James Grippando - Born to Run

“I’m giving you five days to get me the money. I want it wire-transferred to my account in Antigua. Here’s the account number,” he said, as he slid a business card across the tabletop.

Madera didn’t take it.

The Greek nudged it forward. Madera still didn’t reach for it. He didn’t even look at it.

The Greek met his stare. “You’re not going to pay, are you?”

Madera was silent.

The Greek looked past Madera, and he noticed a man standing near the directory in the center of the courtyard. He seemed to be watching them. Instinctively, the Greek’s gaze drifted up toward the second level. Another man at the railing seemed to have his eye on them as well. The Greek knew in an instant that these men weren’t Secret Service agents.

They were part of Madera’s other world.

His pulse quickened, and he suddenly realized that putting Sofia at risk and not getting paid for it were the least of his worries. He had to make a break, but even at the peak of his training, he wasn’t sure he could have outrun three, four, or maybe more of them. From behind he heard the whine of an electric engine, and with a quick glance over his shoulder he spotted a mall security guard. He was driving a flatbed golf cart that was rigged to transport the handicapped.

Yes!

The Greek threw the rest of his coffee into Madera’s face, leaped to his feet, and grabbed the security guard as he rode past their table. A woman screamed as the guard tumbled to the floor and the Greek jumped behind the steering wheel. He put the pedal to the metal and brought it to full speed immediately.

The man on the second floor raced down the escalator. Two other men came running from a bagel shop. The Greek knew they weren’t going to shoot him in front of all these people, but if they caught him, they’d soon stuff him in the trunk of a car, never to be heard from again. He was a dead man if he didn’t get out- now.

He pulled a quick U-turn and sped toward the exit. Shoppers jumped out of the way as he blew past one storefront after another. The security guard and Madera’s men gave chase, but the electric cart was fully juiced and fast enough to have been an emergency-response vehicle. The Greek laid on the horn and drove as if he didn’t care how many people he mowed down. He rode it all the way to the Pennsylvania Avenue exit, ditched it at the door, and headed for the street at a full sprint on fresh legs. A taxi was at the corner of Twelfth Street. He pushed an old woman aside and stole it from her.

“Hey,” said the driver, “that lady was first.”

The Greek slammed the door shut and threw his wallet onto the front seat beside the driver.

“Take as much as you want. Get me out of here. Fast!”

The tires squealed, and the cab launched like a rocket. Through the rear window, the Greek saw Madera’s men huffing and puffing, cursing one another at the curb.

He was smiling, feeling smug and even a little full of himself over the getaway. But then reality hit, and the smile ran from his lips. The bottom line was that he still owed the Russians five hundred thousand dollars. And if there was one thing worse than having the Russians out to kill you, he had just found it.

Now it was the Russians and the Italians.

The biscotti were selling like hotcakes. That was the noon report from Sofia’s nephew, the assistant manager at Angelo’s Bakery.

“Hot cakes should be so lucky to sell like my biscotti,” said Sofia.

It’s wasn’t bragging. Angelo’s was the go-to bakery in the neighborhood, but people drove miles out of their way for the biscotti, which had always been a point of personal pride for Sofia. The famous cannoli recipe was from her late husband’s family, a treat reminiscent of Old World Sicily with traditional thin crust and ricotta filling. The biscotti, however, were her own baby-her way of proving that a Sicilian baker could outdo the Tuscans on their own invention. Sofia came up with something completely new every week, from cranberry-orange-pistachio to vanilla-chocolate chunk. Her latest creation was a softer biscotti with tasty lemon frosting and a texture between a crispy cookie and crunchy biscotti. The secret ingredient was the leavening agent for a controlled release. Customers who hadn’t touched biscotti in years for fear of breaking a tooth were addicted.

“Any more of the amaretto cookies?”

It was one of Sofia’s regular customers, a tailor who had been making suits in the same shop across the street for thirty years. Sofia smiled from behind the counter.

“All gone, sorry.”

“Will you have more tomorrow?”

Sofia’s gaze had shifted back to the storefront window-and her attention shifted along with it.

“Sofia, will you make more tomorrow?”

She turned back to her customer, embarrassed. “What? Oh, sorry. Sure. I’ll hold you a dozen.”

“Grazie.”

“Prego.”

He left happy, and Sofia went to the window and pretended to watch him cross the street and disappear into his tailor shop. But her gaze wasn’t following him. She was focused on the midnight-blue Mercedes-Benz parked a few doors down on the other side of the street.

Sofia’s worries had started with Demetri’s return. Just the fact that he’d tracked her down and shown up at her bakery, completely out of the blue, had been unsettling enough. Asking her to commit blackmail was unconscionable. She’d refused. He remained determined to convince her, and that was when the confusion had begun. She’d served him cappuccino with hazelnut biscotti, and he’d turned on his charm. She allowed him to talk about the old times, the happy times-that brief period in her life when she had thought everything was possible with Demetri. Back then, it was unheard of for a nineteen-year-old girl to leave Villa Rosa and run off to Cyprus with a foreigner, but Demetri had literally and figuratively swept Sofia off her feet. He was strong, handsome, and filled with the confidence of youth. She’d believed him when he vowed never to make her cry, when he promised on his honor to take her back to Sicily someday and buy the biggest house in Villa Rosa. She had been a willing and passionate partner in his plan to conquer the world. But that was all so long ago. Two old lovers separated by decades and reminiscing about such nonsense had given Demetri an emotional opening, a reason to hope that she would come around to see things his way. It wasn’t that he had any real claim to her affection, and she had certainly never regretted her life with Angelo at the bakery. But even after all these years, the good side of Demetri was an undeniable piece of her lonely heart. She only wished that she had never known his bad side.

“You’re asking me to be a criminal,” she had told him. “Think of another way, and maybe I will try to help you.”

He had been sweet to her as long as possible, even shown her a tear-his heart breaking at Sofia’s mere insinuation that he would use her. The weird thing was, she had almost stepped into his web, almost believed in his sincerity. For a moment. Then his notorious temper flared, and it had frightened her to the core. He left in a huff, and Sofia had been worried ever since. She’d barely slept last night, but a busy morning at the bakery could cure just about anything. By mid-morning she had just about convinced herself that she was being foolish and paranoid. If Demetri was in as much trouble as he’d claimed to be in, surely he had no time to waste prevailing on his ex-wife for help. It seemed almost inevitable that she had seen the last of him and his way of life.

Then that dark Mercedes had cruised slowly past her bakery and parked across the street. It had been there for over twenty minutes. Something told her that the two men inside hadn’t come for the biscotti.