Chapter 38 Gabriel
Gabriel
Luca’s voice cuts through the hallway like a blade. “Jefe. Call. Now.”
I don’t knock again. I don’t raise my voice. I step away from her room and move down the hall toward the kitchen.
The house is too quiet. Country quiet. The kind of quiet that makes your ears work overtime.
Wood floors under my bare feet, cold enough to wake the nerves.
A faint smell of old coffee hangs in the air, comforting in a way that feels deliberate, like someone built peace in here on purpose.
The refrigerator hums. A security light outside clicks softly as the wind shifts.
Luca is in the kitchen with his phone out, face tight, eyes sharp like he’s tracking something.
Juan stands at the back window scanning the tree line like the woods can suddenly grow teeth.
His silhouette is solid in the glass, shoulders squared, posture already braced.
Rafa waits by the door, hand near his waistband, one of my trusted security men.
No one is relaxed, because we don’t get to relax.
“What,” I say.
Luca holds the phone out to me. “Unknown number,” he says. “But the voice… is not unknown.”
My jaw tightens as I take the phone and put it to my ear. I don’t speak first.
“Gabriel Gonzalez,” the voice says, smooth and amused.
My blood goes cold. Not because of who it’s . Because of what it means.
“Mikhail,” I say flatly.
He chuckles, soft. “Such a respectful tone. I’m touched.”
I don’t answer the bait. I don’t give him satisfaction.
“How did you get this number,” I ask.
“You’re not the only one with friends,” he says, like it’s a joke.
Of course. Traitors. Paid mouths. Information sold like meat.
I glance at Luca. His face stays hard. No flinch, no surprise. This isn’t a random guess. Someone leaked something, or someone got flipped.
“I hear you moved your wife,” Mikhail says.
My jaw locks. I don’t look toward Savannah’s door. I don’t let my eyes flick down the hallway like my body wants to check on her. I keep my face neutral and my voice colder.
“She’s not yours to talk about,” I say.
Mikhail laughs, quiet and pleased. “She will always be mine to talk about. She belongs to my history.”
My grip tightens around the phone, not enough to crack it, just enough to remind myself my hands are still mine. Rage tries to move and I refuse to let it.
“She belongs to herself,” I say.
“Cute,” he murmurs. “You believe that.”
He keeps talking like this is business, like he isn’t speaking about a living woman with a pulse.
“I also hear your little church performance is being planned without you,” he says.
Romano. Cassio. All of them thinking they’re clever. Mikhail is listening, of course he is. War thrives on gossip.
“And I hear the Alliance has decided your bride needs supervision,” he adds, voice pleasant.
Supervision makes my throat tighten. Supervision means hands near Savannah, and hands near Savannah mean blood if they forget what line they’re standing on.
“I’m calling to offer you something,” he says.
I exhale slow and controlled. “You don’t offer,” I reply. “You extort.”
He laughs again. “True. And tonight I’m extorting politely.”
Luca and Juan watch my face like they’re reading weather. Rafa shifts near the door.
“Tomorrow morning,” Mikhail says, “there will be a shipment hit on your southern route.”
I don’t react. Reacting gives him power.
“It will be framed as cartel weakness,” he continues. “Alliance will interpret it as failure to protect. Cassio will tighten his leash.”
My jaw clenches.
“Unless,” Mikhail says softly, “you give me something else to bite.”
“What,” I ask.
He breathes like he’s savoring it. “Her.”
The room goes silent around me. Even Luca’s breathing stops for a beat. Juan’s eyes flare. Rafa’s hand twitches closer to his weapon.
I don’t move. I don’t shout. I speak with quiet violence.
“No.”
Mikhail laughs, pleased. “You didn’t even ask what I want.”
“I know what you want,” I say. “You want to relive power.”
“Power,” he repeats. “Yes. And punishment.”
I close my eyes for one beat, not from fear, from control, then open them again.
“Your shipment hit won’t happen,” I say.
“You’ll stop it,” he says, mocking. “How heroic.”
He pauses, then sharpens his tone just enough to aim. “But you can’t stop everything.”
