by Alex A King
"I was engaged for a while. Then he tripped and fell on a dick. Repeatedly."
"Honey," my aunt said, "I know the feeling."
"I caught him in action." I gestured at my neck. "It was stuck down the back of his throat, like a fish bone."
My aunt nodded like she knew that, too. "Men are animals," she said. "I should know because I am one." Her attention shifted back to Grandma. "Who do you think took Michail?"
"Maybe Baby Dimitri."
"That skouliki."
I didn't know the man, so I couldn't say if he was a worm or not. Talking to the him sounded like a good start, though. Grandma must have had a middle-of-the-night revelation. I bolted back to my temporary room, tugged on jeans, snatched up my handbag—evicting the million and one sanitary products—and shoved my feet into boots.
Back in the kitchen I said, "So let's go get him."
Grandma looked me up and down. "Oh? And how will you do that?"
"Ask."
"Ask!" Her whole body shook. "Ask," she said to Aunt Rita.
Aunt Rita shrugged. "It's not the worst idea I have ever heard—"
Exactly. I performed a mental fist pump.
"—but it's close."
My euphoria plunged off a cliff.
"Katerina," Grandma said. "What do you think will happen if you walk up to the front door and ask if your father is there?"
"They'll either say yes or no. If they say yes, I'll negotiate."
Grandma was looking at me like I was high. "What makes you think you have what they want?"
"What makes you think I don't? Dad's been in America for thirty years, I know him better than you do."
She reached over to the phone hanging on the wall, picked up the receiver, punched a number. "Xander, come to the house. Katerina needs an escort."
"Who is Xander and where are we going?"
"Xander will take you to see Baby Dimitri," Grandma said. "Baby Dimitri is a Godfather of the Night."
"Godfather of the Night?" A horrible feeling was bubbling inside me. "This isn't a religious thing, is it?"
"Godfathers are very religious. They go to church like it is their job. No one prays harder, gives more money, or throws better funerals."
I had a sneaky feeling Grandma was talking about organized crime. But weren't Godfathers a Sicilian and Italian-American thing?
"How do you fit into this?" I asked her.
"Me? I am just an old woman rolling pastry in my kitchen."
Yeah, right.
I turned to my aunt. "What do Godfathers of the Night do?
"Nightclubs, prostitutes, protection, smuggling, racketeering, and the purchase of bureaucrats. You name it, they do it."
"Drugs?"
"Drugs, of course. Greece's Godfather's are always fighting about drugs. Terrible."
There was no time to squeeze my aunt for more information because there were footsteps outside the door. When the door swung open, I got a face full of bare chest.
Okay, so there was a man attached, but … that chest. A mile of it, tan and smooth and chiseled out of marble.
It wasn't just me: Aunt Rita was fanning herself with her hand. "My Virgin Mary," she muttered.
Grandma rolled her eyes. "My God, you two, it is just Xander. Xander, put a shirt on before these two pass out." She nodded to me. "This is my granddaughter, Katerina. Xander works for the family."
My gaze worked its way up to his face. It was Pool Guy. My incest theory went up in smoke. Our children would be fine. Hallelujah!
"We've met," I said.
Xander said nothing. It seemed like he did that a lot.
"When did you meet?" Aunt Rita asked, resting her chin in her palm.
"Last night or this morning. I was in the bushes."
Xander's smirk was small but present. I changed the subject—fast. "Why do they call him Baby Dimitri?"
"Because he is the youngest of his father's children," Grandma told me.
"And he's the boss?"
Grandma set aside the mixing bowl. "His other siblings are all dead."
"How?"
"You ask too many questions, Katerina. Go with Xander. If you have a problem he will help you. Xander, keep an eye on my granddaughter, eh?"
Progress. Finally.
* * *
Between Grandma's kitchen and the compound's arched entrance, Xander didn't find a shirt. It was just him and his shorts and some kind of slip on shoes that passed for fashionable around here. He swaggered on ahead, silent except for the slap of his soles on stone. His scars moved silently with him, a golden waterfall gushing from his shoulders to someplace below his waist. Whatever he'd suffered it had been brutal.
