Chapter Seven

Wyatt remained on the bench until he could no longer see Melanie's silhouette. Part of him wanted to follow her, but a much larger part needed to make a phone call and he couldn't take the risk of any distractions, not when there was so much at stake.

Wyatt looked around to make sure he was alone. Satisfied that there wasn't another ear in range, he took his cell from his jacket and flipped open the cover. He paused for a moment to clear his mind from the faint scent of Melanie's perfume, then he pressed the key pad. His head cleared the moment the call connected. Wyatt felt the muscles in his face, which had been so relaxed moments ago, tighten with the seriousness of a man who was not about to let something as trivial as a former fling interfere with his plans.

"Chuck. You'd better have good news for me."

"Of course, Wyatt. I came right to work after the party and found a small glitch. I don't know why it happened."

Chuck tone was more than a little apprehensive.

"I came home to take a quick shower and catch some z's, then I'll head back in a few hours and work on it."

"Chuck, you're going to get that system operational right now. When I told you that you were going to be working through the weekend, I meant you were going to be working through the weekend. I don't care if you have to down ten gallons of coffee, get your ass back there, or else."

Chuck was not about to argue. "Ok, Wyatt. I'm leaving right now."

The phone went dead before Wyatt had a chance to reply. He closed his cell and nearly tossed it into the lake. It had taken him ten years to put his operation together and he'd be damned if he was going to let any one of his players sleep through the most important weekend of his life.

Wyatt had come a very long way since his high school days, and judging from his earlier conversations with the losers of his class, he felt confident that he had surpassed each and every one of them in both money and prestige. Although he put on a humble facade when he talked about his little stationery store and print shop in town, he brilliantly concealed what lie beneath. He was having such a wonderful time pretending to be the same sweet kid of his high school days, he almost began believing it himself.

Sitting alone on the bench, Wyatt looked out over the placid Minnesota lake, the very same lake he had ice-skated on when he was a boy. The very same lake they had found his mother's body floating in the morning of his first birthday. Wyatt learned much later that she had drowned running after him when he had crawled onto the frozen lake. When his mother ran over to pick him up, the ice had given way beneath her.

Wyatt's father, Ted Gaynes grew up on a farm in Marshall, Minnesota, received his Bachelors degree from Minnesota State University, then he went on to Harvard School of Business, where he met Marilyn. Less than a year later, they were married and their first son, Jack was born soon after.

Wanting a better life for his family, Ted sold the farm and they moved to Abbeyville where he decided to invest in a local printing company that specialized in formal invitations. When the owner retired, Ted bought him out and soon expanded the operation to include his own paper mill. The Gaynes Corporation was born two years later, and so was Wyatt. After his wife's death, Ted put all his energies into the company, spending what little free time he had with his first born son. Thousands of dollars of therapy could not alleviate the guilt and unintentional blame Ted bestowed on Wyatt for the loss of his wife.

When Wyatt turned two, Ted felt he was old enough to be told that his mother had died. Wyatt didn't understand what his father meant, having no concept of the word mother. He only knew that the other children he played with had a tall, older woman with them in the park, and at pre-school. He felt that the news should somehow have mattered to him, so he had faked sadness, but in fact, felt nothing at all.

As Wyatt grew up, he could tell that there was something special between his father and older brother. He didn't know what it was, exactly, but he knew he wanted it and would do anything to get it. Ted took Jack with him to work, attended all of his sports events, which his older brother always excelled, but when it came Wyatt's turn, his father was always busy. It seemed to Wyatt the only time Ted notice him was when he was called to the principal's office, which was quite often. And while Wyatt didn't enjoy being punished, he did very much enjoy having his father's complete attention. At least until the yelling stopped.

Wyatt tried to follow in his brother's limelight, but he was just never able to shine the way Jack did in Ted's eyes. At nearly every event during their school's annual all-class Olympics, Jack would end up standing on the highest podium with a gold medal around his neck and there was little brother standing alongside of him wearing the silver. His good friend Stuart thought he could cheer him up by giving him the nickname of Mr. Silver, like a silver fox, but it only made things worse when the rest of the class started calling him Silver Boy.

Wyatt had tried to make a joke of the nickname by calling himself Mr. Silver. He even started using the nickname to entice the cheerleaders, and much to his surprise, it had worked. But he had hated it nonetheless and he vowed to someday get even with Stuart for giving him the loathsome moniker.

  As he grew older, Jack and Ted grew closer, leaving Wyatt on his own most of the time. The only friends he had were the guys on the varsity teams, and he knew the only reason they hung around him was the hope they would pick up one of Wyatt's female discards. Wyatt had been fine with that, he had more groupies then he could handle, but the morning Chuck and Eric read Melanie's note in front of his entire entourage was the morning he decided he'd had enough. The boys had totally embarrassed him in front of his teammates and girlfriend and he had to find a way to get back his cool.

