by Jonas Saul
Casper grabbed his drink from the table. It looked like apple juice. At least it didn’t have any tiny umbrellas today. When he was done drinking, he ate the rest of his eggs, moved his plate aside and wiped his mouth.
“I need you,” he said. “We meet Wong in just over three hours. We need you to get inside the cartel. We do it my way. I deliver as promised and you don’t write about me. Deal?”
“Deal. But Aaron’s got to be safe and alive. I get him back and you deal with all the bad guys,” she popped another sausage in her mouth, “and we have a deal,” she finished saying around the food in her mouth.
“I can’t guarantee the state Aaron will be in.” He leaned back in his chair, joining his hands over his flat stomach. “You have to face the fact that this is a brutal group. There are odds with everything we do and even though the odds are good he’s still alive right now, that may change in the future. Especially the closer you get to them.”
“Make it a condition, a caveat.”
“What I’m saying, Sarah, is pinning Aaron’s health on not mentioning me in a book isn’t a deal. You just can’t mention me.”
“And if I do?”
“Don’t test it. In my world, there is no if.”
“What if you die during the operation? Who would stop me?”
“Good point. Let’s hope that doesn’t happen.”
“Yeah. Let’s.”
Neither one said another word until breakfast was done and Casper had charged the bill to his room. Once they were outside in the lobby by the elevators, Sarah turned to him.
“When and where?” she asked.
“I’ll knock on your door by 10:45.”
The elevator doors slid open. They got on and Sarah pressed her button.
“Do I get a gun?”
“Nope.”
“Why not?”
“You could shoot me. Accidentally, of course. No way. You’re too risky.”
“Good point. Better not give me a gun.”
The doors opened on the third floor and she exited before Casper could say anything more.
Chapter 41
Sarah waited in her room until eleven, but no one knocked on her door. She stood by the large window looking out at the highway that led into Athens.
Something didn’t add up. Yesterday Casper had said they knew where Wong was and that they were going to pick him up or nab him around eleven this morning. Then why be ready for 10:45? How could they get to where Wong was that fast?
Her breath caught in her throat. Unless Wong was coming to them. Landing at the airport, maybe even staying in this hotel.
But then where was Casper?
Someone knocked. “Housekeeping.” She heard the key card in the door and bolted across the room. Just as the door was opening, she slammed her shoulder into it.
“Sorry, almost done.” Sarah was careful to keep her body to the side in case whoever was in the hallway decided to shoot through the door. But no bullet came. All she heard was a muttered apology as the maid walked away.
Sarah placed her ear on the door and listened. Ten seconds later she heard another knock down the hall and the same woman said housekeeping again.
She had to get out of this room unnoticed. She was an easy target stuck in the room with no escape. She opened the door slowly, looked up and down the empty corridor and stepped out, the room keycard in her back pocket. Instead of the elevator, she hustled down the hall and took the stairs to the ground floor. She had her passport, a billfold loaded with a few hundred American dollars and her bank card. If Casper abandoned her, she could hunt Wong and get out of Greece on her own. If he set her up as bait for the Mexicans without telling her the plan, she would have to kill him and then expose him for who he was.
On the first floor, she moved toward the restaurant, which meant crossing in front of the counter. The area was relatively empty as most of the guests would’ve checked out.
“Good morning,” a clerk said to her from behind the check-in desk. “Kaliméra.”
She sidled up to the side of the counter and put her back to the wall to examine the lobby and the cars pulling in out front. There was no sign of Casper.
“What’s Kaliméra mean?” she asked.
“It means good morning in Greek.”
“Ahh, thanks.” Then Vivian whispered a word in her head: ef̱charistó̱. Sarah had no idea what that meant but decided to repeat it verbatim.
“Ef̱charistó̱.”
The clerk smiled. “Parakaló.”
“What did we just say?” she asked, idly wondering how this looked to the clerk.
“You said thank you and I said, you’re welcome.” His smile faltered for a brief moment. “What room were you staying in?” he asked.
When she told him, he typed it in the system. “Ahh, yes, Vivian Roberts. Buck Schaffer’s covering both rooms for two nights.”
“Two nights?” Sarah asked. Deal with Wong today and leave was the arrangement. Why two nights?
“Mr. Schaffer just changed it to two nights not ten minutes ago. He left a message on your phone about it.”
“Oh, didn’t get it. Did you see Mr. Schaffer?” she asked.
“He had me call a taxi over from the airport.” The clerk moved from the computer, bent down and looked out the front doors toward the road. “He might still be standing there. He was when you walked up.”
“Thanks … I mean, ef̱charistó̱.” Sarah headed for the doors.
