Trueish Crime: A Kat Makris Greek Mafia Novel (29 page)

“Think about it,” he said, shunting the decision-making to one side, for now. “I’ll be in touch. He pushed the door outward, held it open with one flat palm. “If you stay on this road, you’ll discover uphill and downhill are the same direction.”

“I’ve studied the great philosophers,” I said. “You’re not one of them.”

Then I left while I could.

“
S
he’s gone
,” I told Melas. He was waiting downstairs, firing birds at smirking pigs on his phone. He shot me a surprised glance.

“What?”

“They say it takes a village to raise a child. Apparently a village can also yank a crime lord’s feet out of the fire. She has alibis.” I told him what Thessaloniki’s finest had told me.

He pocketed his phone, stood with his hands on hips while he stared off into the distance, somewhere over my shoulder. I waved my hand in front of his eyes.

“Xander picked her up,” I said.

“Yeah, I figured he was here. He goes where she goes, unless she tells him otherwise. You okay?”

“Relieved. Worried. This isn’t over.” It felt like someone had popped the lid on a tube of Pringles. There would be no stopping until the last chip was eaten, and so far the cops had only licked the powdery flavoring on top. “Also, I realized you’re beating me in Angry Birds.”

Melas molded his hand around the curve of my nape. My hormones shot hot glitter and streamers. But beneath the hormonal fanfare was a warm, reassuring glow. He wanted to get a better look down my front, yes, but he also had my back.

“I don’t mind that you’re a loser,” he said.

He reeled me in, pecked me on both cheeks, then gave me a quick hug.

Afternoon traffic was light in Greece’s second biggest city. That’s the power of the siesta. I leaned back in the rental car’s seat, closed my eyes. And when I opened them again we were at the airport where Grandma’s jet was waiting.

Takis and Marika were arguing off to one side in the shade. The assassins were slumped against the small terminal building, smoking. But not Mo. He was swinging his Aladdin sword, making swishing noises with his mouth.

Oh, God, he was pretending to be a Jedi, wasn’t he?

“Is he pretending to be a Jedi?” Melas asked me.

Great and terrible minds.

“I think so.”

“You keep some weird company.”

I looked him up and down. “Tell me about it.”

He grinned. “Just so you know, I want to kiss you right now.” Then he smacked me on the butt and swaggered off toward the plane, leaving me to cool off in the sun.

Takis and Stavros didn’t ask questions. They knew the business meant knowing when to keep quiet. They’d pounce on me when we shed the assassins and cop.

Not Marika. She began to fire questions as soon as we boarded the plane. I tried to answer using an array of creative grunts and hums, but she had four kids and Takis; noises weren’t going to satisfy a Greek wife and mother.

Finally Takis stomped back from the cockpit. “Shut up so I can concentrate!”

The jet dipped.

“Who’s flying this thing?” I asked.

Two palms up. “The autopilot.”

“
Po-po
,” Marika said. “You have one job on this plane, and even that you can’t do.”

Takis pointed at his wife, then the finger swung toward me like I was due North.

“No more, you two. No more spending time together, having women’s adventures. You go home and cook. You,” he told me, “learn to cook.”

“I’ll tell Grandma you said that.”

“Heh. Maybe I spoke too hastily. I have to go land the plane.” He hurried back to the cockpit.

“Being married to Takis is a life sentence,” Marika told me.

The jet swooped lower.

“
Gamo ta pethamena sou
!” Takis muttered from up front, threatening to sexually violate someone’s dead bodies. “Some
malakas
is parked on the runway. Who parks a car on the runway?”

“In India sometimes they have cows on the runway,” Stavros said.

“Cows on the runway …” Takis snickered. “Nobody listen to Stavros, he is an idiot.”

“It’s true,” Stavros said in a low voice. “The planes have to fly around until the cows move.”

Mo stuck his head over the seat. “The moron is right, they have cows.”

“Nobody asked you,” Takis yelled from the front. “Why are you here? Your employer is dead!”

“I wanted to ride on the plane,” Mo said. “It’s the same as a Persian plane.” He sounded disappointed.

“Why don’t they put a horn on jets?” Takis went on. “Leather seats they have, plush carpet they have, but no horn.”

