A few moments later, his mother finally emerged from the library, face covered in tears, she made her way to find Gabriel, who sat quietly with a gift from his father still clutched in his hands.
“How are you, Gabriel?” his mother asked formally as she sauntered over to the bar to fix herself a drink. She threw her red hair off her shoulders and sniffled.
“Fine, Mom, how are you?” he asked, standing up. “Are you okay?” He had been glad that his father had stood up for him, but angry that everything always ended like this. Neither one of them was a prize, yet they behaved as though one was somehow better at the job than the other.
Turning toward her son, looking the spitting image of his father, she tried to smile. “I should be asking you that.” Taking a sip of her scotch, she exhaled audibly praying for the spirits to rush to her head.
“I’m fine.” Setting down his gift on the coffee table, he went to the Christmas tree and pulled the singular box from under it and walked it over to her.
“Merry Christmas,” he said, trying to muster a smile.
Emma looked down at the box with guilt. He was such a sweet, thoughtful boy. “Gabriel, you really shouldn’t have.” Putting down her glass, she took the box from his hands and set it on the bar counter. Carefully, she peeled the shiny gold paper from the box and opened it, pulling out Louis Vuitton luggage he had purchased for her a week ago on Fifth Avenue.
Gabriel stuttered. “I figured you might as well have something nice for your travels since you’re gone so much,” he said, hoping she might like it. She probably wouldn’t. She’d probably admonish him for purchasing something so extravagant.
But she didn’t protest. Looking at the luggage, she only began to cry. “It’s beautiful,” she said, sobbing into her hands.
“Mom, don’t cry,” Gabriel said, wrapping his arms around her. Kissing the side of her face, he tried to soothe her. This wasn’t the way that he wanted her to come home from her trip, and it wasn’t the way he wanted his father to have to leave. It was just that nothing ever happened the way it was supposed to in his family, not even the simplest of things.
“Ivan is right. I’m a horrible mother. And he’s never right about anything,” she said in her adorable English accent. “I tried, Gabriel. I really tried to get home, but something happened at the camp that needed my attention before I could leave and then the damned flights out were delayed.” She looked up at her son, already towering a foot in height over her. “I never meant for you to spend Christmas alone.”
Gabriel believed her. “It’s okay. Really, I’m fine. I spent it with Dad.”
Emma didn’t know which was worse, her son spending his Christmas alone or spending it with Ivan Medlov. Wiping her face, she regained her fleeting composure to face her son with some dignity. “You wouldn’t say that if you knew that I hadn’t had a chance to get you a gift. What kind of mother forgets to get her teenage son a gift on Christmas?”
Gabriel didn’t care about that either. “I have everything that I want. Just spending time with you is enough.” It wasn’t just a kind gesture on his part to ease his mother’s pain. He really never wanted for anything, except attention.
Emma scratched the back of her neck and gazed off in the distance. “Do you know why I do all of this?” Her red brows furrowed. “Do you know why I work with people who are less fortunate, superficially women, in their world countries?”
Gabriel answered honestly, hoping this would not turn into one of his mother’s long lectures about the world and its monsters. “To make the world better for other people.”
She reached up and took his face in her hands. “No, I want to make the world a better place for you, my son. Because one day, you’re going to have to go beyond the borders of this beautiful country and out into the world. And I want you to be safe in it. I want you to be proud to be a human being.”
Gabriel thought her ideals to be a bit lofty and unrealistic, but he would never tell her that. His father had already told him a million times that the world was a dangerous place and always would be. There wasn’t much that he believed from his father, but he believed him in that.
