Ken Bruen - The Max

Angela thought, Bingo.

Angela asked Katina, “When does his shift start?”

The girl shrugged, said, “Night.”

Angela looked around the cell, which was getting hotter and less comfortable as the sun rose. She said, “How do you pass the time in here?” and then got strange looks from the girls and thought, Uh-oh.

Sure enough, by the time the scorching midday heat hit top level, the sun blasting through the bars, the other women, who hadn’t been wearing all that much to begin with, began unbuttoning their shirts, rolling up their sleeves, pulling off sweat-stained clothes. Angela watched one woman roll her tube top down to her waist and lie down on one of the cell’s two metal bunks. It was like a signal to the others – in minutes, all eight women had stripped down. The two girls who’d been in bikinis tossed their tops in a corner of the cell and sat down side by side in a patch of sunlight, one with her arm around the other’s waist. A very large Russian woman took off her blouse, revealing a skimpy bra through which Angela could make out a tattoo in the shape of an eagle across the woman’s breasts. Jaysus, this fookin’ Lesbos more than lived up to its name. Too bad Angela was straight or she wouldn’t’ve been in such a hurry to get out of this place.

Inga lit another cigarette, inhaled deeply, then passed it to Katina. The Russian woman came over, started stroking Katina’s arm, kissing her neck. She looked at Angela, and purred, “You like?”

Angela shrugged, moved to the water bucket, thinking, Whatever turns you on, lady. As Angela used a dirty towel to wipe off her face, she could see the women pairing off on the floor, the bunks, standing against the wall.

She found an empty corner and sat down, closed her eyes, but it didn’t stop her hearing the sounds around her. She bit down on her lower lip and focused on two things: the young guard and, especially, the money belt.

At midnight, the kid arrived and, Jaysus, the Swedes were right, he seemed like a child let loose in a candy shop. He had an overall deranged look about him, as if someone had hit him in the head with a baseball bat and he was wandering around, permanently dazed. But when it came to men sometimes Angela wasn’t exactly picky. Hell, she’d been engaged to Max Fisher, hadn’t she?

The important thing was that the kid was the only guard on duty at night and sure enough, he was wearing the money belt.

Angela knew she had to work fast. She was surprised no one from Georgios’ family had shown up yet, but it was only a matter of time. She figured she had till morning, tops.

When the kid came by all the women spoke at once, complaining, demanding to be released. But Angela caught his attention, pursing her lips and batting her eyelashes, doing her best Marilyn Monroe come-hither look. Okay, so maybe she was overdoing it, but it worked, didn’t it?

The kid came right over and Angela whispered, “So what does a girl have to do to get out of this place?”

The kid smiled. Jaysus, panted, “Come with me.” He opened and closed the cell door with a giant skeleton key.

They went into what you’d call the office. There was a desk, a chair, and not much else. The walls were corroded and a fan was spinning haltingly overhead.

“Get naked,” the kid said.

Usually it was a turn-on for Angela when the guy ordered her around, but not this time.

“I thought you’d want a little…” she looked at his crotch “… lip service.”

“You kill somebody,” the kid said. “If you steal, blowjob, okay, but you kill, you have to fuck.”

Angela had a feeling arguing this logic would be pointless. Besides, it wasn’t like she had a lot of bargaining power.

They went at it – or rather he went at it – for what seemed like three or four hours. He wasn’t the worst she’d ever had, but that was only thanks to Max Fisher. The kid was lost, in his own world; she could’ve died and he wouldn’t have noticed. At one point she had a flashback to Georgios and she had the temptation to reach up, grab the kid’s head, and snap his neck. Thank God she resisted. She was in enough trouble, and killing a fookin’ prison guard wouldn’t exactly improve her situation.

Finally it ended, and the kid, like every goddamn man Anglela had ever known, fell asleep. She took his money belt, got his keys and then on impulse, picked up one of his heavy boots from where he’d tossed it before climbing on top of her, walloped him upside the head with it, said, “We call that cold cocked.”

She had to move fast. Did she think of releasing the other women? Did she fuck. It was every bitch for their own selves.

She was exhausted, and as she headed toward the docks she thought about how she’d gotten here, to this low point in her life. A few years ago, things had been going so well for her. It seemed like just yesterday she was living in New York, working as an executive assistant, dating guys, living in a studio apartment in Gramercy Park. Yeah, she’d made a few bad decisions – a few spectacularly bad decisions – but did she really deserve this?

She boarded a ferry to Naples. As the boat pulled away, she yelled, “Greece, you can kiss my Irish arse goodbye!”

She remained in the back of the ferry staring half-dazed, watching until the lighthouse at the tip of Lesbos faded to nothing. Good fookin’ riddance.

She counted the money from the kid’s belt, was surprised to find nearly two thousand euro. It’d be enough for a new outfit and a plane ticket, so sayonara you bastards, she was getting the first flight out of this shitehole and back to the States.

Of course then she’d be nearly broke again. But she knew that Max, the little bollix, he’d have money stashed and if she was in that place of total desperation she could do whatever it took to get hold of it. Then, just maybe she could use the stake she got to set up something to sustain her till she could come up with a longer-term plan.

Right there and then, she’d have killed for some lip gloss and perfume. She could still smell the guard. She was tempted to jump into the sea and wash herself clean.

Say what you want about Greek ferries, they have one great feature – a bar.

She headed down there, ignored various suggestions from the motley crew and ordered a large Metaxa. The barman leered at her and she gave him a look that no doubt withered his coming hard-on.

He muttered, “Mallakismeni.”

Yeah, like she gave a shit.

Over in a corner, she saw a girl in her very early twenties, sobbing quietly. She looked pale – maybe English, maybe a fucking albino – and broken.

Angela thought, Welcome to my world, honey. Had one motherfooker, like, ever helped her out? Was there one cocksucker on the whole planet who hadn’t fooked her over in some way? Nope, not one lousy decent human on the planet. She thought, You paddle your own frigging canoe, no time like the present to learn that life sucks and if you were a single woman, guess who gets to do the sucking?

Still, there was a good heart in Angela once upon a time and it still flickered – dimly, but there.

She approached, asked, “Join you, girl?”

The girl looked up, looking relieved to see not only a woman, but an American. She began to weep profusely, said, “Oh, please do.”

The British accent reminded her of Sebastian, but Angela was still sympathetic. She drank off half her brandy and Christ, it burned, bitter and with a kick like a Santorini mule. Which was why she was drinking the shite.

She offered the remainder to the girl, who protested, “Isn’t it a little early?”

Such a Brit.

Angela said, “Darlin’, it’s been too late for you and me since we landed in this fooking country.”

For a moment the girl seemed startled at the profanity and then they both began to laugh, prompting the Greek men at the bar to throw the evil eye at them. Nothing scarier for a macho type than the sound of women’s laughter. They fear it’s directed at them and they’re mostly right.