Chapter Five
Gabriel and his men stood in the elevator patiently awaiting its arrival to the penthouse of the hotel and staring blankly into the reflection of themselves in the mirrors of the d panel. It had taken a near act of God to find out where the Medlov’s were staying and even a greater act of God to get through security downstairs.
Upon arrival, they were stripped of their guns, checked for weapons, bugs, poison and razors out in the rain behind the hotel by a large group of armed bodyguards. Then, they were ushered inside of the building after their pat downs and made to wait in the kitchen hallway among crates and boxes in the dimly lit corner as plates clanged and servers moved about quickly with meals and beverages. In silence, they waited and were watched, feeling as though at any moment they would be lined up and executed if one thing did not check out.
After many minutes passed, they were sent up, and although they all were frustrated by the ordeal, they were all happy that they had survived. One would have thought that they were meeting with a national dignitary not a crime boss, but as many knew, to meet a Medlov was the closest any of them would ever get to meeting pseudo-royalty.
As the elevator buzzed, the doors opened to another large group of well-dressed, heavily armed men. Gabriel shook his head and gave a leisurely smile before he opened his jacket to let them search him again.
“It’s amazing that you all ever get anything done with all the searching that you do,” he said as a man patted down his leg. “Easy,” he jerked away. “That’s not a gun.”
The man looked over at door and nodded for Gabriel to gain access to the boss. He was escorted inside, but his men were not allowed to proceed. Instead, they were ordered to wait, and he alone was led to a sitting room that gave a beautiful view of downtown Moscow.
In a different world than the one outside, Dmitry and Anatoly were sitting across from each other talking and having a drink in the calm of a very luxurious room decorated in fine linens and upholstery, bejeweled with priceless art and classic lamps.
The men looked over at Gabriel with curious eyes, accessing him, watching him, making him feel like he was the elephant in the room.
He cracked a smile, pushed past the discomfort and pulled his balled up fists from his pockets.
“Good evening, gentlemen,” Gabriel said as the butler walked up and took his jacket.
“Good evening,” Dmitry said, placing his glass carefully on the end table. With his legs crossed and his back towards the view of windows, he extended his large arm and pointed at the seat near Anatoly. “Have a seat,” he ordered in a deep, menacing voice. His eyes watched Gabriel as he made his way across the room.
Anatoly did not bother to speak. Instead, he finished his drink in one gulp and stood up, wanting to be as far as possible from the man who claimed to be his cousin. He made his way over to the window and leaned against the table with a sneer on his remarkably young face.
“You’re on time,” Dmitry noted, looking at his watcheak
“I was forewarned,” Gabriel replied, taking his seat.
He looked around, tried to make sure no one was behind him. Suddenly, he was acutely aware of his mortality now that he was in the room with two of the world’s most ruthless killers.
“We don’t like small talk. What do you want from us?” Anatoly asked, rolling his eyes.
Gabriel could see that the only thing keeping the young man civil was his father’s hidden grip. He could feel the repression from across the room. It was as if Dmitry was standing behind his son with hands on his shoulders cooling his hot heels, but in fact, the man controlled the environment from afar. Dmitry sat relaxed in his chair, dressed in a new suit and visibly intrigued by Gabriel’s presence.
“I’ve made a name for myself now. And I felt like it was time to introduce myself. I’ve been waiting in the wings long enough, gentlemen. Imagine growing up your whole life knowing that you had a family that you had been kept from just because,” Gabriel said, looking at Anatoly.
“Now with sob stories...”Anatoly gaffed.
“We are only recently accustomed to sympathy, my boy. Your story might be lost on us,” Dmitry said, wanting the man to skip the theatrics.
“My father was a methodical man,” Gabriel explained. “I’m sure he had some reason for keeping me away. Whatever reason it was, it wasn’t my fault or my choice.”
“Your father was a raving lunatic,” Anatoly interrupted. “He had to be put down like mad dog.”
Dmitry looked over at his chair at his son but did not admonish him. Instead, he turned and smiled at Gabriel. In a gentle manner, he lifted his long hands and put his fingers together. “As you were saying,” he urged.
