Chapter 1 — The Monster I Made

Nicholas Rhodes

The smell of gunpowder always lingers longer than the sound of bullets.

It clings to the air like guilt.

I pushed through the smoke-filled warehouse, boots grinding on broken glass. The echo of distant sirens bled through the night, but I barely heard them. My mind replayed every second of the ambush—every scream, every wrong move, every name I’d lost.

It was supposed to be routine. A simple exchange at Pier 9. Five crates, four men, no witnesses. But someone had fed the Rossis our schedule down to the minute. They’d been waiting for us, hiding behind the freight containers like vultures.

My men had fought hard. Too hard. None of it mattered now.

Marco stumbled toward me, his shirt dark with blood that wasn’t his. “They knew everything, Nick,” he rasped. “Even the backup route. Someone sold us out.”

The words sank in like a knife under the ribs. “Who had the route list?”

“Only a handful. You. Me. Vega.”

Rafael Vega.

The name landed heavier than the smoke in my lungs.

Rafe wasn’t just an enforcer. He was the right hand I’d built my empire around. Sharp. Silent. Loyal—at least, that’s what I’d let myself believe.

I walked past Marco, forcing myself not to look at the bodies scattered across the dock. The harbor lights flickered across the water, mocking me with their calm.

“Check the trackers,” I said. “All of them.”

We found three smashed chips. The fourth—the one Rafe carried—was gone.

---

By morning, every surviving soldier whispered the same thing: Vega sold us out.

I didn’t argue. I didn’t defend him. I couldn’t.

Because every sign pointed to him. The missing tracker. The silenced phone. The empty apartment that looked abandoned days before the hit.

Still, I waited three nights before accepting it. Three nights of staring at the city skyline from my office window, replaying every glance, every word he’d ever said.

“Trust me, boss. I’ve got you.”

I trusted him. And now, twelve men were dead because of it.

When dawn finally bled through the blinds, I poured a drink, let the burn settle in my chest, and made a decision.

“Marco,” I said into the phone. “Find him.”

“What do you want done when we do?”

I stared at my reflection in the glass—eyes hollow, jaw tight. “Bring him to me alive.”

Because killing Rafe outright would be mercy. And I wasn’t merciful anymore.

---

Six months bled away like spilled wine.

The Rhodes name still ruled the city, but I’d changed. My temper had cooled into something colder. The nights stretched longer. Every rumor, every shadow of a man matching Rafe’s description, I followed. Nothing.

The family learned to keep their distance. I didn’t shout anymore. I didn’t drink as much. I simply watched, listened, planned.

Grief turns loud men quiet. It turns trust into paranoia.

I kept a file on my desk labeled VEGA. Inside were reports, half-truths, ghost sightings. He’d vanished across borders, into rumors of South American ports and Eastern European deal circles. None of it real enough to touch.

Until tonight.

Marco burst into my office just past midnight, breathless. “We found him.”

The words barely registered at first. “Where?”

“Southern docks. One of Rossi’s outposts. They were holding him.”

“Alive?”

He nodded. “Barely. Looks like they used him as bait.”

For a moment, everything inside me went still. Then, slowly, the pulse returned—steady, lethal. “Bring him here.”

---

Hours later, the heavy doors of my basement opened, and they dragged Rafe inside.

He looked nothing like the man who’d once stood beside me in tailored suits and quiet confidence. His hair was longer, tangled. His face bruised, eyes sunken but still burning with something that wasn’t fear.

Even broken, he managed to look defiant.

“Leave us,” I said.

The guards hesitated only a second before backing out, the door sealing shut behind them.

The silence that followed was almost holy.

Rafe lifted his head, meeting my gaze. “Guess I’m harder to kill than you thought.”

I should have hit him. I should have screamed. Instead, I walked closer, each step echoing like a countdown.

“You cost me twelve men,” I said quietly. “Twelve families.”

He smiled, weak and crooked. “And yet, you’re still standing.”

My hand twitched. The urge to end it—to make him disappear like the others—burned hot. But beneath the rage, something else pulsed. Something heavier, more dangerous.

Six months of obsession coiled behind my ribs, too tight to breathe.

“Why?” I asked. “Why betray me?”

Rafe’s smile faded. “Would you believe me if I said I didn’t?”

I laughed once, hollow. “No.”

“Then what’s the point of telling you?”

His words hit deeper than they should have. For a heartbeat, the past rushed back—every late-night plan whispered over whiskey, every almost-touch that never quite happened.

I turned away, gripping the edge of the table until my knuckles whitened.

“Tomorrow,” I said, voice cold again. “You’ll tell me everything. And I’ll decide what to do with you.”

He shifted the chains around his wrists, the faintest smirk tugging at his lips. “You already decided the moment you brought me here, Nick.”

I didn’t answer.

Because he was right.

The door slammed shut behind him, leaving me alone with the sound of the rain against the concrete ceiling. It had started to pour again, hard enough to drown the city’s noise. Every drop felt like a countdown I couldn’t stop.

I watched Rafe for a long time. The way his shoulders rose with shallow breaths, the tiny flinch when lightning lit the room. Six months of running had stripped him down to something raw, but his eyes — those dark, reckless eyes — hadn’t changed.

He still looked at me as if I were the one who’d betrayed him.

--

I didn’t sleep that night.

Couldn’t.

