Greek Island Mysteries Boxed Set (Books 1-2-3): Gripping, psychological mystery/thrillers destined to shock you!

by Luke Christodoulou

  “Thank you, sweetie.”

  They both got up simultaneously, smiled a goodbye and walked down to the dock, eagerly watching the speed boat approaching.

  “Do I look like a sweetie?” Ioli asked me imitating the French woman’s voice.

  “I’m sure you could be if you tried.”

  We stood there watching as Doukas, the Athenian coroner, an excited Giorgo and the four member team of specialists got off the boat. Introductions were made swiftly and casually as I knew most of them from old cases of mine. The coroner, Dr. Jacob Petsa, was one fine fellow. Large in appearance and in character. He was a few inches taller than me with broad shoulders, an enormous, round Santa Claus type belly and a pair of tree trunks for legs. His hair was whiter than I could remember him by and he had changed his glasses. Small lens, thin silvery skeleton glasses now decorated his honey brown eyes. He had studied and taught in the States during the nineties and loved the fact that he could talk to me about places and events that he went to during his time there. As a matter of fact the doctor enjoyed talking just for the sake of talking. He must have punched in enough words for a thesis last time we were together during an autopsy of a murder victim. The four member team included two men known to me and a man and a woman who I had not met before. Captain Phillip Dionysiou, Athens’s best crime scene manager, greeted me with a smile and asked how I was doing.

  ‘‘Murder,’’ I replied to the rather short, chiselled faced, dark haired man with the stocky build.

  Next in line was the always joyful DNA specialist Matthew Cosma. He had not changed a bit in the two years since our last common case. Chubby, baby faced and chattier than most Greeks, he took the liberty to introduce the other two officers that followed.

  “This is Dr. Helena Argyriou, our department’s new forensic biologist. She specialises in blood pattern analysis.”

  “How do you do?” I said and extended my hand for a shake. She answered with a slight nod and a flat smile and acted as if she did not see me extend my hand.

  “And this is Alexis Andreadi. The Alexis Andreadi.”

  “Ah, the fingerprint specialist. Rumours say you’re the best. We are going to need your skills with a bloody rock,” I said and shook hands with him.

  “I hope I can be of assistance,” the shy, modest, muscular young man replied.

  “This is my partner, Ioli Cara,” I said and it was then that I noticed that another man was standing down at the dock.

  Captain Phillip caught my eye and said “That’s the profiler. Chief chose him himself. Highly recommended. Why don’t you go talk to him while your lieutenant and Douka bring us up to date with the case and the scene?”

  “Yes, let’s get going,” Dr. Helena snapped as she walked over to the bodies, looking left and right. She had stunning green eyes, but she was not particularly beautiful. However, she was what I like to call presentable. A self-assured woman who knew how to carry herself. She had that confident aura that most women in the force learn to have as they deal with their male counterparts who still lived in a man’s world fantasy or more appropriate in a man’s police department.

  The group moved onwards and I briskly walked down to the beach to meet the profiler.

  “Chief finally decided to put his hand deep in his pocket,” I thought as I studied the well-dressed, tall, middle age man who stood still on the pier, gazing the horizon. He turned around upon hearing my footsteps on the rattling wood.

  “You must be Captain Papacosta,” he said as he reached out. He had a firm grip.

  “Yes. And you are…”

  “Doctor Simon Romas. You can call me Doctor or Roma if you must.” He paused for dramatic effect.

  “I teach psychology at the University of Athens and applied criminology at the police academy,” he added looking straight at me. I noticed his furrowed face. Though I doubt these were lines of age. Lines of over thinking I would classify them.

  “Are you familiar with our case?”

  “Oh yes. Followed it through the media and last night the Chief had the case files and your notes sent to me. I have come to many conclusions, however if you don’t mind, I’d rather walk around the scene, see the bodies and then inform the team of my profile.”

  “Yes… sure…” I said and watched the pompous ass and his air of superiority wander off. I never cared much about the characters of the people I worked with. My only demand was that they were good at their job. I just hoped that one of these specialists would help crack the case.

