The Minoan Cipher

CHAPTER SIX

Leonidas had been stoned out of his mind for three days when he got the call from Salazar. With no work on his plate, he’d moved into a fancy hotel suite and entertained himself with booze, marijuana and expensive prostitutes, like the young woman lying in the bed.

“There’s been a new development,” Salazar said. “The job that’s been on hold is active again.”

Doing his best not to slur his words, Leonidas said, “I thought the whole thing had been canceled.”

“The Spanish government issued a permit when they learned that an American scientist named Hawkins agreed to join the project. He will arrive in Cadiz in a few days.”

“No big deal. I’ll take care of it. Means a bigger body count, so I’ll have to charge you extra.”

Leonidas would never have joked with Salazar if he’d been straight, but the high potency weed had loosened his tongue. Salazar took the comment seriously.

“I don’t pay you by the body, Leonidas. Reimbursement will be as agreed upon. It will be deposited in your bank account when the job is finished to my satisfaction.”

Salazar clicked off without another word. Leonidas took a drag from his joint and spread his lips in a lazy smile. The call couldn’t have come at a better time. It had been months since his last job. A Russian mining magnate had run afoul of Salazar who’d instructed Leonidas to eliminate him.

The man had been well-guarded, however, Leonidas learned that surveillance was lax when the target wasn’t on his yacht. He approached the yacht from the water one night, climbed aboard to plant several explosive devices and triggered a time-delayed switch to activate when the yacht left port on a voyage to the Black Sea.

He’d returned to Spain at the behest of Salazar, who said he had another job for him— stopping a Greek and Spanish archaeological expedition. But when that assignment had been canceled, he stayed in Cadiz. He liked the Spanish women and had no place else to go.

“Carlos!”

The prostitute called from the bedroom, using the phony name he had given her. He went back into the room and saw that the young woman had risen from the bed while he was on the phone. Her name was Isabel and she was barely out of her teens. Her charming innocence was combined with a willingness to please, and he had hired her night after night.

She had a sheet wrapped around her slim body and was bending over a black leather case that lay open on the bed. Instead of being embarrassed at being caught going through his luggage, she shot him a languid smile, reached into the case and pulled out a white wig and a bushy white false mustache.

“What’s all this?” she said, widening her bright red lips in a drunken grin.

“You really shouldn’t have done that, hon.” He talked as if he were lecturing a naughty child.

She replied with a giggle, placed the white wig at a cock-eyed angle on her pretty head, and reached back into the case. This time she came out with what looked like a nose. She held it in the palm of her hand.

“Ugh,” she said. “Is this real?”

“It only looks real,” he said. “I’m an actor.”

Still looking a bit disgusted by her find, she gingerly dropped the prosthetic and the wig back into the case, then came over to Leonidas. She stood close, undid the tie on his white terrycloth robe and kissed his naked chest.

“That’s all right. The rest of you is very real.”

She reached playfully for his hair and pulled. The brown wig slid off in her hand and she let out a loud gasp. His face ended at the top of his forehead as cleanly as if it had been cut away with a scalpel. Above the line of flesh, the bone-white dome of his head was covered with scar tissue. He removed the wig from her hand and placed it back on his head.

“What happened to you?” she said.

“I was in a bad accident years ago,” he said.

The prostitute had said nothing when she’d seen the scar tissue on his body, but a sad look came into her eyes. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I was surprised. Many of my clients have injuries. It’s nothing.” She pecked him on the lips. “Now I have to go. You make me tired.”

She held her hand out for payment.

“Sure, hon. But first, you gotta give me a real goodbye.”

“That will cost you extra,” she said, giggling. Reaching up, she put her hands on each side of his head as if she were about to kiss him. He did the same, conscious that he could break her skinny neck with one violent twist. There would be a muffled snap, her eyes would roll back into her head and her body would go limp. Instead, ignoring the craving to kill, he let his fingers run through her long, dark hair as he stared at the beautiful face before him.

Tucking a wad of bills into her bosom, he gave her a light slap on the backside, and said, “Get your butt out of here, darlin.”

“You got my number?”

“Oh yeah, babe. I got your number.”

He proceeded to push her out of the room. Maybe it had been a mistake not killing her. The young woman had opened a small door to his secrets and, thus, should not be allowed to live. But Isabel was the only one he’d ever met who hadn’t been turned off by his disfigurement. Besides, he wanted to enjoy her services again. He’d have to be careful, though. The last thing he wanted was for her to make him feel human again. That would be bad for business.

He picked up the leather case and carried it to the bathroom. Standing in front of the mirror, he removed the wig and peeled off the olive skin. His face was a featureless mass of white scar tissue that looked as if it had melted and re-frozen in place. There were only nostrils where his nose should be. His ears were mere stubs. His lips non-existent. When he saw photos of his old self, it was like looking at a stranger. The hot-shot surfer dude, and later, the warrior in the Special Ops uniform, had been movie star handsome.

He had been an exceptional soldier, excelling at languages, marksmanship and martial arts. At that time, classes at the UCLA acting school and marriage to his honey-blonde girlfriend were still in his future. So was an improvised explosive device in Iraq. The IED that exploded under his Humvee had killed everyone else in his squad. Goggles had saved his sight, but the blast of flames had completely eradicated his facial features.

Later, while recuperating in a room at Walter Reed Hospital, he learned that the Hummer was one of the models that came with insufficient armor, one of many that had been thrown into the battle in the early days of the war. When his fiancée then came to visit him, he learned as well, after seeing the horrified expression on her face, that there were limits to love.

The Army discharged him with his face swathed in bandages, like the Invisible Man in the H.G. Wells story. His face was a patchwork surgery job that used skin from his body as an attempt to fill in the holes. With nothing else available to him, he went back to what the Army had trained him to do. Kill people.

He returned to Iraq as a mercenary. He only lasted a few months before being fired for drug abuse. Returning home, he was drawn to his old surfing beach. From a distance he watched the young surfers skimming the waves like sea gods. He projected himself into their handsome bodies and the germ of an idea began to form.

Returning to acting school, concentrating on the field of make-up and disguise, he’d learned the craft of fashioning facial features out of artificial skin. During his studies he came across the phrase, Man of a Thousand Faces, used to describe the film actor Lon Chaney, known as a master of make-up. He even adopted the actor’s real name, Leonidas Frank.

He circulated his resume, stressing his chameleon-like ability to get close to a target. A client hired him for an assassination. The target was a heavily-guarded competitor of Auroch. Easily disguising himself as a bodyguard, he’d carried out the assignment with ridiculous ease. After the kill, Salazar had met with him personally and Leonidas accepted a job as a security consultant for special assignments.

Leaving the memories behind, Leonidas snapped back to reality. It was time to get moving on the new job. A cold shower cleared away some of fog in his mind. Then he applied a fleshy fake nose and a weathered olive skin to his ruined face. He replaced the wig with one that had streaks of gray and gained years of wisdom in only a few seconds. He was employed again, thanks to Hawkins. Too bad he wouldn’t have the chance to thank the guy before he killed him.