by Rick Copp
“Guess you know more about Claire Richards than you’ve let on,” I said with a smile. “What else are you hiding?”
Khristos leapt to his feet, pushing me out of the way and making a break for the door. Liam was on him with the swiftness of a cheetah, bringing him down and pinning his arms to the floor. Riled with fury, Khristos picked his head up and spit in Liam’s face. Liam reeled back and clocked him across the jaw with his fist.
Laurette and I both sprang forward.
“Don’t knock him out,” I yelled. “We need to find out about Charlie.”
“I hate to see you boys fighting,” Laurette cooed. “You’re both just so darn cute.” She regretted saying it the minute it flew out of her lips.
“Why don’t you call Larry, you remember Larry, your boyfriend?” I said.
“You’re one to talk. I didn’t bring an Irish hunk and a Greek stud back to the room. It’s a gay three-way just waiting to happen.”
Not wanting to argue, I stepped around Laurette and walked up behind Liam, who still straddled the Greek. Staring down at Khristos, I said, “You know who poisoned her, don’t you?”
“No!” he cried.
“And you know who shot Akshay!”
“No!”
“And you know where the American is being held, don’t you?”
He hesitated for a split second before sighing, “No.”
I grabbed the knife out of Liam’s hand, pushed him off Khristos, and knelt down in front of the Greek. I drove the tip of the blade up against his throat just as his partner had done to me. “Talk to me, Khristos, and you may just walk out of here alive.”
“It had to be Akshay,” Khristos wailed. “He knew the Richards woman would never just hand over her Oscar. And that statue was his only way out of a massive debt. He was desperate. He probably killed her, poisoned her somehow. Then, with her out of the way, he had the opportunity to steal that award.”
Khristos eyed the knife at his throat. He was terrified.
I had to admit it made perfect sense. But why go through the trouble of murdering Claire? After all, he had backstage access. He was in the cast of the play. He could have waited until Claire was onstage and Liam was occupied, and then all he had to do was just break into her dressing room and snatch the statue. No. He didn’t have a strong enough motive to kill her. And if he did do it, then we would never really know the truth, because he was dead. Which led to the next big question. Who killed Akshay? I believed what Ulysses Karydes and his henchmen were claiming. Akshay had the Oscar on him when he died. Why would they kill him? They were so close to getting what they wanted. They might have roughed him up a bit for trying to double-cross them with a fake, but he had made good on his promise to deliver the genuine artifact. Why risk scrutiny from the authorities for no reason? Someone else was behind these killings. Someone not connected to Akshay and not connected to Karydes. Which put me back to square one.
But there was still the pressing matter of Charlie. I pressed the knife deeper into Khristos’s skin, just enough to draw a trickle of blood.
He screamed. “I told you, we didn’t kill anybody!”
“But you did kidnap someone, and I want to know where he is,” I growled.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about!” Khristos was weeping.
“The American. I want to know where he is.”
I twisted the knife a bit, making the cut wider. Khristos screamed. Liam watched me in the moment, a little concerned about just how far I was willing to take this. Even Laurette had her doubts. She had never seen me like this before. But I had never lost my boyfriend before to a gang of Greek thugs. And I surprised even myself with the sheer focus of my rainbow-colored vigilantism.
Tears ran down Khristos’s face. He was stuck. Either betray his boss or get his throat cut. He looked up at me, his eyes pleading. They were met by a grave, determined stare. And it was at that moment that Khristos finally believed I was dead serious.
“The compound. Your American friend is being held on Mr. Karydes’s compound.”
Chapter 28
Grabbing a fistful of Khristos’s hair and yanking his head back until it pounded against the floor, I leaned over his face and waved my knife menacingly.
“Okay, here is what you’re going to do,” I said. “You’re going to hightail it back to your boss and tell him to meet us today at noon at Agios Sostis Beach.”
