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she was ready to enslave herself to you, and you, at the very last minute, released her. I was so certain then that at last someone had real power over you, that at last someone had broken you, Rashid. You wanted her for more than your sexual slave, or her inheritance. You didn’t want to throw her away like the other females in your life whom you enjoy ruining. I even laughed to myself to think it had been a woman, a woman who possessed so much of the lands and their archaeological sites that you believe to be rightfully yours.
    “How wrong could I be? Ever since we were children you have never ceased to surprise me. Nothing has changed; the surprises continue. You let her go. Youallowed her to leave you for Adam Corey. I don’t know how you could have done that. I could not. I believed you to have the coldest heart of any man alive until I saw your face at her wedding, when you walked her down the aisle on your arm and gave her away to Adam. I knew then. It was written all over your face, it burned in your eyes: You had never let her go. You possess that woman just as much as her husband does. You play the game of love with her; you are obsessed with each other.”
    The men stepped into the dilapidated summerhouse, an octagonal wooden affair of peeling, faded turquoise-colored paint and broken windows, topped off by an onion-domed roof of tarnished copper which had over the years been repaired with lead. They sat down in a pair of high-backed, wicker rocking chairs placed next to a round table covered in crisp white damask. It was laden with marvelous sweets from Turkey and Greece, Italy and Paris. In the center was an ornate silver samovar. An old Cretan peasant woman stood off to one side at a small table on which a gas flame glowed, ready for her to make fresh Turkish coffee. Nikos, Rashid’s companion on the flight, stood at another table ready to serve anything alcoholic they wanted.
    Rashid and Christos had been speaking in English. Now, Christos switched into Turkish, which the two attendants had no knowledge of. He picked up a
Fiora Paneforte Margherita
, the delicious Italian sweet from Siena that is rather like a half-inch-thick pancake mixed with candied orange, lemon, and melon rind, and solid with sugared almonds covered in a dusting of plain white flour. He broke off a piece and handed it to his cousin Rashid.
    “There was a time about a year ago,” Christos went on, “that the syndicate was beginning to worry about how deep your involvement went with the heiress Mirella. All those jewels you were buying her and they were picking up the tab for. But you came through, just before they were about to order you to deliver those corporate holdings wanted. You had little choice then, you were in too deep to us. And you did understand that we would have killed her, if we had to, to get what we wanted.
    “But this time is entirely different. We fronted for you, happily bought heavily for you, lied and cheated and used up a great many favors owed us to get you what you asked. We take care of our own, you know that. We felt we owed it to you because, when Mirella Wingfield sold you the corporate holdings we wanted, you made us one of the richest investment syndicates in the world and gave several of us the political power we desired.”
    “Not so very different, Christos. You may take care of your own, but always at a price. True, you and the others were not cut in for a piece of these property deals, but each of you did get a twelve-million-dollar golden handshake and front money.”
    “That’s true, but to be expected. After all, in our place you would have done the same. Favors for friends are good. They are even better when preceded by the thank-you gift. And now, here you are, delivering the last present. I thought Mirella meant more to you than a hundred-year-old vendetta. You will lose her over this latest betrayal of yours. She holds lands and sites in Turkey and here in Crete equivalent to the size of