  *****

  Chapter 21

  New York, 1984

  “Bye boys,” Katie cheerily shouted as she ran out of the bedroom door, dressed for work.

  “God, I’m late,” she said as she saw the burgundy clock strike two.

  “Relax babe, it’s just down the road,” Alexandros calmed her from the sofa where he was sitting with Cricket watching the midday programs on the box. Katie kissed him on the lips in a hurry, then Cricket on the forehead. He did not even bother to turn and look at her, not that Katie paid much attention to him when Alexandros was around. She loved her boy, but she loved her man more. He always felt a distant second in the race for her affection and he knew that telling her about Alexandros’ abusive behaviour would bear no fruit.

  “See you tonight!” she said and with a thud she closed the door behind her.

  Alexandros got up, walked over to the TV and started to flick through the channels without asking Cricket if he wanted to see something in particular.

  “Only shit on again,” he complained and switched off the television.

  “Wanna play a game?” he asked the boy.

  “What?”

  “You deaf or what? A game. You know, play, have fun.”

  “I meant what do you wanna play?”

  “We could Greek wrestle.”

  “Greek wrestle?”

  “Yeah, let me show you. It’s an Olympic sport, you know. Only the bravest Greeks and Romans wrestled. Come on, get up. Stand here. Bend your knees like mine and open your arms like this. Good… Bravo… You’re a fast learner.”

  The boy smiled and felt good that Alexandros was being nice to him for a change.

  “Now, move in closer to me like this… great… and I’ll try to tackle you,” he said and pulled the boy close and twisted his arm, throwing him to the floor. He held the boy’s arm behind his back as he fell upon him.

  “Ah, that hurts… get off!” the boy begged.

  “Come on you pussy, I said only the bravest… be a man,” he said as he gradually got up and commanded “Again!”

  “I don’t wanna play this anymore, it’s stupid!” the boy retaliated.

  Alexandros slapped him hard across his face. The force of the hit threw Cricket to the cold floor. Alexandros kneeled beside him and frantically started to remove the boy’s clothes.

  “What are you doing? Let me go!” the boy started to shout.

  Alexandros grabbed him by the throat, choking him just enough to make him stop shouting.

  “Now, listen you little shit. I’m trying to teach you Greco-Roman wrestling here. The ancient Greeks fought naked. Humble beneath Zeus. If you shout one more time or disobey me again, I’ll give you the beating of your life. Understood?”

  “Yes, sir,” he replied, accepting the fact that he was powerless against Alexandros’ rage. He stood up in the nude and took the wrestling position Alexandros had just taught him. He remained in the same position as Alexandros took off his blue shirt and pulled down his ripped jeans. He was not wearing any underwear.

  “Now, attack me again like before,” he commanded.

  As the boy approached, Alexandros picked him up off the ground and slammed him to the floor, falling next to him. The boy tried hard to absorb the excruciating pain in complete silence.

  “That is called a suplex! And this is a headlock!” Alexandros joyfully explained, then laid on top of the boy and wrapped his arm around the youth’s neck.

  Silent tears fell from hi
s face. He felt ashamed to feel Alexandros’ naked body rubbing against his. As Alexandros released him, he sprang up and ran to his room. This time, Alexandros followed him.

  “Please, leave me alone,” he implored.

  Alexandros acted sympathetically and sat down beside the frightened boy. He hugged him around the shoulders with his left hand while his right journeyed down the boy’s chest to his genitals. The boy shivered and tried to jump off the bed, but was held down tightly by the grown man’s arm.

  “Lay back and be quiet. You think I don’t know you jerk off all the time, you filthy little shithead? Don’t go acting like you don’t like it,” he said as he masturbated the petrified boy.

  “You know, in the ancient temples of Greece it was considered an honour for young boys like you to serve the priests who were representatives on earth, of the gods themselves. Let’s play another game since you didn’t like wrestling. I will be Zeus and you will be a temple boy. Now you will serve me.”