“The jet engine noise is usually warning enough,” I told him. “You can’t really miss it.”

“Except this
malakas
missed it.” There was a short pause. “Definitely a
malakas
. It’s Xander.”

“Is Grandma with him?”

“Hard to say.”

I got out of my seat, worked my way to the cockpit.

Takis shot me a dirty look over one shoulder. “What are you doing? Get back there. Nobody is allowed in the front except me.”

I scuttled backwards.

“If you are going to stand there, be useful, send Xander a text message and tell him to move his
kolos
off the runway.”

X
ander moved the SUV
. Takis landed the plane and we all piled out. My gaze cut through the bodies, hunting for Grandma.

“Where is she?” I asked Xander.

He tilted his head toward the SUV. The windows were up, the engine running. I beelined for it. I yanked the driver’s side door open, boosted myself into the driver’s seat, turned sideways to look at Grandma.

To hug or not hug, that was the question.

Grandma’s fingers were busy with a crochet hook and smooth white yarn. Her eyes were bright, alert, and completely focused on me. How she could crochet without watching her hands was beyond me. Sometimes I glanced down to make sure I was nailing the whole walking thing—and I’d had nearly twenty-eight years of practice.

She hitched an eyebrow into the sardonic position. “Are you catching flies with your mouth?”

No hug.

“Nuh-uh. Are you okay?”

She made a vague noise, waved her hand as though slapping away my inquiry. “Where did you go with my plane?”

“Thessaloniki.”

“Rescue mission?”

“I had questions.”

“Questions.” She laughed. “Go ahead, ask.” Her head went back to bending over the hook and yarn.

“Are you planning to assassinate Kyria Koufo?”

“No.”

The knots in my shoulders fell into loose skeins.

“Did Tony Goats really try to hire someone to kill her?”

“No. Roll down your window.”

I did as she asked. She leaned over me, called out to Xander.

“Katerina is coming with us.”

G
reece was two countries
, the new superimposed over the old. Except, the new was smaller, and like a midriff top it had a hard time covering Greece’s ancient underbelly. It yanked, pulled, tugged, but old bits kept popping out.

Tony Goats’ office was new, shiny, where well-off people sent their children to get their teeth inspected and drilled. But behind the building was a grimy alley that had been here since long before an architect thought up the structure out front. The alley contained all the elements present in every alley throughout history, across the globe: dumpster, fried rice, stray dog, screeching cats, and a corpse. The dead man had been clubbed over the head with a twelve-inch statue of Athena, an item found in every souvenir shop in Greece. Now the goddess of war, wisdom, and lots of things a feminist would be proud of, was taking a dip in the red pool around Tony Goats’ head.

“Katsikas,” Grandma said. “Katerina, call the police.”

I called Melas. My voice crackled as I debriefed him.

“Jesus,” he said. “Who fries rice?”

“Never mind the rice. It’s the universal law of alleys, there’s always fried rice.”

“I’ll be right there. Don’t go anywhere.”

I turned to Grandma. “He’ll be right here. He said not to go anywhere.”

W
e were going somewhere
. Grandma told Xander to wait for the police, while we went to take care of business.

I launched a minor protest. “Melas said not to go anywhere.”

“I heard you the first time,” she said. “And we are not going somewhere—you are. I am coming along for the ride.”

Inwardly, I sighed. “Where am I going?”

“To Varvara Koufo’s house.” She tapped on the GPS. The talking map immediately began interrogating me, demanding to know where I wanted to go, in a sterile, saccharine voice designed for maximum condescension. “Tell it to go to Varvara’s house,” she said.

“Why me? Can’t I press a button or something?”

Not only did I not like the talking map’s passive-aggressive personality, but I also wasn’t one of those people who socialized with Siri—not when I could type stuff and get a silent, accurate result.

“No. Tell her where you want to go.”

Her. Like the tin woman had a job and feelings.

“No.”

“Tell the map where you want to go.”

“Disney World,” I said clearly.

“
Do you mean Walt Disney World, Orlando, Florida, U.S.A.; Disneyland, Anaheim, California, U.S.A.; or Disneyland Paris, Marne-la-Valée, France?
”

“Florida,” I said.

