His eyes widened. ‘No, no I said. The police director made the call. He thinks that more hands are needed on the ground.’

  She watched his face, so familiar, so needy. ‘Okay. Okay, I believe you. I need to get back to work.’

  ‘With Michail?’ Theo’s lips curled upwards.

  Katerina pushed past him briskly. ‘Yes. With Sergeant Mikras.’

  The morning was disappointingly unproductive. They were given a small, windowless room from which to work. Katerina, who was used to writing minor incident reports, usually connected to petty theft and traffic offences, experienced a terrifying realisation of the responsibility she held. She had tried to broach the topic of Theo’s arrival, but Michail had simply said, ‘The police director reserves the right to use human resources as he wishes.’

  Her fingers poised over the keyboard, she looked sideways at Michail, like an errant student who had not revised for an exam. Instead of researching the Hellenakratia articles, he was scrolling through a website about Greek mythology. Before she could speak, he said, without looking away from his screen, ‘Yes, Katerina, I am aware of my insubordination. Please investigate Marius Zamfir; this will not take long.’

  Smirking, she typed the name into her server. She could not remember a time when Michail had broken rules, not even unimportant ones. Predictably, the screen flooded with search results from various publications. Frustratingly, Sofia had instructed her not to contact the Hellenakratia’s editor-in-chief, Christos Panagos. ‘A delicate dance,’ she had said. ‘Don’t contact him without consulting me.’ However, feeling like she was hitting a wall and knowing how busy Sofia was, Katerina had already left three messages on the newspaper’s answerphone.

  Other than that, Marius Zamfir’s name brought up no previous criminal record, nor useful information. Unfortunately, it seemed it was a relatively popular Romanian name. After hours of reading about an esteemed cancer doctor in Sibiu, a lawyer in Cluj-Napoca and a teacher who been awarded a prize for exceptional mathematics lessons in Bucharest, none of whom looked anything remotely like the victim, she banged the keyboard with her fists. ‘We need to speak to that newspaper, Michail, this is useless!’

  Michail nodded, looking at a map on his screen. ‘I agree. You are wasting your time.’

  Katerina blew through her teeth. ‘You think I don’t know that?’

  Michail held his index finger up to her face, marking something down in his notebook. ‘Interesting,’ he said. ‘Very interesting.’

  ‘What are you doing?’ Katerina rolled her chair across to get a better look at his screen.

  ‘Nothing… yet,’ Michail replied, turning to face her. ‘But it is obvious you must visit the newspaper offices. They are not returning your calls.’

  ‘But Sofia said…’

  ‘Ignore her.’ Michail said the words in a strained manner, as if his tongue was stuck. He crossed his arms and looked her directly in the eye. ‘In an unprecedented turn of both my professional and personal ethics, I am suggesting that Ms Sampson, our superior, is lacking in judgement.’

  Katerina raised her eyebrows. ‘Sergeant Mikras!’

  ‘You must not do the dance delicately, as she suggested. We are the Special Violent Crime Squad of the Hellenic Police Department. There is no time for dancing. My suggestion is to go straight to the newspaper and demand to see the editor as a police matter of mortal importance.’

  ‘Right! Wait, what are you going to do?’

  Michail looked back at his screen. ‘I have important research to complete.’

  Katerina swung around. ‘What do you mean?’ Michail furrowed his brow and leaned closer towards his keyboard, typing in short bursts. ‘Michail?’

  ‘Yes, I heard you,’ he said, evasively.

  She jumped up from her chair to stand behind him. His spine straightened and she caught the last imprint of a tab before he closed it. Something to do with textile mills. ‘Michail, we’re supposed to be partners and I’m getting nowhere.’ Michail sat in silence, clearly considering his options. ‘Michail, will you just tell me!’

  ‘All right. Just checking something through…’ He clicked the mouse and the printer whirred into action. ‘Here, you will see all possible myths relating to the goddess Athena.’

  Katerina retrieved the document from the printer tray and sat beside him. Indeed, Michail had collated and summarised a comprehensive list of the goddess’s myths, together with detailed comments along the side of the page. She vaguely knew most of them. There was the birth of Athena, of course, then the battle for the patronage of Athens against Poseidon, the Arachne myth, a blinding of a man named Tiresias, and a long list of appearances in the Homeric epic. She took a breath. ‘So…’

  ‘Yes, precisely.’

