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

by Luke Christodoulou

  ‘Does this look like a knot tied by a left-handed person?’

  ‘Well, I’ll be damned…’

  Chapter 23

  After two hours of collecting evidence from the murder scene, we were back at the police station, waiting for Christina to bring in Jacob for questioning. Her apple-shaped body and hazelnut, long, wavy hair soon opened the door. Jacob walked in, dressed this time in a pair of jeans and a black, leather jacket, zipped all the way to the top. His bloodshot eyes were dry of tears. Christina introduced us and escorted him to interrogation room one. He zombie walked behind her. We followed and sat down opposite him. Christina excused herself and off she went to prepare coffees for all.

  ‘We are so sorry for your loss, Mr. Hatzinikolaou, and we are sorry to have to bring you in, just hours after your wife’s death, but it’s important that your memory is fresh.’

  He looked at me emotion-less as I spoke. With a slight nod, he seemed to agree with what I said.

  ‘Did you hear anything last night, Mr. Hatzinikolaou?’

  ‘Please call me, Jacob. That runway of a surname will leave you breathless,’ he joked, yet remained in the same pitiful state. We smiled and let him continue in his own time. ‘I sleep heavy. I mean, real heavy. Always had trouble with school and the army. It must have been six o’clock when I turned and realized I was alone in bed. I got up, peed and called out for Stella. She did not answer, so I went to find her and… There she was. Killed herself. For another man.’ The last three words came out with anger. Fury burned in his eyes. ‘Do you know how long she had been seeing him?’ he clenched his fists and asked.

  ‘I’m sorry, but no.’

  ‘I fucking went fishing with the guy. Saw him in the pub. That mother…’ He slammed down his clenched fists on the table. ‘Sorry,’ he rushed to add.

  ‘Jacob, I won’t even pretend to understand what you are going through at the moment, but you need to relax and think hard if you heard or saw anything. Anything suspicious, maybe? Out of the ordinary?’

  He looked puzzled. ‘No… But… Erm… why are you asking? Was someone with her?’

  ‘What size shoe do you wear, Jacob?’ Ioli asked.

  ‘Forty-two…’ He looked even more puzzled.

  ‘There were footprints on your carpet. Size forty-five. Know anyone with a size forty-five shoe?’

  ‘Wait, she had help?’

  ‘Or maybe she had too much help? Was the note in her handwriting?’

  Christina pushed open the door with her body and with a faint smile, she left the coffees, a plate filled with vanilla cream biscuits and without saying a word, she exited the room.

  ‘Can I see the note again?’

  ‘Sure.’ Ioli placed the nylon evidence bag containing the note before him. Jacob studied it for a second and announced that it was indeed Stella’s handwriting. I showed him a photograph of the rope. He recognized it as his own from his shed.

  ‘Do you think she was… murdered?’

  ‘We don’t know, Jacob, but we have to examine every angle. Can you think of anyone who would want to hurt her? Any threats made?’

  He shook his head. We drank coffee and listened to his stories about how loved his Stella was. He was a man in torment. But, did he hurt enough to kill her?

  ‘For me, if he knew about the affair, he is a suspect,’ Ioli said, after Jacob had left.

  Ioli spent the rest of the day, labelling fingerprints lifted from the house and faxing them to HQ. She got in touch with the medical examiner, who confirmed death by spinal rupture. No other bruising than that caused by the rope. She had no defense wounds. Everything pointed to a clear case of suicide.

  Just as the evening rolled in and Ioli began to doubt her theory, I called.

  Constable Christina and I were out making door to door enquiries in the freezing cold. At least, it did not rain nor snow. By the time we reached the last house on the street, I was looking more and more like Rudolf. So far, no-one had seen anything. Every single person had been asleep around the time of death. Some houses were completely empty; overflowing post boxes giving away that the owners only stayed here during the lively summer months, which here in Greece are April, May, June, July, August and September. For the islands, you could add October too.

  No early birds on Mitropoleos Street. A quiet street with few houses, a closed-for-the-winter cafe, a couple of shops and one vacant plot overgrowing with January weeds. The last house, opposite the empty plot, looked the oldest of the lot. It begged for a fresh splash of paint. In the front garden plants that survived the drought, fought hard to come back to life on winter’s rain. The wooden steps leading to the main door looked unsafe and an old, black, Ford Capri from the 70’s stood dead in the open door garage. It looked as if it had not been driven in the last ten years; rust and dust had completely covered it and some smart-ass had fingered-written I wish my wife was this dirty on it.

