33. ~Caleb~

Screw this waiting shit.

I hadn't needed to wait on Caspian's people to track Bastian down.

I'd put my skills to good use and found him my own way.

Sure, I'd broken dozens of laws doing it, hacking into things that would've surely put me on several watchlists if I'd been caught. Or in a dark hole somewhere.

But the point was that I'd gotten results.

And now I was here at the designated location, a small abandoned textiles factory.

Waiting in the shadows, I watched as my opening finally came in the form of a guy in loose black sweats stepping out of the rear steel door and firing up a smoke.

Adrenaline thrummed through me, fueling me, as I burst from my concealment, and sprinted at top speed toward the guy.

By the time he spotted me, it was too late, I was already upon him.

I slapped my hand over his mouth, shoving the lit cigarette inside in the process, making him flail and panic as it burned him from the inside out. Then I shoved my gun into his upper back and fired, blowing a hole through his back, right on target for his heart, the sound muffled by his body and the silencer I'd equipped to my piece.

I released him roughly as he sank to the concrete in a heap.

Fucking dead.

One down, many more to go.

I turned away and rushed to the rear door of the building that was now unlocked thanks to him.

I flattened my back against it, readying my gun and peering around the corner.

Just like on the plans I'd managed to pull up, there was a long corridor that led into the actual floor of the factory. There were two doors either side on the way through to the main area, housing four smaller rooms.

The way was clear.

For now.

I pushed inside, stalking down the corridor, my gun at the ready, prepared to fire at any moment and blow these shitheads away.

There was no restraint on my end right now.

I was Wrath personified.

They'd taken my fucking brother!

All this time, I'd been trying to fight against my darker nature and all it had done was lead to this.

Fuck, no!

I was done!

Just as I reached the first door, a shithead dressed in sweats just like the other came strolling out without a care in the world, no clue I'd infiltrated the place. Even his firearm was holstered at his hip.

I was there in the next moment, shoving him into the wall face first, my knee digging into his back, hand fisted in his hair, holding him there with my full strength. He tried to struggle, but it was useless against my power, especially when I was hopped up on rage and vengeance like this, when I'd let the dark take me all the fucking way.

"Where the fuck is he?" I snarled. "Where's Sebastian?"

"Not telling you shit," he choked back.

I ground his face against the rough concrete, scraping away his flesh, blood staining the thing. He struggled and screamed. "Where?" I demanded.

"Jett… he'll kill… me."

"I'm the one you should be worried about." I scraped his face some more. "Now, where?"

"The other side… through the factory… there's another corridor… locked door."

"And Jett?"

"Fuck knows."

So he wasn't still here then.

I snarled, then shoved the muzzle of my gun into his temple and pulled the trigger.

His brains exploded all over the wall, blood spraying my cheek. Mmm. Now we were really getting to the good stuff.

I released him as his corpse hit the floor.

I spun and continued stalking down the corridor.

Coming B.

The slamming against the wall and my demands had alerted the others as I found out in the next second when the other three doors opened and a guy from each rushed out. If that wasn't enough, another two rounded the corner onto the corridor from the opposite side.

Here we go.

With a roar, one of them came at me slapping a metal baseball bat into his palm. He was closely followed by another with a crowbar. Looked like they wanted the up close and personal violence of hand-to-hand combat like I did, especially considering they both had a Beretta each holstered at their hips like the other guy.

Bring it, motherfuckers.

Before they made it to me, I fired off two quick shots to two of the three just behind them, blowing their skulls to shit in seconds.

It fired the remaining ones up, and had the third more cautious one joining the party and pulling out a blade.

With a roar, they came at me, the one with the baseball bat reaching me first.

He swung at my head and I ducked, the miss destabilizing him, and I used it to my advantage, coming up, snagging his bat-wielding arm, then spinning into him and shoving the weight at my back into his chest, loosening his hold on the bat enough to rip it from his grasp. I turned and smashed it into his head. A delicious crack sounded as his skull sustained severe damage and he fell against the corridor wall, throwing his hands out behind him in a desperate bid to maintain his balance. I swung the bat again, sweeping it at his legs and ripping them right out from under him. As he collapsed, I didn't get the chance to finish him off when Crowbar came at me. He swung and missed as I jumped back.

And then I was roaring and slamming my body weight into him, snagging the weapon and driving him into the opposite wall to his buddy. I thrust my knee into his gut, making him grunt and his grip loosen around the weapon.

Not enough, though, and then the guy with the knife was there already. I threw my free hand out and shoved him back. But he bounced back quickly and as I brutally twisted Crowbar's wrist, hearing a definitive crack and a shriek from him, and ripped the crowbar from his grasp, a white-hot pain tore into my arm as the knife plunged into my flesh.

