“Looks like that sucker’s going to get lucky,” said Kouros.
“I doubt it,” said Tassos. “He didn’t want to work tonight. It’s his wife’s birthday.”
“What are you talking about?”
“That’s not his wife. They’re cops. They work for me and they’re tailing Sergey.”
“Son of a bitch.” Kouros looked at Andreas. “How come I never draw that kind of duty?”
Andreas smiled. “If you’d like, I’m sure we could substitute you for the blonde.”
Tassos nodded. “From where they look to be headed, you two would make a far less conspicuous couple.”
They watched Sergey stroll off into the heart of Little Venice as if he had not a care in the world.
“I really want to nail that guy,” said Tassos.
“Avrio,” said Kouros.
“It’s already ‘tomorrow,’” said Andreas looking at his watch. “As of two hours ago.”
***
Sergey and Wacki had spent an hour amid the coffee shops and bars at the T-shape end of Matogianni. “To give you an idea of the type of people on the island,” according to Wacki.
It was the heart of Mykonos’ late-night café society and hosted a number of world-class restaurants tucked away in the branching warren of narrow lanes. Barely thirty yards long, that tiny bit of Matogianni still managed to attract everyone who wanted to see or be seen at some point during the evening.
The next stretch of road offered additional expensive fashion shops, high-end jewelers, and clustered bars trying to offer something unique to passersby.
Wacki walked by them all and stopped at a garden-like setting on the right, just beyond two churches bordering the lane. It was separated from the street by a velvet rope guarded by two attractive, well-dressed women. One immediately lifted the rope. “Good evening, Mr. Wacki.”
“This is the monied crowd’s primary hangout. Inside the music’s deafening, outside the talk and hustle is nonstop. Everyone wants one of those tables on top of the steps by the door. It means you’re a big shot. Or willing to spend like one. All you’ll see here are beautiful people.” Wacki smiled, “And those who can afford to pay for them.”
They sat at a table closest to the front door. Women kept passing by to say hello to Wacki and smile at Sergey. Sergey ignored them. His mind was on all the money the island attracted.
Twenty minutes later they were off to Little Venice and what Wacki called, “the wilder side of town.”
The street into Little Venice was about as wide as Matogianni but here the shops were more attuned to the tastes and needs of locals and the more practical-minded tourist. It was not of interest to Sergey.
Wacki took a left just beyond a large church and then a right into a crowd of what looked to be high school and college kids. “This area has a lot of bars, mainly down along the water. It gets action all night, mostly from the young, straight crowd.” He went through a doorway to the left and through another into an enclosed patio next to a bar crammed with people.
“This one gets partiers of all ages. It gets so crowded in there late at night that a fart could blow out the windows.” He pointed at a door opening to the sea.
“That way, it’s less crowded. Take a right outside and keep going all the way to the end.”
Sergey went first and reached the doorway just as a wave hit the path in front of the bar, soaking everyone on the path. He waited for the waves to subside, then squeezed past three men who had also been waiting to cross in front of the bar.
He saw nothing to distinguish one bar from another. All were geared to marketing the same great view and nightlife vibe to twenty-something-year-olds who’d downed bottles of cheap booze in their hotel rooms in the hope of getting on a buzz that would keep them high enough to nurse one purchased drink in the bar as they worked their routines to get laid.
This wasn’t the way Sergey planned on making his fortune.
At the first captain’s house the path veered away from the sea. Wacki led the way along a lane winding behind the houses up to a large, all-white domed-church off to the right. It sat overlooking the sea just beyond the last captain’s house. Wacki stopped in front of the church to tie his shoelace.
“This is the most photographed church in the Cyclades, the Fifteenth-Century Paraportiani. It’s really five churches in one. Its roots go back to service as part of a gate to a thirteenth century castle that once stood here. That’s why they call this area the Kastro, for castle.”
Sergey kept walking but stopped where the path took a sharp right at the far side of the church. Beyond that point the path and church sat masked in darkness. He looked back at Wacki but a flash of light on his left made him instinctively swing toward it.
Framed in the glow of a cigarette lighter stood a boy of no more than nineteen in a black tank top. He smiled at Sergey.
“I wouldn’t stand there too long unless you’re looking for action,” said Wacki coming up beside Sergey. “For as long as I’ve been on the island this area’s been the place to come for anonymous gay sex. Though it’s toned down somewhat from the old days.”
Wacki stared at the boy still holding the lighter and smiling. “My guess is that’s because there’s a lot more foot traffic through here these nights. Straights and gays on their way down to the new clubs along the harbor on the other side of this hill.
“Most people coming through here these days aren’t looking for action.” Wacki smiled. “Unless they stop.”
Sergey turned and walked past the boy to the top of the hill. He heard music coming from a street in front of him. But the buildings were dark and beyond them stood a long, solid concrete wall. He thought the music must come from the buildings along the harbor below.
Past the church they turned left toward a twenty-yard patch of badly poured concrete that dropped abruptly from a height of two stories to sea level. The drop began at the entrance to a patio off to the right enclosed by a low stone wall. To the left a boulder-strewn jut of land reached out and down to the sea.
As they made their way down the hill between the patio and boulders, Wacki waved his hand off to the right. “One of those buildings next to the patio is the Folklore Museum. Care to imagine the sort of shit the ya-yas with brooms find around here every morning?”
“Doesn’t ya-ya mean grandmother?”
“Yeah. Maybe what they find turns them on.” Wacki practically cackled.
“I’m certain if anyone would know what turns a grandmother on it’s you.”
Wacki seemed unsure whether or not to take the comment as a compliment.
Sergey was not surprised.
At the bottom of the hill they turned right toward a mass of people crowded in front of three bars. Bodies were packed onto virtually every inch of the thirty feet of concrete running between the front of the bars and a low stone wall marking the edge of the sea wall.
“The wind’s not blowing hard tonight so there’s a big crowd outside. They’d all be pounded with seawater if the wind were up.” Wacki pointed at the middle bar. “In there. The one with the white doors is the place I was talking about. It’s the new king of late night in town.”
They squeezed in between a small stage the size of a narrow desktop on the right, and the edge of a bar on the left running the length of the place. They’d just about made it around the corner of the bar when a blaring whistle and a sudden change of music made Wacki tug on Sergey’s arm.
“We’re never going to make it back there. The show is about to start. Just stay where you are. It will be over in five minutes.”
The lights went out except for a spotlight focused on the stage. Into it stepped the drag world’s personification of a mature Eva Peron, all aglitter in a sleeveless red sequin gown and doing his/her lip synching bawdy interpretation of a song from Evita.