  Katerina looked back at the document again. She bit her lip, scanning the notes he had made, wishing she could think of something relevant to say. She agreed they should be looking into all possible avenues. She was surprised Sofia was opposed to the idea.

  ‘To me, it makes sense.’ Michail loaded the mythology site back onto his screen. ‘The trick is making an educated guess about which one. If I can cross-reference these myths with the social media posts, then it is possible we might predict when and where the next murder will take place.’

  ‘Is that not a bit… presumptuous?’ Katerina asked, disappointed. She had hoped he had found something concrete. He ignored her, scrolling down his screen. She felt herself grow impatient. ‘Fine, I’ll go to the offices alone.’

  Without thinking, she reached to touch Michail’s shoulder. Michail leapt up, lurching away from her, knocking the keyboard to the floor with an uncomfortable, prolonged crash. They both stood, staring at the keyboard, entangled in a mess of wires and leads. The office suddenly felt very small. The soft hum of the air-conditioning unit pondered upon the moment, filling the space between them with stale air. She bent down and picked her way through the mess, placing the keyboard back on his desk. Michail nodded, the tension around his eyes softening.

  ‘Right then,’ Katerina said, aware she was growing warm. ‘See you for lunch? Your spanakopita is in the fridge.’

  This seemed to cause Michail even more consternation. He rocked gently from leg to leg, flexing his hands into fists and then releasing them. Eventually, he settled, and arranged his face into an expression that Katerina could only recognise as something between extreme stress and gratitude. ‘Thank you, Katerina. Good luck at the newspaper. And remember, no dancing.’

  Katerina nodded, smiling. ‘Right.’

  The Hellenakratia office was to be found behind a ramshackle of cars and bins on the long central street of Charilaou Trikoupi. Katerina stood on the opposite side of the road, checking she had got the address right. The building was a peeling mess of 1970s architecture and the glass on the narrow entrance door was smashed, held together by what looked like masking tape. Katerina found it hard to believe that the brash publication was made here, and it was even less conceivable that Christos Panagos, who seemed to manicure his public image so masterfully, worked from such a building. She rolled her eyes: the press at its best – never presenting anything as it was. Slippery. She was glad she never had to see another one of these newspapers again. Theo had read the Hellenakratia voraciously, idolising Christos as some sort of modern saviour.

  Taking a deep breath, Katerina marched across the street. The bins stank in the afternoon heat, rotten and thick. She wrinkled her nose and pressed on the buzzer.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Hello, Katerina Galanis, Special Violent Crime Squad.’ She flashed her badge at a video camera. ‘I’ve left a few messages for Christos Panagos. I’m looking for information on an article you ran today.’ She was pleased at the confidence of her voice; she sounded commanding. The intercom crackled and the door eventually buzzed open.

  Katerina entered a tired corridor, decorated with cracked beige tiles. ‘Up here!’ a woman’s voice sounded from above. The staircase was narrow and lined with a wobbly, iron handrail. Katerina ascended two steps at a time. She smiled when she saw the owner of the voice: a woman probably in her mid-forties with brassy hair, tied up in a knot at the centre of her head. The lobby followed a similar colour scheme of yellows and beige and the woman’s desk was a fold-out table, with a laptop and some pamphlets arranged on the top. She flashed her badge again. ‘Special Violent Crime Squad, is Christos here?’

  The woman looked Katerina up and down. Katerina stood very still, wondering what sort of assessment was being made. ‘Like I said–’ she began.

  ‘You’re with the police?’ the woman interrupted, raising a thin eyebrow. Katerina nodded, waggling her badge before putting it away. ‘You work for Sofia?’

  Interesting, Sofia was known even to the receptionist. ‘Yes, Sofia Sampson is running the investigation.’ Katerina hoped the name would carry some weight.