“He kept me out of the way for a long time,” Gabriel continued without looking at Anatoly. He locked eyes with his uncle. “He was a good father most of the time, although very absent. He took very good care of me from a far financially. After college, I wanted to get into the business. It took a lot of persuasion and even a few hundred thousand dollars of bribe money. That’s when he started to give me a little work. It was tough, but once I proved myself, I started to pull together my own men, and he left a portion of his New York business to me when he came to Memphis.”
“That’s a lot to sum up in a few sentences,” Anatoly said unconvinced. “That still tells us nothing about you.”
“What would you like to know?” Gabriel asked, opened to the discussion and the confrontation looming between him and the young boss.
“Any kids? Wife? Other family? How distant was Ivan? Why? What kind of work did he throw your way? Why did he hide you? I could go on.” Anatoly ran his hand down the windowsill and lifted it to look at the dirt. “You call this a suite, papa? This place is filthy.”
Dmitry didn’t bother to respond to his son. He kept his eyes on Gabriel. His gentle manner was slowly changing. His bright blue eyes narrowed. Like a predator, he locked on to Gabriel’s every cryptic word as they fumbled out of the man’s mouth. He was looking for just one untruth, because while he and his men dealt in secrecy and guns, they did not deal in lies.
“Let’s do one something first,” Dmitry said, motioning at the door.
An older man with a black bag appeared from the hall. He was short and balding, dressed in a three-piece black suit and limping slightly. Slowly, he walked over to the table beside Gabriel and placed his bag down. Then reaching inside the leather satchel, he pulled out a small vial and separated it to reveal a long, slender white object.
“He’s going to swab your mouth. Open wide,” Dmitry said, uncrossing his legs. “Then you can continue with your story.”
All eyes were on the doctor as the old man approached Gabriel with a buccal swab in his shaking, glove-covered hands. Lifting his head, Gabriel opened his mouth obediently, and the man slipped his thumb inside his jaw and clenched it with his index finger to pull it away from his teeth.
Swabbing the inside of his jaw, the man looked Gabriel in his eyes with a unreadable frown then pulled the swab out and placed it inside of the container. Pulling his gloves off his hands, he dropped them inside of the garbage can beside the table and left as quietly as he had come.
“Continue,” Anatoly said with a smirk on his face. “And remember that in less than 24 hours, we’ll know if you’re lying about anything that you say.”
“No need to lie,” Gabriel said, looking over at the bottle of vodka. “Do you mind?” he asked Dmitry.
“No,” Dmitry said with a clever smile. “I don’t, if that is what you need to help you.”
Gabriel made his way over to the table and poured himself a hefty glass of vodka. Turning it up, he swallowed one large gulp then turned to the men. He touched his chest and smiled.
“I know what you think,” Gabriel said. “You think that I’m some fraud. But look at me. Really, look at me. I’m the real thing.” He hit his chest. “My father was a good man. I know that’s hard to believe, but he was. He had a few issues. My mother knew it all too well. He fell in love with her or no...he slept with her when they were both just young kids. They met in London. Both went their separate ways but kept in touch. My mother moved to New York and my father followed after. passed.
“During his marriage to his only wife, Ari, he took on a less than active but more than abs role in my life. But he was proud of me. I don’t know why. I wasn’t an alpha male or anything like that. I was a boy scout. I made good grades and played baseball. But he was there, and he did a lot for me.
“When I told him that I was going to NYU, he paid for it. When I graduated and said that I wanted to be like him, he gave me some other options. He wanted me to be better than him. When I proved myself, which mind you wasn’t easy to do, he left me his business. He said that he was going to Memphis to handle some unfinished business and wouldn’t be back. I didn’t want him to leave but he did. I thought that he was running away from me because we had gotten too close, but he claimed that he could start over there.”
“He finished there,” Anatoly said.
Gabriel slowed his explanation. “He was still chasing Ari even though she was dead – still chasing the memory of her. That is what sent him to his end. That is what kept him from my mother. That is what drove him from me. If anything this is all the fault of a woman whom I never even laid eyes on.”
“So, you know how he met his end?” Dmitry asked, finally standing up.
“He loved you,” Gabriel said, biting his lip to maneuver around the question. “I know that it’s hard to believe, but he did. He talked about you all the time. But he just couldn’t let her go.”
