“No, Evgeny, all this for all of us. We’re tired of you, Smirnov. We’re tired of you getting rich off of us and treating us like shit when you can’t do anything without us.”
“Who is us?”
“You think I’m the only one who knew about this…who is okay with this? The council wants you out.”
“The council? Fuck the council. You’re expendable, you’re fucking replaceable. Is that my fault…that you’ve never amounted to shit if you weren’t huddled together to try to complete a thought?”
Dmitry watched on quietly. It amazed him that even though his father was clearly outnumbered and about to be killed, he showed no fear and still exerted as much power as he did moments before.
Khalid gripped the gun. “When we first started out, this was about balancing the scales, giving our men something that the government would not. We are not terrorists. And I made you who you are. You didn’t have a brain in your head when we started this, just the ability to kill and the body to intimidate. Everything else was built on my knowledge.”
Smirnov shook his head. “You’re a funny man. Don’t you realize that without me, you would have been nothing? You owe everything to me, including your worthless life…you and all your offspring. I tell you what, you had better kill me, because if I get just a small chance, I’m going to slaughter your wheezily little shit of a son, I’m going to fuck your teenage daughter to death and I’m going to peel the skin off your wife. And you know what I’m going to make you watch, Khalid.” Smirnov did not bat an eye. His murderous rage was only vaguely reduced by his old age.
“That’s enough,” Dmitry said, disgusted by his father’s rant.
“You don’t get to tell me when enough is enough, you fucking gutter rat!” Smirnov shouted. “In fact, you don’t get to address me at all.”
Dmitry walked up to his father face-to-face and smiled. “Before you die, I’m going to make you beg for it.”
“You could cut me open and pull out my entrails, and you still couldn’t make me beg for it. You’re not man enough. You’re just a little boy with a big gun.” Smirnov growled. “I’m a fucking Vor. Don’t you ever forget that! If I don’t kill you, one of my soldiers will.”
“Let them try,” Dmitry growled back. “You have no idea what I’m capable of.”
“Do I look scared?” Smirnov asked.
“You should be,” Ivan said, walking into the small room. He locked eyes with his father and felt a since of utter satisfaction. “This place is secure, brat. Those pussy guards are all dead. The others are lined up out front for you to do what you want with.”
“Good,” Dmitry said, pushing his father towards the door. “Move, old man.” He knew that wounded Smirnov’s ego more than anything else.
Khalid and Ivan followed Dmitry and his father who walked at gunpoint into the main foyer where they found the scientists on their knees with their hands behind their backs.
Dmitry looked over at his team who stood proudly bearing the fruit of their hard work and hoping for their boss’s approval.
They had it.
“Which one of you is McKnight?” Dmitry asked. Near the far end of the line of scientists was a small framed man with dark curly hair and glasses. He had evidently been working when the attacked happened, because he was still in his white smock. He raised his shaky hand and looked up at Dmitry for mercy.
“Are you the only ones who can complete this NightStar project?” Dmitry asked in an eager voice.
“We are,” the man said, hoping that their knowledge would save their lives.
Dmitry stood quietly thinking then raised his gun and shot the man quickly. It hurt him to his core with every bullet, but he knew that it had to be done. This man was capable of the mass destruction an entire nation and would do it all for profit.
While Dmitry was no saint, he knew that this was now his responsibility. In quick chaos as the man was riddled with bullets, it made him wonder what was so different about him selling a few guns at a time to people who were going to use them to kill versus his father who going to do it all at once. It was then that he realized that he was a hypocrite.
Dmitry finally stopped shooting just a few bullets shy of emptying his clip and looked down at the gun in his trembling hand. His team looked on confused at their boss’s surge of emotion but did not speak.
Smirnov looked on pissed off. “Do you know how much money I have paid him?” he asked his son in disgust. “It’s all been wasted and for what?”
“If but for nothing more than to destroy you, then it’s worth it,” Dmitry answered in a lie.
“You used that thing like it was your first time. Who do you normally get to do your dirty work…him?” Smirnov asked, looking over at Ivan. He smiled at his son. “What do you think he’s going to do for you when the time comes?”
“Let me worry about that, you old fuck,” Ivan said, spitting on the cold floor.
Dmitry knew he had gone too far to turn back now. He had to see it all through. Looking over at Ivan, he clenched his wide jaw. “Do the rest of them, find the prototype, and burn the place down. Get rid of the bodies.”
Ivan saw Smirnov smirk at Dmitry’s orders as if to say I told you so. He turned his back to him. “What are you going to do with Smirnov?” Ivan asked. “You can’t take him back to the hotel. And you can’t do him without me.”
“He owns a chateau not far from here. There are only a few men there. It won’t be hard to take it over and use it to complete the job,” Khalid interrupted.