  *****

  Chapter 22

  The team had split up.

  After an hour on the tree-less island we all returned to Mykonos and went our separate ways.

  Ioli and Captain Phillip were heading to Mykonos Beach Hotel where a young man from Ireland had reported to the receptionist that his cousins were missing and that their cell phones were switched off. If the two missing youths were our decapitated Apollo and Artemis, Captain Phillip wanted to process the hotel scene and anywhere the killer could have attacked them.

  The coroner and I were on our way to the hospital for the requisite autopsies.

  Doukas and his two men were out investigating and interviewing the public while the three specialists had been set up, with their gadgets and findings from Delos, in separate rooms at the local police station.

  As soon as Captain Phillip parked outside the hotel, an old, dyed-blond man dressed in a shiny grey suit with a pink bowtie, jumped out of the hotel’s door, rushed over to the patrol car and discreetly tapped it on the window.

  “Yes?” Captain Phillip asked having lowered his window.

  “Good day officers,” he smiled anxiously. “I am the hotel’s owner. If I may kindly request you to park your vehicle over there behind the palm trees. You see, we get a lot of young ones passing by on their motorcycles looking for a room and a police car is not that… encouraging let’s say.”

  The owner stood there pleased as the Captain parked where he was instructed to. They both exited the car and walked over to the owner waiting by the glass door entrance.

  “I am Andreas Makropoulos. Anything you need, just ask,” he said as he shook their hands with both of his.

  “Oh, the poor young boy. Dreadful state he is in. Woke up and missing his cousins. I told him they are probably… sleeping elsewhere… it is Mykonos you know! But alas, he is sure some wrongdoing has been done. Oh, but let’s not have you two standing out here listening to this old fool. Come in… come in, my darlings.”

  They followed the bubbly senior who never stopped nervously talking through the hotel’s door and into the main reception area.

  “Took him to my office and gave him a good, strong Greek coffee to calm him down. He said he would only calm down if I called the police… and here you are. This is my partner Thomas,” he introduced the muscular, elderly man behind the reception desk.

  “How do you do?” Ioli politely asked as she walked past Mr Andreas. “We will take it from here, thank you. I’m guessing this is your office,” she said, pointing with her glare at the glass door with the golden OFFICE sign.

  “Coffee, water… vodka?” Mr Thomas asked.

  “No, thank you,” the Captain replied and followed Ioli into the office.

  Patrick O’Brien sat curled up in one of the office’s plastic, see-through chairs, rocking his body back and forth with his hands placed between his legs. He stopped at the sound of the door opening and with teary, red hangover eyes, he looked up to watch the two strangers walk in.

  “Patrick O’Brien?”

  “Yes?”

  “I am Lieutenant Ioli Cara and this is Captain Phillip Dionysiou,” she introduced them, but doubted the frustrated man cared much for their strange, foreign names.

  “We are with the Greek police. I have been told you have reported your cousins missing?” she continued saying as they sat opposite him on the soft, sea-foam, lemon yellow sofa.

  “Yes. We were all down at the beach, just here in front of the hotel, drinking last night. Amy left and went to her room and Conor and I slept down at the beach. I woke up and I was alone… neither of them was in their room and their mobile phones are turned off…”

  “Couldn’t they just have woken up before you and decided to hit the beach? Probably somewhere soaking up the sun and…” Captain Phillip started to say.

  Patrick shook his head rapidly from side to side.

  “No, no… they would have woken me up. And besides, we always have breakfast together, Conor loves hotel breakfasts. He even sets his alarm clock so he doesn’t miss it! Something’s wrong, I’m telling you…”

  “I believe you,” Ioli firmly said. She had noticed something during his shaking of the head. She could not keep her eyes away from the small, pale purple and slightly swollen bruise on his neck.

  “Amy and Conor were twins right?”

  “Yes, how did you know? I’m right ain’t I? What’s up? Where are they?” he anxiously demanded to know. He was just a step away from screaming out the string of questions at them.