  The woman took her time lighting a cigarette, leaving Katerina standing in the middle of the room. Eventually, she puffed out a cloud of smoke and gestured for Katerina to take one of the plastic chairs arranged along the side. ‘You can wait here.’ Katerina nodded and took a seat, covering her mouth with the back of her hand. She watched the woman write a text message, cigarette hanging from her mouth. In a few moments, the woman’s phone buzzed with a reply. ‘Go through, then,’ she said, pointing to a flimsy door with a frosted plastic panel.

  ‘Thanks.’ Katerina smiled, glad to be leaving the haze.

  To her surprise, the door led down a long, windowless corridor. When she reached the end, she was met with two doors on either side of the stone walls. Neither was labelled. ‘In here,’ a voice rang out. Opening the right door, Katerina was met with Christos himself, in a deep-blue suit, sitting on a red beanbag, a laptop on the worn carpet before him. His long legs were bent at an almost ridiculous angle, causing his trousers to ride up, exposing fuchsia socks. He peered up at her through a fringe of thick dark curls. ‘Police?’ he purred, through a delicate smirk. He leant back on the beanbag, folding his arms. ‘Won’t you take a seat?’

  His demeanour was enticing, Katerina allowed herself that. She immediately saw how this man – not much older than her – had managed to slither his way through the upper echelons of Athenian society. His smirk made one feel that he was peering into your heart, massaging your darkest secrets with soft hands, embracing them. Katerina folded her arms and scanned the small room. Again, no windows. She fought the urge to check over her shoulder, thinking of the narrow stone corridor outside. ‘I’m good standing.’ She held her hand out, stiffening her chin. ‘Officer Galanis, Special Violent Crime Squad.’ She eyed his mobile phone, which lay beside his laptop. ‘I’ve left you a number of messages.’

  Christos shrugged; his shoulders languid beneath his jacket. Katerina narrowed her eyes at him. ‘Apologies,’ he said. ‘Busy morning, as you might imagine. A lot of… excitement in the air. But I am glad you took the initiative to visit.’

  So, he had been playing hard to get. Katerina observed the dingy, stark office space. ‘Glad I came.’

  ‘You were expecting luxury, Miss… ah, Miss Galanis?’ He straightened out his legs, placing one over the other.

  She shrugged. ‘I don’t know. Seems a bit… bare.’

  He let out a soft laugh, tilting his head ever so slightly backwards, so that Katerina watched his smooth neck convulse with the sound. ‘Ideas are my business, Miss Galanis. I do not require physical distractions. I work for the people, their interests. I assure you my mind,’ he tapped his temple, ‘is an abundance of riches.’

  ‘I see.’ Katerina realised she was holding herself awkwardly. She released her arms to her sides, willing herself to seem relaxed. ‘You named a victim of ours as a Marius Zamfir and suggested that you have information regarding his identification.’

  He cocked an eyebrow at her. ‘Yes.’

  He was going to make her say it. Katerina pursed her lips. ‘I need that information: who he is, where he lived.’ She shifted from foot to foot, her throat was growing dry. She added, in a less commanding voice than she had hoped, ‘You are legally required to give us anything you have.’

  Without making an effort to reply, Christos pushed himself up from the beanbag and stepped towards her. He was tall and she was forced to look up at him, as if in worship. She took a step back, wishing she had forced Michail to come with her. ‘Do you have it? A file?’

  Christos nodded slowly, his smile simmering hot and ready. ‘Sofia draws a blank, then?’

  Katerina frowned. ‘You know Sofia?’

  ‘I know everyone.’

  Katerina shook her head. ‘Will you give me the information or not? We are in the middle of a murder enquiry.’

  ‘Murder?’ He raised a finger to his chin in mock confusion. Katerina was beginning to grow irritated.

  ‘Yes, murder, as you are aware.’ She took another step towards the door. Perhaps this had been a mistake. Christos Panagos seemed only interested in wasting her time. He chuckled, this time low and deep. The vibrations caused her belly to tighten.

  ‘There are some who would say that it is not murder at all, but divine intervention. There are some who say our city’s goddess awakes.’

  ‘You are right, there are some crazy people out there,’ she replied flatly. She turned her back on him, ready to leave. Sofia had been right: a waste of time and now he knew that the team were on the back foot. How stupid of her. And Michail. She began to walk towards the lobby as quickly as possible, happy to be leaving this strange office building.

