by Alex A King
“I don’t know any Greek jokes.”
“Tell me an American one.”
Oh boy. This was going to go well, I could tell. My joke delivery sucked at the best of times. I was renowned for stumbling through to the end, then blowing my own punch line by prematurely laughing. Most of the time no one heard the punch line because it was filtered through my hooting.
I told her the one about the Greek and Italian who were discussing sex. The Greek said his people invented sex. The Italian said, Yes, but we invented it with women.
Marika didn’t laugh. Marika nodded solemnly and said, “I say this with love, but has anyone ever mentioned you stink at telling jokes? We invented sex with women. Italians invented bestiality. Ask Caligula.”
“I can’t exactly ask him, on account of how he’s dead and has been for a long time.”
“Very convenient, no? That’s how the Italians are, always dodging the difficult questions.”
I thought that was a whole lot like the Greeks. “Probably if Caligula had a choice he’d still be alive.”
Marika threw back her head and faked laughed, then she took another long slurp of her ice cream.
I looked at her. “What was that?”
“I wanted to look like I was having a good time. It is called acting. A good bodyguard and spy should be able to act naturally. On a scale of one to ten, how good was I?”
“They don’t have a number for that.”
“Hmph! What do you know about acting?”
“Nothing,” I admitted. “I just watch movies and TV, that’s all.”
There was movement across the street. Okay, that wasn’t exactly a surprise. We were on a busy beach on a hot afternoon, when most Greeks were about to take to their beds until the sun began to nosedive; movement, and lots of it, was part of the fabric of the place. This movement was Laki. He got up from his chair and began a plodding walk along the pavement, hands in his pockets, grin slapped on his face.
Where was he going?
I followed him with my eyes as he slouched past Lopez and Bishop, snugged up to the curb in their semi-mobile garbage can. I hadn’t realized they’d tailed me. Probably Elias knew though.
“Uh oh,” I said.
Laki didn’t stop until he was maybe twelve feet past the Renault. Then he scratched his head and turned around, as though he’d dropped a few of his marbles. I hadn’t yet been able to figure out where Baby Dimitri’s pal stashed his bottle supply, but sure enough he was gripping one in his hand, Zippo lighter at the ready. He touched it to the rag and tossed it in through the Renault’s open window.
“What?” Marika followed my line of sight. “Ay-yi-yi.”
Lopez and Bishop screamed. They flung open the car doors and hurled themselves out into the street. Lopez leopard crawled across the road, dodging the traffic that had slowed to watch the pretty fire. Bishop made it to his feet before the car blew and the blast flattened him.
Over at the shoe and souvenir shop, Baby Dimitri wasn’t paying attention to anything except his phone. He was in the throes of a heated conversation. Lots of hand waving and loud voices. I couldn’t hear him from here, but anger was rolling off him in waves. He was more turbulent than the sea at my back. Which wasn’t exactly saying much. The only time the Pagasetic Gulf made waves was when the wind and moon shoved it around.
“We should go help them,” I said, thrusting my book into my bag.
Marika faked another hair-tossing laugh. “If we do we will break cover.”
I glanced over at Elias, who was slouched against a streetlight, pretending to read a map. He didn’t seem worried about the burning car or Lopez, who had pulled himself to his feet and was now stabbing the air with his finger.
“You crazy motherfucker!” Lopez yelled at Laki. “The fuck is wrong with you? That’s my car, you fucking fuck!”
Laki beamed. Hands in his pockets, his work done, he took his sweet time strolling back to Baby Dimitri’s shop. He plopped down in his usual seat, grinning the grin of the truly loony. Baby Dimitri ended the call and plunked himself down in his chair beside the door. There was nobody in the middle chair today. He said something monosyllabic to Laki, who lobbed back something of equal size.
