Chapter 7: Escalation
The basement door at Mooney's was open.
Not wide—just a crack, maybe six inches. Enough for sound to escape, for light to spill up the narrow staircase. I stood in the fiction section, pretending to browse Hemingway, watching through gaps in the shelves.
Joe descended those stairs carrying a laptop bag.
My Detection had been pinging all morning—cold, focused, intensifying. Something was different today. Joe's energy wasn't just patient anymore. It was hungry.
I waited three minutes after he disappeared, then drifted toward the back of the store. The other employee—young guy, early twenties, name tag reading "Ethan"—was absorbed in his phone at the counter. Didn't notice me slide closer to the basement door.
Voices. Too muffled to make out words.
Then Joe's laugh. That practiced, charming sound I'd heard him use on customers. But there were no customers down there.
I angled my body, used the reflection in a glass display case to see what I could.
The door had shifted wider. Through the gap, I caught a glimpse of Joe sitting at a workbench, hunched over something. Not his laptop. Something smaller.
A phone.
Pink case. Cracked corner. Stickers on the back—I couldn't make out the designs from this distance, but I didn't need to. I'd seen that phone before. In Beck's hand, outside the coffee shop. In photos on her Instagram.
Joe had Beck's phone.
My stomach dropped.
He scrolled through it with the casual ease of someone reading their own messages. Tilting the screen, squinting at photos, occasionally typing something—notes, probably, recording what he found.
The invasion had already begun. While I'd been researching Benji's company, sending emails to LA distributors, playing the long game—Joe had leapfrogged ahead. He had access to her entire life now. Her conversations, her photos, her location data.
I backed away from the door slowly. Forced my body to move naturally. Picked up a random book, carried it to the counter, paid with cash.
Ethan barely looked at me. "Have a good one."
"Thanks."
Outside, the air tasted metallic. Anxiety, probably. I walked three blocks before letting myself think.
How did he get it?
Stolen? Unlikely—Beck would notice. Cloned? Possible, if he'd had physical access long enough to install software. Or maybe he'd just hacked her iCloud. Joe was smart. Patient. The kind of person who learned skills for specific purposes.
It didn't matter how. What mattered was the timeline.
I'd been thinking in weeks. Joe was thinking in days.
The next forty-eight hours became a surveillance marathon.
I tracked Joe's movements with obsessive precision, logging everything in my Memory Palace. The patterns emerged faster now—my Pattern Recognition was sharpening with use, connections forming without conscious effort.
Monday, 7:15 AM: Joe walked past Beck's apartment. Not stopping, not staring. Just... present.
Monday, 11:30 AM: Joe appeared outside NYU's creative writing building. Beck had class until noon. He bought coffee from a cart, drank it slowly, left five minutes before she emerged.
Monday, 6:45 PM: Joe at Beck's gym. Not inside—watching through the window from across the street. Timing her workout.
Tuesday followed the same pattern. Different locations, same purpose. Joe was mapping Beck's life from the outside while reading her private thoughts on the inside.
The Detection hummed constantly now. Cold pressure at the base of my skull, like standing too close to an open freezer. Not immediate danger—Joe wasn't planning violence yet—but the focus was absolute. Beck had become his entire world.
And Benji was still in the crosshairs.
I spotted Joe following Benji twice. Once outside Artisan Elixirs, once near a bar in the Village. Joe kept his distance, but the intent was clear. He was cataloging the obstacle, preparing solutions.
My email to Pacific Grove had been answered—a polite acknowledgment, promise to look into the opportunity. Not a commitment. Not fast enough.
I needed to push harder.
Thursday afternoon, I made a decision.
The bell chimed as I entered Mooney's. Joe looked up from the counter, customer-service smile already in place.
"Welcome. Looking for anything specific?"
Play it natural. You're nobody. Background noise.
"Just browsing," I said. "Friend mentioned this place. Said you had interesting stuff."
Joe's smile warmed slightly. Pride in the store, maybe. Or pleasure at being recommended. "We try. Fiction? History? Something rarer?"
"Classics, I guess. Whatever you'd recommend for someone who hasn't read much lately."
He stepped out from behind the counter—closer now, inside my personal space but not invasive. The Detection screamed cold. I kept my face blank.
"Honest answer?" Joe tilted his head. "Start with something that respects your intelligence but doesn't demand too much. The Count of Monte Cristo. It's a revenge story, technically, but really it's about patience and transformation. Best book ever written about becoming who you need to be."
The words landed strangely. Joe talking about transformation. About becoming.
"Sounds heavy."
"It's a page-turner, actually. Dumas knew what he was doing." Joe moved to a shelf, pulled down an older edition—not valuable, but quality. "This one's a good translation. Unabridged."
I took the book. Our fingers didn't touch, but I felt the proximity like static electricity. My Social Invisibility strained under his attention. He was looking at me now—really looking, not the dismissive glance from before.
"Do I know you?"
My pulse spiked. Kept it off my face.
"Don't think so. I'm new to the neighborhood."
Joe studied me for another half-second. Then the customer-service mask slid back into place. "Must be one of those faces. Let me know if you need anything else."
"Will do."
I paid cash. Twenty-three dollars for a book and a cover story. Cheap, all things considered.
Outside, I walked two blocks before allowing myself to breathe properly. The Social Invisibility had held, but barely. Joe's attention had snagged on something—maybe just paranoia, maybe something more.
I'd made contact. Established myself as a customer, a reason to appear in his orbit again if needed.
But I'd also put myself on his radar.
The math was shifting. I needed Benji gone before Joe decided to act.
That night, I read The Count of Monte Cristo.
Joe's recommendation. A gift from a murderer.
The book was good. Better than good—compelling, propulsive, the kind of story that demanded you turn pages. Edmond Dantès, betrayed and imprisoned, slowly transforming into the Count. Patient revenge executed over decades.
I understood why Joe liked it. The fantasy of becoming someone else. The righteous punishment of people who'd wronged you. The protagonist who was always three steps ahead.
Joe probably saw himself in the Count.
The irony wasn't lost on me. I was doing the same thing—transforming, planning, trying to stay ahead. The difference was targets. Joe hunted innocents. I hunted Joe.
Was that enough of a difference?
I closed the book at 2 AM, logged the title in my Memory Palace along with everything else I knew about Joe's preferences. Literary fiction. Classics. Stories about transformation and revenge.
Understanding the monster meant understanding what fed it.
The book sat on my nightstand when I finally turned off the light. A reminder that time was running out, and LA wasn't going to save anyone fast enough.
Tomorrow, I'd find Benji Donovan and convince him to abandon everything.
Simple.
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