Assassins of Athens

by Jeffrey Siger

‘It’s due in at six forty-five p.m., at the new harbor in Tourlos.’

  ‘Okay. Let me know if anything changes.’

  Andreas hung up. He hadn’t bothered to leave Lila’s room. It didn’t seem to matter how loud he talked or what he said. He wondered if she’d ever hear him again.

  He called Tassos. ‘The Old Man is on his way by boat from Rafina.’

  ‘Boat?’

  ‘Yes, the Hi Speed. It gets into Tourlos at six forty-five p.m. Looks like he’s trying to surprise you by showing up early.’

  ‘Don’t worry. We’ll be ready for him.’

  ‘It’s ready for them. He’s traveling with Demosthenes and a dozen guys like Kostopoulos’ major. Two Cayennes in front and two in back of the Old Man’s limo.’

  ‘What kind of limo?’

  ‘Is that important?’

  ‘Could be.’ ‘It’s a Mercedes 600.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  Andreas paused. ‘You know, if he’s hiring first-rate professional talent, my guess is they’ll sweep the place for bugs.’

  Tassos didn’t sound concerned. ‘We’re ready for that.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘We just are. Like I said, it’s set up to run through the Center’s system. It’s undetectable. Gotta run – have to get ready for our guests. Bye.’

  Andreas hoped Tassos knew what he was doing. But if anything went wrong, it was Tassos’ people who would take the heat. That reminded him: he’d better have someone pick up Kouros at the harbor, and tell his own surveillance guys to be careful. This was no time to take unnecessary chances. He didn’t want anyone else getting hurt. At least not any of the good guys.

  Mykonos’ new harbor lay like a chubby-bottom north-to-south ‘H’ about one mile north of the island’s historic old harbor. The western leg of the ‘H’ sat out to sea, connected to the onshore leg by a hardly noticeable bridge. The distance between the two legs was well less than one hundred yards at the south and no more than forty yards at the north. Cruise ships docked at the seaward northern end of the western leg. The Hi Speed and other large ferries docked and unloaded from the stern at its southern seaward end. The areas between the legs were for smaller craft.

  A part of the onshore leg ran alongside and from three to nine feet below the main road into town. It was approximately a quarter-mile long and seemed forever under construction. People were used to it. A giant’s sandbox, complete with all the old-time trucks, cranes, bulldozers, and other sorts of tank-tread earthmoving equipment every giant’s little boy would love to play with. It even had a set of blocks: car-size concrete ones, lined up along the seaside and used to keep pressure on footings that some day would support the ‘soon to be completed’ marina.

  The loudspeaker blared, ‘We are arriving at Mykonos. Drivers please return to your vehicles.’

  Demon was sleeping, the Old Man dozing. The Old Man leaned over from the passenger’s side of the back seat and said to the driver, ‘Did you tell them where we’re going?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘And how to get there?’

  ‘Yes, sir. I told them to take the back way, up that steep hill next to the taverna across from the stop sign where we come out of the port.’

  ‘Good.’ He leaned back and looked at Demon. ‘I prefer not to be predictable. Just in case.’

  ‘I understand.’

  The boat docked and the rear door began descending. Drivers started their engines.

  Demon looked at the Old Man. ‘Do you mind if I ask a question?’

  ‘Possibly.’

  ‘What are you planning to say to Kostopoulos?’

  ‘Ah, now that’s a good question. And one I’m prepared to answer.’

  The Cayennes in front started moving. He leaned forward again. ‘Stay close, no more than ten yards behind.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  The Old Man continued. ‘He is a very interesting man, more so than I realized. He has both the willingness and capacity to do whatever he thinks necessary to achieve what he sets his mind to. He is not swayed by emotions or fears. He stays focused. He has the qualities of a Spartan.’

  This was not what Demon wanted to know. He did not need a lecture. He wanted to know the game plan. He thought of saying, ‘And Spartans helped end the Golden Age of Athens, so now what?’ But didn’t. He assumed the Old Man was dragging things out to kill time – some bus looked to have traffic backed up coming out of the port.

  ‘I am going to tell Mr Kostopoulos exactly what he wants to hear. He wants to be accepted. He wants glory. He wants prestige. He wants to be among Greece’s aristocracy. I will offer him all that. I will offer him everything he’s ever wanted. And I am the one man in Greece who can guarantee all of that to him.’