  “Do you have a photo of Conor on your phone?” Ioli asked, noticing his Samsung Galaxy in his right hand.

  “Oh God, he’s… he’s…” Patrick started to breath in and out in a panic.

  “The photo… please,” Ioli smiled in an attempt to calm the boy down.

  “Here,” he said after flicking through his phone’s images.

  “Is it him? Is it him? Tell me!” he raised his voice as the two officers stared at his phone in silence.

  Captain Phillip raised his finger in front of Patrick silently asking for a minute. He leaned towards Ioli and whispered “don’t tell him yet. I need him to show me the exact spot they were down at the beach. And you need him to remember everywhere they had been, everyone they have talked to… he is already in a mess… you tell him and we lose him.”

  “I can’t… he deserves to know.”

  “Well, let him show me and then do what you like!”

  “Patrick, can you please show the Captain where you were last night and the route to your rooms? And then come back here. I’ll answer all your questions,” she honestly said.

  The two men exited the room; she stood up and walked over to the window. It surely was a fine, hot day. When she started out in homicides, everyone she knew asked the same first question.

  “Are you ok with being around dead bodies?”

  For Ioli that was the easy part. The dead were dead, and her dead were murdered; it was her job to bring justice to them and their loved ones. The hard part was the living. The ones left behind to deal with the pain of loss. She hated uttering the words “He’s dead” and watching the glow diminish in their eyes. The sincere ‘‘I’m sorry for your loss” that never sounded sincere, but came off as a lousy movie cliché. A mother crying over her dead son, a man losing his wife… and now a cousin on holiday about to learn his friends’ tragic end.

  A tingling feeling on the back of her neck informed her that she was not alone.

  She turned round quickly to find Patrick standing at the door.

  “Searching for the right words?” he asked with a toneless, dry throat voice.

  “Excuse me?”

  He sat down and looked up at her.

  “You promised me answers.”

  She pulled one of the see-through chairs and sat opposite him.

  “The boy in the photo you showed me was murdered last night…”

  The words hit Patrick hard. The worst case scenario came alive. He struggled to speak, but e
motions overwhelmed him and he choked as he tried to say a simple “No, God, no!”

  Ioli watched his face shrivel up. Soon, uncontrollable tears were running down his cheeks.

  “Who would do such a thing?” he finally managed to say in a broken voice.

  “We believe it was a serial killer which we are currently pursuing. I promise you we are doing our best to bring this bastard to justice and…”

  “Amy! Where is Amy?” the thought abruptly kicked in.

  “Let me show you a photo of her,” he said and frantically picked up his phone.

  Ioli took in a much-needed deep breath. She had promised him answers.

  “Patrick, a second body was found. A young girl, but the body was in an… unrecognisable state. Did she have a tattoo of the Irish flag on her thigh?”

  A second wave of pain struck him as he nodded yes and fell back into the chair. He turned his hollow eyes towards a map of Mykonos that was hanging on the white office wall.

  “Conor promised us paradise… and that’s what he got.”

  Ioli let him be for a few minutes before interrupting his thoughts whatever they could be at such a time.

  “I know this is a hard time for you, it’s just that the first memories and thoughts are important and I know you want to help catch their killer… So I must ask, what do you remember from last night?”

  “Nothing! That is what pisses me off the most! Amy left around one o’clock, I think, to go to her room and we stayed down at the beach and continued drinking. Conor fell asleep so I thought OK, night at the beach it is and fell asleep too. I woke up and he was gone. How is it possible someone took him without me noticing? I am quite a light sleeper and I wasn’t that drunk!”

  “Don’t be too hard on yourself. Did you notice that mark on your neck?”

  “Yeah, I guess I must have hit it somewhere…” he answered puzzled.

  “I believe you were drugged. Just like your cousins. That is why you did not wake.”

  Her answer gave minimal satisfaction to Patrick, who could not stop blaming himself.

  “Why him and not me?” the most common question of the living was asked.