Wyatt knew Chuck and Eric were struggling with math and with mid-term exams coming up in a few weeks, he had the perfect solution to regain his reputation. He'd break into the math department, steal the answers and sell them to his classmates. He'd regain their respect and with any luck, will lose that Mr. Silver name for good.

Everything had gone perfectly to plan, until a few days after the transaction when they had told him about what had happened with Katie and Melanie and that James had been the one who had told them about the exams. Of course they hadn't blamed Wyatt, but they did fail their exam and Wyatt was stuck with that awful nickname right up until he walked off the auditorium stage with his diploma in hand. He swore someday he would get even with James O'Brien, no matter how long it took.

If anything positive came out of his high school years, it was his friendship with Melanie Tyler. At first he had felt badly for her for what Eric and Chuck had done, but eventually his feelings began turning into something other than pity. She wasn't the typical cheerleader bimbo he was more than happy to use toss away, but she also wasn't a girl up to his usual standards. So, he would wear a disguise and sneak into the auditorium when she was performing, and after would walk her home under the cover of darkness. She told him she understood, that he had a certain reputation he had to maintain, and she would wait for him to make up his mind.

She was easy to talk to, and Wyatt could totally be himself when he was with her. He thought he could change his ways and he invited her to the Senior Prom. But no sooner had they entered the ballroom, when he saw the stares and heard the whispers coming from all sides of the room that Mr. Silver couldn't get a real date and had to settle for second best. Again.

Wyatt had suggested to Melanie that they move the prom down the road, to a more private room where he proved once and for all that he was good as gold. It wasn't until they were lying naked afterward that she told him she was leaving for California at the end of the week. It was apparent to Wyatt that his style of making love hadn’t been satisfactory enough to entice Melanie to change her mind. With his feelings of rejection and abandonment overshadowing any other feelings he might have had for Melanie at that point, the best he could manage was a kiss on the cheek and an insincere "I'll call you" when he dropped her off at her home and drove away. It would be ten years before he saw her again.

Wyatt spent that summer sifting through dust at his dad's paper mill. Jack was at Harvard finishing his MBA, so Ted thought he'd give his second son an opportunity to see what he was made of by starting him at the very bottom of the mill rung. It didn't take him long to find out that his son had very little interest in any part of the corporate ladder, and less interest in the family business. After years of being ignored by his father, it was quite clear that Wyatt also had no interest in Ted.

Not wanting to completely cut his son out of his life, Ted offered to pay for any college of Wyatt's choosing. Wanting to relocate to a warmer climate, and be as far away from his overbearing father and his disgusting paper mill as he could get, Wyatt decided on the University of Tampa in Florida, an easy liberal arts school where no one would know anything about his brother and Wyatt could finally come out from under Jack's shadow.

Without any authoritative figures to keep him in check, Wyatt received an entirely different education than either his father or brother achieved at Harvard. Wyatt knew his brother was more suited to boring corporate meetings in a business suit then lying on the beach in a bathing suit. He also knew that all work and no play would make him a very dull boy as well, and dull was not something Wyatt Gaynes was famous for. His freshman year he majored in fraternity rush parties 101 and advance keggers.

He soon forgot all about his regular classes. He also forgot the very strict alcohol laws in Florida. When he tried to use fake I.D. to purchase some beer one night, he was sorely reminded.

Being a cute blond Minnesota boy might have been an advantage with college freshman girls, but it was a huge disadvantage in the Florida county jail. What was worse for Wyatt was when he used his one phone call to phone his dad to bail him out, his father told him he was an adult and that it was about time he started acting like one. Ted was adamant that Wyatt take responsibility for his own actions, and told him not to bother showing his face again until he had.

Wyatt was returned to his cell. With no money, or the ability to make another call, he had to find another way to make bail. Wyatt knew he had to rely on his informal education to survive, and the one class he excelled in was the art of bullshit. As soon as the cell door closed behind him, he began bragging to his cell mate, a Cuban national who was caught carrying a counterfeit green card, all about his family's paper mill, trying to convince the man that if he helped him with bail, he would be repaid with interest. As it turned out, his new friend's interest in Wyatt was ten times more than just a return on his investment.

 His cell mate's name was Sepheran and he wasn't just an ordinary illegal. He told Wyatt that, in fact, he was one of the last remaining members of an organization known as T.H.R.U.S.H., The Hedonistic Reformation for the Ultimate Submission of Humanity.