The compound was hopping. Music pouring out open windows, shutters thrown wide. Up on the balconies, mothers were performing light chores while their children ran wild in the courtyard. From the direction of the swimming pool, the water was making sounds as though Jaws was experiencing an ill-fated meeting with Orca: The Killer Whale. Besides family, the compound was home to an assortment of cats and dogs. The cats ignored me. Like most cats they only wanted friends with benefits, and they weren't sure what the benefits of being friends with me were yet. The dogs, being dogs, weren't picky. They got right down to the, Hey, how ya doing? Got any spare pats/snacks/toys in those pockets? With a dog you know where you stand. With a cat all you know is where you can't sit.
On the far side of the archway a motorcycle was waiting. A big, black beast of a bike. Sitting atop it were two helmets: one black to match the motorcycle, the other pink.
"Cool. I bet you look great in pink." I reached for the black, but Xander snatched it away. Before I had a chance to grab it he shoved the pink helmet down over my head.
He gave me two unsarcastic—not even remotely ironic—thumbs up, ala the Fonz.
"Before I get on that thing, aren't you going to put on a shirt?"
He looked at me like my picnic was several sandwiches short.
"What if you take a corner too quickly and …" I smacked my palms together. "… Bam?"
His expression said, No bam. Not today. Not ever.
Arms folded. "It could happen."
Silence.
"Do you ever talk?"
He shrugged.
"Okay, so if you won't talk to me, at least put some clothes on. I'll wait right here."
Face still passive, he picked me up under the armpits, dumped me on the motorcycle. Then the earth moved beneath me as he straddled the behemoth. It was a lean, mean, European machine, nothing like an American hog. No telltale potato-potato, just a wild roar that said pedestrians better walk faster or get right with God. He reached back, grabbed my hands, curled them around his waist.
It was like snugging up to a sun-warmed boulder. Only a sun-warmed boulder didn't have the power to kick my hormones up to eleven.
Concentrate on something else, for crying out loud. Shouldn't be too difficult. I was in Greece, for crying out loud. For the first time in my life I was out of the United States and in one of those places I'd only seen on maps, calendars, or a friend's Instagram feed.
This was my first look at Greece with its light on up in the sky, and man, she was one good-looking broad. There was no other word for it. Greece was old school and old-fashioned and just plain old. But there was a certain class to the way the trees twisted up out of the ground. The sky was bluer, clearer, and closer.
How high up were we anyway?
The motorcycle burst out from behind a long stretch of trees, and now I was getting an eyeful of the gulf. It couldn't make up its mind if it wanted to be blue or green, so it was doing both.
How high up? Pretty damn high.
"Wow," I yelled, but the word blew away.
The motorcycle sped up.
* * *
Xander stopped outside a blue and orange souvenir-shop-slash-shoe-store in one of the Pagasetic Gulf's seaside villages. The establishment sat directly across the road from the water. Its neighbors were in similar state
s of nonchalance about the overabundance of available decorating products, like paint in tasteful colors. The window was cluttered with a mix of shoes, T-shirts, and statues of the Greek gods and various other naked people. A rainbow of espadrilles hung over the door and down both sides, all of them tied to a rope by their ribbons.
"Shoes and souvenirs? That's bold yet fruity."
Xander shrugged. He adjusted the low-slung waist of his cargo shorts, giving me an eyeful of the gun he had stowed there.
Whoa! My eyes bugged. "A gun, seriously? Why do you need a gun? This is just a friendly visit. I'm a diplomat, not a soldier, or … or … whatever it is you are!"
Not a word from the guy made of stone. Hand on my waist, he steered me through the open door.
