‘Thank you,’ said Peter, his heart sinking. He had no idea who ‘Jimmy’ might be, and with no further clues he had no way of finding out. ‘I appreciate the call. I’ll give it some thought.’
There were no other calls. Ella waited till Peter Hambrecht left the college and followed him back to the Randolph, but after a single lonely brandy at the bar, he turned his phone off and turned in for the night.
Depressed, Ella pulled on her jacket and summer scarf and headed back towards her own room, a tiny Airbnb above a bookshop on the other side of Christchurch Meadows. Gabriel was right. It had been a wild-goose chase coming to Oxford, a foolish exercise of hope over experience. Clearly Athena had used her ex-husband and moved on, just as she’d done with all her other old lovers. Trust and loyalty were either qualities she didn’t understand, or luxuries she couldn’t afford. With Makis Alexiadis dead, there was nothing to stop her coming back to reclaim her rightful place as mistress of her late husband’s empire. Nothing except the terrible facial burns that would make her instantly recognizable to her many enemies lurking in the shadows.
Peter Hambrecht had helped his former wife and childhood playmate overcome that problem. Having set up an effective decoy in London, he had spirited her away for reconstructive surgery somewhere else. Unfortunately for Peter, now that she had a new face and name, Athena didn’t need him any more. Evidently she’d moved on to ‘Jimmy’ as her confidant of choice, the next pawn in her endless game of chess, staying one step ahead of her pursuers. No doubt he was another former lover …
Walking past the Radcliffe Camera, its domed roof dream-like in the misty moonlight, it came to Ella suddenly, staring her in the face like the answer to a crossword clue, insultingly obvious now that she’d seen it.
Another former lover. And what had Mary said? ‘I only remembered because they were speaking Greek’?
There weren’t any Greeks named Jimmy. Dimi, on the other hand, short for Dimitri, had to be one of the most common Greek names of all. No doubt in her sexual heyday, Athena Petridis had bedded more than one Dimitri. But if Ella remembered correctly from Athena’s file, there was one in particular who would have both the financial means and the contacts to be able to help her, even now. One who’d been deeply enough embroiled in the Petridises’ criminal dealings to be afraid of Athena’s Lazarus-like resurrection, and what it might mean for his own reputation and legacy.
Quickening her pace, she ran up the High Street to Carfax, turning left past Tom Tower and left again along Christchurch Meadows until she reached the tiny cobbled lane where she was staying. Once safely in her room above the bookshop, she locked the door, drew the curtains, and flipped open her laptop, messaging Gabriel on their private, encrypted service. She could see at once that he was already online. Gabriel was always online. Like a low-tech version of me.
‘Is Dimitri Mantzaris still alive?’ Ella typed.
The reply came back within seconds. A thumb’s-up sign. Then, ‘He’s eighty.’
‘Where does he live?’ Ella followed up.
A few more seconds. ‘Vouliagmeni. Near Athens. Why?’
Would Athena return to Athens? She might. It was the sort of move she was ballsy enough to pull off, although Ella still felt it was more likely she would pick somewhere quieter and more remote, especially if she were going to base herself in Greece. She also couldn’t imagine her living as the houseguest of a figure as famous as Dimitri Mantzaris, the former prime minister.
‘Any other property?’ she asked Gabriel.
This time a full three minutes went by before he answered.
‘No. Goodnight.’
Ella shut down the computer, irritated. Her elation of earlier had evaporated now, her balloon pricked by both Gabriel’s monosyllabic lack of enthusiasm and by the difficulties involved in following up Dimitri Mantzaris as a lead. For one thing she would have to tread carefully if she returned to Athens or anywhere in Greece, knowing that Redmayne had agents from The Group swarming like maddened ants, hunting for her and Gabriel. For another, as a former premier, Mantzaris was bound to have extensive security, making it harder to get close enough to him to pick up any communications he might be having with Athena. All this assuming, of course, that Mantzaris was ‘Jimmy’. She’d felt so certain about it all on her way home from the Randolph. But now, just like P
eter Hambrecht, she could sense her hopes fading.
I’ll sleep on it, she thought, undressing and dropping her clothes mindlessly in a heap on the floor, before removing her make-up, cleaning her teeth and climbing into the creaky single bed. Turning her phone to silent, she plugged it in to charge in the alcove next to her pillow when it suddenly buzzed in her hand.
‘Why are you calling me?’ She mimicked Gabriel’s tone from their last call. ‘I thought we agreed the phone was only for emergencies.’
‘You turned off your computer,’ he answered matter-of-factly. ‘And you didn’t answer my question. Why are you interested in Mantzaris? Is she in contact with him?’
‘Maybe,’ said Ella, too tired to explain everything tonight. ‘I’ll message you in the morning.’
‘Don’t message,’ said Gabriel. ‘Come back to London. I did some more digging just now. Turns out he does own other real estate, through an offshore trust in Cayman. He’s actually a remarkably active investor for an eighty-year-old. And you’ll never guess which property he picked up in private sale just this week, for twice its listed value?’
‘Which?’ asked Ella grumpily. She’d never enjoyed guessing games.
‘Number 24 Liasti Beach Road.’
Ella’s heart leaped into her mouth.
‘Otherwise known as Villa Mirage. Now who do we know who’d pay twice what it’s worth to get hold of Makis Alexiadis’s former center of operations and take it over, lock stock and barrel?’ Gabriel chuckled. ‘Nice work, Miss Praeger. It looks like we’ve come full circle. And now you and I have some travel plans to arrange.’
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Athena Petridis tightened her silk kimono robe around her slender waist and opened the sliding glass doors to the deck, taking her coffee with her. It was her favorite time of day: early morning, an hour or two after sunrise, when the warm promise of the day to come hung soft and sweet in the air, but the ocean breeze made the heat comfortable rather than cloying. And this morning was even lovelier than usual, with one of those spectacular, pina-colada skies that only the Greek islands could produce, an almost tacky riot of azure blue and soft pink and burnt-sienna orange bleeding out from a lazily rising sun.
All the tourists and villa owners were still in their beds, sleeping off the excesses of the prior night’s drinking and dancing and general indulgence. But the army of workers on whose backs the island was run – the garbage collectors and delivery men and fishermen and boutique owners – they were all awake and buzzing around in the streets below Villa Mirage, their mingled shouts and idling engines and clattering crates of produce providing a background soundtrack of life and vibrancy to the otherwise tranquil scene.