  Demon nodded. Those were his goals, too. ‘But, what if Kostopoulos doesn’t agree?’

  They were up to the stop sign, but the bus responsible for the traffic tie-up still blocked the road they intended to take. People were screaming at the bus driver to move. He screamed back that he couldn’t move it, that the bus was broken, and walked into the taverna.

  ‘What shall we do, sir?’ asked the driver.

  ‘Always problems. Tell the men to go along the sea road, and just past that construction.’ He pointed to a large yellow excavator working below the wall next to the road. ‘Take the first left up the hill.’

  The traffic started moving again. The first two Cayennes sped out onto the main road. The Mercedes started to follow, but a motorcyclist shot up along its right side and cut directly in front of it. The limo driver slammed on his brakes and missed the motorcyclist by inches. ‘Malaka!’ the driver screamed. ‘Sorry, sir, I didn’t mean to swear.’

  The Old Man didn’t seem upset. ‘That’s okay, just catch up with them.’

  The two Cayennes were a hundred yards ahead. The driver floored it. He’d be up to them in seconds. The two other Cayennes were right behind him.

  ‘To answer your question, let me put it in American movie vernacular, “I’m gonna make him an offer he can’t refuse.”’ The Old Man smiled.

  Demon leaned forward to pick up a water bottle on the floor by his feet. He didn’t think that was the right way to negotiate with Kostopoulos, but he didn’t have the opportunity to suggest a different approach. All negotiations were peremptorily cancelled by the yellow excavator’s refrigerator-size steel bucket.

  At top speed, the Liebherr 942 excavator cab spins completely around – with claw-tooth bucket extended – in eight seconds. But it only took two seconds for this perfect, some might say golf-like, swing of the bucket down over the wall, into the Mercedes’ windshield, through its insides and out the rear glass. The Cayennes plowed into the mess from behind at fifty miles an hour.

  But the tall man who jumped out of the excavator, raced thirty yards to the sea, and leaped into a waiting Zodiac was not a golfer. He’d prefer calling it a perfect assassination.

  27

  Kouros walked off the Hi Speed before the vehicles were moving and hustled on foot toward the main road. Christina was waiting for him there because ‘traffic was terrible in the port.’ He was three hundred yards from the stop sign when the first Cayenne crept past him. Every window in the convoy had dark glass, but he could make out Demon sitting behind the driver through the less darkly tinted rear window.

  About fifty yards from the stop sign, a motorcycle shot out from behind a dumpster ten feet in front of Kouros and headed toward the main road. The cyclist was riding in the dirt on the side of the road, but when the first Cayenne turned right he accelerated so that he arrived at the intersection just as the second one turned and cut in front of the limo. It was a damn lucky thing he didn’t get hit – or a very professional move.

  Kouros watched the limo and Cayennes tear after the two in front. The surreal part played out in seconds: the swinging bucket across the roadway, the explosion of glass, the wrenching of steel, the aftershocks delivered by the Cayennes; the tall man running toward the sea and disappear
ing with a leap into a boat.

  That was how Kouros described what he saw to Andreas. The official investigation didn’t yield much more.

  Headlines screamed, ‘New Terrorist Assault on the Fabric of Our Country,’ and everyone ran stories venerating the Old Man and his accomplishments. His funeral was delayed by a day, because the Old Man had left instructions insisting there be a public viewing of his body – and that required spare parts from a theatrical supply house in London. It was attended by virtually everyone in Greece who mattered, or thought they did.

  Buried in the stories were the fates of the others in the limo. The driver died instantly. The young passenger miraculously survived the bucket. Evidently he was bent forward when the bucket swept through, shearing off everything above him, but was tragically crippled by the impacting vehicles from behind. He was not expected to survive.

  Andreas stopped reading the stories. He long ago gave up on ‘the truth will out’ or ‘justice prevails.’ He just did his job. And prayed for Lila to survive.

  It was a little more than a week later when Andreas received a call from Tassos.

  ‘Hi, I hear Lila is out of her coma.’

