Gikas snatched up the papers and pored through them in seconds, checking to make sure each one had been signed. Satisfied they met his requirements, he passed them back to the guard. He turned his head back to the guard holding the boy and motioned back in the direction of the bushes. “Put him with the girl in the basement.”
“What?” Teridis asked, rage and confusion mingling in his voice. “You promised you would let him go! We had a deal, Dimitris!”
Gikas had kept his calm long enough. He turned around slowly and stared down at his portly rival. “The deal, Niko, was that I would not harm your child, which I will honor. Letting your son go free, however, was never part of the arrangement.”
Fury blazed in Teridis’s eyes amid tears and sweat. “You lying, low life, crooked…”
“Monster?” Gikas interrupted. “You know, Niko, it doesn’t matter how many words you try to use to describe me. I gave you a chance to join me, and you refused. The first duty of any good king is to eliminate his rivals. Since you turned away my generosity, you must be taken care of.”
Teridis stared up into his captor’s eyes. He wouldn’t beg for mercy, though Gikas wouldn’t bet against it. The man had been a coward in his business dealings. Why would anything change now?
“Well, my old friend, I suppose this is goodbye,” Gikas said and turned away, nodding to his guards. “Time for you to join your wife.”
“No.” Teridis shook his head rapidly back and forth. “No. Please, Dimitris. You don’t have to do this. You have everything I own. It’s all yours now. Send me to exile. Please, I’m no threat to you now.” The pleas for mercy would do him no good, and Gikas kept his back turned to the man.
The two guards behind the prisoner stepped forward and grabbed the desperate man under his armpits, lifting him off the ground surprisingly easily for a man of his girth. He struggled for a moment until one of the muscular guards twisted his arm in an awkward angle. Teridis let out an agonized howl and immediately ceased his struggle as the guards dragged him toward the cliff.
“Dimitris! You coward! You won’t even look me in the face while your goons do your dirty work for you. I’ll see you in Hades, Dimitris!”
Gikas put his head down for a moment as his guards stopped at the ledge with the captive. He turned and gazed across the short span into the questioning, horrified eyes of the man. The sound of the waves crashing below reached a crescendo. “For old times’ sake, I’m going to do my own dirty work this once, Niko.” He took a rapid step toward the men by the ledge and brought his right leg up. The Italian shoe Niko had spit on struck him hard in the chest, and the force of the blow sent him reeling over the edge. His screams faded much like his wife’s as Gikas watched the blubbery body drop to the jagged rocks below. The foamy water splashed over the body a second later, and pulled it out to sea. Gikas spun around and began walking back down the path to his home.
Now no one would stand in his way.
Chapter 15
The three men burst through the metal door to a surprisingly quiet alley. Sean could hear the perpetual whine of the sirens echoing down the narrow side street, but no emergency units had arrived in the back, not yet anyway. Their car, however, was waiting by the sidewalk as Sean had requested.
“You know something, Wyatt?” Yarbrough said, still grimacing from the bullet wound. “I think these guys may have underestimated you.”
“I get that a lot,” Sean said in a fake smug tone. “The underestimating thing, I mean. I think it might be the hair.” He cast a wayward eye up, pretending to glance at the messy blond strands.
Yarbrough laughed, followed by short and painful cough.
“Take it easy there, big guy. We’ll have you to the hospital in no time,” Sean said in a calm voice as he opened the back door of the sedan.
“Get us to the closest hospital,” Sean ordered urgently.
Carl nodded and stepped on the gas as soon as the men had closed the doors. A moment later the car was winding and jerking its way through the streets of Rome. Chaos had fallen on the square, which made Sean glad it was in the rear window and disappearing fast. Fire trucks, police cars, and other emergency vehicles had arrived on the scene faster than Sean had expected.
The driver whipped the vehicle sharply to the right and down another side street, smack into the middle of a town market. The sidewalks were lined with awnings and tents, full of produce, meats, breads, and trinkets. Throngs of pedestrians flooded the road, blocking the thoroughfare completely. The driver slammed on the brakes, and the car came to a screeching halt, throwing everyone forward in their seats.
Agent Yarbrough winced and grunted. “You might need to pick a different street,” he said, trying to remain calm.
“My mistake, guys,” Carl said in a frustrated tone. He threw the car into reverse and backed it onto the previous street.
“Looks like I may have to sit this one out on the sidelines,” Yarbrough said, disappointment apparent in his voice. “Is your next move to head to the train station and see what Ms. Villa hid in that locker?”
“That’s the plan.”
“Good,” Yarbrough said and closed his eyes slowly for a second. Sean could tell the man was desperately trying to fight off the pain. “You’re the only one that can get her back. The president is stuck between a rock and a hard place. We can’t just go in with guns blazing like we did with bin Laden. There’s a lot more at stake here.”
“I understand.” Sean wasn’t lying. He understood how the politics of the world worked, and how the bureaucracies were limited in what they could do, especially when the country was an ally.
Greece had been a friend of the United States for a long time, never having any reason to be at odds with one another. If the president sent in a special forces unit on a rescue mission, that could lead to trouble on a massive scale. Other countries would begin to distrust their allies and wonder how much of that sort of thing would go on in their own backyards. Other American presidents had ordered these kinds of missions, but it wasn’t a precedent President Dawkins wanted to continue. Sean was the only person capable of doing what was needed. It just so happened that what he wanted and what the president needed were in line.
The car veered to the left and then back to the right, merging into a huge roundabout packed with trucks, motorcycles, and passenger vehicles. The cluster of machines seemed to have no order, people zipping in and out of lanes without so much as a wave of the hand, much less a turn signal.
Their driver seemed adept at moving Roman traffic puzzle, deftly weaving in and out of tight spots until he reached the outlet he was looking for. The car dove out of the circle and down another road, heading for a tall, gray building straight ahead.
“The hospital is there,” he said, pointing at the facility. “Do you want me to pull around back or…”
“We’ll take him to the front,” Sean interrupted. “No need for secrecy now. He’s lost a lot of blood and needs to get that wound closed up.”
“Sean,” Yarbrough interrupted. “Leave me at the hospital. I can have backup there in five minutes. I’ll be okay.”
Tommy cast a worrisome glance at his friend, then back to the wounded agent. “That’s not really our style.”
Yarbrough shook his head and put on his sternest expression. “You and I both know you may not have a lot of time. Villa may not have much time, and we believe Gikas is going to make his move in the next few days. The only way to save her is to find out what it is that man is looking for.”
Sean thought about it for a moment as the driver of the vehicle steered the car into the hospital’s driveway and up to the front door. “You’re sure you’ll be okay?” He sought Yarbrough’s eyes for an honest answer.