Vincent Stavros
Vincent Stavros is a pillar of Collingwood's Greek community — restaurateur, philanthropist, the man who sponsors Orthodox Easter celebrations and remembers the names of every child at the community centre. Stavros & Sons has stood on Johnston Street for three generations, and Vincent runs it with the same careful attention his father and grandfather brought to the family business. He speaks slowly, choosing each word with deliberate precision, and when he shakes your hand, his grip is firm but gentle. Everyone knows Vincent. Everyone trusts Vincent.
The trust is earned, in its way. Vincent provides for his community with genuine warmth — interest-free loans to struggling families, jobs for new migrants, a word in the right ear when someone needs help with immigration paperwork. He touches the Orthodox cross at his throat when he speaks of his late father, and the emotion in his voice is real. When the community centre needed renovation, Vincent paid for it himself and refused to have his name on the plaque. He is beloved because he has made himself lovable, and the mask fits so perfectly that even Vincent sometimes forgets he's wearing it.
But the mask slipped when a crew of investigators refused his money. For just a heartbeat, something cold and calculating surfaced — then the car door closed and the charming benefactor was gone. Those who looked deeper found what he was hiding: a basement beneath Stavros & Sons full of terrified women, brought to Australia on false promises, held in debt bondage. The kitchen staff who never met your eyes. The "associates" who speak of Vincent with terror rather than respect. Whatever warmth Vincent shows the community, it doesn't extend to the people he considers his property.