  I knocked, softer than usual. The door looked ready to say goodbye to this world. The windows were open, the worn-in curtains flying out into the wind. Old sixties hits were playing inside. I knocked again.

  ‘I’m coming, I’m coming. Hold your horses! I heard you the first time!’ a croaky, manly voice came from inside. The door was pulled back and a strong smell of cigars hit us.

  ‘Come in, come in and wipe your feet,’ the short man ordered in the same manner he told off kids and grandkids, whenever they remembered he was still alive and visited him.

  He wobbled from side to side, wooden walking stick in one hand, cigar in the other.

  ‘Tea? Coffee?’

  ‘Sir, I am Captain…’

  ‘Yeah, yeah, you’re the cops. I figured that much out. You’ve been going door to door for the last few hours. Tea or coffee? You look like a coffee guy.’

  My face showed my agreement.

  ‘And you, beautiful?’ he asked Christina, in a tender manner and not in that dirty, old man’s manner.

  ‘Tea would be fine, thank you.’

  ‘I’ll make you a mint tea. My wife used to love a strong mint tea this time of day.’ And with that, he trotted off to the kitchen. We sat down on the brown sofa and waited. It was our last house and we were tired. We could spare ten minutes and enjoy a hot cup with a lonely old man.

  Soon, introductions were made and we were enjoying our beverage with Mr. Papadopoulos. He insisted we called him Billy. Made him feel young, he admitted with a mischievous grin.

  ‘Sorry bout the mess. I live alone. Lost my Eleni two years now. Kids all live in Athens.’

  ‘This is an amazing cup of tea.’

  ‘Always use fresh mint. Everyone uses dry mint for some reason. Too lazy to go buy fresh, I guess. So, you are here for that Stella woman?’

  ‘Yes. We were wondering if you may have seen something suspicious even though your house is quite far from hers.’

  ‘Yes, everyone wants a view. That is why I bought this land cheap, even back then and why the opposite plot is empty. Everyone wants to see the sunset. My shades are so rusty, the sun is always orange to me!’ He laughed out loud. We joined him until his laughter was cut off by his cough.

  ‘Stupid old age! Can’t even laugh anymore! Anyway, I watch CSI, Law and Order, Dexter, Castle, Sherlock, you name it. After Mrs. Georgiou next door said the police were going door to door, I noted down all the cars that I remember being on the street at half past five when I woke up.’ He pulled out a once-white, piece of paper. He had my full attention.

  ‘Out of the twelve cars, eleven belong to people living on the street. One doesn’t. And it was parked across from my house. I’ve cracked the case, right?’ He was beaming with self-satisfaction.

  ‘I believe you have! What car was it?’

  He glowed in victory even more. I expected his bald head to start giving off light. ‘It was a 2004, white Fiat Strada. And before you go searching your database for owners, I can do you one better. It had a logo on the side. YourWoodWorker.Gr.’

  ‘That’s in Kamari
, by the airport,’ Christina said. ‘I’ve met the owner. A John something. He did some work on my parent’s house a couple of years back.’

  We thanked Billy for his services. He told us to visit again.

  Menacing clouds threw their first warning shots. I called Ioli with the news. By the time we parked outside the station to pick her up, it was really pissing it down.

  Christina jumped out of the patrol car and Ioli came running out of the building, Beautiful people covering her silky, black hair that she had pulled back in a bun. Christina vanished through the open door, glad to be back close to central heating. The cold on the islands penetrated your skin and chilled your bones. Something about the sea air, I guess. In New York, if you dressed warm enough, you could tolerate the cold easy. Here, you could wear all your clothes and still feel the ice settling on your bones.

  The GPS lady, with her fine math skills, calculated the distance to 8.7 KM and 12 minutes as our estimated time of arrival. The country road was not bad, considering that with all the cuts due to crisis, no maintenance occurred anymore. The wipers were working at full speed and the thunder in the sky, drowned out the car’s radio. Not that we were listening to it. I brought Ioli up to date with our Mr. Billy visit.