Dmitry knew that it could be a trap, but he had a gut feeling that he could trust Khalid. He was as in as far as he was.
“Fine. Let’s go there,” Dmitry said, pushing his father out the door.
“Wait,” Ivan said, looking over at Khalid. “Who is this guy?”
“Vladimir’s father,” Dmitry explained.
“Oh, shit,” Ivan chuckled. “Talk about being stabbed in the back.” He looked over at his father. “Tonight is not your night. Is it?”
“Everyone has their night. Yours will come soon enough, my boy. Mark my words,” Smirnov vowed.
“Promises, promises,” Ivan said, rolling his eyes. “Give me twenty minutes and this place will be a memory.”
Chapter Nine
Loading up into one of the trucks that were used to escort him to the factory only a few minutes before, Dmitry, Khalid and Smirnov pulled off into the dark, cold night headed for Smirnov’s hideaway out in the countryside.
It was a quiet drive for the men. Smirnov looked out of the window with Dmitry still pointing the gun at him from the other passenger seat. Khalid drove, while continuously looking out of his rearview mirror for any straggler bodyguards who may have had a superhero itch.
Dmitry couldn’t help but look at his father. He never thought in a million years that he would have his family reunion like this. But as things often went in his life, he was forced to suffer yet another disappointment.
The eerie quietness forced him to question his own motives. Whether he liked it or not, he was very similar to the man that he would not doubt, before the end of the night, murder. They both were unnaturally ambitious with cold blood that allowed them the ability to murder at will. They both had been cursed with a formidable build and the ability to sway others to do their deeds. Yet, Dmitry couldn’t force himself to ever believe that he would be capable of killing his own brother, that he would grow rich off the back of others or exploit young women.
No. He was much different from this man.
“If you’re having second thoughts about signing your own death warrant, now is the time to reconsider,” Smirnov finally said, taking his eyes off the window.
He looked over at his son with the same piercing blue eyes.
Dmitry swallowed hard and tried to show no emotion. He sat back in his seat and rested his head, still keeping his gun pointed towards his father.
“I’ve made my decision,” Dmitry finally said.
“Based upon
what?” Smirnov asked. “The word of a traitor?” He looked at the back of Khalid’s head.
“Based upon your own decision to have me murdered earlier by the tailor,” Dmitry replied pointedly.
“Oh…that.” Smirnov shifted in his seat a little. “Well, you can’t blame a man for trying to knock out the competition.”
“How was I competition?” Dmitry asked.
“You want to own the world, boy. I can see it in your face. Hiding behind those angelic features lies a greedy demon. If I had allowed you in, the moment that I let my guard down, you would have done exactly what you are doing now.”
Dmitry shook his head. “You don’t know me at all.”
“Don’t I?” Smirnov asked. “There is nothing that I can do to change how you feel about me.” He narrowed his eyes. “This is personal. It’s not about business for you, but for me…there is nothing personal about it.”
“You’re referring to my mother.”
“I am.”
“Why did you cast her away like that?”
“She was a whore. That is what you do with whores. You cast them away.”
“She was not a whore. She was a confused young woman who you took advantage of.”
“Aren’t all whores.” Smirnov laughed. “You have a lot to learn about women.”
“She was barely a woman. She was a child.”
“Depending on what part of the world you were raised in. In my mind, she was a woman.”
“What about us?”
“What about you? You and your brother were a mistake. It happens. She had the chance to get an abortion. I had her in my home. She was well kept…well decent enough. When you came, I warned her and then three years later, the same shit again. I had no choice but to put her out.”
“Do you have any more children?”
“Why would I tell you?”
“Khalid?” Dmitry asked.
“Not that I know of, but he has many secrets,” Khalid answered.
“That’s right,” Smirnov smiled. “Dead or alive, I have many secrets, and you couldn’t unravel all of them in a lifetime.” After taking another look at Dmitry’s gun, he rested his head back. “Even if you accomplish everything you have set out to, answer me this…what will you have gained.”
“I’ll be able to sleep at night knowing that the man who tortured my mother is dead.”
“I didn’t torture her. I didn’t kill her.”
“Who did?”
“How the hell am I supposed to know? Some john, I suppose. Your mother had options. She was a beautiful girl. She could have stopped selling her body. When you were born, she was barely seventeen. When you died, she was barely in her thirties. All that time in between and the only thing she could find to do was sell pussy, and you think that I’m the bad guy.”
“Don’t let him get into your head, Dmitry. He knows that he’s outnumbered. So now, he wants to try to outsmart you,” Khalid warned.
“Do me a favor. If you’re going to allow this suka to continue to talk to me, then just shoot me now and save me a little sanity, eh,” Smirnov said repulsed.
Dmitry felt himself drowning in his thoughts. “You had a chance to help her,” he argued.