“Say what you’re really calling to say,” I tell him.
His amusement fades into something darker. “I want you to understand she is not invisible to me.”
“She’s invisible,” I say, “because you will be dead before you reach her.”
“I like you,” Mikhail says lightly. “You have teeth. That’s why Cassio uses you. That’s why Romano fears you.”
Romano fears me. Interesting.
“But teeth don’t matter if I choose the right target,” he continues.
“What target,” I ask.
“A child,” he says.
The word hits like a gunshot. My body goes still, because Savannah was a child when he took her, and he knows exactly what that word does. He wants it to crawl under the door like smoke. He wants her to hear it through the walls.
I force my voice not to change. “She’s not a child.”
“No,” he agrees. “Not anymore.” Then, too softly, “But she still remembers being one.”
My stomach turns. He’s doing it on purpose. He wants her to spiral. He wants me to get loud. I don’t .
“If you speak her like that again,” I say quietly, “you’ll regret it.”
“So protective,” he murmurs. “That’s good. It means you’ll be predictable.”
Predictable gets people killed.
“I’ll make this simple,” he says. “You give me her, and I spare your route.”
I hold still. My voice stays cold.
“You don’t get her. Ever.”
“Then you’ll have to earn that promise,” he says.
“What do you mean,” I ask.
His voice turns almost cheerful. “I’m sending you something. A reminder.”
My spine tightens. “What.”
He pauses just long enough to let dread bloom. “Check your gate footage.”
Then he hangs up.
The line goes dead.
For one beat, nobody moves. Then Luca steps forward. “Jefe, I can pull the compound cameras—”
“Not the compound,” Juan cuts in, voice tight. “Here. He said gate footage.”
The hair on my neck lifts. This property has cameras. We installed them. We swept it. We trusted it.
I look at Rafa. “Pull the feeds.”
Rafa nods and moves fast to the security laptop on the kitchen counter. He opens the camera app and clicks through tabs. Front drive. Side yard. Back tree line. Gate.
The screen loads in grainy night vision. The drive is empty. Rafa scrubs back thirty minutes and the gate view flickers.
My blood turns to ice.
A black sedan with no plates sits outside the gate. The driver’s door is open. A man stands in the dark like he’s posing, like he wants the camera to catch him. He faces the lens and lifts something in his hand.
A white rectangle. A photo.
He holds it up to the camera, still and deliberate, then steps closer to the keypad.
He doesn’t enter a code. He doesn’t try to breach.
He just leans in and places the photo against the keypad like an offering.
Then he turns and walks back to the sedan, unhurried, like he knows we’ll be watching later.
Rafa pauses the footage and zooms.
The photo is visible enough to make my throat close.
It’s old. Faded. A child. A small girl with dark hair, bruises on her cheek, eyes too big and too empty.
Savannah.
My chest tightens so hard it burns. Juan swears under his breath. Luca goes rigid. Rafa’s face drains.
I don’t breathe for a full second, because that photo means one thing.
Mikhail knows exactly where to aim.
Not at my routes. Not at my men.
At her.
At her past.
At the child inside her that still thinks speaking gets punished.
“Get that off the screen,” I order.
Rafa hesitates, confused.
“Now,” I snap.
He minimizes the window fast.
Good. Savannah cannot see that image. Not tonight. Not when she just chose.
* * *
Luca’s voice is tight. “He had eyes on the gate. He followed the convoy.”
“Yes.”
Juan’s jaw is clenched. “This was the feeler. They wanted you to see him.”
“Yes.” I look toward the hallway, toward Savannah’s locked door, and my voice drops. “And he wanted her to feel it.”
Because she will. She’ll feel it in the air, in the way voices tighten, in the way boots shift, in the way the world suddenly holds its breath.
“What do we do,” Luca asks.
I stare at the kitchen counter like it’s a map. Coffee smell. Warm lamp light. All of it trying to pretend we are normal men in a normal house.
We’re not.
“We stop playing defense,” I say.
Juan’s eyes sharpen. “Meaning.”
“Meaning we don’t meet them on their terms.”
