71. Raphael
Raphael
I’LL UNLEASH THE FORCE OF A BLACK HOLE FOR HER…
Citizen Soldier Playlist
“The Devil Inside”
My suspicion.
Jude’s sharp eye.
Rory’s wild idea.
Vincent’s strength.
And Seth’s ingenuity.
All five of us. Together, we are the reason we’re still breathing. I know this. I repeat it like a mantra, forcing logic to override instinct. Because cold, hard facts are the dam against the rising flood of wrath. Wrath I wanted to unleash on Jude in that cavern.
The flood was rising fast.
A single word from him, and I would’ve broken the levee myself.
Vincent stepped in just in time.
I cannot forget the past goddamn ten years we’ve worked together, lived together. No, not lived. We’ve survived.
Until her.
Always gods and monsters, but we had little to no purpose, no legacy, no scars but the ones on our backs—and the psychological ones we shared from our past.
Until her.
We were just chains without purpose—forged in trauma and fire, unbroken, but bound to nothing.
Until her.
As the Prophet’s SUV burns with the newly expired body doubles, we embark into the woods near the mine, get inside the tunnel, and make our way to our alternate supply pickup location.
Silence thickens. The dank, stale air drifts all around us when we should be surrounded by the scent of burning firewood, pine needles, and Briella.
We would have spent the night in one bed.
Me before her. Rory at her back. Jude and Vincent on each side of her legs, and Seth curled up at her feet like a faithful worshiper.
We would have risen with the dawn, fucked her till she couldn’t walk before a shower and a grand Christmas feast for breakfast.
And I am ultimately to blame. My responsibility. The moment I discovered the tracker, I should have done more than Protocol X. Too fucking overconfident in the ten years we spent reinforcing this place.
I underestimated this Prophet.
I should have planned for a good offense as the best defense. Take the fight to him first.
At the very least, I should have planned a retreat. We would have been on the run, but she would have been with us. She would be safe.
None of us speaks a word, but the tension could fill a canyon. The unspoken need burning inside all of us to reclaim our Queen. Except, it’s fire and ice in my system and the worst goddamn thirst I’ve ever had.
The old mining tunnel comes out in the middle of the woods. We wait for a few minutes, ensuring no drone activity.
After a mile of walking, we reach the fire watch tower under the cover of night. It rises like a skeleton out of the trees, all steel and shadow, barely holding together. It creaks in the wind—high, haunted. Perfectly overlooked.
We duck under the black branches as the tower groans above us.
Inside, the air is stale with dust and old ash. Seth sweeps for vermin. Jude sets up the comms. Vincent peels off to the corner and pulls out his phone. “I’m calling in the code. Barn’s live. I left the door key under the trough.”
I nod. Provided all goes well—it must, there is no other choice—we will return to gather as many belongings as possible, including the animals, then find an alternate location. We begin again. We rebuild. Our Queen at our side.
Unrolling the map across the rotting desk near the busted window, I inspect the distance to Easthaven.
The blueprints come next—printed from Briella’s thumb drive.
I already knew. I spent a full hour inspecting every potted plant until I found the tech.
If I were less of a bastard, I would have shared my pride in her.
But I was too protective, too possessive.
When any thoughts of her past already threatened to pollute her place with us, I would never share any of my knowledge of that past.
Jude sets his medical bag on the opposite end of the table, gaze roaming over the blueprints. They’ve got the Prophet’s whole damn compound sketched in holy arrogance. I smooth my palm over the page. Every hall. Every blind spot. Every hidden door he never thought we’d find.
Rory’s pacing. Back and forth. Heavy boots on wood, floorboards whining with every pass. His cleaver’s strapped to his back, and his jaw is locked tight enough to crack.
“He’s hurting her,” he growls without stopping, hands clenched into iron fists.
“I know.”
He pivots, stomps again. “You don’t understand—”
“I said I know.” I cut sharply.
He stops.
I don’t look at him. Just keep tracing the path to the compound with my finger, the red ink I used to mark potential breach points. “You’ll get your chance,” I say quietly. “When the drones shift, and Alden’s men move out, we move.”
He doesn’t speak, but I hear the crackle of his leather gloves as he flexes his hands—like he’s already wrapping them around the Prophet’s throat.
Soon.
