Chapter 19 Gabriel
Gabriel
Isat in the back of the boat next to Damien while he guided us through the choppy harbor water toward the abandoned dock.
The wind dragging at the edges of my coat.
Nikolai sat opposite me, pale as a ghost, his breath rasping through his nose as if he were fighting to contain the fury of being caught—and of knowing he was being used.
"Why did you betray us?" Damien asked with real hurt in his voice, but he masked it well. He didn’t look back, just kept his hands steady on the throttle.
Nikolai sneered but didn’t respond. Just when I thought he’d stay silent, he turned his head toward me, voice low and steady.
"February tenth. Nineteen ninety-two."
I frowned. "What?"
"That’s the day I came to America. My father opened a convenience store in Brighton Beach. No bank would lend to him, so he took a loan from your father."
His jaw clenched.
“The interest bled us dry. My parents sold everything. Our apartment, the furniture, my mother’s jewelry, just trying to keep up. Eventually, we were living in the store.”
He looked down at his feet.
"I was sixteen. Working night shifts at the shipping yard to help pay the loan, but it wasn't enough."
He paused, breath shallow.
"I wasn’t there the night it burned. When I got back in the morning... there was nothing left."
His eyes lifted, sharp with memory.
"My parents died. The fire marshal blamed faulty wiring."
Damien scoffed. "No one forced him to take a loan. Not our fault your family couldn’t pay what they owed."
Nikolai stared at his feet, voice barely audible over the sound of the water.
"I did what I had to do to survive. For a while, I wanted revenge. But I was powerless. Stranded. And the path I ended up on… it led me back to your father. Made revenge possible."
He looked up, gaze steady now.
"I never betrayed you, because I was never loyal."
"You’ve been waiting this whole time," I said, staring at him. "Lurking. Undermining us."
He said nothing, just stared back at me, letting me see the resentment he restrained for as long as I had been alive.
"You’re a fucking pussy,” Damien hissed over his shoulder. "You've had hundred of chances to kill my father, yet never did.
Nikolai smiled, thin and deliberate. "There are subtler ways to destroy a man than putting a bullet in his head."
The boat rocked gently as Damien eased the motor back. The dock came into view—rotted, crooked, forgotten. Nikolai looked up at it, exhaled slowly.
"I have had my revenge."
I ignored him, resting a hand on his shoulder and sliding my knife back into its sheath. "I want you to understand something. I’m letting you go tonight. After you do your job. I just want the girls back, there’s no need to spill any more blood.
Damien glanced back. "Sorry about your family," he said with a grin only I could see.
Nikolai blinked, disbelief coloring his voice. "You’re letting me go?"
I nodded, "After you give the Ivan's man that fake intel. You disappear."
His eyes shimmered with fragile hope. "I’ll be gone. You won't ever see me again."
"I believe you,” I said quietly.
From where we anchored, just beyond a thin line of trees, we had a clear view of the dock some distance away. I pulled the wire from the bag.
"Now we’re going to mic you up," I said. "If you fuck this up, even a little, things won’t be pretty. Understand?"
"I understand," he muttered.
I taped the wire to his chest and stomach, fixed the mic to his collar. "Now go wait by the dock. We’ll be watching."
"And listening," Damien added as Nikolai climbed off the boat and disappeared into the woods.
Damien pulled the rifle from under the seat and handed it to me.
Through the thermal scope, the dock lit up in grayscale—white for heat, black for cold. Nikolai’s figure glowed faintly, hunched and twitchy. Even from here, I could make out the tremble in his shoulders.
He stood there nearly thirty minutes before another figure emerged from the trees—tall, lean, careful. He moved like someone used to watching his own back.
"You got somethin’ for me?” the man said, his voice crackling through the radio.
"Here," Nikolai replied instantly, nerves undercutting his words. Whether he feared us or the man in front of him more didn’t matter. He handed over the flash drive without hesitation.
"Cold night, huh?" the Sinclair man asked, eyeing him.
"Yes.”
"Not that cold, though," The man added.
Through the scope, I saw Nikolai flinch.
Then came a burst of static-laced laughter as the man clapped both hands on Nikolai’s shoulders and jostled him roughly.
"Relax. Don’t worry about the Auditores finding out," he said. "They’re done. Lay low for now. You’ll get a call when it’s finished—and you’ll get your cut."
He slipped the flash drive into his coat pocket, turned and walked off without looking back.
Once the man was gone, Damien fired the motor up again, easing us closer. Nikolai was still there, waiting.
He met us halfway up the planks, sweat gleaming along his temple.
"He took the flash drive. I did my part," he said, too fast. "So... you’re letting me go, right?"
"One more thing first."
I drew my pistol and shot him in both knees.
His scream ripped through the air, cut short by a gasp as he collapsed. He clutched his legs, face twisted in agony.
I grabbed him by the legs and dragged him back toward the boat. He howled, clawing at the dock, scratching up rotted wood and dirt in a pointless struggle.
“You said—“ he choked out as I threw him into the boat.
"Shut up," Damien snapped, reaching under the seat for the cinder block and rope.
Nikolai cried out, slipping into Russian words I couldn't understand, frantic and broken.
"You said you’d let me go," he gasped.
"We are," I said, pinning his arms and threading them through the cinderblock holes before binding his wrists tight. He stayed still, watching in horror, like it wasn’t actually happening to him.
Damien steered us out from the dock. Nikolai sobbed quietly, the engine drowning him out.
Once we hit deeper water, Damien killed the motor. Silence swallowed everything but Nikolai’s breathing—ragged, panicked.
"Any last words?" I asked.
His mouth opened. Nothing came out. Just the shallow gasp of someone realizing this was his last breath in open air.
"I guess not," I said, and pushed him overboard.
It was almost meditative, sitting up here knowing he was fighting down there—struggling to hold his breath as he sank deeper into the black. A minute passed. Then two. His lungs would be filling with water at any moment.
"I told Dad about the rest of the plan," Damien said.
"Let me guess. He doesn’t like it."
"He doesn’t."
"I’ll talk to him. The plan moves forward. With or without his approval."
Damien nodded once. Nothing else needed to be said.
Nikolai was dead.