“Tonight,” Luca says, already understanding.
“Yes.”
Juan steps closer. “And Savannah.”
I inhale slowly, because she is the only part that matters.
“She stays safe,” I say. Then I look at Luca. “And we don’t let her hear his voice. We don’t let his name become a sound in her sleep.”
Luca nods once. Juan’s face stays hard. “He already got to you.”
“He got my attention,” I correct.
I move to the hallway and knock softly on her door. Not loud, not urgent, just gentle.
“Savannah.”
Silence, then her voice, small. “…Yes.”
I keep mine steady. “Tea is on the table outside your door. Drink it. Keep the door locked.”
A pause. Then a whisper. “Okay.”
Her voice trembles slightly. She knows something happened. She can feel it.
“You did nothing wrong,” I tell her.
Another pause. Her reply is breathy. “I know.”
But I can hear it. She doesn’t know. Not really. Not yet. And if she sees that photo, she’ll think she caused it. She’ll think choosing love summons punishment.
I won’t let that belief take root.
I step away from her door and back into the kitchen, back into the war.
“Full perimeter,” I tell Juan. “Silent rotation. No headlights. No talking outside.”
Juan nods and moves.
I look at Luca. “Find the sedan. Find the man. Trace the route, the plate swap, the phone ping.”
Luca is already moving, thumbs flying.
Rafa pulls up the footage again, smaller this time, controlled, no zoom, no photo.
“And when we find him,” I say, voice turning into something colder, “we take him alive.”
Juan’s mouth tightens, satisfied and angry at the same time. Luca’s eyes flash. Rafa swallows.
They all understand what that means.
It means answers.
I step to the window and stare out at the black line of trees. The woods stand still, but I don’t trust stillness.
Mikhail wants a reaction. He wants me to run to church. He wants me to put Savannah on a stage. He wants her sentence to become a weapon other men hold.
No.
I press my palm flat against the cold glass and make myself a promise I don’t speak out loud.
He doesn’t get her breath. He doesn’t get her sleep. He doesn’t get her past as leverage.
He gets one thing from me.
A mistake.
And then he pays for it.
Luca’s voice pulls me back. “Jefe,” he says, eyes on his screen. “The sedan didn’t just show up once.”
I turn. “What.”
“Two earlier passes,” he says. “Slow rolls. Same time spacing. Like he was confirming your camera angles.”
Juan’s voice goes quiet. “He wanted the shot. He wanted you to see the photo. Exactly.”
Yes. Because this wasn’t surveillance. This was theater. Mikhail’s theater. And theater is what men like Romano understand.
Which means Romano is either complicit, or about to be used.
I look toward the hallway again, toward the locked door, toward the woman who finally started to believe the world could be quiet without being dangerous. Something in my chest tightens into something sharp.
Not panic.
Purpose.
“Keep her contained,” I tell Juan. “No voices near her door. No radio bleed. Nothing.”
Juan nods. “On it.”
I look at Luca. “And I want every whisper between Romano and Cassio. Every call. Every meeting time. Every church plan.”
“Done,” Luca says.
Rafa clears his throat, hesitant. “Jefe… if he has a photo like that—”
“He has more,” I cut in, because I know men like Mikhail. They hoard pain like currency. They keep trophies. They keep reminders.
Savannah is not a trophy. She is not a reminder. She is a living woman behind a locked door drinking tea like she deserves peace.
I pick up my phone. I don’t dial Romano. Not yet. I dial someone else, a number I don’t use unless I’m done being polite.
The call connects. A voice answers. “Gonzalez.”
I keep my tone quiet. “Find me a ghost,” I say. “A sedan. No plates. And the man who thinks he can leave pictures on my gate.”
A pause. Then, low and eager, “Yes, Jefe.”
I hang up.
Because the next move isn’t a conversation. it’s containment.
And outside that locked door, Savannah doesn’t need to know any of this yet.
She needs tea. Warmth. Sleep.
I keep my voice steady, and I let the war come to me.
Because if Mikhail wants to aim at the child in her, he’s going to learn what happens when you aim at something I protect.