by Gunn, Autumn
In my peripheral I saw that his grasp on the gun had loosened just a bit. The champagne was still in my right hand. I grabbed the railing with my left. Looked back out towards the sea, but kept Hassan in my peripheral.
He was still processing. Thinking of what to say next. What information he could gather from me.
I bent my right knee slightly. Gaining some leverage in the process. I came up on my toes of my left foot. I got one more look in my peripheral at Hassan. The gun had dropped to just two inches above my hip level. I locked in that position in my mind. I dropped the inside of my right knee and pivoted on my right big toe counter clockwise. As I spun back and around counter clockwise from my hips that torque and leverage that had started on the inside of my right knee transferred through my hips and mid section. Through my left leg. Into my left foot. It settled right against the inside of palm of Hassan’s right hand and right into a Soviet issue Marakov pistol.
The pistol left his hand with such a velocity that it carried right over the railing and into the Aegean Sea. My left foot touched down. I followed through with the last remaining torque in my hips and fell forward into the counterclockwise rotation. I brought my right arm up and caught Hassan by the side of his neck. I had him around the neck but face to face. No leverage. I instinctively raised my left knee and just in time. His right knee rose to meet it. Four inches below my testicles where he had been aiming. My left knee had bent in to block the blow. I leaned my body weight into him as the power from my left knee drove my left foot into his shin. He buckled forward towards the ground.
I landed on my back with Hassan on top. The lying equivalent of the standing position we had just been in. I was on the bottom. I slid my left knee over the top and rolled right on my right hip. As we spun I pulled my right arm out from behind my head. I was on top of him. He was on his back. There was no way he was getting up.
I reached down with both hands and began choking him. He swung widely at my face.
“Where is Devlin?” I yelled.
Hassan just kept swinging widely with his fists. Most of his swings hit my shoulders. A few found their way to the side of my head. Because he was on his back he was generating very little leverage with his blows. I blew him a kiss in exchange for the love taps he was giving me. The effeminizing kiss only irritated him more. I squeezed harder around his neck.
“Where.” I paused. “Is.” I breathed out in a yell. “Devlin!”
He said nothing. Just squirmed under the pressure. I released the death grip. No need to kill a source of information. I looked around for something to tie him up with. Nothing. We’d have to do this the hard way. I delivered a medium punch to his nose. Blood gushed everywhere and his eyes watered. I drilled him in the kidney. He was now immobilized with his vision blurred. That’s good enough for now. I kneeled next to him and then flipped him over. I grabbed him by the hands and drug him across the deck. I lowered him down the stairwell. Dropping him the last eighteen inches. I swung down the stairwell hole and was back on top of him. It was overkill. He wasn’t about to go anywhere. I took him into his master bedroom where I had done recon ten minutes earlier. I pulled the sheets from the bed. I hog tied him and pulled him into the hall where I could keep an eye on him.
I went back into the room with the boxes. Pulled out the one on top and threw it on the floor. I ripped the top off.
Condoms. Cases and cases of condoms. I pulled down another box. More condoms. I opened a case. The condoms were individually wrapped. I squeezed them. They felt normal. I opened two from each big box. Totally normal. I was surprised.
I made my way through the rest of the yacht. Each area seemed more extravagant than the last. I pulled paneling off the walls. Nothing. Hassan wasn’t stupid. Except for the part where he tried to take me down. He might be involved in shady stuff, but he’s keeping an arm’s distance. He’s not going to serve himself up on a platter for law enforcement.
I went back topside and surveyed the area. We were still the only boat in the area. I didn’t have the phone with Claire Abbey’s number. Only the Nokia I used to communicate with the Turk and his men. How to play this one?
I played out a few scenarios. None of them ended well for Hassan or the Turk. Then I came to my senses. One dumb move and all the work Abbey and Frost had done up to this point was wasted. Not only bad for them, but I’d be facing some stiff charges, and the streets of Europe would have a lot more heroine. Triple no.
I went up to the yacht’s bridge. The controls to run this thing were beyond my comprehension. How did Hassan not have a crew? It’s not that he didn’t have one, it’s that he chose not to have on for his meeting with me. Maybe they were expecting him. Surely the vessel had GPS. Somebody somewhere was watching.
Luckily the controls were labeled in English. I ran through their meanings in my head. That and how they probably go together. I was running out of time, but they were finally making sense. Net sounder. Sonar. Echo sounder. Conning. Radar. Underwater trawl visualization. I could make this work. And I had my best friend. Autopilot. And I was starting in open water with no one around so I could practice in this parking lot in the sea before I pulled out into real traffic. First to check on Hassan.