Three men were sitting inside in a semicircle of craptastic chairs from some bygone era. Two of the guys were probably born around the time King Leonidas was getting his fortune told in Delphi. The other guy was maybe mid-fifties, but his wardrobe was trendy back in the sixties and present-day Florida. White shoes, slicked back hair, short sleeves rolled up around twigs that wished they were biceps. Had a look in his eye that said he was meaner than a starving, rabid dog, but his pasted-on grin said he was real glad to see me.
"Who," he said, inspecting me, "are you? You must be a Makri, because that is one of the Makri dogs you brought with you. But I do not know your face. Which one are you married to?"
"Katerina Makris," I said, keeping a death-grip on my s. "And I'm not married to anyone. I'm looking for Baby Dimitri."
"You found him. Katerina Makri, eh?" He shot his buddies a curious glance. They had nothing for him but blank shrugs. "Where did the old woman get a granddaughter?" The question was for Xander, not me.
I rolled my eyes at the ceiling. "Do I need to explain how reproduction works? A man puts his—"
The Godfather of the Night and Souvenirs laughed big and loud. "I know how babies are made. I have made quite a few myself—sons and daughters. But until today I did not know your grandmother had a granddaughter."
"Surprise," I said. "I've been in America."
"America?" The three men swapped glances. "You are Michail's daughter then, eh?"
"That's right. And I'm here looking for him."
Astonishment plastered his face. But was it real or fake? "Why would you come here to look for your father? I have not seen the man in thirty or more years. Not since he ran away like a gypsy dog, with his tail tucked between his legs."
It kind of, maybe, a little bit, sounded like he knew my father. Dad always seemed like he was hiding out in America, and he did get out of Greece in a big hurry. But he wasn't a coward.
Was he?
Knowing what I already knew about my family, I couldn't blame him for hiding under America's bed all these years. I kind of wanted to hide there, too.
"I'm asking everyone if they've seen him." Not true, but if Baby Dimitri didn't pan out I planned to knock on every door in Greece if need be.
"Oh? Who else?"
Think fast. "Uh, you're the first." Rats, not fast enough. "But there are others."
The men exchanged more glances. Laughed. Not a friendly kind of laugh, but the psychotic titter of hyenas as they considered an easy meal heading their way.
"So, do you have him?"
"What happened to your father?" Baby Dimitri asked me.
"Some men took him."
"Very interesting. Some men in America and took him. Took him where? Did you see these men?"
I glanced at Xander to see what he was doing about backup, but he was standing outside, fiddling with his cell phone. Very helpful guy. Didn't talk, didn't help. Stood around with a gun and a phone and looked good.
"Not exactly." I straightened my spine. "But someone described them to me."
"Someone reliable?"
The neighborhood perv, but I wasn't about to tell them that. What if someone decided to silence the old guy? I wasn't crazy about the former judge, but he was harmless as long as you didn't look when he said, Hey, look!
"Reliable enough. If you know anything, I'd be grateful for any help."
"This one has nice manners," he said to his decrepit buddies.
Baby Dimitri got up out of his chair, moved about the shop with the same precision a satellite orbits the Earth when its trajectory is beginning to decay. Round and round he went, until he was one foul puff of air away. Seriously, the guy needed to brush with something other than garlic and raw fish eggs. He sucked saliva between his teeth then said, "I haven't seen your father. My men have not seen your father, nor have they been to America lately. Tell your grandmother that. Was this her idea?"
I stood my ground. "Mine. I figured it was nicer to ask politely what a person might want in return for my father. I was raised in America. Greeks might have invented democracy, but we rock at diplomacy." Well, sort of. There were times when America completely sucked at diplomacy, but maybe Baby Dimitri didn't watch the news or read the papers.
He nodded to one of his cronies. The old guy rose from his chair slowly, like someone was using a jack under his backside. He grinned on the way past. One gold tooth. Not a sign of enamel in his mouth. An overabundance of gum space. I'd say he needed a dentist, but the time for dental care was long past.
"Where's he going?"
Baby Dimitri grinned. "So you are a diplomat, eh?"
"Trying to be. Is it working?"
"Eh." A one-shouldered shrug. "I will let you know. What did these men who took your father look like?"
