Friday, September 5, 2014

BLOWN COVER

*****
*****
Sinon Spinning Lies About The Trojan Horse

It was Thursday, the day before New Year’s Eve and Lucky’s mother was standing on a chair, while Leda pinned up the hem of the cocktail dress she was going to wear at the British embassy party. She and Lucky’s father would be the guests of the Digby’s.

Lucky, meanwhile, planned to spend the evening at Keith’s house with a few friends from school. He figured he and Keith would spend half the night telling about their adventures in Metaxa Square, a conversation he’d rather not have just now. Every time he thought about it, his stomach churned like a washing machine. However, Mr. Jacobs – the new CIA medic and semi-official youth counselor – said that the more he told the tale, the less effect it would have.

“Think of it as creating an emotional callus,” he said. “The more you talk about it, the less it will bother you.” He gave Lucky a playful thump on the shoulder with a half-balled up fist. “Not that it’s bothering you that much, right?” he added. “You’re a real soldier. I could tell the moment we met.”

Lucky had the sudden urge to flatten the man’s nose with one of his grandfather’s patented punches. He immediately felt ashamed of himself. The guy was just saying Lucky needed to be tough – what was wrong with that? Nothing, right? Tough was good. Scared was bad.

Lucky’s father entered. Normally he’d be getting “tuned up,” as he put it, for the New Year’s celebration. But he was on standby and could drink nothing stronger than coffee.

“Just got the call,” he told Helen, who was being helped off the chair by Leda. “Joe dumped that new bike of his.” Helen started to get alarmed, but his father raised a hand. “He’s fine. In the hospital, but fine. Nothing but bruises and badly wounded pride.”

Joe had bought himself a motorcycle. Not a motor bike, like Yorgo’s, but a powerful British Triumph – the Tiger 110 - that Joe had shipped from England. He told everyone who’d listen that it was the fastest Triumph to date and that it was similar to the bike that Marlon Brando straddled in the “The Wild Ones.”

“Thank God for that,” Lucky’s mother said. “Not to sound callous, but does that mean he’s going to work, or do you have to take his shift.”

Lucky’s father shook his head. “No such luck,” he said. “They want to keep him under observation for the weekend.” He checked his watch. “There’s a cab on the way to pick me up.”

Helen sighed resignedly – but with good nature. “That’s life at the Pickle Factory,” she said.

The cab came about 6 p.m. Lucky’s father kissed Helen goodbye and waved to Lucky as he hopped in and the car sped away. The usual procedure was that his dad would take the cab to the U.S. embassy, which was his cover job. There, a special pool car would ferry him to the base. It wasn’t a fool-proof system, but it had the value of being simple and not drawing attention to itself. Embassy people were routinely whisked here and there on assignments.

Recently, however, some people had been getting paranoid about the transportation setup. That had been Joe’s stated reason for getting the Triumph – so he could drive himself to work.

After his father departed the evening progressed normally. Lucky and his mother and Charlie had dinner. After Charlie went to sleep, they listened to the radio for awhile – “Suspense Theater” had been imported from the States. Then they went to bed. Lucky was reading “Andersonville,” MacKinlay Kantor’s fabulous Civil War novel about the infamous Confederate POW camp. The U.S. embassy maintained a revolving library of new works for its personnel and their dependents.

It was a gripping tale, but the hour grew late and Lucky fell asleep with book the across his chest. Hours later a door slammed violently shut and he came suddenly awake, alert and his nerves thrilling. He looked around – the bedside light was still on. Were they under attack again? He listened closely – no rattling on the roof, or running feet on the veranda.

Then he heard voices – his mother’s, urgent and frightened. His father’s voice – a rumble, but very weak. His first thought was that his father was drunk and abusing his mother again. He jumped out of bed, ready to race out and defend her. Then he remembered that his father was supposed to be at the base. What had happened? He heard the phone ring and then his mother answering it. She mumbled something, then very clearly he heard her say, “Hurry!”

Lucky shrugged on his robe and went to see what was happening. He found his parents in the living room and it was a bizarre sight.

His father was sitting in a straight-backed chair, his sports coat flung open, his white dress shirt peeled back to reveal a bloody T-shirt. Lucky stared at the darkest spot, which was a long gash across his stomach that was bubbling blood. His mother had a pan of hot water, a bottle of alcohol and several towels. Everything was a smear of red.

Lucky’s father looked up. His face was gray and pinched with pain, but he forced a smile that was more of a grimace than anything. “Had an argument about the cab fare,” he said.

Lucky’s mother turned. “The bastard stabbed him,” she said. “I’ve called the medic.”

“Who stabbed you?” Lucky demanded.

His father waved a tired hand. “Just get me some brandy,” he said.

Lucky ran to fetch it. His father drank down a hefty shot and some of the color returned to his face. “Don’t ask any more questions,” he said. “They wouldn’t like it.”

Lucky knew that by “they” he meant the CIA investigators – Agency cops. Just by invoking them, he realized that his father expected the investigators to arrive along with the medic at any moment. And sure enough, fifteen minutes later, the medic and two large men in sports coats and open-necked shirts arrived. The medic treated his father on the spot – getting Helen to spread sheets across the couch. He cleaned the wound, shot the area full of Novocain and looped in several stitches.

“He was lousy with a knife,” he told Lucky’s dad. “Missed all the internal organs.”

“You’d better go find him,” his dad told the two large men. “I left him in a ditch. His cab’s outside.”

One of the men caught Lucky listening in. “Why don’t you find something to do, son,” he said.