She looked Gabriel in his bright, innocent green eyes and smiled. “We have a responsibility to use our wealth to help those who need us. We have an opportunity to help those who normally would have no future. That’s why I go to third-world countries, because they need our help more than anyone else. And if the righteous don’t intervene, then the monsters will come in peddling their madness and pretending to offer relief, only because they want to turn their minds. That’s how the world gets so fucked up, Gabriel. People just want an opportunity, and they will turn to anyone who promises a better future, even if the people who offer it are evil.” She shrugged. “Who knows, the girl I help today might very well be your wife tomorrow.” Emma kept the rest of her hopes to herself. She didn’t tell him about the disappointment she had experienced at the hand of his father and uncle, the price she paid for loving someone who was below her in social stature. But her son was his father’s child. And more than likely marrying a Rockefeller wasn’t in his future.
Marriage was a subject that Gabriel did not ponder at all, especially coming from his family, but he appreciated his mother’s effort. “I’ll remember that,” he said, leading her over to the sofa. “You know, we have a good life here. It’s not so bad is it? I mean, we can at least celebrate it every once in a while.”
“Of course we can,” Emma said, knowing that all of this was much too heavy for such a young man. “I just know that one day, all of this will come to an end and real life will begin. I want you to be ready, Gabriel.” She wouldn’t even begin to tell him the atrocities that she had just witnessed in Senegal. It was the likes of which, many would never witness in their lives.
“Ready?” Gabriel smirked. “Life is what you make it.”
“That’s not true. Life can be a lot more than what you make of it. There are going to be people who hate you simply because of who you are and what you represent.” It was why she had been late getting home. Someone had tried very hard to see that she never got home again, but they had failed.
Gabriel wasn’t sure who he was or what he represented, but he would never admit it to his mother. It would break her heart.
“Hate me? Because I’m rich?” he said with a scoff. “I’m not rich. You are.”
“Your family name, whether you choose to use Hutton or Medlov, is always going to be the elephant in the room. People will try to destroy you because of it. They will hate you because of it. I just want you to remember that, to recognize that and when the time comes to fight against it. Breaking you will become some people’s main purpose in life, because if they can break you, then in a way, they can break what you stand for.”
Gabriel didn’t know if he’d ever be that important. “One day, the real world will come calling and I’ll be ready. I promise, but for now, can we leave the world behind and just focus on us?” He twisted up his lips and shrugged at her.
Emma took a deep breath. The life lesson was over. “I’d like that very much,” she said, leaning into his shoulder. “So what would you like to do for Christmas?” He could name anything at this point, and she’d give it to him, determined to make this up to her son if she could.
“Well, I’d like to take the car dad bought me out for a spin,” he said, dangling Porsche keys.
Emma rolled her eyes and shook her head. “That fucking man.”
***
Donetsk, Ukraine
Secret Neo-Nazi Compound
This was a new low for Gabriel, eating slop out of an aluminum dog bowl, but he put his pride aside and ate as much as he could to maintain his strength. Because eventually, he knew deep within himself that he was getting out of this place. His mother had promised that one day he’d leave the borders of the US, but he’d never imagined that he’d end up here.
Oh well.
The good thing was that the bastards had finally given him clo
thes after the last call from Kiev. Evidently, someone didn’t want him murdered…yet.
In the darkness of the small room, he watched a rat run from the corner to the door, then push its small body under the crack and disappear. At that moment, Gabriel envied that rat and hated himself at the same time. How low in life did one have to fall to envy vermin? He would have given anything to be back at Valeriya’s shitty hotel right now, wrapped in her naked embrace on a dank, smell carpet while he made love to her. Just a few weeks ago, he thought himself to be above the dilapidated hotel, but in comparison to this place, it was the Ritz Carlton.
The thought of Valeriya made him smile. His mother had been right about that too. It was like she was clairvoyant or something. When he got out of this place, he was going to marry her, a girl from a country nearly reduced to third-world status by its constant wars.
How ironic.
For now, he had to survive. He had to dig deep, find his center and stay there. He could not let these lowly fuckers break him. Because if they broke him, they broke what he stood for. And finally, he knew what that was.
It was a pity that it had taken a vacation at Club Hell to get there, but he was not going to die in a cell with only self-actualization to keep him company. Life was not going to end here, in a place where it was just starting.
