They were in the study at Villa Mirage, with the vast modern picture windows tinted dark for privacy, and a stunning bespoke concrete and linen couch serving as the patient’s examination table. In the past, Makis had agreed to come into the surgery for his regular check-ups, drawn at least in part by the lure of Dr Farouk’s extremely attractive but depressingly attached receptionist, Mariette. But ever since the dismal failure of Cameron McKinley’s London operation, Makis had been too depressed to get out of bed most days, let alone leave the villa.
How could it be? How was it possible that not only Athena, but Ella Praeger too, had slipped through his fingers? Again! He hated himself for caring more about Ella’s escape than he did about Athena’s. The slippery little witch was proving as cunning as her mother had been before her. Not only had she got away, but she’d managed to kill Roger Carlton, a seasoned operative and reliable assassin with more than two decades’ worth of experience. As for Athena, once again Makis now had zero idea where she was, or whether or not she even knew that an attempt had been made to kill her. Thanks to Cameron’s incompetence, he’d been left naked. Exposed. Vulnerable.
Was it any wonder his blood pressure was through the roof?
‘My diet’s fine,’ he growled at Dr Farouk, a slight, immaculately dressed Egyptian who always smelled of a distinctive mixture of expensive cologne and camphor. ‘Same chef. No changes. I’ve been a little stressed.’
‘More than a little,’ Dr Farouk said, removing an old-fashioned thermometer from his battered leather doctor’s bag and inserting it under Makis’s tongue. When it came to medical care, Makis preferred tradition. ‘I don’t suppose you’d consider taking a vacation?’
‘This is a vacation,’ Mak mumbled around the thermometer.
‘I’m serious, Makis,’ frowned the doctor. ‘These numbers aren’t good. I know you keep fit, but you’re not a young man any more.’
A knock on the door interrupted this dispiriting conversation.
An ashen-looking lackey stuck his head into the room. ‘Sorry to disturb you, sir. But a man’s been detained at the gatehouse.’
‘And?’ Makis snapped, as Dr Farouk removed the glass vial from between his lips. ‘Can’t security deal with it?’
‘Well, yes, sir. But they thought … I thought … you would want to know. It’s the man. From Athens.’
‘What “man from Athens”? What the hell are you talking about? There are three million men in Athens, you cretin!’
Dr Farouk watched with alarm as his patient’s
face began to turn a violent puce. It wasn’t healthy how quickly Makis Alexiadis could go from calm to apoplectic in a matter of seconds. He didn’t think he’d ever known a man with less emotional regulation. For all the outward trappings of success and good health, the man’s inner life was clearly a wild and uncontrollable storm.
The poor lackey swallowed nervously. ‘The man … the very tall Arabic man. He was stopped in the grounds of the mansion?’
Makis’s eyes widened. ‘You can’t mean Salim?’
He’s here?
‘Yes, sir. And he’s asking to see you. He says it’s urgent.’
Makis frowned, then laughed. Did the idiot have a death wish? Not many men would be brave – or foolish – enough to dare come crawling back to Makis Alexiadis having failed at a job as important as the one Mood Salim had been given.
He turned to Dr Farouk. ‘We’ll have to finish this later.’
For a moment, the elegant little medic considered protesting. But only for a moment. There was a steel in Mak’s eyes that spelled danger.
‘Show Salim in,’ he barked at the lackey. ‘Then leave us.’
Mood gazed around him at the opulence of the villa as he followed Makis’s manservant down a long, light-filled hallway. This wasn’t opulence in the Libyan style. There was no gold, no rich rugs or priceless antique furniture or chandeliers. This was starker, sleeker, altogether more modern. And yet the endless expanses of marble and glass, and the two vast, abstract stone sculptures at either end of the corridor spoke just as eloquently of wealth, status and power. Perhaps more so. After all, who needed art when one had the limitless blue Aegean sparkling on the other side of windows so enormous and brilliantly clean they were practically invisible? Everything about Villa Mirage was impressive in a clean, controlled way.
‘In there,’ the manservant nodded towards a set of walnut double doors.
Steeling himself for the encounter ahead, Mood pushed them open effortlessly with his weightlifter’s arms and closed them behind him.
Makis, business casual in his shirtsleeves and suit trousers, had his back to him and did not turn around when Mood entered, continuing to stare out of the window.
‘You came back.’
‘Yes.’
‘You failed. You let Athena get away. But you still came back.’
Mood was silent. As this wasn’t a question, it didn’t seem to require an answer.