CHAPTER 130: THE BOSS IS GONE

Rico — POV

Fuck.

My pulse jackhammered in my ears as I stared at the tracker screen. The blinking dot that had been Justin’s lifeline, our thread to him — just vanished.

One blink, two... then gone.

My stomach bottomed out.

"No. No, no, no, fuck!"

I scrambled, refreshing the map, punching keys, running diagnostics — maybe it was the signal, maybe a glitch. But deep down, the icy dread in my gut already knew:

They had some kind of jamming device. Military grade or worse. The kind you can’t buy off the damn dark web. The kind only mad scientists and black-ops fuckers use when they really don’t want to be found.

And Justin — fuck — Justin was in that van.

"Boss, what’s happening?" one of the guys barked beside me, weapon half-raised, breathing hard.

"They took him," I ground out, my voice raw, almost choking on the words.

"They fucking took him — and we can’t track him anymore."

The van had already peeled off before we breached the block.

Too late. Always two goddamn steps too late.

He was gone.

And the worst part? Justin didn’t know that.

He’d think we were right behind. That Rico and the team were seconds away from busting down doors, guns drawn, dragging him and June the fuck out of whatever hellhole they’d been shoved into.

But we weren’t.

We were stuck staring at a dead screen, with nothing but stale tire smoke in the air and a tracker that had just flatlined.

"Fuck!"

I slammed my fist into the van wall so hard the metal rang, pain slicing up my arm.

But it barely cut through the panic building in my chest.

Justin had always been the one who kept us steady, the one who charged into fire with that cold, ruthless certainty. And now?

He’d walked straight into the jaws of the beast — trusting me to bring the teeth to fight back.

And I’d lost him.

One of the guys muttered something — I couldn’t hear over the roaring in my head.

I swallowed, forced myself to look at the dark road stretching ahead. Empty now.

The taillights of the van were already gone.

My hands were still on the keyboard, typing commands that wouldn’t fix shit, refusing to accept defeat.

"We can still find him," I barked, voice hoarse, chest tight.

"Pull street cams, traffic feeds, every fucking CCTV in a ten-block radius. That van can’t just vanish."

"But boss, what if they go dark? Rural roads? No cameras?"

"Then we trace tire marks, talk to homeless guys, buy off traffic cops, hack fucking satellites if we have to!"

The words tumbled out, half-rage, half-desperation.

"We’re not losing him. Not after everything."

But the truth clawed at my chest, bitter and cold:

Justin was out there, surrounded by people who knew exactly how to stay hidden.

And he didn’t know we weren’t coming.

Not right now.

Fuck, fuck — he’d be waiting for a rescue that might not come.

Might never come.

For a second, my vision blurred.

I squeezed my eyes shut, nails biting into my palms.

Justin had always been there. Always.

The big brother I never had, the monster you’d rather have on your side than against you.

And now he was gone — and June too — both of them.

My mouth felt dry, tongue thick as stone.

"They planned this," I whispered, realization burning through the haze.

"June was the bait. But Justin... he was the real target."

They wanted him too. And now they had both.

I opened my eyes, knuckles white on the edge of the console.

"All right," I rasped to the team.

"Full sweep. Mobilize everyone. Dig up anything on that van. Call in every favor we’ve got."

"But boss—"

"No buts," I snapped, voice breaking. "Justin’s waiting on us. And June needs him. We don’t stop."

Even if my hands were shaking.

Even if the tracker was dead.

We were still coming.

Because that’s what Justin would do for me.

Because that’s what family fucking does.

Somewhere in the darkness, Justin might be staring at a steel wall, bloodied and cuffed, thinking Rico’s right behind him.

And I had to make damn sure he was right.

"Hold on, brother," I whispered under my breath, chest burning with helpless fury.

"Just hold on a little longer."

Justin had always had our backs.

Always.

Even when he was barely holding on himself, half-eaten by the same darkness that had chewed through all of us.

He made it his mission to keep us out of the cages we’d crawled out of. Made sure that none of the kids he dragged into freedom ever went back behind steel doors, back to white coats and syringes.

He carried that weight like a curse. And now... now he was the one they’d gotten.

And it wasn’t just him. They had June too.

I sat there in the van, staring at the blank tracker screen, my fists clenched so hard my nails cut into my palms. The pain kept me grounded. Kept me from screaming.