  In 17 minutes (I’m looking at you, GPS lady), we were outside a lonely bricked warehouse with a tin roof. The rain fell upon it hard, its drum music echoing through the surrounding fields by the country road from the airport to the village of Kamari. We drove up to the building and in haste, found ourselves under the wooden pergola that covered the entrance. The aluminium door below the sign YourWoodWorker.Gr open. The wind banging it, yet never closing it. Inside, it was quiet like a grave. Ioli walked in, pistol secure between both her hands. I pulled out my gun and stood by the open door.

  ‘Hello?’ No answer.

  ‘John?’

  Again, no reply. Just the wind howling through gaps in the bricked wall. We both stood in the vast, open space. A damp and draughty place. Planks of wood and work tables filled the space.

  ‘Police. Is anyone here?’ Ioli called out, her gun moving around, covering the ground.

  ‘Looks clear,’ I said, and that was when we heard a faint, screeching sound. The rain was dying down and quiet spread across the valley. The sound echoed clearer this time. It came from the office, in the rear end of the warehouse. Guns straight ahead, we approached.

  Suddenly, a noise from below. A huge rat ran beside Ioli’s left foot. She whispered a curse, that found its way out from behind gritted teeth.

  The noise now clear and familiar. It reminded me of my daughter playing on our neighborhood swings. I turned the knob and pushed open the door, jumping in the room with my gun ready to threaten. I froze at the sight of the hanging, naked body. Ioli gasped for air and her eyes widened in shock.

  Before us, a man suspended by his arms and feet from the ceiling, face down. Thick, metal wire, tied to a hook on the ceiling held his wrists together. Same with his ankles. Blood dripped from his head, mouth and nose, forming a pool of blood beneath him. A second, smaller pool formed by drops of blood dripping from his dangling penis. Ioli walked around.

  ‘What the…?’ Her hand covered her mouth in disgust. His anus was held open by a weird ring, a green sex toy. He was badly bruised, showing signs of severe rape.

  I placed two fingers on his neck’s main artery. He was dead, yet the body, even in this cold, was still quite warm. He died during the last two hours.

  ‘Costa, how is this all connected?’ she asked, panic gently covering each word.

  ‘Either this guy was killed by the same murderer who killed Stella or this guy killed Stella and was killed by another?’ The repetition of the word killed, gave away my confusion. Too many puzzle pieces, no box cover to look at.

  As I called Christina and the medical examiner, Ioli searched around the building. No one was to be seen. She came back, hunting rifle in her latex-covered hand.

  ‘Think I found Kate’s murder weapon…’

  ‘Lift it for prints,’ I said and called the chief to let him know the unexpected turn our case had just taken. I also requested, all evidence and DNA sent in, to go to the top of the list.

  Half an hour later, Hercule and the coroner’s apprentice, whose name I still don’t know, lowered down the body. His back housed a plethora of tattoos. A cross, head shots of Saint John and Saint Mina and a couple of passages from the Bible.

  FOR GOD SO LOVED THE WORLD, THAT HE GAVE HIS ONE AND ONLY SON, THAT WHOEVER BELIEVES IN HIM SHALL NOT PERISH BUT HAVE ETERNAL LIFE – JOHN : 3:16

  ‘For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,’ Ioli read the other.

  What a way to die. Not that there is a good way. I don’t feel like dying old, senile and with shitty diapers on, in some nursing home or worse in some smelly hospital with bitchy nurses that wait for you to die cause they need the bed for the next old, senile fart with diapers on. No. Sir. There is not a good way to go.

  Loud, ground shaking thunder killed my flow of thoughts. The body of John Mina was bagged and rolled out of his workplace. Bruise-colored clouds covered the little blue left in the sky and swallowed the orange ball burning behind them, ready to dip into the horizon and call it a night. The paramedics were having a difficult time, wheeling him through the muddy pathway. The strong rain gathered momentum and a wrong step, in a wrong puddle, brought the first paramedic to her knees. Her colleague was busy pushing the stretcher, rushing to leave the rainy outdoors. He hit her hard with the stretcher on her forehead, opening up a nice, blood producing, stitches needing scar, that would be the talk of the week at the local hospital. The body bag fell to the left and rolled in the mud.

  No. Ma’am. There is not a good way to go.