We watched as the fat cop peeled his skinny partner off the sidewalk. They stood there swapping a lot of low words, while black, chewy smoke spiraled in every direction. Then, decision made, Lopez went striding off in the direction of Baby Dimitri’s shop, face like a fast-moving hurricane. The big cop was a dead man walking. Even the incoming fire truck wouldn’t be able to save him now.
He planted himself in front of the two mobsters, hands on hips, mouth moving a mile a minute in a language they barely understood. Laki, I thought, probably didn’t know any English beyond the basics: arson; fire; burn, baby, burn.
The Godfather of Knickknacks and Footwear didn’t break eye contact with the beach. His arms were folded. His legs were crossed. He broke the pose for a moment to pick at his teeth with his pinkie nail, then he resumed the arm folding. If Lopez was alive and standing in front of him, ranting and raving, Baby Dimitri didn’t show it. To him the cop was nothing more than sun-hardened gum on the sidewalk. Baby Dimitri shoved the phone against his ear again. He talked for a moment then hung up and went back to his original don’t-care position.
It was about thirty seconds later that a couple of strapping young men hauled ass across the street. They were in flip-flops and swim shorts and black sunglasses. Somewhere in time, Annette Funicello and Sandra Dee were flicking their hair, plotting to invite them to a bonfire. The hired hands closed in on the two Portland cops, then they each grabbed one and steered them into the shop.
They didn’t come back out. Any of them.
Baby Dimitri leaned back in his chair, hands behind his head. He was a magician, the king of this strip, and he had just made two problems disappear.
“We should go,” I squeaked.
“That’s what I was thinking,” Marika said. “I could use a coffee after all this spying. Did we get anything?”
“No.”
“That is too bad. I thought for sure all this hard work would pay off.”
We trotted back to the convertible, with Elias following a few dozen feet back. The car was empty, no sign of Donk.
I looked up the street, down the street. Nothing. “Where did he go?”
Marika glanced around. “Who?”
“Donk. We left him here, right?”
“I remember now. Probably he went to scope out breasts at the beach.”
That sounded like Donk. Actually, that sounded like most teenage boys.
I reached for the car door.
Elias grabbed my arm. “Don’t. I think there’s a bomb.”
Yikes! “A ... a bomb? On my car?”
He crouched down beside the Beetle, indicated for me to do the same. Then he pointed out a flashing red light, stuck to the undercarriage.
“Either it’s a bomb or a transmitter of some kind,” he said.
“So ... what do we do?” Because I had no idea what to do about red flashing things under my car. But fortunately Elias did. He made a phone call, then he told me someone from the Family was on their way. It was kind of nice having a bodyguard. A bit like having a baby sitter who does what you tell them to do. You want ice cream? No problem? Need a bomb removed? Cool.
I tried to ignore the bits of me that were quietly freaking out. Someone had already tried to blow me up today, and now someone else wanted in on the explosive action. If it was a bomb. Maybe it was a harmless transmitter, put there by someone who just wanted to follow me around. Because that wasn’t creepy and stalkerish at all.
Chapter 13
Marika and I sat on the curb, under the shade of a beech. Heat wafted up off the road in damp woolen sheets.
“Virgin Mary,” Marika said, fanning her face with her hand. “This summer is a hot one.”
I knew zip about Greek summers, except that they were hot. “Worse than normal?”
“The same.”
A couple of old biddies stopped to gape at us. Well, me—they were gawking at me.
One of them summoned up some courage. “Aren’t you ...?”
“No,” Marika said. “Move along before I shoot you both for fun.”
They hurried away, exchanging whispers and probably vicious gossip.
“Good thing you have me to guard you,” Marika said. “You are like a rock star.”
More like there had been a puff piece about me in the newspaper, accompanied by a ton of speculation about what I was doing in Greece and what my future would hold. And, okay, maybe a picture or two: me dining with Detective Melas, and a charming portrait of me being hauled out of an alley upside down, minutes after a serial killer added me to his must-kill list.
Rock star sounded like a better deal. I wanted to be one of those.