“And how does that make you feel?” Dmitry probed. He knew how it made him feel. Defeated.
“As about as sad as it makes you. We both lost him to her, you.” Gabriel clinched his jaw. “I wanted to reach out to you when it first happened. I wanted to share the pain with you that you must have surely felt for what you were forced to do, but my mother passed during that same week. I felt like it was a sign. I needed to prove myself first. And I think over the last few years, I’ve done that.”
Anatoly watched from a far as his father approached Gabriel. They looked more like Medlov men than he as they stood face-to-face. They both were unmistakable giants in stature, muscular in size, and most of all beautiful. Their features appeared to be carved from the most stunning stone, every careful definition of their faces perfect and startling.
These were the type of men that people wrote about, the type of people marveled over and worshipped. Anatoly hated that. It was hard enough to live up to his father, now he had this bastard here vying for his attention, begging to outdo him. He stood up from the windowsill and cleared his throat.
“Vasily, bring in the computer,” Anatoly snapped.
Vasily walked in quickly and set up the large laptop. Typing something in, he adjusted the camera and nodded at his boss.
“Recognize anything?” Anatoly asked, walking over to the computer. Both men took their eyes off of each other and met him at the table. “This is your home. I had < si"3">our men in New York record this just for you.”
All three watched as a masked man kicked in the door of Gabriel’s high-rise penthouse in Manhattan and tear through each room. The camera the man held gave a clear view of the young man’s private life. There were pictures of his mother, his grandparents and even his father. He gave them close up shots of the degree on the wall, the closet space, the bed, the kitchen. The man and his crew tore through the house, through his dressers and his bathrooms.
They searched the entire house for any sign of anything unusual.
Gabriel watched—mortified. His condo was being trashed and the little shit standing beside him was visibly enjoying it.
Gabriel leaned further into the computer and tapped the monitor. “Can you tell him to please stop ruining my shit?” he asked in a growl.
Dmitry watched, amused that his son had thought to be so clever but also torn by the clear destruction going on in front of him. He would never undermine his son’s authority and order it stopped but to watch the event unfold was almost painful. The men flipped the mattresses, tossed the files, looked through his computer, took down his paintings, opened his vents, unscrewed his phones, everything.
“Don’t worry. If they don’t find anything, I’ll send maids to make it perfect before you return home. It will look better than new,” Anatoly said, turning from the computer happy with himself.
“What exactly are you looking for?” Gabriel asked.
“I don’t know. What exactly are you hiding?” Anatoly turned to him.
“I didn’t come here for this shit,” Gabriel said, standing up to his full height. He looked Anatoly up and down and then gave a clever smile. Dmitry could instantly see his dead brother in his young nephew. “But if you want to play games, Anatoly, fine. I didn’t record it for you, but I did have a very interesting date with the manager of your clothing store the other day. Renee’s a sweet woman, and she can hold a great conversation, but I didn’t pump her for a single piece of information on you, and I’m sure that she’ll tell you that I’m no Ivan. Is that testimony enough.”
The room became silent.
Ahh. There it was. Revenge in its purest and most malicious form. Dmitry didn’t need the test results to see his brother’s seed. He turned from the young duelers, refusing to become a part of their juvenile tactics. He had a lot to teach them both.
As the butler entered the room with hors d'oeuvres, he grabbed a cracker and caviar off the platter and waited for the eruption.
“You are checking up on me?” Anatoly asked.“You must have death wish.”
“Obviously, I was, but I didn’t trash your shit.”
“Renee is my shit,” he said, before he could catch himself.
Dmitry didn’t blink. So, it was Briggy first, then Victoria, now Renee. He really liked Renee. He was hoping that she would avoid his son’s clutches. Evidently, however, she wasn’t as smart as she looked.
“Alright, enough men. I do believe that I called this meeting for my own purposes. You all should schedule time aside from this to sort out your differences about women, eh,” Dmitry said, returning to his seat. “Besides, I think that Gabriel, if you are a true Medlov, regardless of your rivalry with your cousin, we should work something out. Throw you some more business.”
Gabriel’s focused shift.
