A Sudden Death in Cyprus

by Michael Grant

  Finally, the yellow Porsche reappeared. Chante, at Delia’s suggestion, took to the scooter again, I took the wheel, and we were off.

  ‘We need to discuss what we should do once we have his location,’ Delia said.

  I glanced at her, surprised. ‘I figured you would arrest him. Isn’t that the whole point? He’s your guy, your bête noire. You’re Javert and he’s Jean Valjean.’

  ‘Nothing would make me happier than turning the prick over to Italian justice. But Panagopolous is just a piece of the puzzle. He could lead us to whoever is up the chain from him. Normally I’d apply for a search warrant, if this was in the US. Then we could grab his laptop and phone, see what we found.’

  ‘Delia? Am I hearing an ellipsis?’

  ‘Ellipsis?’

  ‘The three little dots that suggest the speaker is waiting for the other person to fill in the blanks? Because, um, what you’re thinking but not saying is illegal and you’re FBI – that was made very clear to me. And, two, that’s not just some middle-aged banker, that’s a bad guy who works for a company run by ex-SEALS and ex-SAS and guess who wins a fight between me and some special forces dude?’

  ‘I understand if you’re scared.’

  ‘Do you seriously think you can shame me into committing suicide? Have you met me?’

  She sighed and suddenly banged the dashboard with her fist. ‘Goddammit!’

  ‘If you know where he lives you can reach out to the Italians …’ That sounded weak, even to me.

  We followed Panagopolous to a somewhat-past-its-prime development of twenty or so villas. We stopped well back as he pulled his absurd car to a stop and swaggered inside.

  We sat there stewing for a while. Delia was a few hundred feet from her guy, her obsession, and suddenly now she was facing the fact that there might not be much she could do about him. We had his home address – we were at his home address – and she could try for extradition, but ExMil could easily transfer him to another office out of the country. I understood her frustration.

  Chante was listening to all this byplay and beginning, I suspected, to realize she was in the middle of something more serious than she’d imagined. What exactly she was concluding, I didn’t know. I supposed her infatuation with Delia was keeping her here.

  ‘We need to catch him in the act,’ Delia said. ‘If we can do that, we can flip him. Maybe.’

  ‘Well, yeah, obviously, but we’d need to know when the next boat is coming. If he’s even still part of that operation.’

  Chante finally had had enough of the cryptic talk. ‘What is this?’

  ‘This?’ Delia asked.

  ‘Why are we following this man?’

  I was not in the mood for equivocation or for Delia’s claims of security clearances. ‘He’s a human trafficker who killed a bunch of refugee kids by tossing them into the sea to avoid being arrested. Delia’s got a hate-on for him. And it’s all tied into the murder on the beach. And also Russian money laundering. Though goddamned if we know how exactly.’

  Chante absorbed that, and said, ‘And you?’

  Meaning me. ‘I’m a retired gentleman thief – like Cary Grant in It Takes a Thief and—’

  ‘To Catch a Thief,’ Chante corrected.

  ‘Whatever,’ I said.

  ‘And you are not Cary Grant.’

  ‘The point is,’ I insisted doggedly, ‘I am being blackmailed by Delia into helping her, and now she seems to want me to go beat a confession out of some guy with very well-trained muscles.’

  ‘I never said any such thing,’ Delia snapped.

  ‘And by the way,’ I said, because I was on a roll of sorts, ‘you’re no Grace Kelly, either, Delia, because she was nice and would never send Cary Grant to get his ass kicked.’

  ‘Are you a coward?’ Chante asked me, her tone scorching.

  For a second, I was too outraged to respond, which turned out to be a good thing, because Delia spoke instead.

  ‘No, Chante,’ Delia said quietly. ‘He is not a coward. In fact, he is quite brave. Brave and intelligent. If David were not an immature, sociopathic man-child, he could have had a career in law enforcement.’

  As a writer I am often overpraised. Goodreads, the book review site, has one of my books more highly-rated than Hamlet. Granted this is because Hamlet is assigned reading for high school kids who take out their rage on Shakespeare by writing bad reviews, but still, the point is I know I am sometimes overpraised. But only as a writer.

