I screwed up, got loaded, but I swear to you—I did not know that knife was real.” He reached out to touch her injured stomach, but Pilot gave a growl and batted his hand away.
“Don’t even fuckingthinkabout touching her ever again, asshole.”