“I wouldn’t mind being a rock star,” I said. “Too bad I have no musical talent.”
“Nobody cares if you have no talent. Image is everything,” said the woman dressed like a waitress. “That’s why I have these mirrored glasses. Without them I could be anyone. These glasses say danger cannot touch you. I see everything.”
“Elias saw the red light first.”
“Yes, but only because he saw it first. I would have seen it first if he hadn’t.”
Somewhere, Socrates was face-palming.
About three years of endless summers later, a black van pulled up alongside the Beetle. The windows were tinted. The rims were dull black. It looked like a kidnapping waiting to happen. Or an arrest. The side panel slid open and two of the cousins jumped out. They unloaded a couple of big metal cases, carried them over to the Beetle. The van’s front window rolled down. Stavros was driving. He waved us over.
“Get in,” he said.
We climbed in. If the Family bomb disposal team screwed up there was a chance they wouldn’t live to do the sirtaki another day.
I leaned over the front seats. “Are they going to be okay?”
“Probably,” Stavros said. “They are the best. Okay, maybe not the best, but two of the top ten.”
“In the world?”
“No ...”
“In Greece?”
He made a face, wiggled his hand in a so-so move. “In this part of the country.”
“I really liked that car,” I said wistfully. “Probably I would have liked my cousins, too, if I’d gotten to know them better.”
Stavros eased the van down the block, until he decided we were a safe distance away. He parked, and then put on a headset so he could communicate with the technicians.
“That’s what me and this one need,” Marika said, nodding to Elias. “Everyone would know we were professionals with those little headsets.”
Elias had been watching out the van’s back window this whole time. Now I saw him flinch.
“You don’t need headsets,” I told her. “You’re better off blending in.”
“Then how will everybody know I am a bodyguard?”
Elias flinched again. I wanted to pat him on the shoulder and assure him that eventually Marika’s bodyguard fad would pass—probably around the time bullets flew, if it came to that.
Stavros laughed in the front seat.
Marika’s eyes narrowed to dangerous slits. “What is so funny?”
His laugh died a quick, bloodless death. “Nothing. I am listening to those two malakes back there.”
She settled back down in her seat, huffing. It was obvious she didn’t believe him. She was oversensitive about the situation, thanks to her husband’s mockery.
“I still think we should have those little headsets. I will have to do my hair a new way though so it does not get all messed up. Maybe we could get those earpieces instead, like the Secret Service.”
“You’re not the Secret Service,” I said.
“I could be. I have ambition, goals. Takis does not believe me but I am more than a housewife.”
Stavros glanced back. “What is wrong with being a housewife? I would love to be a housewife. Uh, househusband.”
Marika snorted. “In this family? Good luck.”
His face fell. “It could happen.”
Family values were complicated in the Makris family ... and in Greece. The women were women and the men were worried about where that was going.
“What do you think, Katerina?” Elias said.
“About ...?”
“Househusbands.”
“People should do what makes them happy.”
“Baboulas won’t live forever,” Elias said. “When she dies and you take over, maybe you see that Stavros gets the life he wants.”
We all looked at him. Stavros and Marika gasped. Marika crossed herself frantically.
“What?” He shrugged. “It’s what everyone is saying. The old woman can’t live forever.”
“She will try,” Stavros said in a reverent tone.
Someone knocked on the side of the van. Marika whipped out one of her smaller guns and—PEW—shot a hole clean through the sliding door. Elias leaped over the seat and tackled her.
“Fuck the Virgin Mary!” Stavros yelled. “What are you doing?”
“Someone has to protect Katerina,” Marika said, her face squished into the upholstery. “Katerina, are you okay?”
The hole was the size of a dime. I peered through it. If there was a body on the ground I couldn’t see it.
“Why aren’t we deaf right now?” I asked.
“Silencer,” Marika said. “A good bodyguard can kill someone quietly.”
“I think you’re getting bodyguards and assassins mixed up,” I told her.