Gabriel had learned to tell time by the rise and fall of the sun. It was around this time every day that Yuri Danko came by to visit him. He had a steady regimen of torture always ready, with a particular interest in gut punches and face spits. But every time that Yuri beat him, he thought of one thing and one thing only. Eventually, he was going to be unchained and given the opportunity to hit back. When the day happened, he was going to fuck the little man up.
On schedule, the heavy door swung open and a freshly shaven Yuri Dank walked into the cell. Today, he didn’t carry his whip or chain in his hand to drag across the floor before he hit him with it. Instead, he was accompanied by another man, the one they called Yegor.
Gabriel put down his food and looked up at them. “What’s the matter, Yuri?” Gabriel asked, voice cracking from being deprived of water. “You don’t look like your normally charming self.”
Yuri eyes narrowed. “It seems your uncle wants you back,” he said, taking a seat in the chair that was chained to the other wall.
Gabriel didn’t blink. “I told you that eventually he would.”
“He killed 100 men and women today, destroyed two of our training sites,” Yuri seethed. He clenched his jaw. “And I’d love to send you back to him in boxes, but my superiors think that we should make an offer for you.”
He pulled a letter out of his pocket and turned it around where Gabriel could see it. It was a fax of the letter left at both of the sites that had been bombed by Marat’s team. It simply read, “We Want Gabriel Medlov Back Alive and Unharmed.”
Gabriel shrugged like the answer was simple. “This is where you get to negotiate, Yuri.”
“I don’t negotiate with Russians.”
Gabriel laughed. “My uncle is a lot more than that.” He sat up against the concrete wall realizing that while he was the one in shackles, Yuri was the one who was trapped. “He’s not going to stop, and eventually if you don’t answer, he’ll start to go after your families.” Glancing over at Yegor, he saw fear wash over his face. “He’ll buy out your government if he has to. He’ll buy out the Russians. Eventually, he will find a way to buy out your superiors, but eventually, he’ll get me.”
Yuri snarled at Gabriel’s answer, angry that after all the man had been through, he still had some arrogance left. “And what if by the time that we give you over, there is nothing left of you. What if I carve the skin right off your body and make a bloody lamp with it? Then what will your overcompensating uncle do?”
Gabriel couldn’t lie and say that the thought had not crossed his mind, but he’d deal with that when the time came. “Then he will do the same to everyone you love. If everyone you love is dead, he’ll find the people that you work with and kill the ones that they love. And it will never end. Ever.” Gabriel wanted them to fear his uncle.
He wanted to get so far into their heads that they didn’t sleep at night. “Do yourself a favor, Yuri. Call him and make a deal before it gets any worse.”
Yegor kept quiet while the men had their exchange, but he knew that Gabriel was right. Not even the Russians had gotten close enough so far to blow up their camps. If this Dmitry Medlov was as powerful as everyone said, then it was time to give Gabriel Medlov back. The key was to get Yuri to see when he had lost.
“I was told to keep my hands off of you,” Yuri said, standing up, preparing to blow off a little steam in his own special way. “The powers that be in Kiev want you healthy and ready to be exchanged as soon as possible.”
“Exchanged for what?” Gabriel asked.
“Valeriya Nenya,” Yuri answered as he pulled a rope from his pocket and wrapped it slowly around his fist. He walked across the room toward Gabriel. God, he almost got an erection from the idea of beating the rich prick. “But I am going to disobey that direct order just one more time.” The glint in his eyes said that this might be the worst beating that he ever gave Gabriel.
Shackled to the wall by the bed, Gabriel knew there was nowhere to run, so he didn’t even try to fight. All he had left was his pride, and Yuri knew it. “Make it count, motherfucker,” he said, spitting on Yuri when he got within distance. “I know that I will.”
Chapter Seven
Ceasefire…
Prague, Czech Republic
The Medlov Compound
The sound of feet moving fast down the limestone hallway echoed throughout the lower corridor of the Medlov house. Sprinting, Anatoly ran past the guards to his father’s office.