A taxi pulled in off the road and drove over to a man standing on the side as she made it to the doors. He carried a briefcase of some kind. Outside, the taxi’s back door was just shutting and then the taxi pulled away.
Sarah ran after the cab as it hit the road and sped away from her. But not before she caught a glimpse of the face of the man in the backseat.
It wasn’t Casper.
It was a Chinese man. And he hadn’t been carrying a briefcase. It was a large leather-bound book.
She had missed James Wong by seconds.
Another taxi was coming her way. She ran into the street in front of it, arms flailing until it stopped.
Thankfully the backseat was empty. She hopped in and said, “Follow that cab. The one that’s about two hundred yards ahead of us.”
“No English,” the driver said. “Greek. Sygnómi.”
Vivian filled her head. “What?” she said to Vivian out loud.
“Greek,” the driver replied.
Sarah ignored him and listened to each word Vivian said. Then she repeated it to the driver.
“Ahh, you speak Greek,” the driver said in Greek with Vivian translating in Sarah’s head as he spoke.
The taxi started away from the hotel so fast he almost left rubber behind.
“Where did you learn to speak Greek?” he asked, with Vivian whispering the English to her.
“I don’t speak Greek,” Sarah said in Greek after Vivian told her how to say it. “Just these voices in my head.”
The driver glanced at her in the mirror, then looked back at the road.
What did I say to him, Vivian? What was that last part?
Vivian explained.
Great. Thanks. Now he thinks I’m insane. After a minute, Sarah said, You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?
Vivian didn’t respond. The driver was gaining on the taxi with the Chinese man. It was all going down too fast. What had happened to Casper? Was this a trick? He said they had intel on where Wong would be and when. Why was she following Wong into Athens, a city she was altogether unfamiliar with?
At least she had Vivian who suddenly knew how to speak Greek. Although that made sense. She’s on the Other Side. Vivian could probably translate every language known to man for Sarah.
But where was Casper? She adjusted herself in the back seat, moving a little lower. Then she turned to look out the back window. Two vehicles with kids, a Mercedes driven by a man in a suit and one other taxi made up the cars close enough to be following them. She turned back around and
stared at the back of Wong’s cab.
Maybe no one was following her. Maybe Casper was dead and she was on her own. Maybe Wong discovered they were in Athens, killed Casper and was now heading into the city to go about his business.
Or everything she thought was mere speculation and the man in the taxi ahead of her was a Chinese man on his way to meet his wife after forgetting a leather bound scrap book at their hotel.
None of it made sense. Casper was probably back at the hotel wondering why Sarah took off.
Or worse still—this was an ambush and Sarah was walking right into their trap.
But what else could she do but follow her instincts? Or what Vivian said to do? And since Vivian was currently silent on the topic, Sarah would continue to follow the Chinese man with the large book until this lead proved fruitful or turned into a waste of time.
She had to believe it was Wong. It was too much of a coincidence. Soon she would see Wong’s taxi pull over somewhere and he would exit the vehicle.
And she would be on him faster than a fly alights on shit.
Chapter 42
Someone knocked on the door so lightly, Casper almost didn’t notice it.
“Housekeeping,” a male voice said.
Before Casper had a chance to respond, a key card entered the door, the handle dropped, and the door began to open.
“Still here,” Casper shouted. “Haven’t checked out yet.”
In a millisecond he understood that the man entering the room wasn’t housekeeping. In fact, the tall, well-built man in a black Hugo Boss suit didn’t even work for the hotel. No, he had to work for Wong.
Casper dove over the bed for his shoulder holster. His right hand snatched it up as he rolled off the bed and onto the floor, stopping suddenly where the wall was.
Hugo Boss rounded the corner, aimed his weapon with its suppressor already attached and shook his head back and forth twice.
“Leave it,” he ordered.
Casper had been about to yank his gun out of the holster, but stopped. He had needed only two, maybe three seconds more. Imagine, dying because of a few seconds. That would never go on his gravestone, but it should.
“Up,” the man ordered. “Leave the holster.”
Casper set the holster aside and struggled to his feet from a scrunched position in the corner.
“Now what?” Casper asked.
It was getting close to 10:45. Sarah would be wondering where he’d gotten to.
“Sit.” Hugo motioned at the desk chair by the window.
Casper did as he was told. This was bad. They had him. Did they have Sarah? Could they capture her? Didn’t she have a dead sister who kept her alive?
Once in the chair, he stared at Hugo. The man didn’t waver. He didn’t take his eyes off Casper.
“What’s the deal here?” Casper asked.
“We wait.”
“For what?”
“Shut up now.”
