I browsed, hidden eyes watching the shop keeper and the street beyond the window all while appearing to look for that perfect ring or necklace. I tried on a silver ring only to put it back. The shopkeeper’s sharp eyes darted my way when I returned it to its display. Running a jewelry store alone, you needed eagle eyes to catch pickpockets and snatch-and-grabbers.
My father had tried to keep me from the men in his world, the dangerous men like Alexei, though I’d been fated to marry one of them eventually. If he’d known some of the skills I’d picked up from his body guards and thugs over the years, they would not have survived his extreme disappointment. I wasn’t any old average shoplifter, when I wanted to exercise my fingers.
While the shop keeper watched my right hand at the rings, my left palmed a necklace out of the window display, just out of the man’s view. My right hand moved to a wide gold bangle, fingers ghosting over the metal. The man’s eyes flashed my way and out of view; a diamond ring joined the necklace in my other hand.
Two men in linen suits stormed down the road outside. Their eyes flashed in every direction, glaring at every woman they passed. I turned my body away, slowly, just a customer browsing the next display case. The men continued down the street and out of view.
“I just don’t know, if you dropped the price by 1, 000, maybe I’d buy it,” the unlucky woman said to the shop keeper.
“That is impossible,” the man replied in English. He snatched the diamond ring back from the woman. “It is a full carat and that’s only the center stone. The metal and jewels alone are worth more than that!”
She’d annoyed him, it was like she wanted me to do this. Maybe my luck had been so bad since Alexei had burst into my life that the universe owed me one. At this rate, I wouldn’t even feel guilty for ruining her trip.
“Haggling like that, you’d get eaten alive at the Italian market back home,” the woman huffed. She stepped back from the counter. “You just lost yourself a sale, buster. I’ve got to get back to the ship anyway.”
She turned to storm out of the store but I’d already moved. We collided, knocking her off balance. Knobby fingers grasped at anything to stop her fall. They found my arm and latched on for dear life. If I’d kept my balance, that might have saved her from sprawling onto the tile floor.
Instead, I’d rolled into the fall. Her shoulders and ass landed at the same time. She kept her head from the tile. A crack to the skull might have left her injured, more than a bruise or two. That would have sent a spasm of guilt through me. So much for winning over everything, I guessed. It seemed concussing my victim was my limit, even though my plan worked better with her unconscious.
She groaned, expressing all the air out of her lungs when my elbow jabbed her chest after I landed on her. Knocking the wind out of her was fine, she’d recover. Annoying and loud as she’d been, by now a small part of my mind was already planning how to make it up to the woman. She’d get an envelope stuffed with few thousand dollars in the mail with no return address for sure.
As she thrashed about underneath me, my left hand slipped past her purse. The necklace and ring dropped on top of it, half inside the large pocket. The fingers on my right hand curled around the thin lanyard. I rolled off her and jerked my arm as I stood.
The lanyard yanked her neck up. Wide eyes, tears smudging the dark liner, glared up at me. The thin cord snapped behind her neck and she dropped back to the floor. I mentally added $5k to the inevitable envelope. Her fingers grasped at my arms. One of those talon like nails dug in, but I shook her off. The envelope lost a thousand bucks for the scratch.
“Taccheggiatrice, taccheggiatrice!” I yelled thief in Italian once I sprang to my feet. My finger pointed to the jewelry hanging half inside her purse.
The shop keeper had rounded the counter to help when we tumbled to the floor. His eyes followed my finger and the concerned frown on his face twisted into a scowl. The wrongly accused woman shook her head, she pointed at me but I’d knocked the wind out of her good. That damn envelope just doubled in thickness.
Before the shop keeper had even moved, I’d dashed out the door. Up the street, I slipped down another alley, It snaked back and forth, all but deserted. Behind me, the shop keeper’s voice rang out for the Polizia. The envelope ballooned up to 40k. What was the going rate for a night in an Italian jail?
I couldn’t let it get to me now. At the end of the maze-like alley, I spotted water on the horizon. I needed to find the cruise ship’s pier. It was near enough to where Oleg had moored the dinghy. An old city like this might have its charm but the streets were a maze. I’d gotten turned around more than once in my flight.
I found myself on the wall of the old city, the port stretched out in front of me, both the cruise ship and Alexei’s yacht floating out in the center. The wall continued down to my right; below it a few hundred yards away were the piers. Oleg stood at head of the nearest, his eyes scanning the streets leading from the old city.
To avoid him, I kept a street back from the sea wall but followed its curve. By the time I caught up with a group of tourists returning to the ship, the lanyard hung around my neck. The picture of Nicola De Luca didn’t have my cheekbones and I didn’t share her crow’s feet but the glasses I’d nabbed hid those facts. Her less than sunny disposition and willingness to share it had probably made an impression among the staff. They’d give the ID a glance and let me by without wanting to incur the unlucky woman’s wrath.
Two lines had formed in front of the entrance to the cruise ship’s pier. One of the large tenders had already left, packed with passengers. I stepped into the line the furthest from Oleg’s sentry position. He hadn’t looked my way yet, but every advantage counted.
