Elias froze. It was Petra’s voice and he hunkered down into his seat like he was a cop on a stakeout trying not to be discovered. He had assumed they were inside the house. It was well past midnight. He didn’t even know why he had driven up here on his way back to Liakada. Except that half an hour ago he felt looking at the property might make him come to a decision about going in and making an inventory tomorrow. But he knew, if going in was what he decided, he was going to have to be upfront with Becky. He wasn’t sure he had it in him to go behind her back and let himself in when she was staying there. It would be wrong. Her things would be there. Her pad and pen maybe. Drawings of animals with holes in them…
‘You told me you drank tsipouro with those guys. I only drank wine.’
It was Becky’s voice now and Elias lifted his head a little, daring to look out of the open window to see her. The women were walking, slowly, at varying degrees of wobbly, heading towards the gate of the property.
‘The wine!’ Petra exclaimed, throwing her hands in the air. ‘It looked like it had come from a ninety-year-old with a bad urine infection.’
‘How do you know?’ Becky responded. ‘How many pots of pee belonging to ninety-year-olds with urine infections have you been witness to?’
‘You really don’t have a clue what goes on in Bangkok, do you?’
‘I don’t seem to have a clue what was missing from that stifado, either.’ Becky stopped walking and let out a sigh. ‘And that means I’m losing my touch. And if I’m losing my touch then that means I really am just someone who butters bread for a living.’
‘Bread is important though,’ Petra replied. ‘Like, you can eat it and you can spend it. You can never have enough of it.’
‘You are definitely more drunk than I am.’
‘Not too drunk to do sailing tomorrow though.’
‘What?’ Becky exclaimed.
Elias watched them. Both still stood outside the gate of the villa, underneath the full moon illuminating them like a spotlight. Swaying a little…
Petra laughed. ‘The guys – the ones I met in the restaurant. They’re meeting us at Avlaki beach tomorrow and we’re going to do sailing.’
‘Oh, Petra, no. I’m not really very good at things like that,’ Becky protested.
‘Things like what?’
‘Anything that involves any sort of coordination.’
‘Like putting one foot in front of the other right now?’ Petra asked, pushing the gate open.
‘Well, if I’m going to be forced to go sailing then you’re definitely going to have to do Dark Dating,’ Becky told her. ‘In fact, I’ve already had to pay for our entry so…’
‘Dark Dating? What the hell is that? Do you have to have dinner with vampires?’
‘You can’t see, and you’re not allowed to speak either,’ Becky explained.
‘What kind of dating is that?’
‘Very quiet dating I’m guessing.’
Petra let out a burp. ‘It’s that stifado,’ she announced. ‘It’s given me all the indigestion.’
‘Nothing to do with the shots with those guys then?’ Becky asked.
‘I think that Eleni put something extra in my meal. She doesn’t like me.’
‘There was definitely something missing from the recipe, I wish I could figure out what it was.’
‘We should have swapped bowls. I probably had what was missing in mine. You could have shared the burping with me.’ Petra held her breath for a few seconds and then spoke again. ‘Now, let me tell you about Atlantis because I think you and he could definitely be a match made in…’
‘Atlantis?’
‘I was going to say “heaven” but—’
‘Atlantis can’t be his real name!’ Becky exclaimed.
‘I met someone called Golem in Ho Chi Minh City.’
‘No!’
‘I swear! Now, Atlantis is tall, but not too tall. Dark hair and lean, but not too lean and he doesn’t smoke. Well, he didn’t smoke at any point during the six or so shots we did and he would have done, wouldn’t he? If he was a smoker. I’m guessing you wouldn’t be into a smoker.’
‘Well… I might not hold it against a guy if he was, but I do prefer—’
‘Ha!’ Petra laughed. ‘You mean you might hold it against the guy. Hold it against him. Get it? Hold it against him, as in your vag—’
‘I get it, Petra,’ Becky answered.
Elias watched the two women open up the gate then, after a few attempts, successfully close and lock it. They had been to Liakada. They had met his mother. Of course they had met his mother. His mother had most likely been here at the villa when they arrived. How crazy was this? His own mother cleaning the very house that belonged to his client from the UK! Except that streak of coincidence was not what was bothering him the most. What was concerning him was the fact Becky might already know he had lied about his occupation. And that she was going sailing tomorrow with someone called Atlantis.
He waited a few moments until a light went on inside the property and then he started up the car and drove away.
Thirty-Nine
Avlaki Beach
‘It’s a great view, isn’t it?’
Becky, wearing a pair of sea shoes she had found in the utility room that were at least a whole size too big, crunched the soles down into the stones. It was another beautiful beach. White stones and small patches of sand in between, leading down to a shore where the waves seemed to be increasing in intensity the more she eyed them up. The sky was still a perfect blue, but it was windy. Petra had claimed it perfect sailing weather and she had bounced around the patio earlier, holding up miniscule swimwear in an effort to get Becky to help her choose an outfit for the expedition. No hangover was evident in the demeanour of the twenty-year-old. Becky, on the other hand, had already downed five super-strong Greek coffees and didn’t feel vaguely normal at all. But the scenery was helping. This beautiful aquamarine bay with the rise and fall of the mountain behind it and again, with the peaks across the water in Albania.
‘The waves are starting to look fierce,’ Becky commented. She was wearing a life-vest and that had worried her from the very outset.
‘I didn’t mean that view!’ Petra remarked. ‘I meant Atlantis and Troy.’ She made some strange feral-cat-style noise. ‘I like a bit of a wetsuit look.’
Except the men weren’t wearing wetsuits. They were wearing nothing on their torsos and some sort of tight-fitting bottoms that stopped mid-thigh. It was all a little bit Aquaman.
‘You have to admit they’re both fit,’ Petra said, continuing to admire the men who were now in the water and taking ownership of two rather flimsy-looking craft. The sail was tall like a yacht and billowing with the force of the wind, but the hull of it was small. It barely looked able to contain a whole person, a bit like the chairs in Eleni’s cafeneon.
‘Becks! Are you listening to me?’
‘No,’ Becky answered. ‘I’m concentrating on looking at those boats that are bumping up and down on the waves like they’re made of paper.’ And not a nice, plush thick kind you might make a glossy leaflet out of. No, the really thin printer paper that usually got stuck in the roller.