  ‘Lena will give you the file,’ Christos called after her.

  ‘What?’ Katerina almost hissed the word, turning on her heels. Christos was framed between the narrow walls, legs spread widely, his face beaming.

  ‘Lena, the receptionist. She will give you the information you require. Arrived yesterday on my desk. No idea who from, like magic.’ He bowed his head and Katerina hurried down the corridor. ‘Send Sofia my regards. She will be pleased to hear from me, I am sure.’

  Katerina rested her head against her mother’s front door and wondered how long she could stand there, head hung limply, pressure growing pleasingly on the front of her skull, before being classified as clinically mad. She twitched her lips, encouraging her face to move into a pert smile. There was a theory about smiling and the positive effect it had on the human brain. Something to do with the muscle memory tricking the frontal cortex into thinking it was happy. It was not something she had ever had to consider before. She was just tired, that was all. All things considered, she was coping quite well. There were good things in the world, in her world, upon which to focus. She liked the song the neighbours played, even though her mother would be complaining about the noise as the synthetic beat dropped in bulbous waves through the floor. It imitated Katerina’s pulse, which had grown loud in her ears. She listened to her insides for a bit. Pictured the blood, encased by fibres, pumping through her veins. Always pushing, always in a hurry, working so relentlessly in constant flow.

  She pulled her head from the door.

  It was still there. Flat 2 written in gold. The white panelled door could have done with a lick of paint since before her father passed. There was laughter from within the apartment; her mother on the telephone. She would be pleased to see her youngest daughter at a sensible hour. Tomatoes were baking, the unmistakable sweet and acidic aroma wafted under the door. Her mother would be prodding them with the spatula, careful not to break their skin, minding not to burn them. She would be pleased to nourish Katerina, to wash her clothes, to encourage her to bathe after the long, hot day. There was everything to be grateful for.

  Katerina’s phone buzzed: Sofia, scheduling a meeting for first thing tomorrow. No doubt to discuss what the history was between herself and Theo, as well as to tell her off for going to the Hellenakratia offices. There was also a note about how Sofia’s London contacts had uncovered some extra information about Laurence-Sinclair. Sofia had sent through a menagerie of documents. Obviously, I’ve read them, Sofia wrote, but a second pair of eyes would be useful. Michail has them too – use Google Translate if required.

  Katerina pushed the key into the lock. The door was well over a hundred years old, same as the building. The key was the old-fashioned kind so the mechanisms of the lock stuck and crunched as it turned.

  ‘Katerina!’ her mother called from the kitchen. Like most of the apartments in the area, her mother’s was a cavernous, spacious surprise. The entrance hall housed a tall mahogany display cabinet, full of blue and white ceramics. The hallway was abundant with paintings: her mother was not a picky woman. Biblical scenes, cheap oil replicas, photographs of sculptures, friends, prints of unknown artists interested in the modulations of the human form lined the walls.

  ‘In here!’ shouted her mother again. ‘I am doing the supper, come sit!’

  Katerina noticed the living-room lights were off. Lola and Kalle were not here tonight. Perhaps they would be joining later. Or perhaps they were on late shifts.

  ‘Katerina!’ her mother’s voice cracked towards the end of her name. ‘By God! I forgot the herbs!’ Katerina listened to her mother skate across the kitchen in – no doubt – her open-toed rubber slippers. ‘It will be no good without the herbs!’

  The kitchen was full of the daily mess. Her mother was incapable of cooking and clearing away at the same time. Her father had tried to improve the catastrophe of pots, pans and jars that routed the kitchen nightly but her mother had always said, ‘A mess in the workspace is a delight in the mouth. I am not a boring cook, my darling.’ She said the latter whilst pointing at him, moving her finger in a circular motion, her grin as wide as their love.

  At the large kitchen island, set in the centre of the room, sat Theo. Katerina stopped in the doorway, one hand steadying herself. He looked at her, his dark eyes soft, his hands clasped firmly on the counter. He wore a tight black T-shirt so that his arms bulged indulgently through the stretched material. His police gun remained attached to his hip.