At the front of each line, a man wearing a bright red polo shirt with the cruise line’s logo on the breast held a tablet and logged each passenger before letting them pass. He asked them a question too, but I couldn’t hear from this distance. The one in front of me had fallen to the monotony of the task. He only offered the most cursory of glance at each passenger before his eyes fell back to the tablet.
Oleg stood rigid suddenly but his head was turned away from me. I followed his gaze. A small group of men in linen suits jogged down the sea wall in the distance. They slowed at every street, gazing down them before continuing on. By now, only a few people remained in the line ahead.
Behind the men with tablets stood a few beefy men in black shirts with the word ‘security’ written in English on them. As long as I made it past them, I’d be off this island. The last passenger in front of me passed through the gate, and I stepped up to the board badge checker.
“Are you bringing any alcoholic beverages aboard the ship Ms. De Luca?” the man asked in a monotone. His eyes only rose to read the badge though they lingered on the display my dress made of my breasts.
“Only what I drank,” I replied aping a New Jersey accent, slurred from drinking.
He rolled his eyes when I barked a chuckle but waved at the gate. As the chuckle subsided, I stepped through. The security guard in front of me glanced my way. When Alexei had led me through the streets I hadn’t noticed the attention this dress got from anyone but him. Now, I’d been reminded why I didn’t want to buy it in the first place. I’d really owe Katie after this.
The guard next to him stiffened and stared my way. I froze but heard the altercation behind me. Another man in a linen suit argued with the ticket taker, right in his face, screaming. The guards stepped past me to keep him out. I continued down the pier to the last tender.
The men who’d been approaching the waterfront hurried to their comrade. Oleg watched the Mafioso try and force his way past security. His head kept moving, gaze nearing me. Unless I ran all the way to the tender, I’d never avoid his detection. That’d get too much attention from security. Maybe they’d listen to the crazy man who was trying to get past them if I sprinted to the tender.
I continued my measured steps down the pier. Oleg froze when his eyes caught up to me. A refined thug, indeed, my disguise hadn’t fooled him for a second. I blew him a kiss and offered a wiggly fingered wave. He shook his head slowly and started back to their dinghy, phone in hand.
“Hurry up,” called a red shirted man at the stern of the last tender, “we want to get underway soon.”
Once I found a seat next to a charming retired couple I was about to learn way too much about in a five minute ride, the tender took off. At the next dock, Oleg untied the dinghy. Alexei jogged down the pier as the tender reached the cruise ship’s waterline port. This close, the ship towered over us, at least ten stories of windows and balconies above from my count.
My former captor and his refined thug pulled away from the dock as I stepped onto the cruise ship. With a wave to Barb and Davis from Spokane, I left my seat mates behind and speed walked through the corridors of the ship. The light tan walls and patterned carpets looked almost the same as the ship Katie and I had taken on our short cruise.
I followed the overhead signs to the stairs. Three flights up, I finally made it to the main deck. Dozens of passengers crowded the railings, getting one last look at Syracuse before the ship moved on to the next port. I’d have to figure out where that was.
It took at least a minute to squeeze through the crowd to get a good view of Alexei’s ship, only a few hundred feet from the perch I found myself on. My fingers squeezed the railing. Alexei hopped out of the dinghy before it even came to a stop at the back of his yacht. He flew up the stairs, three decks to the bridge. Pausing before he opened the door, his head swiveled my way.
At this distance, surrounded by other people, he’d never find me in the crowd. Even if he did, I was out of his reach… for the moment. There was no need to worry, but my stomach rumbled anyway. He’d seen me, I just knew it, felt his attention, even from so far away. It sent a shiver through my spine.
He lifted his right arm, fingers to his temple in a salute. I fought the smile that came to my face. He’d called me a worthy opponent and I’d proven him right. I’d won.
My exhilaration faded with the adrenalin now that I’d escaped both Alexei and the men who had tried to take me from him. He’d follow; a man like him didn’t give up after one failure. The other men hadn’t given up easily either. They’d called me by my mother’s maiden name too. I had so many questions and had just run from everyone who might answer them.
My stomach grumbled, not out of worry but hunger. I’d only had tea today. Alexei and I had been ambushed before he could show off the street food he’d been hyping up all morning. My hand tapped against the badge hanging from my neck. On that cruise I’d taken with Katie, our badges worked the vending machines, got us into the buffet. I could sure use a drink.
Before trying it on a person, I found a vending machine selling sodas. A wave of my purloined badge got me a coke and charged Nicola De Luca’s account $2. I added a few bills to that envelope I’d send after I got home as I sipped it, following the signs to the nearest bar.
Ten minutes later I sat at a small table on the balcony, a whisky sour in my hand. My eyes scanned the harbor for Alexei’s yacht. It had left the small harbor and floated outside it. They’d sailed too far out to identify him specifically, but I knew he’d be following us, maybe even find our itinerary and get there before we did. I’d have to keep an eye out. His little game hadn’t ended.
“Where have you been hiding this whole trip?” asked a voice to my right.
My head jerked to the side. The last dregs of my adrenaline had my fingers squeezing the glass, ready to strike. The man who spoke hadn’t noticed. He flashed a smile, and one of his thick but sculpted eyebrows rose with a nod.