Chapter 28:
The devil you know
You said "I do" to
the wrong side*
*Kovacs - The devil you know
Gemma stood next to her sister over the bleeding man.
"What do you suggest?" Her sister asked concern lacing her words.
"I honestly don´t know. I have to find the loose threads and cut them off but by then there will be new ones, it´s no good. If I cut off one head another will grow… I need to find the source but by then my organisation could be damaged beyond repair, let alone my reputation." Gemma threw her hands in the air and let them fall to her sides again. It was no use to panic over this, it had happened before and she´d dealt with it but never on such a big scale. She felt her sister´s eyes on her when she walked over to the kitchen table to pour herself another drink. Someone was trying to destroy her not only that someone was trying to take over her business starting at the outer ring and surly would not stop there. Servillas didn´t know who employed him just the name of some spokesman but he did know his way around in the criminal world and had heard rumours that his employer tried to buy off other parts of her business. Mostly small and minor bits and pieces but still.
Suddenly Gemma realized why Moran had come to find her so quickly after her disappearance though he never told her. Usually he would´ve waited at least half a year, the only reason could´ve been trouble. Trouble he didn´t want to voice until she would´ve been back on her feet and focused again. Well, trouble had found her first.
"We need to leave maybe to New York? Or back to Europe?" Yasmine suggested.
"We?" Gemma turned raising an eyebrow.
"If you´re going down I should aid you. I´m still your sister."
"No. I never involved you there is no connection between us and that´s what will keep you alive. Your work is still with the CIA and those freelance activities you like to involve yourself in so much."
"It´s my decision, Gen!"
Gemma turned towards her sister to tell her once and for all she would never involve her when Sherlock came back into the room.
"What did he say?" Sherlock inquired nodding towards the hunched over figure on the chair.
"None of your concern. I´ve to make a few calls." And with that she left the two of them leaving the house. Slowly she walked the path down towards the car pulling out her phone in the process and finally called Sebastian back.
"Boss?" He picked up after the first ring and Gemma couldn´t help but roll her eyes.
"Yes, who else?"
"Thank god you´re alive!" He was honestly relieved.
"What did you think? I´m not easy to kill, you of all people should know that, Sebastian. And why the hell did you think it necessary to contact Yasmine?"
"Are you serious? You ran off without a word for that bastard and I receive intel about a threat to the organisation; Gemma someone is after you! Was I supposed to just sit put and wait?!" Moran was agitated by now.
"Sebsatian, I´m alright. Can we stop for a moment and talk about the threat? We´ve a hostage the guy was sent to capture me and he told us several parts of the organisation have been compromised. Small and insignificant ones but nonetheless. You understand where this is going?" Gemma pinched the bridge of her nose feeling a headache.
"Us? So Yasmine is with you? And he? Is he alive then?"
"Yes, yes Yasmine found us. Concentrate on the difficulties we´re facing."
"Yeah, I did a bit of digging and found at least four compromised smaller business partners, mostly drug and weapon dealers. I see the storm that´s coming… Going after one of them is pointless since it´s most likely our mystery opponent will have compromised new ones by the time we fix the current ones. That will ruin our reputation, the organisation will fall apart and the mysterious man will take over. So I couldn´t get a hold of the head of our advisory, yet. What are we going to do?" Moran´s voice was strained and tired; Gemma supposed he spent the whole day trying to find some kind of information.
"Good, we´re on the same page. I´ll get rid of Yasmine and Mr. Holmes and sent them to America and Europe. I´m coming back as well and work out a plan until then. I need you to cut the loose threads off of business make it very clear that we´re displeased. Let one of the others make a list of people with enough influence to pull something like that off."
"Will do. Though I suppose you already know who is capable and holds a grudge against you…"
"Yes I do but none of them is likely."
"Alright, and Gemma please do stay in contact this time."
"What are you my baby-sitter?"
"Yeah kind of I guess." Moran muttered and with that he hung up. Wow, he hung up! Gemma contemplated calling him again to tell him that he should watch his behaviour but decided that he was probably majorly pissed and to be honest had every right to be. The headache grew stronger and she was tired, hungry and very aware of the forlornness of the situation at the moment. She reminded herself while walking back to the house that she´d managed to outlive worse than that but couldn´t fully convince herself that she would this time without help.
