Trueish Crime: A Kat Makris Greek Mafia Novel (33 page)

Kostas Makris was my father’s brother. My uncle in Germany. And inside my childhood—and adulthood—home there was a safe stashed full of cash and alternate identities, one of which was Italian. I dredged my memory for entry and exit stamps, clues about where Dad had been and when. But all I could recall were tales he had told me about long-distance truck trips he’d had to take for work. When I’d taken that brief, unwanted, jaunt back home, only the most recent date in one of the passports had stood out.

I needed to see the rest.

“I need to go home,” I said, clicking off my phone. “There’s some business I need to take care of. Then I’ll be back.”

I could have told her—maybe
should
have told her. But my uncle was her son. Loyalty passed to sons before granddaughters. When I delivered the news about the counterfeit money, it would be with proof in hand.

Assuming she didn’t already know.

Distrust bubbled in my midsection …

Grandma’s hands quit kneading. When her eyes met mine I realized that somewhere along the way they’d warmed from flint to chocolate chips. In half a month we’d come a long way together. Where would we be another month from now? A year? Would she still be here in this kitchen, baking her worries away?

“Takis will take you in the jet,” she said. “Stavros and Elias can go, too.”

I shook my head. “No henchmen. No bodyguards. I want to go on a regular airline. No private plane.”

“Katerina—“

“I’m doing this my way. It’s important to me that it be all above-board. But I’ll be back.”

She nodded. “Okay.”

I’d saved Grandma’s life, and now I was standing up to her. Things were slowly changing.

And now I was going home.

Home. Mom and Dad’s house.

Where there was a safe full of money, and passports with Dad’s face and other men’s names. Where there was a gun I hadn’t known he had.

“You did well while I was … away,” Grandma said. “I knew that strength was in you.”

“There was no choice. Sink or swim.”

“There is always choice.”

The phone came on again. I was fiddling, the way I did when my mind was chewing cud. “I thought that puzzle box would be a clue.”

“We both thought the same thing. We are optimists, you and I.”

“You?” The word blurted out.

She nodded, went back to the kneading. “Even after all I have seen in my life, I want to believe in good things. I wanted to believe Rabbit had an answer for us, a clue about Michail. He owed me big. But …” She shrugged.

Rabbit had let her down.

But if I could help it, I wouldn’t.

If there was a correlation between Dad and the counterfeiting I was going to find it. And there was one. I could feel it lounging in my gut, lazily waiting on me to make a connection.

The End

T
hank
you for reading
Trueish Crime
, the second of Kat Makris’ adventures! Want to be notified when my next book is released? Sign up for my mailing list:
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