“
Calculating distance and route
.” The tin woman wandered off to play with her calculator. A moment later she was back. “
Unable to calculate distance and route. Please choose an alternate destination. Preferably someplace realistic.
”

Sarcasm from a machine. What a world.

“Varvara Koufo’s house,” Grandma said, flicking her gaze sideways at me. The map adjusted itself to accommodate her command. No sass, no sarcasm this time.

“Why did we go to Tony Goats’ office?”

“To give him an alibi,” she said. “Now I will go to see Varvara Koufo, to let her know her husband is dead.”

“Are you going to kill her?”

“With what, Katerina? Do you see a gun? I have my crochet, that is all.”

I had a feeling a crochet hook was a deadly weapon in Grandma’s hands. Not that I knew much about killing people, but I was sure you could make a decent garrote using yarn and a hook.

“Why would Tony need an alibi?”

“He was Michail’s friend. A good boy. I did not want a good boy to go to jail for a crime he did not commit.”

“What crime?” I repeated my earlier question. “Are you going to kill her?”

“Only if talk fails—and I do not believe it will. We are old friends who do not always face the same direction when it comes to business. This is one of those times.”

H
alf an hour meandered by
.

You’re not supposed to leave pets, kids, or adult grandchildren in the car with the windows up, so I had rolled everything down twenty-nine minutes ago. Greece was being uncharitable today: no breeze, no flirtatious hint of rain in the near future. There was shade sulking here and there, but it seemed to shift whenever one of Kyria Koufo’s neighbors tried to hide in its lower temperatures.

A little fishwife had set up shop in my head. She was yelling at me to quit being a moron. Grandma should have been back by now, and even the voice in my head knew it. Cold sparklers waved inside my gut, making pretty, icy patterns in my last cup of coffee.

Grandma wasn’t one to walk into a dangerous situation unprepared. It was in her nature to be the one with the upper hand, the trump card, the secret weapon. Me, it was in my nature to be the one spouting tired metaphors. I’d watched her knock on Kyria Koufo’s door and vanish inside when it opened. There hadn’t been any switcheroos between here and the house.

Had she given me the slip, going through one door, escaping through another? Maybe. But why would she do that?

I jumped out of the SUV, slammed the door behind me. I dropped my bag’s long strap over my head, so that it sat across my body. No weapons inside except my slingshot, which lived in there with a bag of marbles that had been a loaded gift from Baby Dimitri. The gun someone had left on my bedside table, before my confrontation with the Baptist, had quietly vanished, somewhere between it not firing when I squeezed the trigger, and me shaking like a Chihuahua on meth as my rescuers ferried me back to the compound in this exact same SUV.

The gate squealed as I pushed through. I walked up to the door, which had been repaired since Aunt Rita lobbed a rock at it. Listened. This was Greece—no one walking past would think my eavesdropping was weird. Chances were they’d done the same thing themselves. Around me, boy cicadas wheezed love songs to girl cicadas. Not too far away, a rapper was spitting out Greek words. There was a steady hissing from further down the street where one of the neighbors was spraying her yard with the hose.

But from inside this house? Nothing that I could hear.

I knocked. “Kyria Koufo?” I called out. “Is Grandma still here?”

There was a small sound on the other side of the door, then it opened. Kyria Koufo was wiping her hands on a calico apron.

“Katerina! She was here and then she left.”

Rats! It looked like I had inherited a few genes from Grandma after all, including the escapee allele. “Did she say where she was going?”

“Your grandmother is not a woman who shares her plans. All I know is that she went out the back door. She looked like she was in a hurry.”

I thanked her and trotted back to the SUV. The plan I was cobbling together involved driving around the neighborhood until I saw an old woman in black ambling down the street. Which would narrow my search parameters by pretty much nothing. You couldn’t throw a crust of stale bread in a Greek village without hitting an elderly widow. Sometimes I suspected Greece had a quota to fill. One-point-two black-clad fossils per square meter.

I pulled out my phone, dialed Aunt Rita.

“Is Grandma at the compound?”

“No, she’s with you and Xander.”

“Not anymore. Somebody killed Tony Goats. We left Xander there to talk to the police.”

Not with words. Possibly with Charades. Probably he was going to be there a long time while they guessed at words.