Anatoly stood flabbergasted. Throw this bastard more business? He found the thought preposterous. He looked up at the towering man and rolled his eyes. Why did he have to be a spitting image of Ivan? Things could have been so much easier if he didn’t reek of his father.
“I look forward to it,” Gabriel said, bowing his head a little.
“Oh, it will only be with Anatoly’s blessing, which he will give if you prove yourself,” Dmitry said, looking at his son. “Regardless of what you have heard, I am no longer boss. My only son has taken over that role, and he’s done exceptionally well. I am only here in mentoring capacity.”
Gabriel bit his lip and hid his fever-pitched anger. If he had to wait on approval from this prick, he’d never get in good with his family. However, Gabriel was a salesman. He knew how to bridge broken relationships and make people happy. Maybe he could put his skills to use on his cousin.
At the top of the stairs appeared the little girl from the funeral. With caramel smooth skin that was only interrupted at her rosy cheeks, she appeared to be a living doll. She stood barely three feet tall, a slender 50 lbs. with liquid, long black hair and startling blue, hypnotizing eyes.
Clutching a teddy bear in silence, she watched the men as they talked with a clever grin on her face as if she knew exactly what was going on. Gabriel peered over at her, unable to take his eyes off the beauty.
“Daddy, can I come and sit with you?” she asked. Her clear voice carried across the room like a song, stilling the quiet chaos that ran feverishly through the men’s pensive stares.
Dmitry stopped his conversation in mid-sentence. Eyes lighting up with every step that she k toward him, he extended his arms, received her with a homecoming hug, and pulled her into his embrace. Gabriel watched in amusement.
Such a small child commanded such reverse between the two men. He looked over at his cousin and realized that even Anatoly had switched his focus. While just a moment ago, he was adamantly opposed to him being in the room, he had all but forgotten him long enough to admire the young girl. And his uncle was completely entranced. It was evident without saying so that she was his reason for retirement.
“As I was saying, we are all family,” Dmitry continued, kissing his precious daughter on the crown of her head. “And it is important that we work together in concert with each other instead of against each other. If I had my way, Ivan would still be alive, and we all would be working towards a more powerful empire.”
“How much more powerful can one empire get?” Gabriel asked.
The men turned his way with greedy stares. He could tell in their looks that they both desired more. It was the most prominent gene in their collective DNA. Greed.
“A great deal more powerful, my boy,” Dmitry said, still doting on his daughter. Rocking her on his knee, he bounced her playfully. “Once you check out, we’ll show you how the Medlov’s really do business, and you can walk away from this day job that you so religiously cling to. It’s against the code. It’s against your blood.”
“But you ran a restaurant,” Gabriel debated.
“Where I was the boss. Are you boss at your day job as day trader?” Dmitry asked.
“No.”
“In that lies the problem,” Anatoly finished.
He broke his trance and walked over to the butler to retrieve a small hors d'oeuvre. “We are about absolute power, not a piece of it. A piece of anything will never get you anywhere. You must discipline yourself to see supreme reign.”
They locked eyes.
Gabriel questioned his temporary tutor. “And do you consider yourself to have complete reign, cousin?”
Anatoly gave a lazy smile and slipped the caviar in his mouth. Patting his hands together to wipe off the crumbs, he looked up at the giant man and shook his head. “I won’t allow myself to have anything but complete reign, brat. That is what makes us different. I would never settle, where you already have.”
There was something cataclysmic about the reference of the word brother for Gabriel. For a moment, his cousin, his superior, had allowed their differences to be removed long enough for him to share his philosophy of life and of business. And most of all, he had been called brother. The look in Anatoly’s face was that of absolute certainty like God himself had assured him of his place on earth. It was odd that a man of such evil would have such a look – to be so sure of himself and so focused on his goal. Gabriel shook the thought off. He would think about that more when he was alone.
Their philosophical moment was over; however, when the black woman whom Gabriel assumed was this family’s Helen walked into the room. She strode in with her eyes locked on him like he was a leper. With eyebrows spike and hands slipped into the pockets of her pants, she made her way over to Dmitry and stood behind his chair. Placing her hands lovingly on the back of the chair as if to protect her small family, she broke her silence.
“I was wondering where you had run off to,” Royal said to her daughter.
