I blinked at Axel. “But… How can you be my next-door neighbor? A man lives there.”

Axel just looked smug. “Not anymore.”

I narrowed my eyes on him. “What did you do?”

“I just offered him a much better accommodation, and a lot of money on top of that. He packed and was gone within three hours.”

I said nothing for a while, just watched him, and he looked back at me, his eyes moving, searching, jumping from one feature to another.

Then finally, I asked, my voice a whisper, “All for what, Axel?”

He swallowed so hard I could hear it, shifting where he stood. He opened his mouth,...