  ‘Yes, thank God. About four days ago. Doctors said she’s getting stronger every day.’ Andreas heard a sniffling sound on Tassos’ end of the line.

  ‘That’s great. I’m in Athens—’

  Andreas interrupted. ‘I figured you were from the increased number of smiles on Maggie’s face.’

  ‘I’ll never tell.’ Tassos laughed. ‘Do you think it would be okay if I visited Lila?’

  ‘She’d like that.’ Andreas paused. ‘I’d like that, too. Meet you there in an hour.’ He hung up.

  He knew how Tassos felt about him. Tassos lost his own son and his wife during childbirth. Yes, Tassos wasn’t a cop like his father. But then, Andreas thought, am I? Sure, Tassos had something to do with what happened at the port. Andreas was certain of that. Big fucking deal. In today’s world, who knew which of them was doing things the right way? He really should do something about the distance he’d put between them. He knew what Lila would say: it’s time to start trusting again.

  Andreas arrived at the hospital fifteen minutes later than he said. That would give Tassos all the time he needed to enchant Lila.

  ‘Hi, honey.’ Andreas kissed her.

  ‘Ah, the other cop in my life has arrived. You’ve just lost number-one position to Tassos. I never knew before how much everything you’ve achieved in life was because of him.’

  Tassos smiled. ‘Well, almost everything. He did get to you before I did.’

  ‘And a lucky thing for him.’

  ‘Maybe I should leave and give you guys more time alone.’ Andreas was smiling ear to ear.

  ‘As a matter of fact, I’m the one who must leave. I have to catch a boat back to Syros.’ Tassos leaned over and kissed Lila on both cheeks. ‘See you soon. And keep him in line, please.’

  Andreas walked Tassos to the elevator. ‘So, any more news on our port pancakes?’

  Tassos turned grim. ‘Don’t start with me, please.’

  Andreas put up his hand. ‘No, no, I’m not going that way with this. Whatever went on there is out of my jurisdiction. Mykonos is your jurisdiction. You’re in charge, and I have no interest in what happened other than curiosity. Trust me on that.’

  Tassos smiled. ‘There’s hope for you yet, Kaldis.’

  Andreas rolled his eyes. ‘Thanks. So, what happened?’

  ‘Bottom line, Kostopoulos did not have as much confidence in the recording equipment as I did. My guess, and it’s only a guess, is he was willing to cooperate with your plan and remained cool on the phone with the Old Man because he had his own plans. You should have seen his face when I told him they were coming by boat. He went white as a ghost. The major and his men had been at the airport all day doing God knows what. Kostopoulos took off to find them and that was the last I saw of Zanni until he showed up at the hospital asking to see the Old Man’s corpse.’

  ‘Whew.’

  ‘Yeah, he wanted to see all the parts they’d been able to find.’ Tassos shook his head. ‘As for the scene at the port, that bus blocking the road miraculously started and dis appeared right after the … what did you call it?’

  ‘Pancake party.’

  ‘So, I leave to your imagination whether the bus was a setup to block the only other way out of the port to the Cultural Center. And the construction site wasn’t supposed to be working at that hour, so the guy running the excavator wasn’t union. From Kouros’ description, I think we both know who he was, but Kostopoulos insists the major was with him at the time.’

  ‘Neat, very neat.’

  Tassos nodded. ‘Want to bet whether the ones who actually killed Zanni’s son are still alive?’ Tassos waved a finger. ‘Don’t take it. Bad odds on the negotiator, too.’

  ‘What are Linardos’ chances?’

  ‘Pretty good, unless Kostopoulos is suicidal.’

  ‘What are you saying?’

  ‘I don’t think the Old Man’s cronies in this banishment bullshit missed Kostopoulos’ message – delivered on a steel bucket inscribed with the head of their leader – that their potsherd days were over. But that created a problem for Zanni. He doesn’t know who the others are, but they know who he is. They’re probably deciding right now whether to walk away or put a bounty on his head.’

  Andreas smiled. ‘How much would it take to get the major’s attention?’

  Tassos laughed. ‘That’s why I think Linardos is safe. If Kostopoulos goes after him, that guarantees the others will pay whatever it costs to take him out rather than wait around and wonder if he’s coming after them too.’