“Daddy’s having a meeting,” Anya informed her mother. Looking over at Gabriel, she smiled. “Who is he, daddy?” she asked in a near whisper.
Gabriel thought that it was clever that the young girl had not asked the question when she had first come into the room. Rather, she waited until her question would carry the most weight and garner the most attention before she posed it. Already methodical.
“This is Gabriel,” Dmitry explained. He would not clarify his presence any further, at least until he had irrefutable proof via DNA that the man was anything more to him.
“Like the angel,” Royal said with a crooked smile. Her eyes gazed over him for a moment, summing the man up. “Are you an arch angel, Gabriel?” she mocked. “Have you a message from God?”
Gabriel could tell that she didn’t like him, but he knew that she was his key to getting into this family. The men couldn’t love the daughter as they did without loving the mother.
“I guess that it is ironic that a man like myself would be given the name,” he agreed. “A Medlov could hardly ever be a messenger of God.”
“So you believe in nature versus nurture, do you?” Dmitry joked. He raised Anya carefully off his knee and guided her to her mother. “Love, let us finish this, da. I’ll be in for dinner in a moment.”
“Alright, baby,” Royal said, taking her daughter’s hand. Walking past Anatoly, she rubbed his back. “How are you?”
“Fine,” Anatoly said, understanding her concern for his loss earlier. He touched her hand.
“Will you have dinner with us tonight?” she paused. She insisted quietly.
“Da, da,” Anatoly answered softly.
“It was very interesting to meet you, Gabriel, the arch angel,” Royal said before she left theroom. She gave him a dirty look. “You look very much like your late father. Let us hope for your sake that that is the extent of your similarities.”
“I’m sure it is, ma’am.” He bowed his head a little to bid her good evening, although he was unsure why. There was something about the woman that made him feel the need to bow, to be careful and most of all behaved.
An older man was standing in the corner looking at them the entire time, listening to their conversation and watching Gabriel’s every move. He was stocky with a head of blondish gray hair tapered carefully around his pale face and startling blue eyes.
In a pair of black slacks and a black shirt, he brandished two very powerful weapons in holsters under his massive arms. As Royal approached the stairs, he turned his attention and followed her and the child back into the other rooms of the suite.
Gabriel automatically assumed the man must have been their bodyguard as he could feel emanating across the room another aura of protection.
Once Dmitry was sure that his wife was gone, he focused his attention back to the young men. He had been calm the entire time, choosing his words carefully and keeping the conversation light for the most part. Gabriel found it odd that he was so gentle. He had expected a brooding man full of threats and words laced with violence. Instead, he had been greeted by a man who had been all but forgiving of his father and respectful of everyone around him.
“You’ll be staying with us until those results come back,” Dmitry said, leaning his sharp elbows against his knees. “A room has been arranged for you on our floor and your friends have already been sent off.”
“You want me to stay in this suite with you?” Gabriel asked dumbfounded.
“No. Royal would kill us both,” Dmitry chuckled and looked over at Anatoly. “I’ve arranged for him to have a suite on this floor, if that’s fine by you, Anatoly.”
Anatoly rolled his eyes. He wouldn’t deny his father his wishes, even though he wanted to do so. Instead, he tried to maintain his fleeting composure. “That will be fine, papa.”
“Good,” Dmitry said pleased. “Anything that you need, our men can provide for you. But you won’t be allowed anyone in or out until the doctor visits us tomorrow evening. I’m sure that you can understand that you can’t just waltz in here and make your introduction without a proper background check. In interim, be available should Anatoly or myself have questions for you. And if you check out, then be prepared for further instruction.”
“Look.” Gabriel shook his head. “I’m okay with checking out with you guys and having my mouth swabbed, but I’m not cool with being quarantined like I’m some kind of virus. I have businesses to run myself.”
“What Vor does everything himself?” Anatoly asked. “You have soldiers for that. If you don’t, you are a failure.”
Gabriel didn’t respond.
“This is not negotiable, Gabriel,” Dmitry said, standing up. “The men at the front will show you to your temporary housing. I’m sure you’ll find it more than acceptable. But for now, you must excuse us. We have dinner waiting.”
Walking out, closed to any discussion, Dmitry and Anatoly left Gabriel in the sitting room to await his next escort.