  John was a simple man and so was his workplace. He only had what he needed, mostly tools. Receipts and orders filled his office drawers. No family photographs, no holiday souvenirs, no needless junk. A practical man. On his desk, an outdated computer – the ones where the screen is double the size of the modem, a brown, vintage, rotary dial telephone and a black, hardcover Bible.

  His home did not differ. He lived alone in a one bedroom apartment in the nearby village of Kamari. Never married, never fathered offspring. A forty year old that kept to himself, never socializing with the neighbors. He had a bed to sleep on, a table to eat on, an oven to cook in and a fridge to keep the milk cold. No sign of a TV or a couch.

  The night sky, filled with a glowing slice of moon and millions of flickering white dots, signalled the end of a rainy day. A single, lonely cloud shipped through the stars. It was a peaceful ride back to our hotel. Our case puzzled us both. Both needing reason to prevail.

  Ioli spoke first. ‘He kept to himself, no friends, no family… But he was religious. The tattoos, the Bible, the icons above his bed.’

  ‘Pay his local church a visit in the morning?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘No?’

  She couldn’t help but smile.

  ‘Keep your eyes on the road, please. His last name was Mina, he had Saint Mina tattooed on his back…’

  ‘Saint Mina church in Thira.’

  ‘And that’s possibly where we’ll find our connection. It is the church nearest to Kate and Stella. They both went to church on Sundays.’

  ‘The local priest could help us. I doubt he’ll be awake at this time of night.’

  ‘First thing in the morning…’

  She did not complete her thought. My ringtone leaped around the car.

  ‘Annoying grandpa ringtone,’ Ioli commented once again. I ignored her remark once again. It was turning into a thing. Into one of those annoying routine lines we humans tend to say. A Pavlovian response to a sound, smell, picture, movement.

  Unknown US number.

  ‘Hello?’

  ‘Costa? Costa, my boy,’ was all my mother, Maria, managed to say without crying. The rest came with tears and sobbing.

  ‘Mama? You OK? What’s wrong?’

&nbs
p; ‘It’s your father, Costa.’ My heart skipped a beat. The better part of my brain used instinct and pulled over, parking the car on the muddy side of the road, killing fresh grass as the vehicle came to a full stop. I had never heard this tone of voice with her. I was expecting her next words to be your father is dead.

  ‘Costa, can you hear me?’

  ‘Yes, mama!’ My voice rocketed to the high eighties of the dB scale. Ioli jumped in her seat. She laid her hand gently on my shoulder. Her smile letting me know that she was there for me.

  ‘He’s been hit by a car…’

  ‘A car? How? How’s dad?’

  ‘On his way to the park. He just got out of surgery…’

  ‘And now you call?’ I regretted yelling at her immediately.

  ‘I was in shock. I stood outside the door, going up and down like crazy!’

  ‘I know, Mama. Sorry. Is dad ok?’

  ‘They don’t know. This young blond doctor said she did all she could, but he was old and things don’t repair like when we are young. He hasn’t woken up, Costa! He might not…’ The last words struggled to come out her mouth. She could not say any more.

  ‘Call Auntie Tonia. Don’t be alone.’

  ‘I will. I will. All his friends are here, too. When can you get here?’

  ‘Me? Mama, I can’t leave…’

  ‘Costa, he’s your father! He is dying and you…’ The same angry voice I heard only once before. I was fourteen when the police came round our house. They were doing rounds asking all the neighborhood boys if we knew anything about Panayiota Karaoli’s rape. She was fifteen at the time. She was returning home, late at night, and walked through the park where all the block’s teens hang out. She was attacked from behind, blindfolded and pulled into the trees. Her hands were tied together and her legs spread apart. She felt scissors cut off her jean shorts, her Disney sweatshirt and her sports bra. She could not recall how many had their way with her as they took turns raping her. They left her there, bruised, bloody and scared. The following morning, the news spread like wildfire in our small, Greek community. Everyone was a suspect. Especially, teenage boys to whom the park served as a second home. The cops were sure one of us would know something. I had -without mama’s permission-taken the metro with my mate Jimmy. We went to that Led Zeppelin concert we were not allowed to go to. The two cops towering me, asking me about my whereabouts the previous night were less scary than my mother. As I chewed on my words, making silly, unprepared excuses, she snapped!