“Who says that I didn’t? Your mother had a little drug problem to go along with her profession. Any money that I gave her went straight into her veins.”
“She wasn’t on heroin.”
“Really?” Smirnov frowned. “Funny, I don’t recall that being the case.” He winked at Dmitry. “Maybe you were better off without both of us. Did you ever think of that?”
“Maybe the world will be better off without the both of you. I have thought of that,” Dmitry answered.
Smirnov didn’t like that he couldn’t break Dmitry. He kept looking for a chink in his armor, but as far as he could see, the young boy didn’t have any. Pity for him. He never thought that he’d go out at the hand of his bitch boy and a bastard son.
“Life is ironic,” Smirnov said aloud.
“Tell me about it,” Dmitry said with a huff.
“So, what are your plans for me? I’m curious to know,” Smirnov said, changing the subject.
“What do you think I have planned for you?”
“A quick death. Maybe one to the back of the head,” Smirnov said, rubbing the back of his skull.
“My mother didn’t have a quick death. She choked on her own blood. Her face was smashed in to the point that she couldn’t see out of her own eyes. She died a painful death unable to see her sons even in her last moments.” Dmitry fought hard to keep the images of her out of his mind. He had to focus now.
“So you plan to beat me and then rape me?” Smirnov smacked his lips. “That’s a bit much.”
“I plan to rape a part of you that is far more important than your body,” Dmitry growled. “I’m going to take everything, and you’re going to give it to me, or you’re going to meet the other side of your other son. Ivan is known for his craftsmanship with a knife. I’ll have him carve you like a roasted duck if you don’t do everything that I say when I say it.”
“Money.” Smirnov smiled. “You are just like me.”
“Does that scare you?” Dmitry asked.
“No. It makes me proud, actually. If I had been taken over by Khalid, then I would be devastated, but in the Smirnov way, you are simply taking over the change of the guard. I’ll give you what you want, because in your own way and as much as it kills you, you’re giving me what I want.”
“And what is that?”
“A legacy.” Smirnov laughed. “Word will get around that my son has taken over. You look just like me; you think like me. It will only make me more notorious.”
“And what makes you think that word will get around?” Dmitry asked.
“Look in the mirror. You can’t hide it.”
The thought infuriated Dmitry. Rolling his eyes, he looked out the window as they pulled towards the gate of a large chateau lit up in the distance.
“You make a noise, and I’ll shoot you in the neck,” Dmitry said to Smirnov. “It’s one of the most painful ways to go.”
“I know that,” Smirnov answered, frustrated that the boy was talking to him like an idiot. He sat back in his seat quietly.
Dmitry rolled down his window before the guard could walk out and raised his gun.
The guard stepped out of his shack and flipped on his flashlight. Walking up to the Land Rover with his dog, he took one look at Khalid and stepped back.
“Hello, sir,” he said robotically. “I’m sorry. I didn’t recognize you at first.” He looked in the back of the truck quickly and saw a strange man bearing close resemblance to boss Smirnov and knew that it must be his son. He nodded quickly and stepped back to hit the button to open the gate.
As he did so, Dmitry opened the door and pointed the gun. Two shots and the man was in a pool of his own blood, half in the shack and half out of it.
Smirnov saw a glimmer of an opportunity to wrestle the gun out of Dmitry’s hand but remembered Khalid was already turned towards him with the gun pointed.
“Don’t try anything,” Khalid said with a sinister glare on his face.
“I bet you’re enjoying every minute of this, aren’t you?” Smirnov said, sitting back.
“Like you wouldn’t believe,” Khalid answered.
Dmitry jumped out of the truck and went to the shack. Picking the man up, he threw him over his shoulder, took his gun. The dog didn’t bark or move, obviously aware that Dmitry was not afraid of him.
“I don’t like shooting dogs. So be good for me,” Dmitry said, turning his back to the animal.
Khalid popped the trunk and Dmitry threw the dead body in the back. Within seconds, they were headed quietly down the mile-long drive to the house.
“Nice place,” Dmitry said, wiping the blood off his hands.
“Thank you. I bought it a few years ago,” Smirnov said, unmoved by the gun down he had just witnessed.
“The deed for it i
s locked in the safe,” Khalid informed Dmitry.
“Good,” Dmitry said with a grin. “Then I’ll have an excellent summer home for the holidays.”
Smirnov cut his eyes at Dmitry. “Only a gutter rat would come here in the summer. This place is designed for the beauty of the snow.”
“I’ll make a note of that,” Dmitry chuckled. “How many men are normally here when he’s away?”
“Five,” Khalid answered.
“Why didn’t he stay out here instead of at the hotel?” Dmitry looked over at his father for an explanation but he didn’t receive one.
The Chronicles of Young Dmitry Medlov: Book One Page 31