It was a sharp motherfucker, even penetrating through layers of my tactical gear.

And it was a big mistake on the asshole's part, because I didn't react to pain like most others.

It dragged me deeper into that dangerous headspace.

With a snarl, I grabbed his wrist and drove the blade deeper, his eyes shooting wide in some real shock as I got off on it.

It compromised his focus and his grip and I wrenched the blade free.

And then I became that thing… Wrath in all its twisted and depraved glory.

It was all a blur of fiery red, a cacophony of screams and desperate pleas, as I wielded the crowbar and the blade against the remaining hostiles still alive and kicking.

Bones crushing.

Flesh tearing.

Blood spurting and spraying.

Shrieks fueling the violence and brutality.

When I finally started to come out of it, I found myself in a sea of bodies, smashing the crowbar repeatedly into one of their faces, the guy in question already dead to the world with his entire face and skull caved in, completely unrecognizable now.

I dropped the crowbar and it clattered to the ground with a haunting finality.

I staggered back.

Blood dripped from my hands.

It painted my face, slicked my tactical gear.

I was panting heavily as I took in the carnage all around me.

Bastian!

I sucked in a couple of steadying breaths, then stepped on the carpet of corpses and made my way further into the facility.

"Bastian!" I thundered through the place. "Bastian!"

I'd almost searchedthe entire factory, just one more door to go.

I hadn't encountered any further hostiles.

Turned out they'd all come out to meet my arrival. Stupid decision on their part.

Lambs to the fucking slaughter.

Just like they'd deserved.

I hadn't found Jett anywhere. It looked like he'd taken off. That hostile had been telling the truth.

I reached the last door and yanked at the handle. It was locked, so I fired off a shot, tearing through it.

Then I shoved it open, my gun at the ready.

My gaze landed on Bastian.

He was strapped to a chair, his head lolled forward.

"Bastian!" I cried, rushing over there.

I tipped his chin up and an awful shudder rolled through me as his eyes met mine and I saw how dilated his pupils were, how glazed, how fucking high.

I scanned him rapidly and saw the puncture mark from a needle.

"Jesus Christ," I choked. That motherfucker had shot him up.

With Bastian's history and what he'd been struggling with recently, it was beyond sick.

"Cal?" he slurred. "Carry me… to bed… it's late."

"We're not home yet, brother. We will be soon, though. It's gonna be okay. You're gonna be okay."

A sliver of awareness lit his eyes. "Jett?"

"That's right. He's gone. His men are down. I'm getting you out of here right now." With that, I pulled out a blade, then ripped through the ties binding him to the chair.

As I gathered him to me, taking the majority of his weight, because he could barely even put one foot in front of the other, his quiet, unsteady voice echoed around the room. "Elijah Bane… he killed them… did you… did you… know?"

Fuck.

Footsteps sounded, thankfully interrupting a conversation I both didn't want to have, and which Bastian was absolutely in no state to have.

In the next moment, Caspian's men barreled into the room. With him at the forefront.

He studied Bastian, and the horror on his face smashed into mine.

I could see it taking him a shit-ton of effort not to comment on it.

That would draw Bastian's attention to it and scare him while he was like this and high out of his mind.

So then, Cas focused right on me.

And right away I saw the accusation there.

He knew my work.

He knew it was me who'd put those motherfuckers down.

To say he wasn't pleased was a major understatement.

"Fall back," he told his guys. "Get our doc in here ASAP for Bastian, then call in the cleaners."

They nodded at once, then headed out to do his bidding.

Cas strode up to me and Bastian. "What you did out there… fuck, it crossed a major line."

Yeah, it had.

It really had.

I hadn't been able to stop.

I'd wanted their pain, their blood, their screams.

I'd wanted their lives.

It had gone way too far and I'd relished it so much more than I ever had before.

I'd let the dark take me all the way.

Even now, I could feel it.

It had its claws in me deep.

And the worst part was, I wasn't sure I wanted to fight it.

Fortunately, his phone rang, taking his attention. He took the call. "Luke? Yes, we have Bastian and—what? When? What's the damage? Fuck. All right, secure the areas and commence damage control protocol. And tell the team to move faster—find the motherfucker! Fucking well find him!"

"What's happened?" I asked as he hung up and fisted his free hand.

"Three of my holdings have been hit in quick succession."

"Shit, Cas," I breathed. "You think it's Jett?"

He nodded. "The timing is too coincidental."

"It's a distraction—all of it, including taking Bastian and directing a shitload of your resources and attention to tracking him down," I reasoned. "Shit, he's using it as a smokescreen."

Cas pulled at his hair in distress. "Jett is in the city."