Lefteris leaned forward in his chair. “Are you, crazy?” He wagged his right hand in front of his own face. “In the first place, as you just said, it’s not mine to sell. All I have is a lease. Besides, I have no interest in selling.”
“No interest in selling your lease? At any price?”
“At any price that you or your partner here could meet.” Lefteris turned and ranted at Wacki rapidly in Greek.
Sergey waited until he had finished.
“Wacki, tell me exactly what he just said, word for word.”
Wacki started to stammer.
“I said, ‘word for word.’”
Lefteris spoke. “I said that you and your asshole of a partner, Wacki, couldn’t possibly come up with enough to pay me what I would want to give up the hotel. It’s my baby. I’ll nurse it to my death. So stop wasting my time.”
Sergey nodded. “I understand your commitment to a place you created, but on reflection, perhaps the time has come to consider moving on and enjoying the fruits of your life in luxury and peace.”
“Like I said, the two of you are wasting my time.” He tried to stand.
Sergey barked, “Please, don’t get up before you’ve heard my offer.” He softened his voice. “That would be very rude.”
Lefteris dropped back into the chair.
“First of all, sir, Wacki is not my partner. He is just one of my many paid employees.”
Sergey fixed his eyes on Wacki. “Isn’t that right, boy?”
Wacki looked at his feet. “Yes, boss.”
Lefteris looked at Wacki. “You told me he was your partner.”
“You must have misunderstood,” said Wacki still looking at his feet.
Sergey turned to Lefteris. “Well, now that we’ve cleared up that little misunderstanding, perhaps we can get down to business.”
Lefteris raised and dropped his hands. “Why not? After all, it’s bad business to turn down a deal you haven’t been offered. So, what do you have in mind?”
Sergey pulled a piece of paper out of his shirt pocket and waved it at Lefteris. “I’d prefer that my employee not know the amount I’m offering you. It’s written out on this, and as soon as the ministry of tourism approves the lease transfer that amount will be paid to you in full. I assume you’d prefer for as much of the purchase price as possible to be paid off the books, but I’m afraid with all the regulatory scrutiny these days I can’t risk losing the license by doing it that way. So, to compensate you for that inconvenience,each year I will pay you five percent of the hotel’s annual net profits for as long as I have an interest in it.”
Sergey handed the paper to Lefteris and watched as Lefteris tried to hide his surprise. He wasn’t a very good poker player.
“There must be something else you want from me,” said Lefteris.
“Yes. In order to ease our transition into the community, for a reasonable period of time I expect you to make yourself available to me as a consultant, all expenses paid of course.”
Lefteris shook his head from side to side. “I don’t get it. Like I said before, you must be crazy. We both know your offer makes no sense. The hotel isn’t worth anything near what you’ve offered. Why are you offering so much?”
“I assume that means my offer is acceptable on the terms I’ve outlined?”
Lefteris looked at the paper again, drew in and let out a breath. He nodded. “Yes. But I’ll have to check with my attorneys. As soon as I get their okay I’ll have them prepare a memorandum of understanding to submit to the ministry.”
“No problem. As long as I have your word that we have a deal.”
Lefteris stood and extended his hand. “We have a deal. But I’d appreciate it if you didn’t tell anyone what you’re paying me. No reason to start attracting hungry relatives and long lost friends.”
Sergey laughed. He put down the cigarette he had not smoked, stood up, and shook Lefteris’ hand.
Teacher would be pleased.
***
On the way back to town, Sergey listened as Wacki rambled on about how Lefteris must be losing it to have thought that Wacki would ever suggest he was Sergey’s partner. As they pulled up in front of the hotel, Sergey leaned over and patted Wacki’s thigh.
“I assume Lefteris and the recently departed Christos Vasilakis were friends?”
“Yes, very close friends.”
“And you were as well?”
“Yes, I’d worked for Christos for a while a few years back.”
Sergey shook his head. “Horrible what happened to that old man. Beaten to death in his home during a robbery. He was a legend on this island. Probably almost as much of one as you think you are.” Sergey laughed and gave a gentle slap to Wacki’s thigh.
Wacki forced a grin.
“Just so there’s no confusion, my friend, about the degree of loyalty and confidentiality I expect from you, if I think you’re even mumbling in your sleep about anything having to do with me or any of my business, let alone talking about such things to another human being, I can assure you that you’ll look a hell of lot worse at your funeral than poor Christos did at his.”
Sergey squeezed Wacki’s thigh hard enough to make him jump. “Remember that always.”
***
Teacher smiled as she listened to Sergey tell the story of his negotiations with the hotelier. He sounded as enthusiastic as a young boy reciting the details of his first day at school. He had so much more to learn, but this was not the moment to make that point. This was a time to praise and encourage him, and to savor an emotion she never thought she’d sense again: a loving mother listening to her child.
It was a lifetime since she’d felt that way. No, two child-lifetimes.
Teacher had tens of thousands of followers gladly willing to die to execute her orders and she truly loved them, but not with a mother’s love. Her love for them was born out of the camaraderie they shared as ignored and undervalued human beings united by a common lack of faith in governments and endless suffering at the hands of society’s empty promises. They were the disenchanted, the crazies, the betrayed, the outcasts, the exploited.
Teacher used the skills she’d developed as a trafficked child to harness their rage and focused it in violent attacks on those she presented as symbols of their oppression. She offered her followers a simple satisfaction for otherwise belittled lives: revenge.
It did not take long before prospective targets saw the wisdom in paying Teacher for protection from her followers’ ire. That’s when money started rolling in and Teacher’s life became infinitely more complicated.
The money was far more than necessary to care for her followers, and deciding what to do with it led to bankers, lawyers, and investment advisers. Teacher had become part of the very system her followers despised. But they saw her as different, for she brought them a better life; something no government had ever done. In exchange, they ruthlessly spread her methods of doing business across Eastern Europe, taking advantage of power vacuums that accompanied distracted, corrupt governments. And those who went to prison found new followers for her there. No opportunity was missed, and all knew her simple rule: Those loyal to her were lavishly rewarded and those not were mercilessly destroyed. Teacher had become the quintessential, multi-national corporate leader.
She smiled again as Sergey described how “Lefteris’ eyes popped wide open when I gave him our offer.”
She thought how very different things would have been had her sons lived to succeed to all that she’d achieved in her life.
Her smile vanished. I never would have permitted them my life. They were gentle, open souls who loved, not harmed.
No. Her life demanded a very different sort of successor.
Chapter Eleven
In mid-afternoon Andreas received a call from Europol informing him that a man traveling as Sergey Tishchenko had arrived that morning in Greece on a flight into Athens’ Venizelos International Airport. They had no further details, except that the name matched that of a man the Greek police were looking for in connection with a murder investigation. Andreas thanked the agent for the information and gently put down the receiver before letting out a roar of curses at the ineptitude of Greek bureaucrats.