Page 104 of Wreck Me

And, honestly, neither could I.

16

~Caleb~

It wouldn’t be long now.

That was what I’d been telling myself for the last two weeks when Cas had given the go-ahead for us to get back into our nightly activities, to come together again as The Jackals.

In the Ancient world, jackals were considered gods of the underworld, their calls the sound of death. They were also seen as ruthless and devious slayers, brutal gangsters of the animal kingdom.

In a lot of ways, that symbolism fit us well when we went out under that moniker.

We hunted and punished the sickos in the city, dealing out a merciless brand of justice, sometimes even lethal justice. Our reputation had become so widespread and so feared among the criminal underground that after we’d marked our targets and their place of business with our ‘J’ brand, others steered clear and it had uprooted neighboring businesses time and again, often clearing out whole pockets of the vermin.

Cas and I had started it up during our high school days, shortly after my sister, Hayley, had taken her own life after that fucked-up kidnapping. It wasn’t public knowledge, because my parents had managed to bury it, but what had happened was so much worse than what had even made the headlines seven years ago. She’d been taken outside a nightclub in the entertainment district, kidnapped by three sick and twisted assholes who’d wanted her for ransom, the massive payout my parents, being the hotel tycoons that they were, could give. But they hadn’t just kept her there locked in a room. They’d assaulted her, tortured her with horrifically sexually degrading acts. I’d been dabbling in hacking back then and one of my first successes had been accessing the cameras in the warehouse where they’d had her, shortly after her release. I’d regretted it ever since, because I’d seen everything and it had been imprinted on my brain, a stain that was forever permanent. The things they’d done to her… Jesus Christ.

After my parents had paid the ransom, she’d been released. But she hadn’t been able to live with what they’d subjected her to and my mom had come home from a business trip a few weeks later and found her hanging in her closet, dead to the world.

After that, my grief had quickly morphed to a rage so pure that not only hadn’t I been able to check it, but it had also given birth to that darkness that now lurked just below the surface at all times.

And so Cas and I had started The Jackals so I could purge, so we could take comfort in the deliverance of brutal justice upon all those out there like those motherfuckers.

We’d even gotten them too, all three of them.

They’d suffered the brutal death they’d deserved. We’d made damn sure of that.

After the car accident that had taken so much from Cas and Bastian, we’d brought Bastian in on it too. We’d fucking well needed it at the time too, because I’d become the full embodiment of Wrath and with Caspian being Ruin, bringing in Bastian’s Rein element had absolutely come at the right time to reel us in.

And that had been well and good for years, giving all of us the outlet that we’d needed, until Cas had brought Damien in on it for complex reasons involving protecting Bastian from that bastard’s fury and refocusing him in the process to something more productive.

But his Chaos persona had grown too unhinged and we’d pulled him.

We’d had to lie low because of him nearly exposing us too.

Now, this Shakers op would mark our return to it all.

Thank fuck, because I couldn’t wait much longer.

I’d been itching to get back to it.

Worse than that lately, actually.

With my therapy meets with Skylar, delving into all that talk of the dark, it had triggered it all in me, and it had become increasingly trying to check it all, to keep it tampered down.

Being with Cas for that weekend-long fuck and lovefest had helped, but not quite enough.

I needed to taste that violence, to inflict punishment, to effect justice.

That was the only thing that quelled this demon within me.

It was taking longer than we’d anticipated to set up the op, though, because Cas had been immersed and focused on strategizing the downfall of Elijah Bane with Dante Mancini.

I got that it was his top priority and I couldn’t say anything, because I knew how personal this was for him, for all of us, really—well, Bastian didn’t actually know yet.

And that had delayed the other thing.

Bringing in our fourth.

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