Page 137 of Stalkers Anonymous

I look at her. I can’t help it. I spent so much time trying to keep this woman safe—and most of that time, I made the mistake of thinking she was something soft I had to shield. She’s not soft. She has never been soft. She is a woman who treats trauma patients for a living. She’s seen terrible things. She knows terrible things. And here she is, thinking not only about protecting herself, but also about protecting the next woman Winters will victimize if we don’t take action.

“So you want him scared.” Jessica is summarizing now. “Hurt, probably. And then handed to the cops.”

“Yes.” Hailey’s voice is strong, likely encouraged by a little liquid confidence. “A full confession tape would be a nice touch, but not entirely needed. We already have video evidence against him.”

Jessica nods slowly, taking it in. “Okay. Consider it done. We’ll do it.”

“Is that…okay?” Hailey’s voice loses a little bit of its swagger, like she can’t believe it’s that easy.

I almost can’t believe it’s that easy, and I’m getting the uncomfortable feeling that the group does this far more often than I originally thought.

“It’s more than okay, Hailey.” Jessica smiles. “It’s actually one of the cleaner asks we’ve gotten. A lot of people in your seat want them dead. You want something we can give you twice over.”

Tyler sits back in his armchair and laces his fingers behind his head. “You sure you’re ready for this?”

“As sure as I’ll ever be.” Hailey shrugs.

I finally break my silence. “I want to be the one to go hands-on with him.”

“Rule three?” Jessica turns her attention to me. “We move as a unit or we don’t move at all.”

“I know.” I drag a hand down my face. “I’m saying it out loud because I know I can’t do it without saying it out loud first. I know I should not be in charge of this. I want it noted that I am, right now, on the record, asking the group not to let me call the shots.”

Tyler’s expression is amused and he chuckles. “Look at you,” he says. “Using your big-boy words.”

“Shut up, Tyler.”

“No, I’m proud.” He grins. “That was very mature.”

Jessica clears her throat. “Boys.”

We both snap our mouths shut, but I let a look that could kill linger on him for several seconds.

“So.” Jessica refocuses the room. “What I think we’re building is: Hailey lures Lars somewhere. We are staged at the location before he arrives. He shows up expecting to find her alone. He doesn’t find her alone. He gets the parking garage special, in reverse. We get him scared, on tape, a written confession if we can swing it, and then we hand him to the police. He goes away for a long time. Hailey gets the closure she came for.”

“Yes.” Hailey sets her glass down. “That’s what I want.”

Jessica stands and looks between the kitchen and Hailey’s empty glass.

“Absolutely,” Hailey says without Jessica needing to ask.

“Tyler, get ready to take notes while I get more refreshments,” Jessica orders before disappearing into the kitchen and reemerging with an opened bottle of wine.

Tyler has a yellow notepad out and ready to go, flipped to a clean page. He starts dividing it into three columns of neat block-letter handwriting. DAY OF. LEAD UP. AFTER.

Austen has a laptop open. No, actually, he has two laptops open. Grant produces a mechanical pencil and a pad of graph paper from his camera bag. Zach is on the phone in the corner, mumbling quietly.

These are the same people I sit in folding chairs with. The same people I thought I had all figured out.

I am actively recalibrating everything I thought I knew about these people. I’m not someone who’s easily surprised, but today, reality has humbled me. I couldn’t have even imagined who these people are. Not in my wildest dreams.

Hailey, beside me, holds out her empty glass for Jessica to refill, giving me a reassuring smile.

“Day of.” Tyler’s pen moves. “Eyes on Lars from forty-eight hours out. Two-person rotation, no gaps. Cole, you’re off that one—you’re too close. Grant and I have it. Zach on overflow. Austen, you’re running comms from the van.”

“Got it.” Austen doesn’t look up and continues typing away.

“Lead up. Hailey writes the bait message. Jessica edits. Austen scrubs metadata, sends from a clean burner account. Forty-eight hours of bait time so it doesn’t feel like a trap.”