Chapter 52 Rhea
Brighton storms into the kitchen while I’m running my fingers through my hair, socks clenched between my teeth, halfway through pulling on tights and a sweatshirt.
“Go back to bed,” he says in a tone I don’t recognize—and don’t like. He grabs his keys and shoves his feet into a pair of boots, clumsy and frantic.
“No.” I slip my socks on and then a pair of sneakers. “Wherever you’re going, you need a friend,” I snap, and he stares at me for a long, tense moment. For a second, I think he might argue further, but he pops open the front door and waits for me to lead him out.
The truck ride is silent. Neither of us says a word. I don’t even bother to put on music. Brighton pulls the truck into a dark, empty parking lot of a massive church I’ve never seen before and shuts off the engine.
“Someone very important to me took his life last night.” He says. “I have to go inside and deal with a bunch of questions, and I don’t have answers for them.”
His jaw tightens uncomfortably, and it’s pretty clear that he’s trying to keep himself together. Whether it’s for me or for himself, I don’t know, but either way, I hate it.
“Okay, give me the keys,” I say. “You’re all going to want coffee.”
He stares at me for a moment and hands the keys over.
“I’ll be right back.” I offer, watching him climb from the truck and wander off into the darkness, waiting until light spills from the church door as he steps inside before I climb over the console and start the engine.
It’s not uncommon for men like Brighton to get too familiar with death. More often than not, they spent their time at funerals because if active duty didn’t kill them, home soil sometimes finished the job, but I knew the sound of a man who meant it when he said he wanted to die.
I’d still be able to tell his footsteps just from the sound.
I inhale slowly and pull out of the parking lot to find the closest coffee shop.
I have zero information about who will be there, so I grab whatever I can and hope it’s enough.
I linger outside a liquor store, debating if they’d also want that, but I’ve never seen Brighton drink and would feel weird about bringing it into a church.
When I pull into the lot, José swings in from the opposite side and brings his jeep up beside me.
“Need some help?” He asks, hopping from his seat and grabbing the bag I’m balancing on top of the donut box. He looks exhausted, and his shirt is buttoned wrong, crooked all the way up.
“Thanks.” I shoulder the rest, grab the two boxes of coffee, and let José close the door behind me as we start inside.
“Where’s Bright?”
“Inside,” I say, not having anything else to offer him. He eyes me for a second, shifting his grip on the bag he’s carrying to open the church door.
“Don’t take it personally,” he says after a minute. “Brighton doesn’t even talk in groups.”
“He doesn’t?” I question as he leads me over to a table.
“Never.” José shakes his head. “I know he’s one of the best guys to be stationed with, and I know that he did everything he could to save those boys in his squad.” He mentions, and I tense.
His squad?
“He never talks about them,” I push, just to see if I can learn something new that might help him through whatever grief he was about to tackle.
“They call them ‘The Six, ’” he says while he helps me set out the food and cups. “It was a tragedy, really. Bad ops had them marching through a town they shouldn’t have been in. Child Soldiers."
“It was kids?” I do everything I can to keep my face neutral.
“Ambushed them in an alley, killed everyone. Brighton had stopped to help some old lady on the side of the road, and by the time he found them, three were dead, and the other three bled out. Brighton kept them going for twelve hours until evac came, but it was too late.” José explains.
“I couldn’t imagine the guilt he feels, but there was nothing he could do.
If he weren’t so damn kind, he would have never helped her and would have walked into the same ambush.
I think that’s why he doesn't talk about it, because he still thinks it's his fault they’re gone. Like he wasn’t enough, so he doesn’t get to share their stories. ”
“He’s punishing himself,” I whisper, and José nods. “He just doesn’t talk to anyone?”
“Maybe, Sarge, but never in front—” he trails off as the door opens and more guys file in.
“Hey,” Brighton calls from the other end of the room. He looks so tired and sad. “In here.”
They all follow the sound of his voice and leave me alone with the story of Brighton’s past, haunting me.
I sit on a bench and open my phone. The Six.
I type it into the search bar and a few articles from 2017 pop up in the results.
He had been twenty-five when it happened.
I clench my jaw and scroll through the article.
There’s a lot of information I don’t understand, and even more that breaks my heart.
Most of them were dads with young kids, just like Brighton.
My nose stings as I try to keep the tears at bay, but when I see the photo of them together, smiling with their arms around each other, I break.
Major Brighton Black’s efforts will not go unnoticed. The twenty-five-year-old combat medic lasted twelve hours bouncing between the bodies of his remaining squad members, doing whatever he could to bring them home alive.
The photo below rewires how I see him.
He’s being escorted off a plane in some desert location following what looks like six gurneys, his gear soaked and stained in blood around the knees and torso.
My stomach churns. “Is there a reason there's six?” I had asked him about those daisies.
For twelve hours, he had knelt in the blood of his friends.
I set the phone down and wipe my tears on the back of my sweater sleeve with shaky hands.
I inhale, taking a walk to clear my head.