Hassan was still hog-tied and looking no better. It wasn’t worth the risk to leave him down there, but I also didn’t want to bring him up in case I did something stupid at the controls that got called in. If the Coast Guard came aboard I’ve got problems. Problems Abbey can probably work out, but who knows what information leaks before then. And how do I tell my story. Sorry, just give me a minute to go ashore, run to my apartment, get my unabomber Nokia, and call the DEA. Don’t worry everything will be OK. That’s not going to fly. At least not right away and not very well. Not covertly either.
I left Hassan hog-tied and stuck him in the bathroom. In the tub. I wedged a big table against the door. In case he did manage to work his hands free he wasn’t going to get out of that room.
I got the yacht going in the right direction. Surprisingly it was easier than I thought. Years of working with smaller vessels definitely helped.
When I got within sight of shore I slowed down her speed. I could see the café we were using in the distance. At five hundred meters I started to get her stopped. It didn’t go exactly as planned, but at three hundred meters from shore I had it under control. I dropped anchor and searched the cabin for a pair of drunks and a dry bag.
I found various sizes of swim trunks in one of the guest cabins. None looked like a good fit. I cut a hole in the side of one of the pairs and cinched them tighter with some rope I frayed and cut with a knife from the galley. It would have to do.
I put my things in a dry bag and made my way to the ladder at the stern. I began the swim to shore. There were a few other yachts in the area, but they were too busy drinking and sunbathing to take much notice of me. I swam right up to shore and came out in front of a café. There were two brunettes in sundresses leaning on one other for support. An afternoon likely filled with ouzo and now drowning in the aphrodisiac from the finished oysters sitting on their table. They waved little waves my direction. One blew kisses. Not now. No time ladies. The only girl on my mind was Abbey. Personally and professionally.
I arrived at the café. Pulled my clothes from the dry bag and removed the keys. I put the keys in the lock and turned. I didn’t hear the turn of a lock unlatching. It was already opened. I took a step back and kicked the door open with my foot. Taking cover behind the outside wall. No noise. I popped my head around the corner and back. Empty. I stepped in side. The filing cabinet had been turned upside down. The drawers were out and empty. I ran upstairs. The mattresses had been removed from the frames and thrown on the floor. The frames were upside down.
Somebody got here before me. I ran back down stairs to find the other Nokia brick. It was missing.
No way to call Abbey.
No idea where she was staying.
And a hog-tied guy I had kidnapped on his yacht I had just stol
en parked just around the corner and three hundred meters offshore. Not good.
Chapter 5
Hurry up and wait. It was my best option. Technically I was just a civilian. A very highly trained one on foreign soil, but still a civilian. I was cooperating with the DEA on this one. I didn’t like it, but my best move was no move at all. Literally. Just stake a position and wait. And wait. And wait.
At 0217 I heard someone come around the corner. I was perched on a rooftop next door. Lying in the prone position isn’t so bad. Lying in the prone position and not moving for over four hours is. I had scaled the building two hours prior. I noticed an Internet café next door. They had business hours until 2200. I quietly entered at 2143 and went straight to the head. I opened the window and looked out.
I had seen the window from the street. One of the great things about Europe is the narrow streets that seem to be in many of the countries. They were built to slow horse-mounted attacks and provide shade from the sun during the scorching summer months. I couldn’t imagine a horse-mounted attack on a Greek island years ago. Surely they would have spotted them from shore. Then again I didn’t imagine I was going to be jumping out of a window from an Internet café onto the top of a gyro shop either.
I saw the person light a cigarette. That rules out Abbey and Frost, unless they’re in disguise or buying time. The body moved towards my café a few more feet and stopped to take a drag and check phone messages. It was a man. I could tell by the movement.
He checked his phone for seventeen seconds the proceeded closer to the front of my shop. He stopped just at the corner where you can start to see the front door. Checked his phone again. Left the phone in both hands but looked up mid-typing. Like he was trying to send a clever or well-thought reply. I couldn’t get a great angle on his face. He was too far underneath me.
I waited. He waited.
He put the phone in his pocket and moved towards my café like he owned the place. Turned the handle and walked inside.
I counted down from ten to one backwards. After one I low crawled to the edge of the roof. I had picked this particular position earlier because there was access up and down. The gyro shop below me had long closed and the workers gone for the day.
At the front of the shop there was a small concrete overhang above where two tables and four chairs had been. I switched my hand position on the side of the roof. From prone I lifted my knees and tip toed my feet over to the edge. I dropped my body over the ledge still holding onto the roof. I looked down. Landing zone all clear. I let go of the roof and landed onto the concrete overhang. I turned and faced out towards the street. Still no one. From the kneeling position I had landed in I executed a nearly identical drop to the ground. Just the starting position had changed. It had taken me less than four seconds to execute the back-to-back drops. I ran across the street to the door of my café.