The last time I had traveled to Mykonos, I met a local while skin diving who invited me there for lunch. It was a very isolated strip of beach, quiet, with low dunes that could conceal quite a lot of secret activity. It was about as far outside of Mykonos town as you could get and still be on the island. The only house in the vicinity was a tiny shack owned by a kindly Dutch woman and her Greek husband who operated a homey tavern. I remembered they had to close when it got dark because they had no electricity. It was the perfect locale for an exchange. Out of the way. But with a pair of witnesses if anything went wrong.
“You tell Uli to bring Charlie unharmed and we’ll give him his damn Oscar,” I said.
Khristos was on his back, sprawled out on the floor, frozen. Sitting on top of him, I tapped the tip of the blade against the bridge of his nose.
“Are you hearing me, Khristos?” I said.
He quickly nodded.
“If your boss tries anything stupid, or if Charlie has so much as a bruise on him, not only will I make it my personal mission to skewer him like a souvlaki, I’ll personally come back for you too.”
Why couldn’t I ever be this good in an audition? I could be raking in a fortune playing a variety of badasses on all those franchise cop shows like Law and Order and CSI.
Laurette, who was never without a biting and sarcastic comment, was utterly speechless. This was indeed a first. She simply stared at me, part of her impressed and another part of her scared silly by my forceful display of brutish bravado.
I slowly stood up and stepped over Khristos’s prone body. Liam watched him like a hawk as he scrambled to his feet, ready to pounce on the Greek henchman if he made any kind of unexpected move. But my tough-guy act had worked. He backed slowly toward the door.
“I’ll tell him,” he said. He stumbled into the door, felt for the knob with his left hand, and swung it open. When he was reasonably confident that I wasn’t going to jam the knife into his back when he turned around, he made a break for it and disappeared into the darkness.
Laurette dropped to the couch and exhaled loudly. “I didn’t sign up for this.”
Liam grinned at me. “That was fucking incredible! You were so awesome, so believable, that piece of shit nearly wet his pants!”
“We’ve only got a few hours until we have to grab a cab over to the beach. It’s clear across the island. At least a half-hour drive.”
“Shouldn’t we call someone for backup?”
“Who? Karydes owns the local cops. And if we call the authorities in Athens, they’ll never get here in time. Besides, if we bring an army, Uli could panic and kill Charlie,” I said. “We’re on our own.”
“Don’t worry, Jarrod. I’ll have your back,” Liam said. This was quickly turning into one of those low-budget action movies with Casper Van Dien that Showtime aired in the wee hours of the morning.
“We better wake Delphina up and get the Oscar out of the hotel safe,” I said, heading for the door.
Laurette followed me, turning her head and smiling at Liam. “We’ll be right back.”
As I marched across the yard toward the office, Laurette shuffled along in her slippers, trying to catch up.
“Jarrod, wait, this is insane,” she said, reaching out to pull at my arm. “You can’t be doing this. First of all, as cute as the Irishman is, he strikes me as a tiny bit unstable. Look up ‘loose cannon’ in the dictionary, and you’ll probably see his picture.”
“I’m going to need a crazy man on my side if I’m going to pull this off.”
“Please, let’s call someone, anyone, before
we rush into this. Honestly, Jarrod, wake up. Think about what you’re doing.”
“I’m only thinking of Charlie right now,” I said.
“And if you screw this up, Charlie is the one who is going to pay the biggest price.”
I had already been obsessing about that very fact, and when she said it out loud, it all came crashing down on me. But failure was not an option at this point. And I couldn’t let my best friend in the world chip away at my resolve.
“I can only go by what my gut is telling me, Laurette.”
I spun away from her and rang the bell outside the office door. I waited another few seconds and rang it again. A light popped on inside and someone fumbled to unlock the door.
Delphina, her eyes heavy, her hair tangled, yawned as she opened the door to find us. “Yes?”
“We’re sorry to wake you, Delphina, but it’s an emergency. We need to get something out of the safe.”