"Foreign. The witness said they looked like mobsters."
The look he gave me was blank. "What else would kidnappers look like?"
Here we go again. "I'd try to blend—"
A deafening boom shook the shop and the world went up in big puffball of flames. The store window shattered and a body landed on top of me, crushing me into the concrete floor.
The body was Xander. He was big, heavy, and … God, I was going to die, my insides squished out like a jelly donut.
Maybe not. Evidently satisfied (more or less) that my life wasn't in immediate danger, he rolled off me and pulled me up by both hands. I leaned past him, looking for the source of the bang.
"Ohmigod, ohmigod!"
Flames had engulfed Xander's bike, turning it into a decent-sized bonfire. Bits of metal that had shot into the sky landed with a tinny clink.
Baby Dimitri laughed. "Looks like your motorcycle had a small accident. Was it made in China?"
"Ohmigod." I wheeled around to gape at the wannabe Floridian. "Did you just blow up Xander's motorcycle?"
He shrugged, two palms up. "Not me. But him?" He nodded toward the new ventilation system that had previously been a window. "Maybe."
His gold-toothed buddy was currently standing across the street by the water, rolling a cigarette. Goon number two was still in his chair, only now he was scraping the tip of a scary looking dagger under each nail, curls of gunk spiraling to the floor. This was one of those classy establishments. I wondered if every pair of shoes came with a complimentary dose of foot fungus? Up until that moment I'd been too freaked out to move. Now I had to get outside in case I caught scabies or pinworms.
Spectators had gathered around the burning motorcycle, and the crowd was growing. One kid had shoved a newspaper into the fire and now he was running up and down the street, pretending to bear the Olympic flame. Onlookers were holding their phones up in the air, capturing the moment for YouTube and Vine. I pushed to the front, where Xander was watching silently.
My hands grabbed my head and scrunched, digging into my scalp. This couldn't be happening. People don't just go around blowing up stuff. It wasn't … nice. Or legal.
A cop car pulled up. I did a double-take when Officer Friendly from last night got out. He nodded to Xander, who lobbed the nod back.
Good to see it wasn't just me who got the silent treatment.
"Nice fire," Officer Friendly said to no one in particular.
"There's a motorcycle
under the fire," someone told him.
"Not for long."
It was true, the fire was gulping its lunch.
I looked at Xander. "I hope you're insured."
Could be yes, could be no, if his non-reaction was any indication.
"We meet again, Katerina Makri." Officer Friendly checked me out hard. He performed the approving body-scan thing with his eyes. Smooth.
Okay, so I wouldn't pretend I wasn't doing the same thing. In harsh daylight he had a few tiny lines huddled around his eyes, but that injected some humanity into the Photoshopped poster he'd presented last night.
"Officer Friendly," I said.
"Detective Melas. Nikos Melas."
"Stop looking at my boobs, Detective Melas."
"You're a doll," he said, grinning.
"Greece is full of pretty women." At least that's what the view along the waterfront was telling me, and I was bundled up like a snowman compared to most of them.
"Always room for one more."
My gaze slid sideways to see what Xander was making of this conversation, but he was too busy punching letters into a cellphone to care about Detective Nikos Melas and his idea of small talk.
"Whose motorcycle?" he asked.
I nodded to Xander. "His."
"How did it happen?"
Baby Dimitri was inside his shop, sawing a toothy line across his neck with one bony finger. Yikes. For the lie that came next I blamed a mixture of fear and the desire to not burn bridges. Maybe if he heard something about Dad, the Godfather of the Night and Shoes would contact me.
"Spontaneous combustion," I told the cop.
He snorted. "I don't believe you." He looked at the burning bike. "Your grandmother's not going to be happy."
"Do you know my family well?"
"Too well." He checked me out again. "And suddenly not well enough."
"What can you tell me about them?"
He shrugged. "Nothing your grandmother would be happy about."
Ooooookay. "What are my cousins like?"
"Ugly. They're all men."