Gemma re-entered turning to her sister than back to Sherlock. "We´re good to go then?" It was more a rhetorical question. Her fingers wound around the gun on the table. Swiftly she took two steps and shot the man tied to the chair. Sherlock and Yasmine both flinched at the loud noise of the firing gun. Gemma sighed and let the gun sink; she wished she could just go back to her main trade where she stood above all this nasty business. She preferred wearing expensive suits and dealing with information and favours. This was not what she´d worked for; to go back to this! She´d never assumed someone would dare to undermine her organisation like this. By hindsight it was all her own fault, she should never have allowed herself to get involved with Sherlock. But she´d just been so bored… Everything had become easy and predictable, her throne would have stayed untouchable not even Mycroft Holmes or the whole CIA or any kind of organisation could have done something about it. They had co-existed until one day she´d died. On the other hand this was some kind of distraction something to set her mind on. She wouldn´t be bored until this cat-and-mouse game was solved or she would have been killed.
Yasmine had come with a jeep they now used to head back to La Paz. No one knew that she had come to aid Gemma and frankly no one knew she existed in the first place so they could spent the night in a hotel without having to fear to be discovered before they would all take different planes. The ride to La Paz was uneventful none of them felt like talking.
Intentionally Gemma didn´t neither pay the hotel nor did insist on taking a suite what she normally would have done. Yasmine was left to pay for three normal rooms and a set of new clothes they bought at an over-priced hotel shop (the hotel was at least an expensive one with boutiques, Gemma had insisted on at least that much comfort after the exhausting trip) before everyone headed to their rooms.
Eventually Gemma showered again and dressed herself in panties and a black tank-top before she fell on the bed and ordered room-service. She´d finished half of her meal which consisted of some expensive salad and fancy grilled fish when someone knocked on her door.
Gemma sighed she was exhausted and just wanted to have a smoke and go to bed. For a moment she considered ignoring the unwelcome guest but the knocking just became more persistent. 'Sherlock…can´t you just go to sleep?' She thought annoyed but got up anyway and opened the door. Sherlock didn´t seem to mind her state of undress or the fact that she stood in the doorway not planning to let him in. He simply strode past her into the room. Gemma rolled her eyes behind his back.
"Why do come in Mr. Holmes! To what unhappy circumstances do I owe this visit?" She made an inviting gesture behind Sherlock´s back as he walked into the hotel-room.
"We need to talk." Was his short pressed answer.
"Do we now?" She shut the door a bit too forceful and followed him back into the room.
To her genuine surprise Sherlock pulled a gun from his jacket as he turned to face her. Well, at least something unexpected from him, maybe he was not as boring now as Gemma had thought. He must have slipped the gun from her sister´s back she was really thoughtless sometimes.
"The game is over. You´ve your troubles and I do have mine. Mine are basically caused by you and yours don´t affect me. I decided that I´m more than unwilling to play your little games anymore, all I want is my life back, to return home and the thing standing in my way is your false identity that destroyed mine. The only logical conclusion to my problem is to bring Moriarty back and eliminate Ricarda Brooke a fairly easy solution, won´t you agree? So here is what´s going to happen: In one hour a flight to Europe leaves from the airport and the two of us will be on it! I´ll drag you back to London and force you to undo your misdeeds." Gemma listened to an irritated Sherlock by now even more surprised that he would dare to threaten her like this.
"Oh really, Sherlock? You will make me undo it? Or did you mean your brother? He already tried once…" Her eyes glinted dangerously assessing Sherlock then she just shrugged and went on before he could say another word. "You know the old saying, Sherlock? In love and war everything is fair… And honey I do love war." She lilted. "But what fun is war when your opponent is already defeated? So do not bore me, Sherlock."
"You will come with me or I will kill you and bring you back to London in a body bag!" Sherlock spat through gritted teeth.
Gemma looked up at him fixing him through dark lashes taking a measuring step forward until the barrel pressed against her sternum. "Will you now?" Sherlock switched the safety of the gun off not wavering under her stare.
The hint of smile danced over her face when she stepped closer into Sherlock´s personal space. The gun pressed hard against her bones until Sherlock´s arm started to bend. She grabbed the lapels of his new dress-shirt to pull him to her eye-level. The gun slipped over her skin pointing upwards leaving an angry red line on her pale skin. Tentatively she licked her lips carefully watching Sherlock´s reaction. His eyes darted to her lips for a brief moment.