She was annoyed, but her desire to be a good hostess overwhelmed her irritation, and she waved us inside.
Delphina asked no questions. She just wrapped her powder blue robe tightly around her and led us behind the desk to the safe. She spun the dial a few times, and after a click, she turned the lever and the stainless steel door opened. She reached inside, pulled out the sack, and handed it to Laurette.
“Is there anything else?”
“No, that’s all,” I said. “I’m truly sorry to be bothering you so late.”
She forced a smile. “No trouble. Enjoy the rest of your night. Or the start of your morning.”
“Thank you,” I said and we headed for the door.
“Oh, Mr. Jarvis, Ms. Taylor,” she said. “If you find yourselves in any kind of trouble, please don’t hesitate to come to me. I may be able to help you.”
“That’s very kind of you,” Laurette said.
“I’m very serious,” she said, folding her arms. “You know where to find me.”
We thanked her again and left the office. As we crossed back to our room, Laurette clutched the top of the sack in her fist, swinging it by her side.
“What do you suppose that was all about?” Laurette asked.
“Well, she obviously knows we’re up to something. We haven’t exactly been acting like your typical American tourists.”
“She was so ominous. It was kind of creepy. You think she peeked inside the sack and saw what was in it?”
I shrugged.
“We better make sure she didn’t swipe the Oscar and replace it with a candlestick or something,” Laurette said, opening the sack and fishing inside for Claire’s Academy Award.
She wrenched the statue out of the confines of the sack and held it up in the air. “Looks like the real thing to me.”
At that moment, just as I opened my mouth to warn her, Laurette crashed her knee into a chaise lounge by the pool. The shock caught her off guard, and she lost her balance. I reached out to grab her, but it was too late. She toppled over, and in a desperate bid to steady herself, threw the Oscar into the air. She landed on the cement with a thud.
Just as my eyes shifted upward in search of the flying Oscar, I saw it plummet back to earth and land a few feet from Laurette. Oscar hit the cement headfirst. There was a sickening crack, and the little man’s gold head separated from his body and rolled over the side of the pool, where it splashed into the aquamarine chlorinated water and sank to the bottom.
“Damn it, my knee is bleeding!” Laurette wailed.
I stared at the decapitated Oscar.
“Jarrod, did you hear me? Can you run back to the room and get a wet towel and a Band-Aid?”
I glanced over the side of the pool, and made out the stoic tiny face of the poor, unlucky, beheaded Oscar. Laurette had no idea yet that her clumsiness might have just cost Charlie his life.
Chapter 29
“How are you ever going to take care of a child you adopt from China if you can’t even look after an inanimate object ?” I said, jumping into the pool to retrieve Oscar’s head. I knew I was wrong to say it, but I was distressed about Charlie and my emotions were getting the best of me.
“How could you attack me like that? After all we’ve been through together!” Laurette bellowed. “I know you’re upset, I know the statue is our best chance of getting Charlie back, but to question my mothering skills . . .”
I didn’t hear any more. I took a big gulp of air and swam down to the bottom of the pool and scooped up Oscar’s head in my fist. When I shot back up to the surface, I saw Liam lumbering over to Laurette.
“What happened?” he said.
Laurette raised the headless statue up in the air for him to see.
“Christ, we’re dead,” he whispered.
“No, Charlie’s dead if we don’t figure something out,” I said, lifting myself out of the pool and handing Liam the little gold head. I twisted my shirt in my hands, wringing the water from it.
“Jarrod, I’m sorry . . .” Laurette had calmed down from the shock of her fall and decided after years of friendship, she might as well cut me some slack for my harsh words. She plopped down on the chaise lounge that had caused her unfortunate tumble and carefully examined her wounded knee.
I marched over, leaned down, and kissed her lightly on the forehead. She looked up at me and gave me a gentle nod. Both of us knew our blowup was a result of the agonizing pressure we were under. There was no need to discuss it any further.