  But as me? As sad as it may seem, If David were not an immature, sociopathic man-child he could have had a career in law enforcement is one of the nicest things anyone’s said about me. And Delia actually defending me to Chante gave me a warm glow.

  You take your pleasures where you find them.

  Your opportunities, too.

  ‘Hey,’ I said. ‘The house next to his. That’s a for-sale sign.’

  ‘Maybe he’s a bad neighbor.’

  ‘Or it’s a lousy neighborhood, despite the superficial suburban blandness. Doesn’t matter, really. The point is no one is home next door.’

  ‘What are you thinking, David?’ Delia asked me.

  ‘I’m thinking we could place cameras and know exactly when Panagopolous comes and goes.’

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  I was already doing as much surveilling, sneaking, lying and breaking and entering in a week on behalf of the FBI as I’d done in any given six months of my old life. But an unoccupied suburban home? That barely qualified as a crime. Nothing’s easier than breaking into an unoccupied suburban home.

  We drove back to my villa, dropped Chante off and picked up some items I happen to have in my possession: a camera, a router, a cell phone uplink, the usual. I grabbed a screwdriver and wished I had a drill, but this would work for a start.

  Delia and I drove back to Panagopolous’ house. We parked one street over. I’d gotten rid of my GPS tracking devices, so I was not creating an evidence trail and unless I made a real mess of things this would not result in a police canvass of the neighborhood. Me vs. an unoccupied suburban villa was like asking Gordon Ramsay to cook up some tater tots and I was as relaxed as it’s possible to be while preparing to commit a crime. I got out and Delia took the driver’s seat.

  ‘Call me if you get into trouble,’ Delia said, as I leaned down at her open window.

  ‘You’re in my contacts under “cavalry.”’

  ‘I meant that, by the way, what I said to Chante. You’re a brave man.’

  ‘Brave, sociopathic man-child,’ I corrected.

  She smiled her sleepy, mocking but still genuine Delia smile. ‘Well, that goes without saying.’

  ‘Good luck kiss?’

  She kept smiling, closed her eyes slightly, tilted her head and as I leaned in the window closed between us. She made a shooing gesture with her fingers and I toddled off up the dark street with my trusty John Lewis messenger bag over my shoulder loaded with the tools of my erstwhile trade.

  Down the side alley, around to the back of the unoccupied house, and a quick shim and the sliding glass door was open. I do love a cheap lock. I popped in, closed the door behind me, snapped on my flashlight while keeping the beam in my fist to allow only enough light to escape. I took the stairs two at a time, opened the door to the room that would be adjacent to Panagopolous’ house and got down to it.

  There were two windows facing Panagopolous. The roof eaves were shallow, but, I thought, probably enough. I slid the window open and cantilevered myself out, butt on the sill, free hand gripping a support beam beneath the eaves. I spent a few minutes cursing at screws that would not bite, wishing again that I had a battery-operated drill, wishing my injured hand didn’t throb as if it was a bongo being played with a hammer, and finally got the camera mount in place. It was small, not invisible, but a casual glance would not spot it. If Panagopolous happened to look out of his window, he would be very unlikely to see it.

  I checked the batteries, and covered the green ‘power’ light with
a snippet of duct tape.

  Now for the router. For that I needed power and concealment. This took some work, but down in the kitchen I found they had installed a garbage disposal. Under the kitchen sink I found an electrical socket. I unplugged the garbage disposal and plugged in the router, and even took the time to awkwardly screw the router into place behind the sink. Then, with Wi-Fi established, I checked the app and ran back upstairs to adjust the camera to take in a better angle of Panagopolous’ driveway.

  I named the Wi-Fi ‘Athena’ for Delia, checked that everything was clean and evidence-free upstairs, and trotted back down the stairs just as the front door opened. I reversed direction, scampering back up the stairs and squatted where I could see without being seen. Two men entered. One of them was Thorne Breen.

  Thorne Breen with a gun in his hand.

  My brain raced, throwing out disconnected thoughts. They had Delia or she’d have warned me. Why hadn’t I checked this empty house for silent alarms and cameras? Was that even what gave me away? What weapons did I have? Screwdriver and brass knuckles which in no universe trumped two guys with guns.