There was another knock on the side of the van. A voice said, “Don’t shoot.” Then the door slid open and Detective Melas peered in. His face was all frowny; not surprising since Marika had just tried to blow a hole in him. After his German encounter he had to be getting twitchy around guns.
“Aren’t you supposed to be hiding?” I asked him.
“I still am. Mostly.” He climbed inside, scooted me over so he could sit beside me. His arm went over the back of the seat, this close to being a teenage pre-grope. The wig was still on his head. When he saw me glance at the pretend hair he pulled it off, dumped it in his lap. “What’s going on? Why is Marika shooting at people?”
“She’s my new bodyguard.”
Melas’s eyebrows rose. “I thought Elias was your bodyguard.”
“Where was Elias when you tried to break into the van just now, eh? Sitting here on his kolos,” Marika said, voice distorted by the squashing.
“Let her up,” I told Elias. I reached over to help her back into the upright position. She shot Elias in the face with her eye lasers—and hers were wicked. The woman had sons and Takis. She’d had practice.
Melas looked confused. “I thought she was your sidekick,” he said to me.
“I was,” Marika said. “But bodyguard is a paying position.”
Melas grinned. “She’s getting paid to be your friend, honey.”
I pulled back so I could get a good glare in. “What are you doing here?”
“I was driving past and saw a couple of guys working on your car. Then I saw the van parked further up. Figured I’d come see what was up.”
“Bomb under my car,” I said. “Maybe.”
Stavros bobbed his head up front. “Bomb,” he agreed.
Hearing confirmation sucked all the sass out of me. Someone had gone to the trouble of strapping a bomb to my car to kill me.
I flopped back in the seat, covered my face with my hands. As hiding places went, it sucked. “I want to go home.”
“There was a dead policeman in your home,” Marika reminded me. “At least here you have got bodyguards.”
“And people trying to blow me up. Did you hear about the suicide bomber at Grandma’s party?”
Melas looked shocked. “What?”
I told him all about it.
Face grim, he leaned back i
n his seat, closed his eyes for a moment. “I don’t have my phone,” he said. “I really need it. I suppose I can go get it now that all the Germans are accounted for.”
“Uh ...”
“What?”
I passed on what Pappas had told me, and his face morphed from grim to apoplectic. “He escaped? What was everyone doing? Sleeping?”
“The guard was using the facilities with the headphones on.”
“I hate it when Takis does that,” Marika said behind me. “He sings. And if he is watching a movie he yells when there are guns and shooting.”
“I do that,” Melas said.
“Me too,” Stavros said.
Elias waved his hand.
“I think that’s just a man thing,” I said. Dad used to flip out watching mob movies. Now I understood why.
“Time to go,” Melas said. He wrapped his arm around my shoulder and kissed my hair. “Don’t get blown up.”
“Where are you going?”
“I need to get my phone back somehow. Maybe Pappas can get it.”
“I’ll go,” I said. “We’ve been in the paper together. No one will think it’s weird if I’m visiting you in the hospital.”
“I won’t mind if you look sad and cry a bit while you’re there.”
“Don’t push your luck, or I’ll pull the plug.”
He dumped the wig back on his head, kissed my hair again, and grinned.
“You wouldn’t pull the plug.”
“I’d think about it.”
He winked and he was gone.
“Virgin Mary.” Marika crossed herself. “He wants you.”
“He’s just being friendly.” Yeah right. Even I didn’t believe that.
“Takis used to be that friendly when he wanted to—”
“Stop,” I said. “I don’t want to know.”
In the front seat, Stavros pulled off his headset. “You can relax now. It looked like a bomb but it was not a bomb.”
“What looks like a bomb but isn’t a bomb?”
He shrugged. “A fake bomb?”
“Is that a real thing that exists? What do you do with a fake bomb?”
“Put it under people’s cars and make them think it is a real bomb?” Stavros guessed.
“I bet they make them in China,” Marika said.