"And yet I see your pupils dilate and the beating of your pulse quicken under your skin." Their faces were only inches apart when Gemma went on her lips almost brushing his as she spoke: "You will not kill me. I once thought that this was the difference between us but I guess we are even now since I found myself unable to end your life. So do not make threats you can´t live up to."
"Maybe we both have changed." Sherlock replied calmly re-adjusting the gun against her chin.
"Mmmhh maybe…" She hummed. "I´m in a generous mood today so I´ll offer you a deal. You are going to help me with my current – troubles and I promise to make yours go away."
She aspirated the end of the sentence and Sherlock inclined his head the smallest bit awaiting the inevitable touch of lips - that never came. Instead Gemma turned away from him putting some distance between them. "Do you take my offer?"
"You suggest I entangle myself with your world? To side with the devil?" Sherlock raised a questioning brow.
"Side with the devil you know aaaand you won´t be bored, promise." She turned and winked at him. "Or you can always leave, I´m not holding you back. You´re the main reason I find myself in those unfortunate circumstances therefor I suggest you might as well aid me to untangle the mess. But if you do leave: stay the fuck out of my business! I will not and I repeat that bit I will not come to your rescue again."
"It´s daring to suggest I´m the reason for your current troubles if I recall correctly you staged your little game back in London for your own amusement and if I might add tried to kill me. So forgive me if I do not feel guilty."
"True. But it was not me who decided to betray you and by the way you knew very well I wouldn´t react kindly to that. Besides it was never just for my amusement…"
"However I´m not the criminal mass-murdering psychopath in this room. I assume that has something to do with your situation."
"Are you not, my dear? And do keep up: it is anti-social personality disorder these days. Personally I don´t think I fit the description just one bit, do you really think you fit in there? Why bother with categories made-up by boring ordinary people?" She stepped to the coffee-table and fingered a cigarette out her new purse and lit it blowing the smoke in Sherlock´s direction. She retrieved a small gun that her sister had given to her earlier that evening hidden from Sherlock´s view with her free hand. "To answer your former suggestion: I do not really have enemies, even your dear brother was not my enemy. We co-existed just fine before you delivered him the opportunity of a life-time on a golden plate to get to me."
Sherlock let the gun sink to his side and exhaled before he spoke again: "You know very well that it was not my decision to make, when he found evidence of our – affair I had to… I tried to warn you to stay away but you were just too preoccupied to listen!"
"Oh dear an affair? How daring… I knew – but still." Sherlock could hear the hurt still evident in her voice she didn´t care to mask anymore and felt himself grew more and more irritated with her again.
"What did you want me to do?! To marry you?! Make it official: The famous detective entangled himself with a criminal? Not any criminal but the so-called Napoleon of crime? How would that have worked out for both of us?!" He was almost shouting now.
"Don´t worry about it, the deed is done. For the record I´m not the marrying type. For now I´m in need of your professional skills. This will be strictly business and it will stay that way." Secretly Gemma found it as amusing to see Sherlock get emotional for once as she found it sad to see he obviously did care more than he´d ever shown. They might have worked out together if it weren´t for the Ice-man but as she told him there was no use in dwelling about elapsed opportunities.
"If we´re talking business: I want payment."
Her lips curled into a crooked smile. "What kind of payment?"
Sherlock rolled his eyes and Gemma chuckled amused turning fully back to Sherlock with the cigarette in her left and a small gun in her right hand pointing at his head. "So you see I tend to be very resourceful and you still fall for the slightest distraction when it comes to me, that is kind of endearing but a big weakness you can´t allow yourself anymore. Just because I don´t plan to kill you at the moment doesn´t mean I won´t."
"As far as I see it we´re on the same side with not killing each other right now so there is really no use in pointing a gun at me." Sherlock stated dryly.
"Yeah, I just wanted to show off." She threw the gun on a nearby armchair and truly it was just luck she´d thrown in her purse a bit earlier. "You will be paid for your services in whatever currency you prefer… Remember you would help to rid the world of some bad people, though. That´s what you like to do, don´t you?"
She slowly walked back to him looking up at him with big eyes. "Pleeeasseee…?"
"Oh don´t be coy, doesn´t suit you in the slightest. I guess if you pay me and there is not really anything else to keep me occupied… Fine."
Gemma clapped her hands gleefully. Though she had to admit she was surprised how easily he´d reconsidered to join forces rather than to just kill her. Sentiment was a weird thing.
"Great and now get out! I know you don´t bother with sleeping too mundane for you or something but I do need some beauty rest."