  I withdrew to the bathroom which had one door on the hallway, the other on the bedroom where I’d set up the camera. I lifted the heavy porcelain lid off the back of the toilet, flushed said toilet and whistled the tune from the Old Spice commercials – whistled to signal obliviousness. No idea why the Old Spice ditty. I darted into the bedroom, leaving the connecting bathroom door open while silently shutting and locking the hallway door.

  It was all about timing now, timing and luck. Would both guys come upstairs together, or would one scout ahead?

  Gritting my teeth so hard they were on the verge of cracking, my heart pounding, I stood flattened against the wall, listening.

  Footsteps. Cautious footsteps coming up the stairs. I tried to slow my own breathing because the sounds of my own fear were making it hard to hear.

  One set of footsteps. The second guy would stay at the bottom of the stairs because they hadn’t had time to clear the lower floor. And they could be pretty sure that a) I didn’t know they were there, or why would I be flushing the toilet and whistling the Old Spice tune? And, b) that I did not have a gun, this being Cyprus not Wyoming.

  The footsteps reached the top of the stairs.

  I leaned through the bedroom connecting door and whistled again, which let me say is damned hard to do when you’re shaking, pulled back into the bedroom and heard the quiet effort at opening the bathroom door.

  Locked. The kick would be coming in 3, 2 …

  I moved fast across the bedroom, out the door to the hallway just as crash!

  The bad guy, not Breen, was just recovering his pose, raising his pistol and noticing that there was no one actually on the toilet. I stepped behind him, fast, and swung the porcelain toilet lid hard and even faster.

  Nine times out of ten a panic blow will miss or make only partial contact. But every now and then …

  A good five pounds of hard white ceramics hit the back of his head with all the precision of a well-rehearsed Bourne movie action scene. He dropped like a beef cow that’s reached the end of the slaughtering line. I stepped over him, raised the lid high and brought the edge down with every ounce of my strength on the back of his neck.

  And that was the end of things going well, because I caught him only a glancing blow, lost my grip on the porcelain which tumbled away, knocking the man’s gun across the floor.

  I leapt, but tripped over the downed man and smacked my forehead into the sink cabinet. I saw wild geometric patterns and stars and knew I was stunned, knew I had to move fast despite it, started crawling, made it maybe three feet before a hand grabbed the back of my collar and I felt something cold pressed against my medulla.

  ‘Live or die, Mr Mitre. Live or die?’ Thorne Breen said.

  I was still somewhat preverbal at that moment and gave no answer. Nor did I resist as he dragged me out of the bathroom and kicked me down the stairs.

  I tried standing but he was there in front of me and pushed me back with barely a shove. I landed on my rear and decided to stay there until the world stopped spinning.

  Breen moved behind me, shoved me onto my side, squatted behind me and tightened a zip tie around my wrists. Then he took my bicep, hauled me partly erect and threw me against a wall where, once again, I decided to just sit down for a while.

  Breen did a quick, professional body search, producing my wallet, passport, cigar torch, a Montecristo Petit tubo, my flask, my phone and my useless brass knuckles. He dropped it all negligently on the floor and swept them all away with the side of his shoe.

  ‘Well, then, Mr Mitre. It seems I have you at a disadvantage.’

  Lacking bon mots, I stayed quiet, feeling a sick worry for Delia.

  ‘Stay put, eh?’ Breen said, and kicked me in the kidneys. The pain was extraordinary and I nearly passed out. Breen then took the stairs two at a time. He was upstairs for a good minute which I used to what advantage I could, by kicking at my meager belongings and scattering wallet, phone, flask, tubo and brass knuckles, and squirming about a bit.

  Breen came down more slowly than he’d gone up and he did not look cheerful. He was wearing what I imagine was his ‘work’ clothing: a black Hugo Boss blazer over a black T-shirt, with sneakers and black jeans – the essential items for the stylish, well-dressed thug.

  ‘You bloody killed the stupid twat,’ Breen said. ‘You cracked the fucker’s skull. His brain is leaking out, and he had little enough to spare. Well done that, it’s a neat trick taking down an armed man with a toilet lid.’

