Golden Chariot by Chris Karlsen

Author:Chris Karlsen [Karlsen, Chris]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: shop, humour, Seattle, eBook Publsiher, contemporary, reads, books, au, publish, download, shopping, electronic, britain, e-book, lit, story, best seller, publishing, usa, author, digital publisher, myspace, Smashwords, submit, writing, romance, Amazon, html, publication, award winning, digital, comedy, submissions, wwwbookstogonow.com, links, australia, mobi pocket, purchase, read, marketing, short story, reader, buy here, award, yahoo, fictionwise, free, authors, PDF, buy, reading, fantasies, publisher, Droid, romantic, submission, bebo, recommended read, sale, british, ebook, bestseller, Books to Go Now, stories, publications, uk, action, american, writers, phone apps, short stories, book, adventure
Publisher: Books to Go Now
Published: 2012-03-14T04:30:00+00:00

Chapter Forty-Two

Athens

The phone rang on Stevan’s desk. He answered on the second ring.

“Stevan...” It was Waterman.

“Aaron, how are you?”

“Never mind how I am. What the hell is going on?”

“Pardon?”

“You ordered the hit on that Turk, Ekrem Zeren. I’m not a moron. It took me awhile to figure out you were behind the murder. You lied when I asked you point blank. Why?”

“You didn’t need to know. It was a personal vendetta, like yours with the Dashiell woman.”

“I don’t appreciate being bull-shitted. Now Heather, Zeren’s girlfriend, is missing. Charlotte’s family is upset. They’re worried about her safety. Frank said Elizabeth has asked her ex-husband and son to use any influence they have to find out more from the Istanbul police.”

Stevan swiveled his chair around and poured a snifter of cognac from the decanter on an antique chiffonier.

“Do they have a contact with the Istanbul authorities?” He passed the snifter back and forth a few inches under his nose, enjoying the spicy bouquet.

“Of course not. How the fuck would they?”

“Sounds like a personal problem.”

“I don’t want problems with our plan, personal or otherwise. Give me a goddamn straight answer. Are you involved?”

Stevan stroked the picture of his daughter, Aphrodite, he kept on his desk. “This is news to me,” he said and sipped his cognac.

“Is there a chance your associate, the one you hired to kill Zeren is responsible?”

“I didn’t hire him to take her. Why would I be interested in the woman?”

“Look, none of this is part of our deal. We agreed to have Charlotte disappear and take the fall for the theft. Your contract murder nearly killed her in the process. I’ll let that stupidity go. The girlfriend is a different story. It means more cops poking around. The whole operation is taking an ugly turn. I don’t want anything to happen to Charlotte before the job is finished.”

“Calm down. Everything is going as planned. Zeren’s woman is not our concern,” Stevan said.

“I don’t like it. I’m warning you, anymore surprises and I’m out. The deal is off.” Aaron slammed the phone down hard.

Stevan set the snifter on the desk and removed the mother-of-pearl inlay box from his bottom drawer. He gave Aphrodite the Victorian jewel case for her sixteenth birthday. She kept her personal treasures in it, including her diary.

He lifted the lid and took out the photos of her and Ekrem. How happy she looked. How she loved him. I love him too much to live without him, she wrote in the last entry of her diary.

The hatred welled up again in Stevan. He remembered how he humbled himself in his humiliating phone call to Mustafa Zeren, Ekrem’s father, pleading with him on Aphrodite’s behalf. Stevan heard the conversation in his head as fresh as the day it occurred. Staring at her picture, he replayed Mustafa’s cold response.

“Ekrem cannot marry her. How would it look, the son of a Minister of Parliament marrying the bastard daughter of you and your whore?”

Ekrem’s termination of the relationship broke his Aphrodite’s heart.

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