“What the fuck was that about?” Alex yelled at his kid brother as Cronos sped their car away from that poolhall in Argostoli.

“How the fuck should I know?” Oz yelled back.  “I didn’t know this was going to happen!  My job was to get you back in Greece to negotiate a truce because you’re the only one they would meet with.  They were supposed to release Zylena, and we were supposed to negotiate a truce!”

“Zylena!” Alex said, his heart heavy.  “How could Jabari and Maximus come out firing when they knew those bastards had our sister?  Their asses weren’t there to negotiate any truce.  Their asses were there to take Batebbi and all of the others out.”  Then Alex hit the side of the door panel and yelled, “motherfuckers,” so violently that Cronos glanced at him through the rearview mirror, to make sure he was going to be alright.

Then Alex had another thought, about another woman, and he pulled out his cellphone.

“And what was that shit about Papa muscling them out of the Games,” Alex asked Oz, “when Papa said they had muscled him out?  Batebbi told the truth about that too?”

He could tell Oz hated to admit it.  But he admitted it.  “Yes,” he said.

Alex shook his head.  How could he have not seen this?  How could he have allowed himself, and his good name, to get mixed up in this backward-ass bullshit?!

“But we were still there to negotiate a truce,” Oz said.  “And to get Zylena back.  We’ve got to get to the castle, and see if they will be willing to reason with us and return her unharmed. That’s our only option.  They have to know that father has the upper hand now, no matter how he got it. He is firmly in control now.  Their second-tier leaders are now dead too.  Thanks to you,” Oz added, which only angered Alex more.  “Father now is the sole leader of the Greek Mafia.  But if you’re asking me if I knew Jabari and Maximus were going to pull that shit, Alex, before we even had Zylena’s release, the answer is no.  You know I would not have approved anything that nuts.  I had no idea.”

Alex could kill somebody right now!  He was that upset.  But he called Kari instead.  She was in that house with that twisted, power-hungry motherfucker.  He had to make sure she was okay.

But Oz was frowning.  “What are you doing?” he asked him.

“Calling Karena,” he said.

Oz stared at his big brother as if he was staring at a stranger.  At a time like this he was worried about a lady?  Alexio?  The man with a lady for every day of the week?  For every mood he was in?  Was this man his big brother?

But Kari didn’t answer the call.  And it terrified Alex.  “Faster, Cronos,” he said to his driver.  “Get me back to the castle as fast as this bucket can get me there!”

And Cronos floored the gas, and flew right past the car in front: the car containing Alex’s uncles.

Kari had gotten out.  Just when she prayed, and needed that sink to do for her what it did for Alex, she felt around to the furthest underside of the sink, found a button, and pressed it hard.  The sink slid open to a passageway, and she ran through it.  As she was pulling the sink back closed, Elasaid men had kicked the door down.

Now she was running.  And if she doubted it before, she did not doubt it now: she was running for her life.

But it was tricky.  She had to scale down the side of a mountain.  But she did it.  She hurried down rock after rock after rock until she was near the bottom.  But when she saw at the bottom, a group of Elasaid’s men seemingly searching for her, she started running sideways, toward the plateau of woods that ran parallel to the sea.  But someone on the ground saw her, and began firing.

She darted into those woods and kept running.  She had one loaded gun.  She was not going to be able to outshoot an army of men.  She ran.

But just as she was nearing a clearing, and was about to take it, another group of men, this time two of them, were seen.  When she saw them, they saw her, and they attempted to get off a round.  But Kari dropped back and fired first, and fired repeatedly.  She hit them both.

But she knew the sound of the bullets had alerted that other group of men, the larger group, and she had to keep running!

She ran across the clearing, back into another thicket of woods, and kept on running.  What she loved about Alex was the level of confidence he had in her abilities.  He truly believed she could handle situations like this.  What she hated most about Alex was his confidence in her abilities.  She wasn’t at all sure if she could handle shit!  But she knew she had to.  Not just for her own sake.  Or even Alex’s.  But for Jordan’s sake.  Nobody was going to take care of him the way she did.  No matter how bleak it looked now, she was going home to her son.

But it only got bleaker.  As soon as Kari made her way out of those woods, and was hopeful that she had strayed far enough away from the larger group of men, she found herself face to face, not only with yet another group of men, but their pointed rifles too.  All sixteen of them.

She dropped her own weapon, and held up her hands.