“Fuck you now. Wait for what?”
Hugo flipped the gun into his left hand, approached the chair and drove a beefy fist into Casper’s face. It knocked him sideways so violently that his forehead bounced once off the top of the desk.
When he looked back up, rubbing his cheek, Hugo was standing by the bathroom door, the gun back in his right hand again.
“That’s a whole new meaning to head desk, eh?” Casper said. Hugo looked at his watch. “You know what I mean? When someone says something inane on social media. You know, head meets desk.”
Hugo lowered the gun. His arm was probably getting tired.
“You gonna talk to me?” Casper asked. “Tell me what’s going on? Because I have to go soon. Got a lunch date with a hot Greek guy that wants it from behind.”
“Shut up. Last warning.”
“Unless you’re into that sort of thing,” Casper continued. “Hey, I know, we’re already in a hotel room. No need to buy each other dinner.” Casper got up from the chair, fear motivating him to move. If he was going to die, he was going to do it on his feet. There was zero chance he would allow himself to get shot sitting at a desk in a leather office chair. That was no way for a soldier to leave this life. “Come on. Take off your jacket, stay a while, big boy.”
Hugo’s cell phone beeped. He read the screen. Then smiled.
“It’s time. Sarah’s in the taxi. She’s as good as dead. Now you.”
Casper ran and made to jump at Hugo, but the sound suppressor spit metal venom one after another, arresting his advance.
Casper hit the carpeted floor with what he counted as five bullets in the chest area.
It was odd that he thought of the hotel maids at that moment. What happened to the maid who would normally clean this floor? Did she die for the master key that Hugo used on the door?
What a waste.
Everything was such a waste.
Buck Schaffer, also known as Casper to his friends, stopped moving on the floor of the five-star hotel.
Chapter 43
“What is this area called?” Sarah asked the driver in Greek.
“Monastiraki,” the driver said, still acting wary.
He hadn’t spoken to her for the forty-five minute ride into Athens. Sarah didn’t care. He had a job to do and was doing it well.
After several backward glances out the rear window, Sarah ascertained no one was following them. It was only the Chinese man and Sarah and now they were in an area called Monastiraki.
The blinker on the cab ahead indicated they were pulling over to double park. Then the four-ways came on.
As if on cue, Vivian told Sarah how to speak the Greek words that Sarah was thinking.
“Pull over,” Sarah said, but the driver was already doing it.
A horn sounded behind them.
“Sixty Euros,” the driver said.
Sarah pulled out an American fifty and a twenty and told him to keep the change. Up ahead the Chinese man had exited his cab and was headed for the sidewalk.
“Wait,” her driver said in English. “I only accept Euros.”
Sarah stopped and looked back at him. “You knew English this whole time?”
“Only a little.”
“Change the currency at a bank or something. There’ll be extra. And next time, watch yourself with tourists. You never know who’s in your back seat.”
She got out, slammed the door hard, and ran for the area where the Chinese man had disappeared. She came upon a square of some sort with a small church or temple to her left. A group of young men were break dancing in the center of the open square to music blaring out of a stereo at their feet. People crowded around to watch and toss coins into an open guitar case.
Past the church, the tables and chairs that had been set out in the blazing early morning sun in front of a line of restaurants were jammed full of tourists eating gyros and other Greek dishes.
To her right, scanning all the faces for the Chinese man, she came upon a sign that said, Monastiraki Flea Market. In the distance, on a plateau, sat the ancient Acropolis. Momentarily, it made her stop and stare.
Forcing her eyes away, she saw what she had been looking for. The Chinese man was about to enter what looked like an alley that led to tourist shops. She ran down four wide steps, bumped past people and made it through the center of the square and to the opening of the alleyway before he made it fifty yards.
She slowed her pace to keep a distance. Up ahead a road intersected the shopping lane. Tourists were everywhere. White Brits looked like lobsters under wide brimmed hats. She thought she heard Danish being spoken. A couple walked by speaking French. She got to the road, traversed it, and kept going, the Chinese man still up ahead, not looking back.
Two men walked by, one wearing a Lakers shirt and the other wearing a shirt that said, They’re Either Arguing or They’re Greek. The taller one said something about loving Plaka and then they were by her and she missed the rest of their conversation.
Chinese man turned right up ahead. Sarah ran to catch up. Anoth
er narrow street was just ahead. She began to cross it when Vivian screamed at her.
Dive, resonated in her head so loud that Vivian’s shout caused an instant headache.
Before the echo of that word diminished, Sarah leaped off her right foot, thrust her hands out, and felt the wind of a car as it raced by, missing her by less than an inch.
