Page 19 of Can't Stop Watching
"You need a fucking therapist, Wolfe," I mutter, but my brain's already running the inventory.
Directional microphone—I've got a Takstar SGC-598 in my trunk that could pick up conversations through her window from here. Pair it with my night vision monocular, I'd have eyes and ears. Simple. Effective.
Completely fucked up.
I pace the rooftop, gravel crunching under my boots like bones. This building has line of sight, structural integrity, minimal foot traffic. It's perfect. I could plant a MURS radiotransceiver near her window—small enough to look like a cable box, strong enough to transmit clear audio to this rooftop.
I could watch her eat breakfast. Hear her sing in the shower. Know if she cries herself to sleep.
The thought of her crying twists something inside me. I've seen men die and felt a lot less than this.
"What the fuck is wrong with me?" I whisper to the night, but the city doesn't answer. Cities never do. They just watch, like me, collecting secrets no one asked for.
I sit on the edge of the roof, legs dangling over six stories of darkness, and pull out my phone again. I could order the few spare items and upgraded gadgets I need right now. One-day shipping. By tomorrow night, I'd know her favorite songs, how she talks to herself when she thinks no one's listening.
I thumb through listing, adding items: RF detector to sweep for competing surveillance, mobile hotspot to create a secure connection, a new weatherproof case for the equipment, just in case.
This isn't protection. It's not even professional curiosity. It's something darker, something that lived in my father, something I swore I'd never become.
My finger hovers over "Proceed to checkout."
One tap, and I cross a line I can't uncross.
I take the final step, tap the button, and the rush hits me like a drug. It feels exhilarating, intoxicating, yet it’s laced with a heavy dose of guilt. A high from the thrill of crossing that line, followed by the weight of knowing I’m spiraling into something I shouldn't.
I let out a sharp breath, staring at the screen like it just handed me a loaded gun. Obsession is a strong word—stronger than I ever thought I'd apply to myself. I’ve spent my life in control, tracking down bad people and dismantling their schemes. Yet here I am, becoming the monster I vowed to hunt.
My heart races, each beat drumming a different narrative in my head: Lila's laughter at the bar, her tentative smile when she thought no one was watching. The way her green eyes shimmered with something unspoken when she caught me staring. All those moments stack up like dominoes, each one pushing me closer to this reckless decision.
“What the hell am I doing?” I mutter into the night air. The wind whips around me, carrying my doubts away but leaving an undercurrent of excitement thrumming in my veins.
I lean back on my hands, feet still dangling over the edge of the rooftop. The city hums below—voices blend into a murmur that almost soothes my chaotic thoughts. I picture Lila tucked away in her apartment, maybe studying or writing something for class, her freckled face furrowed in concentration.
But then there’s that other image: her cowering against that frat boy’s grip—the fear etched across her features. Something inside me snaps at the thought.
“You’re not saving her,” I whisper harshly to myself. “You’re stalking her.” But deep down, I know it feels more like protecting and a twisted sense of justice sparks inside me.
I stand up abruptly and pace along the rooftop's edge again, hands running through my hair as frustration mounts. This isn’t who I am. It can’t be! But with every calculated risk I've taken tonight, every justification I've crafted for this madness, it becomes harder to convince myself otherwise.
I take a deep breath and pull out my phone again. The order confirmation glows on the screen, evidence of what I'm becoming. My gut twists with shame as exhilaration courses through me once more.
Stuffing my phone back in my pocket, adrenaline races through my veins like liquid fire. There's a line in the sand, and I've just sprinted across it with middle fingers raised.
I could cancel the order. Call this whole thing off. Walk back from this ledge—figurately and literally. Go back to being the good guy with a dark past instead of the creep with surveillance equipment and a hard-on for a bartender who wants nothing to do with me.
But who the fuck am I kidding?
"What's the point?" I whisper into the wind, the words carried away like ashes. "This is no simple infatuation. I'm… I'm really obsessed with Lila Marks."
The admission lands like a punch to the gut, but there's relief in it too. The kind that comes when you finally stop fighting gravity and just fucking fall.
People like to pretend we're civilized creatures, evolved beyond our animal instincts. But that's the great cosmic joke. We're all just predators with credit cards and smartphones, hunting different prey.
Mine has auburn hair and green eyes that hold secrets I need to unravel like they're the goddamn meaning of life itself.
I laugh, a hollow sound that echoes across the rooftop. Yep, I've become exactly what I hunt. The irony isn't lost on me.
The wind whips around me, cold against my face, but I barely feel it. My thumb hovers over my phone screen for a second before I give in to the inevitable. The weight of my decision settles in my gut like lead, but I push through it anyway.