“What now?” Liam said. It was clear he was now our partner in all of this, because he was so close to avenging his beloved Claire’s death he could taste it.
“Maybe we can call Mr. Karydes and just explain what happened. He might understand. He might even still want the Oscar, head or no head,” Laurette said hopefully.
“No,” I said. “I’m not going to risk making him mad.”
“Maybe we can fix it,” Liam said.
Laurette’s eyes widened. “We can use Krazy Glue!”
“There’s no guarantee we can repair it, and we’ll be losing valuable time. Looks like we’re just going to have to rescue Charlie before we’re supposed to meet Karydes.”
“How do you propose we do that?” Laurette asked, her eyes wide with curiosity.
I took a deep breath. “Raid the compound.”
A nervous giggle escaped Laurette before it slowly dawned on her that I was completely serious.
Laurette and Liam accompanied me down the stone sidewalk to Mykonos town, still unsure whether I was crazy enough to go through with this off-the-cuff plan. I approached a snoozing cab driver slumped down in the front seat of his taxi, parked off to the side of a tiny traffic circle surrounded by shops and cafés.
I shook the sleeping driver awake. “I need you to take us to the Karydes estate.”
The driver just sat there like he didn’t hear me.
“Do you know where it is?”
“Everybody knows where it is,” he said. “But you don’t want to go there unless you’re invited.”
“I’ll give you a hundred euros if you take us at least within a half a mile of the place. We’ll continue on foot from there.”
A hundred euros perked up the driver’s ears. He shifted around to see if I was serious. I was already waving the bills in my hand.
“Half now, the other half when we get there.”
He snatched the money out of my hand, spun around, and fired up his beat-up, dented taxicab.
Laurette’s head was spinning from my macho posturing. “How do you know Charlie’s still there?”
“Khristos said he was there. Why would they move him? Besides, the last thing they’ll expect us to do is show up now, before the scheduled exchange. Who is going to be stupid enough to break into the place in the predawn hours?”
“This is a suicide mission!” Laurette wailed.
“That’s why you’re not going. There’s no way I’m going to be responsible for my best friend getting shot.”
“What about Liam?” Laurette said.
�
��He can tag along or not. That’s his choice. All I know is, if Charlie’s going down, I’m not letting him go down alone.”
Liam stared at me, trying to figure out if I had gone off the deep end. Was I so out of touch with the reality of the situation that I was going to get him killed?
I got in the back of the cab.
Liam put up his hand. “I’m in.” He turned and gave me a slight smile as he followed me into the backseat. “Are all actors this crazy?”
“You of all people should know. You’re an actor too.”
“No, I’m not,” Liam said with a smile. “That was all Claire’s idea. She just wanted to fuck with the director.”
“Well, you’re still an expert on crazy actors. You were sleeping with the spokeswoman for crazy actors.”
Liam couldn’t argue after two roller-coaster years with the mercurial Claire. I just hoped that Charlie would have the opportunity in the near future to commiserate with Liam about living with self-involved, daft actors.
Chapter 30
After Laurette waved us off, it was a short ride to Psarou Beach, a remote yet dramatic enclave surrounded by high, majestic mountains populated with lush, vast villas nestled comfortably into the landscape. Below, a smattering of luxurious yachts rocked gently in the water surrounding the beach. This was undoubtedly Eurotrash central.
“Which one is Karydes’s place?” I asked as I pulled the other fifty euros out of my wallet and handed it to the driver.
“The biggest one, of course,” he said, as if I had just asked the stupidest question he had ever heard. He pointed toward the top of the highest mountain.
The villa dwarfed the properties below it and stretched halfway across the peak. It was white with blue shutters, like almost every other property on the island, but stood out simply because of its expansive size. It was going to be a long hike to get up there.
Liam and I barely had time to get out of the cab before it sped away. The driver had no intention of allowing anyone to see him dropping us off and thereby connecting him to us.