At first, Wyatt thought Sepheran was making up some elaborate story, or that he was totally crazy, but since he was also Wyatt's ticket out of jail, he kept quiet and listened to the rest of what Sepheran had to say. According to his cellmate, T.H.R.U.S.H. disbanded in the early 60s, and had become a mere shadow of what they had once been, but recently a few key players had begun to emerge, and they needed a new leader, and a new plan. Sepheran had come to U.S. to meet up with his contacts, but was arrested before he had the chance.

Wyatt was now more than a little intrigued by Sepheran's story. The two men spoke for hours before Sepheran's contact arrived to post bail. Once they were free, Sepheran introduced Wyatt to the other members of what was left of T.H.R.U.S.H. They immediately took to the highly charismatic American and his analysis of their situation. Their individual groups were completely disenfranchised, many had a different set of goals and there was a great deal of infighting. It didn't take Wyatt long to impress what was left of the membership to envision a much more global plan, and to convince the heads of the individual cartels that careful patience and planning was the only way they were going to rise from the ashes, like the another bird, the Phoenix. Sepheran became Wyatt's chief organizer, leaving Wyatt free to return home and establish his base of operations.

Wyatt returned to Abbeyville to collect his trust fund, only to discover it had been dissolved and he was essentially broke. His father had retired and Jack was now CEO of Gaynes Industries. When he asked his brother to let him back into the company, Jack turned him down flat and since Ted no longer had any say in the operation of the company, the best he could do for his son was set him up with a small printing and stationery store in the heart of town. After that, both Ted and Jack pretty much washed their hands of him and Wyatt was free of all family ties and responsibilities.

There were many late night meetings in the basement of Wyatt's store with Sepheran and several of his fellow former operatives and it wasn't long before a solid plan began to come together. However, Wyatt didn't fully trust his new partners, and he knew he needed key players that, at the very least, wouldn't be speaking to each other in a foreign language he couldn't understand. Former friends would be the perfect target, he thought, and his class' tenth reunion would be the best opportunity to discover their weakness and exploit it to his own advantage.

Wyatt began making a list of possible candidates. In the short term, he needed a high profile business reporter to help make his own company profitable. In the long term, he knew he would need an expect computer programmer for his international communications and an influential politician in his back pocket would complete the picture. It hadn't taken Wyatt long to find the reporter, and the others followed soon after.

At the O'Brien's anniversary party reception where the guests mingled, Eric Kramer was more than eager to put Wyatt on the top of his must mingle list. Eric told Wyatt that his journalist career was going nowhere, even with his Master’s degree from the University of Missouri; the only assignments he had been covering were boring dog bites man stories. Eric told Wyatt that he really needed a "big" story which would launch his journalistic career, and thought a national profile on the Gaynes family would be perfect. But instead of asking Wyatt to be the focus of the piece, Eric had asked him to give his card to his brother Jack so he could interview him on running the family business.

Wyatt said he would do what he could, without any intention of doing so. When Eric told him he was leaving for South America to investigate a rumor about a suspected slave trade, Wyatt came up with the perfect plan. Three days later, Wyatt put in a call to his T.H.R.U.S.H. contacts in a small obscure village in South America and set-up the fake story for Eric to "uncover".

The expose resulted in Eric receiving the Pulitzer for International Reporting, and a very prestigious job with the Wall Street Journal. At the celebration party, Wyatt had taken Eric aside, showed him the faked documents and threatened to expose him as a fraud.

Soon after, articles about Wyatt's stationery store began being prominently featured in Eric's Man on the Street column, and Wyatt's business began to thrive. That was only the beginning.

Chatting with the other guests, Wyatt overheard talk that James O'Brien was thinking about running for a seat on the city council. Always one to help an old friend, Wyatt offered to sign on as James' campaign manager. The deal was signed with a handshake, and soon after Wyatt set up James' campaign office, hired his staff and set up all of his campaign financial records. Wyatt also created two nearly identical reports, one for the elections commission, the other for himself.

Wyatt was building his worldwide operation, bit by bit. When the new Millennium began, his portfolio was only slightly financially affected by the dot.com crash of 2001. However that gave him the much needed final piece to his plan. Wyatt needed an expert computer geek to finish the final programming, and who better than an old friend who was facing financial ruin.

Charles Haussman was living in Silicon Valley when his financial empire came crashing down. His son was in his second year of medical school at Stanford and his daughter had applied to Princeton. Charles was desperate, and a desperate man was an easy target. With his financial situation precarious, Charles was very surprised when his daughter ran into his office all excited that she not only was accepted in the college of her choice, but had also received a fully paid scholarship for the entire four years. Soon after, Charles received a notice from Stanford that his son's entire medical school expenses had been paid in full. 