  Breen had the second gun shoved into the waistband on his right hip. Looking around he said, ‘Now where the hell did the knuckledusters go, they would be very useful right about … ah, there!’ He retrieved the brass knuckles, laid his own gun on the windowsill and slipped them on.

  ‘Nice,’ Breen said. ‘Much better than using a pistol butt. With the crosshatched grip it would take me an hour to get all the blood and hair and tissue cleaned off. Shall we test these out?’

  He swung a short, sharp, well-aimed blow that caught be just below the not-yet-healed previous wound on my jaw. I didn’t feel pain, that would come later, what I did feel was shock.

  He raised his hand, knuckles out to show me my own blood. ‘See? I can throw brass knuckles in the dishwasher, can’t do that with a gun. Thank you!’

  I sat splay-legged against the wall, fattening lip dribbling red, the front door to my right, the window and the pistol to my left, none of which mattered much since I was too woozy to try a run, and my hands were zip-tied behind me.

  ‘All right then, Mr Mitre, it is time for a conversation.’ He squatted between me and the window, reached over, took my bruised and bloodied face, and turned me to face him. ‘This can be quick and easy and end in apologies and a ride back to your villa. Or it can end with you permanently, irreversibly brain-damaged, left here to explain to the police in garbled grunts why there’s a dead man upstairs and how you came to be here.’

  ‘What, no death threat?’ I think that was intelligible, it’s hard to know when your jaw is numb and your ears are ringing.

  ‘No, no, Mr Mitre, I’m not a murderer, I’m just a bloke who wants answers. Besides, I’ve learned from long experience that more people are prepared to face death than are prepared for a lifetime of drooling and shitting in diapers.’

  He had a point there, I thought.

  ‘Now, let’s chat, shall we? Let’s start with who you really are and why you are poking your nose in business that ain’t yours.’

  ‘You know who I am, I’m David M—’ And bam! More stars. Pain, this time, too.

  ‘Let’s try again. Who are you, really?’

  ‘Tony Stark,’ I said. ‘Secretly Iron Man.’

  ‘Now, now, we both know that Tony Stark is not a secret identity, he’s quite openly Iron Man.’

  I had to get a thug who watched Marvel movies.

  ‘Peter Parker?’<
br />
  The next blow was a quick toe to the solar plexus, which knocked the wind from my lungs and sent spasms like cramps through my torso.

  ‘All right, all right, I gasped. ‘My real name is Carter Cannon.’

  He frowned, searched his memory for cultural reference points, and said, ‘Well, I rather doubt that, it seems improbable, but let’s not get hung up on names. What is it you are doing?’

  ‘I’m installing a surveillance camera to watch the house next door.’

  ‘And why?’

  ‘Want to see where the asshole next door is going.’

  ‘Which brings us right back to “why?”’

  ‘He got a friend of mine pregnant. I’m trying to get him to pay child support.’

  That puzzled him and he forgot to punch me. He sighed and even smiled. ‘You know, Mr Mitre … or whatever your name is … everyone thinks they can withstand torture. But it’s nonsense. Rumour has it the cousins waterboarded Khalid Sheikh Mohammed for ten days. Ten days! You know how long it took for KSM to break? On his second waterboarding. Day One. The rest was just to flesh out details, and of course for the enjoyment of the agents. Everyone cracks.’

  ‘What is it you want to know?’ I asked in a slurred, low whisper.

  He leaned closer. His left foot was planted between my knees. His right boot rested so that it was touching my left hip as he loomed over me, all alpha male dominance.

  I had a plan. Unfortunately I’m right-handed and the plan required the use of my left hand, which was already growing numb from the zip tie.

  ‘I’ll ask you one more time. Why are you poking your nose in other people’s business?’

  I coughed and made it last, spitting out blood and generally making noise. I recovered slowly, shook my head as though trying to clear it, and said, ‘I’m not sure about the black Boss with black jeans, it seems a bit nineties to me, honestly. Should have gone with a nice pair of medium gray Zanellas.’

  And that’s when he felt it.

  You know what hurts worse than a beating? Burning. There’s just something about the pain of burning flesh …

  Breen leapt back like a cat spotting a cucumber. The flame licked up the back of his right leg. He yelled, ‘Fuck!’ and danced in a circle, trying to turn his head far enough to see what was causing him such pain.