Justin had spent years — years — making sure kids like us could go out into the world and breathe free air. Some of them went to college, got jobs, tried to forget. Built normal lives. Because they knew, deep down, if the monsters ever came back...

Justin would be waiting in the shadows, knives drawn, ready to tear them apart.

That’s who he was.

Broken, yeah. Haunted by the shit we all survived. But he never let it drown him completely.

Because he had to protect us.

And now he was the one caught.

I kept thinking about the look he must’ve had when the tracker died — the moment he realized we weren’t there. That maybe... this time... there wouldn’t be anyone to drag him out.

Fuck.

It felt like someone had taken a blade to my chest and was twisting.

He saved me too.

People think I was always his second, his right hand. They don’t know that when I came out of that facility, I was a wreck. Couldn’t sleep. Couldn’t stop shaking. Couldn’t even speak without stuttering so bad the words fell apart.

Justin was the one who stayed up at night, sitting on the floor outside my room, so I wouldn’t feel alone. The one who taught me how to fight — not just with fists and blades, but to fight the monsters in my head.

He never let me forget who I was.

And now? Now I didn’t know who he’d be by the time we got to him.

They had June.

And June... June was his one soft spot.

His Achilles’ heel.

The only thing that could cut through all the armor he’d built over the years. The thing that could bring him to his knees.

I’d seen it the first time I caught them together, before they were even "together." The way he looked at her. Like the whole fucked-up world could burn as long as she kept breathing.

And they knew that.

That’s why they took her. Not because she was number twelve, not really. But because she was Justin’s.

I ran my hand over my face, the skin slick with sweat.

We’d raided five facilities in three days. Five. Each time hoping — praying — that June would be there, chained to some table, alive but saveable.

Each time we came up empty.

And with every dead end, I watched something dark coil tighter around Justin’s shoulders. His voice got rougher, his hands steadier — too steady, like a man already dead inside. The bloodlust came creeping back.

I knew the signs.

He was close to losing it.

Even before they took him, I was terrified. Terrified that if we did find June, he wouldn’t be the man she loved anymore. That he’d be all blade and fury, no heart left.

And now?

Now I didn’t even know if he’d still be Justin by the time we reached him.

Especially if they used June against him.

I’d seen what the labs could do. How they could break a person, rebuild them into something monstrous. They’d tried it on me, on dozens of us. And they’d almost succeeded.

Justin lasted the longest. They hated that.

They tortured him because they couldn’t tame him.

But if they had June — if they put her in front of him, bleeding, screaming...

I didn’t know if even he could hold out.

I scrubbed a hand over my face again, trying to breathe past the tightness in my chest.

He always carried us. Now it was our turn to carry him — but we were stumbling, blind, behind him. And that thought — that we’d fail him the way the world failed us — made me want to smash my fists through the windshield.

The van rattled over a pothole. One of the guys in the back shifted uncomfortably. No one spoke. The silence was heavy, filled with shared fear none of us dared voice.

I finally found my voice, low and cracked:

"He kept us free."

They all looked at me.

"He kept us out. He gave us normal."

One nodded, swallowing hard. Another looked away, his jaw clenched.

"We owe him."

Justin always said the only way to kill what they did to us was to live. Go to college, fall in love, have kids. Build something. Be something.

He never let himself have that. Because someone had to watch the door. Someone had to stay a monster so the rest of us could stay human.

And now the monster had been dragged back into the dark.

My chest ached so bad it felt like my ribs would crack.

They took the one person who’d never stopped fighting. And they had June — his tether to humanity.

If they turned her into a weapon against him...

God.

I didn’t know what would be left of Justin.

I took a breath, my lungs burning.

"We’re gonna get him back," I told the team, even if I wasn’t sure I believed it.

"Whatever it takes."

No one argued. Because what else was there?

Outside, the night stretched dark and endless.

I couldn’t help thinking that somewhere in that dark, Justin was kneeling on concrete, blood in his mouth, waiting.

And June — poor fucking June — might already be too broken to recognize him.

But he’d always believed in us.

Now it was our turn.

Even if he wasn’t whole when we found him.

Even if she wasn’t whole.

Even if they used June to break him.

We still had to go.

Because Justin was our shield. And now he needed us.

And God help them — because if they broke him...

We’d burn the whole fucking world to get him back.