  ‘All it takes is for one of them to get nervous enough to put up the bounty.’

  Tassos nodded. ‘I think Zanni now realizes that his power-trip bullshit has brought home a curse. My guess is he’ll leave Greece and spend the rest of his life looking over his shoulder, trusting no one. A pretty miserable penance.’

  ‘For a pretty miserable guy.’

  Tassos shrugged.

  ‘Speaking of penance, do you know what Linardos is doing these days?’

  Tassos head-gestured no.

  ‘Playing Demosthenes’ guardian angel. He hired the MedEvac unit that airlifted Demosthenes to a private hospital in Athens and is paying all his bills. Kouros tells me Linardos visits Demosthenes and prays. Sits by his bed and actually prays.’ Andreas paused. ‘But the prayers aren’t working. His doctor told Kouros that if he survives it will be as a mind trapped in an utterly useless body.’ Andreas paused again. ‘Like being buried alive and forced to silently watch the rest of the world walk over your grave until the day you die.’

  Tassos let the thought drift away before speaking. ‘You’d think he’d want Demosthenes to die, to get rid of the last bit of incriminating evidence.’

  ‘Makes you wonder what will happen if Demosthenes dies.’

  Tassos shook his head. ‘Can’t imagine Linardos is worried about anything Demosthenes has on him. The Old Man is a martyred national hero, and no politician wants to tarnish that image by letting this story get out. It just might get the people wondering who in government can they trust.’ He paused, then rolled his left hand in the air. ‘As far as the media are concerned, they’re no different. If they go after Linardos they’re going after one of their most respected own – with a story guaranteed to make enemies of some of Greece’s richest and most powerful families. Besides, God knows what shit Linardos has on his colleagues in the Greek press.’

  ‘Yeah, but there’s always the foreign press.’

  Tassos smiled. ‘Spoken like a true Greek. But, as much as we like to think they do, the rest of the world doesn’t give a damn about what goes on here. Unless something is burning, Greece doesn’t make the international news. Even then, not for long.’ He shook his head again. ‘No matter what coverage this gets outside of Greece, the story is dead here because everyone wants it to go
away. Linardos knows that. My guess is he’s not praying out of concern over what might happen to him if Demosthenes dies.’

  ‘Then, why? For his granddaughter, for Greece?’ Tassos spread his arms and looked up as if asking for an answer from above. ‘Who knows? Both could use some heavenly intervention.’ He let his arms fall to his sides and looked back at Andreas. ‘Maybe it’s just guilt for whatever part he played in all this, or simply a matter of thanks that he’s not the one who’ll end up living out the rest of his days on a slab. My guess is it’s a bit of both.’

  Andreas shrugged. ‘Well, we keep track of everyone in and out of Demosthenes’ room. Sooner or later, something will break and,’ Andreas pointed up to where Tassos had been looking, ‘god willing, we mere mortals might get an answer.’

  ‘Or he dies and you find out faster.’

  ‘That’s the easy way.’

  Tassos winked. ‘I know.’

  Andreas laughed. ‘And so you sum up our differences, my friend.’ They embraced and said goodbye.

  Andreas still was smiling as he walked into Lila’s room.

  ‘Happy, stranger?’

  ‘Very.’

  ‘Come over here and hold my hand.’ Her eyes were wet.

  ‘What’s wrong?’

  ‘Nothing. I’m terribly happy, and hope you are too.’ She kissed his hand. ‘I have something to tell you. The doctors spoke to me this morning. They’re still running tests. They’re not sure yet about the extent of the damage—’

  Andreas’ heart jumped. He prayed it would be good news.

  ‘But they wanted me to know they were very hopeful.’

  Thank god. He squeezed her hand.

  ‘Only one test is unequivocal.’ Lila stared into Andreas’ eyes. ‘I’m pregnant.’

  Watch out for the next novel by Jeffrey Siger

  Coming soon from Piatkus:

  AN AEGEAN

  PROPHECY

  St John wrote the apocalyptic Book of Revelation over 1900 years ago in a cave on Greece’s eastern Aegean island of Patmos. When a revered monk from that holy island’s thousand-year-old monastery is murdered in Patmos’s town square during Easter Week, Chief Inspector Andreas Kaldis is called upon to find the killer.