Chapter 17
CHAPTER
SEVENTEEN
I stood near the back.
I wasn’t exactly hidden. I was just . . . unremarkable.
That had always been the trick.
The crowd around me buzzed with excitement—true crime fans craning for a better view, whispering theories to one another, phones lifted in anticipation.
I blended easily into them, another face in a sea of curiosity and morbid fascination.
I liked it that way.
From here, I could see the stage clearly. The lights. The microphones. The podcasters—icons, really, to people who craved answers wrapped in suspenseful storytelling.
I’d listened to them since they started. I knew their voices. Their rhythms. The way they paused before saying something important.
I wondered—briefly, fondly—if my story would make it onto their podcast someday.
It deserved to.
The morning had gone exactly as I’d hoped. My lips curled as I remembered it all.
Gina had run, just as I’d anticipated.
She had run and run and run, lungs burning, feet raw, fear sharpening every sense until the world narrowed to instinct and breath.
I’d given her time. Space. Rules.
I was generous like that.
It never mattered.
None of them ever escaped.
I found all of them eventually.
I’d enjoyed finding Gina.
The way her breathing hitched when she heard me step on a branch behind her.
The way her panic charged the air, shifting from sharp to resigned when she realized I was close.
The way her shoulders shook when she tried—and failed—to hide behind a boulder far too small to conceal her.
It wasn’t just the chase.
It was the moment she understood she had never truly been out of my reach.
That recognition—raw, helpless, inevitable—was the part I savored.
I shifted slightly in my seat as applause rolled through the auditorium again. The sound thrilled me—not because of the performers, but because of the irony.
So many people were obsessed with darkness.
So few recognized when darkness sat beside them.
I smiled again.
On the stage, the podcasters waved.
They were professionals. Confident. Certain they were the ones in control of the narrative.
I almost laughed.
Part Two waited patiently, unfolding already in my mind like a well-loved blueprint. Part Two was always better. More refined. More satisfying.
The anticipation sent a pleasant jolt through me.
I glanced around the crowd, at faces flushed with excitement, minds already racing ahead to twists and revelations. I was right there among them, shoulder to shoulder, unseen. Untouchable.
No one looked twice.
My gaze returned to the stage.
The best was yet to come.
Only nobody knew that yet.
Nobody but me.