Shadows swallowed the last slivers of moonlight. The darkness pulsed, alive.
They were close.
I pressed a trembling hand over my mouth, choking down a sob. If they found me, they wouldn’t just kill me. They’d tear me apart. I’d die tasting my own screams.
A thud. Then another.
Terror paralyzed me. My body refused to move, refused to listen. The air stank of sweat and blood, thick with the promise of death.
A gunshot.
Silence followed with that weird ominous eeriness. The kind of silence that lingers before the final scream.
And then-
A voice. Low. Amused. Cruel.
“She’s here.”
My blood ran cold.
Hands wrenched me from the shadows before a scream through my lips. “Let me go!”
I was hauled by the back of my shirt from the pit. A guard yanked me forward. I thrashed, and kicked, but he was too strong.
“Gotcha,” he sneered twisting my hands behind my back as my back arched in pain. Panic clawed up my throat. His fingers dug into my skin as he started to drag me away. I was about to kick him and accept rolling down the cliff when suddenly his hold loosened followed by a gunshot.
The guard jerked. His grip slackened. A perfect hole bloomed between his brows. His body swayed before crumpling like a broken puppet.
I gasped, stumbling back, my hands slick with his blood.
The night swallowed the echoes of the shot and my pounding heart. My breath came in ragged gasps as I whipped around, searching-
And then I saw it.
A silhouette between the trees.
The shadows shifted, and he stepped forward.
My breath hitched.
Ralph Romano.
The fire behind him flickered in his cold green eyes. He looked me up and down with his unreadable eyes and I didn’t know if I should be grateful or terrified. But I barely registered him because behind him, standing stiffly was another person I least expected to see.
“Kyle…”
Before I could think, I was moving-or maybe I was falling.
Sobs tore through me as I collided with his chest. My body trembled, but it wasn’t just from pain. It was from the unbearable gravity of everything-the fear, the helplessness, the suffocating loneliness gnawing at my ribs like a caged animal.
I didn’t care about the fire in my lungs, the sharp sting of my twisted ankle, or the way my ribs ached with every breath.
I just needed this. A tether. A touch. Proof that I was still here. That I hadn’t been swallowed by the dark.
My fingers curled into his shirt, clinging like a drowning soul grasping at driftwood in an endless sea. If I let go, I might sink. If I let go, I might disappear.
Kyle stiffened against me and knowing this may be awkward for him, I didn’t care. “Uh-” He patted my back. “Okay. You need to breathe-”
“He’s going to kill him!” I sobbed, shaking and pulling away just to look at him. He flinched maybe witnessing the horror in my eyes, cause his jaw tightened. “Lucius-he’s planning something, Kyle! You have to take Judas away-”
Kyle pulled back slightly, gripping my shoulders. His face was grim. And cold. Brows furrowed, and lips set in a straight line. “We don’t know if Judas is here,” he said carefully. “We didn’t see him.”
A chill crawled down my spine.
I pulled away and turned to Ralph who just looked at the man he just killed with a strange look in his eyes. “Mr Romano…”
He didn’t look at me. “He’s here.”
Kyle frowned. “What?”
Ralph gestured.
“Look at this.”
We turned.
The warehouse burned, flames clawing at the night sky. And in front of it-
Corpses.
Burning.
My stomach lurched. Bile rose to my throat as I stumbled back. The fire crackled, hungrily devouring what was left of the bodies. The smell of charred flesh coated my tongue.
Kyle exhaled sharply. “Jesus Christ.”
My pulse pounded in my ears. This wasn’t just death. This was erasure. A deliberate, brutal cleansing of existence itself.
I wanted to scream. To scrub the image from my mind, to unsee it, unknow it. But it was too late. It was burned into me, just like them.
Judas did it?
Now that I saw it-really saw it-I realized I never knew him at all.
Not the monster him.
Not this him.
Never him.
I had seen Judas angry, violent, and merciless. But this-this was something else entirely. This wasn’t just revenge. This was obliteration. The air around me felt wrong. My skin prickled as if my body itself was rejecting the truth.
He burned them.
Judas burned them alive.
I swayed on my feet. My hands trembled.
No. No. He wouldn’t-
But he had.
Because it was necessary.
I exhaled shakily, the horror of it pressing down on me, sinking into my bones like a sickness. But beneath that horror, something else curled, something dark and numb and sickeningly accepting.
They deserved it.
I blinked.
They would have done worse.
Judas did what had to be done.
The flames roared louder, and suddenly, I couldn’t feel anything at all until Ralph’s voice snapped me out of reality.
“Get her out of here. I’ll handle the rest.”
I looked at Ralph who was unloading his gun and checking the bullets. He was going to fight the remaining men alone? If something happens to him…
“No!” I yanked free from Kyle’s grip. “Please, come with us….”
His green eyes flicked to mine. The cold irises turned soft for a moment. “Don’t worry about me. Worry about yourself.” He exhaled sharply. “For once, let me do something for my son.”
My chest tightened. There was something bitter in his voice, something raw. Something he didn’t want the world to know. I swallowed hard.
Kyle didn’t wait. He swept me into his arms, carrying me as I thrashed. “Stop fighting, dammit,” he gritted out.
“I can walk-!”
“Yeah? And let you run back into danger? Not happening.”
I clung to his shirt as he moved quickly through the trees watching as Ralph clicked his gun and ran towards the burning warehouse. My heartbeat refused to slow.