Lucky made himself scarce. However, he stopped by the front window to look out. There was a taxi in front and for some reason its windshield wipers were going, flipping back and forth. Lucky slipped outside and went to the cab. The engine was still running. He switched it off, then found the wiper button and switched that off as well. He noticed that the back window was smashed in and there was glass and blood all over the seats.

A CIA cop loomed up behind him. “Good thinking,” he said. “Don’t want to wake up the whole neighborhood.”

Lucky returned to the house. He found his mother in the kitchen. Leda was up and Lucky’s mother was telling her to go sleep in Charlie’s room in case the noise disturbed him. But Leda was sleepy and frightened and it was hard for her to understand.

Lucky said in Greek, “There was a small accident at my father’s office. The doctor is with him now, so there is no need to worry. But we don’t want to upset the baby, you understand? He would worry about his father.”

This calmed her immediately. Work-related accidents were a normal part of Cypriot life. “I’ll see to Charlie,” she said, going to the refrigerator and getting out some milk in case he woke up.

When she was gone, Lucky asked his mother what had happened.

“Somehow they found out,” his mother said. He didn’t have to ask what she meant – obviously, his father’s cover had been blown.

“He never got to the embassy,” she went on. Her face was pale, but she was very much in control of herself. “The cab driver tried to kidnap him. They got out into the country and your father knew he had to do something fast, before other men came. There was a fight and your father was stabbed. But he got the knife away from the cab driver and chased him out of the cab. Then drove home.”

“And the cab driver?” Lucky asked, remembering that his father’d said he’d left him in a ditch.

“He might be dead,” she replied. “Your father wasn’t sure.”

Before she could say more, one of the CIA cops entered and said he needed to confer with Mrs. Cole in private. Lucky didn’t mind being left out, knowing there was little his mother could add.

The talking went on for an hour or more. Lucky went to bed. The next day his father – looking gray and a little woozy from pain pills – was driven to the base to meet with Mr. Sisco.

When he returned home he said they had thirty six hours to get out of Cyprus.


NEXT: GOODBYE TO JIM ON STOKAHLO HILL



*****

 LUCKY IN CYPRUS: IT'S A BOOK!



Here's where to get the paperback & Kindle editions worldwide: 


Here's what readers say about Lucky In Cyprus:
  • "Bravo, Allan! When I finished Lucky In Cyprus I wept." - Julie Mitchell, Hot Springs, Texas
  • "Lucky In Cyprus brought back many memories... A wonderful book. So many shadows blown away!" - Freddy & Maureen Smart, Episkopi,Cyprus. 
  • "... (Reading) Lucky In Cyprus has been a humbling, haunting, sobering and enlightening experience..." - J.A. Locke, Bookloons.com
*****
NEW: THE AUDIOBOOK VERSION OF

THE HATE PARALLAX

THE HATE PARALLAX: What if the Cold War never ended -- but continued for a thousand years? Best-selling authors Allan Cole (an American) and Nick Perumov (a Russian) spin a mesmerizing "what if?" tale set a thousand years in the future, as an American and a Russian super-soldier -- together with a beautiful American detective working for the United Worlds Police -- must combine forces to defeat a secret cabal ... and prevent a galactic disaster! This is the first - and only - collaboration between American and Russian novelists. Narrated by John Hough. Click the title links below for the trade paperback and kindle editions. (Also available at iTunes.)

*****
THE SPYMASTER'S DAUGHTER:

A new novel by Allan and his daughter, Susan


After laboring as a Doctors Without Borders physician in the teaming refugee camps and minefields of South Asia, Dr. Ann Donovan thought she'd seen Hell as close up as you can get. And as a fifth generation CIA brat, she thought she knew all there was to know about corruption and betrayal. But then her father - a legendary spymaster - shows up, with a ten-year-old boy in tow. A brother she never knew existed. Then in a few violent hours, her whole world is shattered, her father killed and she and her kid brother are one the run with hell hounds on their heels. They finally corner her in a clinic in Hawaii and then all the lies and treachery are revealed on one terrible, bloody storm ravaged night.



BASED ON THE CLASSIC STEN SERIES by Allan Cole & Chris Bunch: Fresh from their mission to pacify the Wolf Worlds, Sten and his Mantis Team encounter a mysterious ship that has been lost among the stars for thousands of years. At first, everyone aboard appears to be long dead. Then a strange Being beckons, pleading for help. More disturbing: the presence of AM2, a strategically vital fuel tightly controlled by their boss - The Eternal Emperor. They are ordered to retrieve the remaining AM2 "at all costs." But once Sten and his heavy worlder sidekick, Alex Kilgour, board the ship they must dare an out of control defense system that attacks without warning as they move through dark warrens filled with unimaginable horrors. When they reach their goal they find that in the midst of all that death are the "seeds" of a lost civilization. 
*****



Here's where you can buy it worldwide in both paperback and Kindle editions:

U.S. .............................................France
United Kingdom ...........................Spain
Canada ........................................ Italy
Germany ..................................... Japan
Brazil .......................................... India

TALES OF THE BLUE MEANIE
NOW AN AUDIOBOOK!

Venice Boardwalk Circa 1969
In the depths of the Sixties and The Days Of Rage, a young newsman, accompanied by his pregnant wife and orphaned teenage brother, creates a Paradise of sorts in a sprawling Venice Beach community of apartments, populated by students, artists, budding scientists and engineers lifeguards, poets, bikers with  a few junkies thrown in for good measure. The inhabitants come to call the place “Pepperland,” after the Beatles movie, “Yellow Submarine.” Threatening this paradise is  "The Blue Meanie,"  a crazy giant of a man so frightening that he eventually even scares himself. 

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