Bursting through the doors with his phone, he interrupted his father on a call. The urgent look on Anatoly’s face, flush red and tight, was alarming enough to stop Dmitry’s heart.
Was Gabriel dead?
“I’ll call you back,” Dmitry said, hanging up the phone without waiting for a reply. He swallowed hard, making his Adam’s apple bob. Bracing for the news, he waited as the words formed on Anatoly’s lips.
“We found him,” he said, breathing hard. “I have Marat on the line.” He raised the phone in his hand.
Pure adrenaline coursed through Dmitry’s veins at the good news.
Waving Anatoly in, he rose from his chair. “Marat, tell me what you have,” he said, tone suddenly upbeat.
Marat and his team were holed up back at a Russian camp on the border of Ukraine. In a tent while the rain beat down on them, he struggled to hear his boss on the satellite phone. “We’ve hit them hard. Twelve sites. The other three were questionable, so we only surveilled them. Gabriel is at a Right for Donetsk camp to the east of the city, about 30 miles away. I sent Anatoly the exact location.”
“How do you know?” Dmitry asked. He needed more. Staring at the phone in Anatoly’s hand, he felt his heart began to constrict.
“It’s the most fortified of the three remaining sites. And the security has tripled,” Marat answered, looking at the schematic in front of him on his cot.
“I imagine that they’ve tripled security everywhere,” Anatoly replied.
Marat disagreed. “No Boss. This site and this site only has tripled its security. It’s a fortress there. From the Intel that was gathered by the locals, it’s run by Yuri Danko. Second-in-charge is a Yegor Kachur. We had some background run on both of them. Yuri has no family left.
They were killed during a shelling in Donetsk two years ago. He has no children. No wife.
And from what we can find, no living relatives. But Yegor’s family is quite large. They own a bakery in town that is still open and he has a son and wife who live about 15 miles from here.”
His hands began to tremble. “I want them,” Dmitry said quickly. “Have one of your men find them and follow them. I’ll let you know when to pull the trigger. I’m sure bring
ing them back to the Russian camp won’t be an option. So, I’ll make arrangements for you to stay somewhere close to the camp.”
“Will do.” Marat took a deep breath. “The camp is large. I’m sending over photos of it now. We’ll need you to get any aerial shots and blueprints that you can manage to prepare for an extraction. It’s going to take a hell of a lot more than five men.”
Dmitry had a hell of a lot more than five men. “Vasily will get the schematics and blueprint for you. For now, just keep your eyes on the camp. Now that we know where he is, I am headed to Russia to speak with the colonel. We’ll have Allan speak with Davidovich. We will get that ceasefire. In the meantime, let me know if there are any changes at all.”
“Yes, Boss,” Marat said, wiping his tired eyes. Pulling 24 hour shifts was starting to wear on him.
Dmitry was proud of his man for following through. “You’ve done well, Marat. When this is over, I will reward you handsomely.”
Marat appreciated it, but just some time off would be nice. “Thank you, Boss.”
Hanging up the phone, Dmitry reached over and grabbed Anatoly by the back of the head. Putting his forehead on his son’s, he exhaled a deep breath of gratitude. “We’re close,” he said to Anatoly.
Anatoly smiled. “Now that we know where he is, we must move quickly, Papa.”
Dmitry could not agree more. “Prep the plane. Call the colonel.” He stood straight up and slipped his hands in his pockets. “And filled the suitcases with enough money to buy a country. I want to take this fight to those fucking bastards’ doorsteps.”
“Don’t we want to wire it?” Anatoly asked. In the past, physical dollars were never passed in a meeting. For this, they were talking about millions of dollars.
“No, I want the men to see the money in front of them. It will be harder to refuse that way.” He walked over to the window and looked out. The glint of sunlight bounced off his blonde hair. Taking a deep breath, he closed his eyes. “I want all of them to pay, Anatoly. I want them to never again want to hear the name Medlov.”
Gabriel's Regret: Book Two (The Medlov Men 3) Page 13