I fold the blueprints, sliding them back into my coat like a promise.
We take her back.
And this time, no one walks away clean.
“Rory.” Seth steps in front of his partner, cutting through Rory’s fury. “Need to take the edge off?”
Rory snorts. “Thanks, Lad. But I’m saving all my edge for her. When the time comes…”
He doesn’t need to finish. When push comes to shove, when the beast is truly off his leash, Rory is more dangerous than I. Not as effective. Not as deadly. But dangerous, yes. Unpredictable and crazed as a firestorm.
Vincent is the volcano. The pressure building over time until it erupts with terrifying force. Relentless and destructive when pushed.
Seth is the lightning. Brilliant nd impossible to ignore. But targeted strikes. Fast and hard, driven by emotion and fire, lighting up the sky with fury when the people he loves are threatened.
Jude is the undertow. Unseen and patient, he pulls you under before you even realize you’re drowning. Calculated and lethal in silence.
And I? I am the eclipse. The sudden darkness falling like a divine omen, shifting the world into stillness and dread. A force that changes everything simply by showing up. The one who strangles the senses, filling every cold space in my being.
Driven to such a state, the hunter in me strikes, the predator targeting my wrath in a way I never have.
“Get on your knees,” I bark at my partner, blood raging too much.
His jaw turns to steel. He knows the implication in my voice, the abuse I want to inflict.
Vincent steps toward him, but his brutal eyes are directed at me. I know he fully intends to play the oldest card, but Jude holds up a hand, staying his partner.
Rory and Seth stiffen, observing the showdown, not interfering.
When I don’t back down, Jude turns his whole body toward mine. He stands taller, using every inch against me. His muscles flex as he sets his hands on his hips. Head high and chest swelling, he stares me down. “No, Raphael.”
The ice in me spreads. I don’t move. He doesn’t want to see me move.
The tension grows thicker, too thick. It suffocates me. The tension threatens to tear the bond of brotherhood. And I am the one feeding it.
Jude is trying to bleed it out, slowly, carefully, like poison from a wound.
I clench my hand into a fist at my side. Still not moving. Normally, Jude is my rook. My right hand. But now? We are both kings on the board.
His eyes sharpen to black blades, his neck muscles throbbing. “We’ve fucked in anger. We’ve fucked in madness. We’ve fucked in sin and suffering. But we have never fucked in hatred.”
“I cannot feel love,” I remind him.
Jude steps closer, lowering his head toward me. I still don’t flinch. Or blink. But those black blades throw down—like iron sharpening iron.
While his hands quiver, he is wise not to touch me.
“I will not let your pain turn you into the damn monster we all destroyed together.”
Fuck.
He is stronger than I tonight. It’s irrefutable. He does not conquer my strength. Or smother it. This is Jude, the healer, personified.
The same healer who once moved through that fucked up orphan’s home, patching me up night after night, whispering reassurances while the world outside forgot we existed.
And on the night we came for him—freed him from that prison transport—he was too far gone. Too injured.
He needed blood.
And we are the same type.
He talked me through it—barely conscious, still directing me like it was any other procedure. We used a length of tubing and a syringe. Improvised a drip from my vein to his.
We cauterized the wound to stop the worst of the bleeding.
He stayed alive. Because he always does.
Even half-dead, he wouldn’t stop fighting to live.
He is fighting for us all now. But most of all, he’s fighting for me, the way I fought for him that night.
Blood brothers.
Jude has never been a vessel for my hate—never just something to pour it all into.
He is the transfusion. Our bond. Not a vessel for my rage, but the one who took part of me into himself and didn’t let it kill him.
He absorbed it. My fury, my fear, the worst of me.
And still, he stayed whole.
He didn’t just survive me. He made space for me inside him.
And somehow, we’re both still alive.
When he binds a strong hand around my neck, I freeze. His head bows to mine, a moment of depth, of intimacy I do not deserve. One I will reject. Because I cannot feel it the way he does. I cannot process it. But he does not deserve my hate.
And I am not ready to let go of my wrath.
Like Rory, I am saving every icy drop for her, on behalf of her.
The eclipse will be blacker than ever.
I’ll unleash the force of a black hole for her, obliterating everyone and everything in my path.
Even if it means I swallow her whole.