The door was open a good two and a half feet. I waited. No sounds. I could see the wall next to the door was covered in darkness. I squinted for five seconds to acclimate from the streetlights and moonlit street to the darkness of the café.
I put my arms by my sides and quickly squeezed through sideways. It was less of a squeeze and more of a fast slide. There were no lights. I stayed against the dark wall. I saw a man’s back to me by the filing cabinets. It was the man from the street. Same build, same mannerisms. He had a Mini Maglite and was looking for something.
I got in a crouch and took two steps forward. The first to build speed. The second to prepare for launch. On the third step I shot my body at the man like an NFL linebacker on an unsuspecting ball carrier on Sunday afternoon. I hit him so hard in the waist I could feel his body buckle when his pelvis hit the floor. I heard the loud crack of his head hitting the floor. I immediately cupped his mouth with my hand. There was no point. He wasn’t speaking anytime soon. He was out cold.
“Stamatíste! Stop!” A voice called out behind me.
“Astynomía!”
I turned only to be blinded by a flashlight to the face. I closed my eyes and opened them slowly. The flashlight perfectly illuminated the gun barrel to its right.
“Zamora?”
I recognized the voice.
“Abbey?”
Three seconds later the room was flooded in light. I looked to see Abbey walking back towards me from the light switch just in time to see the shock on her face as she looked to my right. I looked down.
“Oh, no.”
“Is he OK?” She said.
“He’ll live. He’s going to need a nap, and some R&R, but he’ll live.”
Frost was out cold. I might have fractured his pelvis. I rolled him off his left side and examined his head.
“No external bleeding. He hit hard, but the outside is OK. We need to get him checked out. We don’t want his brain swelling.”
“Geez, Zamora. What did you do?”
“Subduing the suspect.”
“I guess so.”
“We need to get him to a hospital to get looked at.”
Abbey pulled out a smart phone and started typing.
“Found one. Private doctor. He does house calls around the clock during the summer season.”
“Call him. We can’t move him though.”
“We have to get out of here,” Abbey said. “This place is hot.”
“We don’t have a choice. We can’t risk Frost for the mission.”
Abbey looked down. She had worked hard on this case. We both knew it. Abbey tapped her phone.
“There might be someone pulling recon outside,” I said. “And there might not.”
“Hello. Yes. I have an unconscious man. He needs help. He hit his head hard,” she said slowly and clearly. I waited while she gave the address and finished the call.
“The man said within fifteen minutes a car will be here.”
“If we’re seen it’s not the end of the world. We can recover. They’ll just think we’re working together. They already think I’m an underling for a bigger fish.”
“How do you know that?”
“I went fishing myself today. And I caught a whopper.”
“What do you mean?”
I gave Abbey the quick run down of what had happened. After only seven minutes I heard a car approaching outside. I waited just inside the door just to make sure.
“Hello?” A voice called. “Doctor Antoniou here.”
I stepped outside calmly and shook the doctor’s hand. He came inside and took a look. He pulled some smelling salts from the pocket of his white button down shirt. Put them to Frost’s nose. Frost made a face like someone had stuffed his mouth full of lemons.
“He’s going to be OK. I’ll take him back and take a look at him though. Just to make sure there’s nothing internal. Also clean him up a little. The cobwebs will clear in two to three days.”
“Thank you, Doctor Antoniou.”
“Guys, I’m sorry, but I have to ask. This café looks very suspicious. I’m not one to talk, but I also don’t want to get involved in anything that might come back to harm my family or me. I don’t exactly have a lot of days left on this earth and I want to end them on my own terms.”
“Not at all, Doctor. This is my café. I was robbed and thought I had stumbled onto the thief. Little did I know my friends passed by to check on me, saw there was something wrong, and entered. I stumbled upon them thinking I had caught them.”
“I see. OK. Good idea to file a police report then.”
“We’re going to do that.”
“OK. I’m glad, but it’s none of my business. I’m just here to help this man out. No more questions from the peanut gallery.”
I paused a second and looked at the doctor. “Did you ever live in the United States, Doctor?”
“What makes you ask that?”
“You said peanut gallery. That’s something I would expect only an American to know. That and your English is very good.”
“Well, thank you, young man. I did. Astoria, Queens for thirty-one year
s. Do you know it?”
“Of course.”
“Enjoyed every minute of it, but nothing like being back home.”
“I understand.”
“Now if you can, please help me lift this man so we can get him out of here.”
The doctor reached down to grab Frost’s feet. Abbey elbowed me playfully in the side. I looked at her as if to say, what. I could read her lips. And I’m English right?
Duh! I mouthed. She rolled her eyes and tried to hold back a smile.
We got Frost back to Doctor Antoniou’s home office. He gave him a battery of tests and released him after he started talking a little and was able to stand on his own two feet.