I couldn’t let the information eat at me, not because it shouldn’t, but because Brighton needed me to be the strong one for the two of us.
Even if he doesn’t want me to be. I busy my hands and brain, finish setting up the food and wander closer to the door where most of them disappeared through to listen to the plans, but I only hear José and Brighton arguing.
“What do you mean he’s not coming?” Brighton snaps.
“I called him on the way over here to see if he wanted a ride, and he told me that he couldn't make it,” José explains.
“This isn’t optional.” Brighton’s voice is exhausted and strained. “He was one of Harvey’s best friends. I shouldn’t even be holding this!” Something gets thrown across the room, a chair maybe, and a loud sigh leaves José, “I’m sorry.”
“Annie said she’ll handle the food, and Leon’s girl can help set up a group to contact anyone who might wanna come to the funeral. Let us handle it. I know this is hard.”
“It’s not hard, it’s bullshit.” He swears before stomping away.
I tried to convince Brighton that working is a terrible idea, but he storms around the Hollow like a black cloud. There’s so much electricity coursing beneath his skin that he’s ready to blow at any second.
“Is he alright?” Boone asks, tossing me a look as he gives a nearby table their food.
“One of his military friends committed suicide.” I swallow tightly.
“Why the hell is he working?” Boone asks, crossing his arms over his chest. It’s moments like this that it's clear they’re twins. They share the same scowl, but Boone uses it so sparingly that it can be easy to forget they are.
“I begged him to go back to bed, but he refused. Said he had too much to do today,” I say.
“I’ll keep my eye on him, see if I can use some Jedi mind trick…” He nudges me, and I give him a pathetic smile in return. I do my rounds, keeping an eye on some rowdy people at the back of the Hollow, and end up at the table where Kaia is sitting with guys from her station.
“He’s still crying about that!” Lee says, leaning on Kaia. “He had to take his truck to Lorette to get them to service it.”
“I hope he transfers out of our district. He’s such a pussy,” Kaia shakes her head and pounds back a shot of tequila.
“He didn’t deserve an angel like Rhea anyway,” Lee flirts. I try to ignore him.
“Shut up, Ramos, you’re too much of a coward to ask her out.
It's the only reason she ended up on a date with that chode.” One of the other guys teases.
Lee Ramos is handsome, all dark hair and tawny skin with sharp green eyes and a smile that makes women weak in the knees.
But he’s goofy and a player. Even if he had, I would have told him to fuck off.
“Rhea.” He pushes up out of the booth and leans against the wall next to me as I try to watch the crowd for trouble. “What do you say?” He’s trying to be cute, but he’s yelling over the music, and my interest is in the way Brighton watches like a hawk.
“Lee, sit down before you get put through a wall,” Kaia warns, but he doesn’t listen.
“Oh, come on, Rhea, just one date. I’ll show you how a real man treats a woman,” he inches closer, but I don’t dare take my eyes off Brighton. He’s gone completely still—like a predator.
“This idiot is being stalked like a field mouse, and he has no idea,” Kaia barks out a string of laughter.
“What the hell are you talking about?” He scoffs and makes the mistake of touching my arm. I blink, a groan leaving my lips, and when I open them, Brighton is gone. Shit.
“Flirting with Reaper is a death wish,” Kaia stands up and backs away from the table. I know what she’s doing because I’m doing the same thing.
“Is that supposed to be cryptic, Keegan?” Lee laughs.
“Nope, that’s a literal problem you’re about to have,” she whips her head around and spots Boone before I do.
She cups her hands over her face, and at the same time as she yells his name, Brighton comes out of the crowd, and without warning, sucker punches Lee in the side of the face.
Lee crumbles to the ground, and I try to lay hands on Brighton, but he’s got blinders on and drives a boot into his side.
“He was just flirting, he’s drunk!” I say loudly, hoping it gets him to stop.
Boone is moving towards us as fast as he can, but the crowd is becoming tight around the commotion, and Brighton is already hauling Lee up by the collar, completely unfazed by the amount of eyes on him.
“Let him go, it was innocent, he wasn’t getting anywhere with it!” I do my best to get between them, but Brighton turns his back on me walking Lee backwards through the sea of bodies toward the front door. “Brighton!” I yell, chasing after them as Lee’s boots scrape clumsily across the floor.
“Shit!” Boone flies out of the crowd from the left and manages to duck beneath his brother’s arm, successfully placing himself between them.
“Let go of him, Bri. You know you’re not angry at this little weasel.
You’re just tired, man,” he urges him to listen.
“Brighton!” He snaps when the calm technique doesn’t work.
“Cut it out!” Something about the phrase makes him stop, and his grip loosens on Lee.
“You out,” Kaia moves fast, cutting Lee off before he can say anything idiotic that might relight the fire that’s been put out. “Now, come on, move your stupid ass.”
Boone works Brighton back and gets him into the kitchen away from everyone’s gaze as Judd screams over the sound of whispers and music that everyone gets a free round.
What the actual fuck just happened?