What Charles didn't know, until much later, was that Wyatt's operatives had hacked into the admissions office of Princeton and made sure Charles' daughter was accepted. He also arranged for full tuition to be paid at both colleges. Then, Wyatt had flown to California, under the pretense he was visiting the local wineries and wanted to look up his old friend. Charles was very glad to see his old high school friend, until Wyatt showed Charles him the paperwork and simply told him that unless Charles agreed to come work for him, the money would be withdrawn and he's reveal the falsified admissions. Once that happened, that would be the end of med school for Charles's son and his daughter would be expelled, not only Princeton, but no other university would take her. The threat was all he needed to convince Charles to agree to join Wyatt's newly organized T.H.R.U.S.H..

Charles packed up and moved from the warmth of California to the frigid Minnesota tundra. Charles's wife lasted one winter before leaving him, but Charles had no choice but to stay and finish the job for Wyatt, at least until his children graduated.

Now, Wyatt's plan was finally coming together. One more day and he'd own this stupid little town, he thought, and his brother, Brenda and all the others who had said he was only second best would know he had made it to the top. There was only one person whom he wished could have been with him at his moment of triumph.

When he saw Melanie at the cocktail party, his first instinct was to greet her with a hug, but then he remembered what happened the last she was in his embrace, and decided against it. Twenty years might not have been nearly enough time for her to forgive him for what he had done which was quite obvious when he felt the chill in the air between them drop below zero before the last syllable of his ex's name escaped his lips.

He wished that he had the chance to tell her that he had returned to the hotel room that night only to find out Melanie had already left. If she hadn't, Wyatt would have told her the real truth of the events of that night that Wyatt had meticulously planned for his girlfriend to walk in and discover him in bed with another woman to make her jealous. The way Brenda made him feel every time she mentioned his brother.

Before he left Florida, Wyatt played the part of party boy nearly every night, until he met Brenda. She was a cocktail waitress in a local hang-out which he frequented. It didn't take long for his charm to win her over, and they began dating regularly. When they'd returned to Abbeyville two weeks before Katie and James' anniversary party, Wyatt mistakenly introduced Brenda to his brother. After that, Jack was all Brenda could talk about, what Jack was wearing at the company party, the gorgeous house that Jack lived in, and what a great success Jack was at running the family business compared to Wyatt's endless series of failures.

Wyatt was at the end of his patience. He didn't want to break up with Brenda, but he needed to shut her up about Jack and find a way to make her see that it was Wyatt she really loved. The best way to do that, Wyatt thought at the time, was to make Brenda believe that another woman wanted him. At first he had planned on hiring a hooker, but once he saw Melanie at the O'Brien's party, he set her sights on her instead. Wyatt rationalized that since Melanie lived in California, and it was only going to be a one-night thing, he was sure Melanie would understand. Fortunately for Wyatt she had been a willing participant.

It hadn't taken much more than a phone call, and a promise of a romantic overnight at one of Abbeyville's most prestigious hotels to entice Brenda to meet him in the hotel room at the exact time where she would be certain to discover him in bed with Melanie. Unfortunately, Wyatt had underestimated Brenda's reaction. Instead of falling for his pretense, and his overblown apologies, she had run straight into his brother's waiting arms

They married the following year.

Wyatt wasn't invited to the wedding, but by that time he was too involved with setting up the final pieces of his organization to care.

When he saw Melanie sitting alone on the bench, it had been so easy to fall back into his old routine, and he momentarily regretted it, but she didn't seem to notice, or maybe after all these years, she simply didn't care, he thought. But, she did take his card and Wyatt was confident that she'd call him, and maybe they would pick up where they had left off all those years ago. Afterall, she was here, she was alone, and she was still very attractive. What better way to spend an otherwise boring reunion than with a familiar body? He could feel their very unique passion begin to stir within him when their lips had met, even for a brief time. All he needed to do was turn up the heat a bit and she'd melt back into his arms, and into his bed, whichever he desired, but that scenario would have to wait.

Another time, another place, he thought as he rose to return to his car for the drive home. He was determined not to let anything, or anyone, not even a former lover, stand in his way.

Yes, Wyatt felt very confident. He took out a cigarette and began to relax for the first time in months. After twenty-five years of planning all the pieces were now in place. It had been a long time coming, and a great deal of planning and hard work, but by this time Sunday night, Wyatt would finally achieve everything he had ever wanted. Nothing less than total control over the entire world.

With the headquarters right in his tiny innocuous hometown of Abbeyville, Minnesota.