I stayed in my office, the city sprawling beneath me like a kingdom I no longer recognized. The Rhodes empire was stronger than ever — territories reclaimed, rivals silenced — yet none of it felt like victory. It felt like surviving out of spite.

Marco found me at dawn, setting a folder on my desk.

“His statement,” he said. “He keeps insisting he didn’t sell us out. Claims the Rossis had an inside informant from our side.”

I flipped the folder open. Rafe’s handwriting scrawled across the pages — uneven, tired, but defiant.

> I took the fall because someone had to. Check the shipment logs from the inside circle. They were altered before I ever saw them.

I closed the file. “And you believe him?”

Marco hesitated. “I don’t know what to believe anymore. But you asked for truth. Maybe this is it.”

Truth.

A word that used to mean something.

---

By the time I went back downstairs, the rain had eased to a steady drizzle. Rafe sat exactly where I’d left him, chained to the steel chair in the center of the room. Someone had cleaned the blood from his face. It made the bruises look worse.

He glanced up when I entered. “You look terrible,” he said.

“So do you.”

“Fair trade then.”

His voice was hoarse, almost gone, but the sarcasm was still there. I hated that part of him — the part that refused to break even when he should have.

I moved closer, resting my hands on the table’s edge. “You wrote that the logs were altered. Who did it?”

Rafe shrugged. “Doesn’t matter now.”

“It matters to me.”

He met my gaze, calm in a way that unnerved me. “If I tell you, you’ll kill them. Then you’ll kill me anyway. So why bother?”

I stared at him, searching for any sign of the man I’d once trusted. But trust was a fragile thing; once broken, it turned everything sharp.

“Tell me, Rafe.”

He shook his head. “You wouldn’t believe me.”

“Try me.”

Something flickered in his expression — a mix of pain and something dangerously close to regret. “The betrayal came from higher up, Nick. Someone feeding information to the Rossis for months. I took the blame because they threatened to go after your sister.”

The room went silent.

My pulse stumbled once before finding its rhythm again. “You expect me to believe you sacrificed everything for me?”

He smiled faintly. “I didn’t do it for you. I did it because she didn’t deserve to die for your father’s mess.”

I took a step back, the floor seeming to tilt. Memories collided — my sister’s sudden disappearance abroad, the coded messages we’d traced but never confirmed. Rafe had been there the whole time, silent, watching.

My voice came out low. “You should have told me.”

“They would’ve killed her before you could blink. You know how this world works.”

I did.

That was the worst part.

---

The rest of the day blurred. I left him there, ordered food sent down, and locked myself in my study again. Every instinct screamed that he was lying — that he’d spun another story to save himself. But another part of me, smaller and quieter, whispered that maybe he was telling the truth.

I’d built my empire on the ability to read people.

So why couldn’t I read him anymore?

Because I didn’t want to.

---

Night fell again.

When I returned, he was asleep, head tilted back against the wall, the faintest shiver running through him. I stood in the doorway longer than I should have, remembering how his laugh used to sound — the rare, unguarded one that never reached anyone else.

Six months of hunting him hadn’t burned that memory out of me.

It had only made it worse.

I stepped closer, the chair scraping when I sat across from him. His eyes opened instantly, sharp even through exhaustion.

“You’re still here,” he said quietly.

“I have questions.”

“I bet you do.”

“Why didn’t you come to me?” I asked. “Why disappear?”

He let out a slow breath. “Because I knew you. You would’ve tried to save everyone, and gotten yourself killed in the process. I needed you alive to keep the syndicate stable.”

“You decided that for me?”

“Someone had to.”

The chains rattled when he shifted, and for the first time, his composure cracked. “I didn’t betray you, Nicholas. I took your bullet before it could hit you. If you’re too blind to see that—”

I slammed my hand on the table. The sound echoed through the basement like a shot. He fell silent, but the words hung there between us, heavy as smoke.

For a long moment, we just stared at each other — two ghosts of the same war.

Finally, I spoke. “You’re lying.”

“Maybe,” he said. “Maybe not.”

---

When I left him that night, I didn’t feel victory. I felt something far worse — uncertainty.

Upstairs, Marco waited by the doorway. “What now, boss?”

“Keep him here,” I said. “No one touches him without my say.”

“And you? What’ll you do?”

I glanced at the rain-streaked windows, the city lights bleeding through like wounds that wouldn’t close. “Find out if what he said is true. If it is…” I hesitated. “Then we’ve been fighting the wrong enemy.”

Marco nodded and left quietly.

I poured another drink and stared into it, seeing only Rafe’s face in the reflection — bruised, stubborn, still burning with that same impossible defiance.

Six months I’d hunted him out of rage.

Now I wasn’t sure if I wanted vengeance — or answers.

Maybe both.

---

When dawn came again, the house was silent except for the ticking of the grandfather clock. I stood by the window, the city bathed in pale gold, and realized something that chilled me more than any betrayal ever could:

I didn’t hate him anymore.

Not the way I should.

And that terrified me.

Because hatred was simple.

Obsession was not.

I looked down at the file labeled VEGA, still open on my desk. My own handwriting stared back at me — the first line I’d written six months ago:

> When I find him, I’ll destroy the monster I made.

I closed the folder, the words blurring as the morning light hit the page.

Maybe the monster wasn’t him after all.

Maybe it was me.