Page 5 of Glitched Fates & Stolen Mates

I kept to the shadows, matching their pace from across the street. My hearing should have picked up their conversation easily from this distance, but they were speaking in soft murmurs that barely carried on the evening air.

Of course they were. Probably whispering sweet nothings in each other’s ears. Probably being all intimate and coupley in that way that made single people want to be sick.

I needed to get closer.

I crossed the street at the next corner, trailing them close enough now that I should have been able to hear them clearly.

Should have been.

But they were still speaking too quietly to make out their conversation. Frustratingly, infuriatingly quiet.

The world beyond Felix and Wren might as well have been static. Until footsteps thundered and a jogger nearly knocked me sideways.

“Excuse me!” she called out, bright and cheerful in a way that made me want to disappear into the pavement.

I spun around, heart hammering. A woman in neon running gear had stopped behind me, earbuds dangling around her neck.

“Sir, you dropped this!” She moved towards me, waving something in her hand—my wallet, apparently having slipped from my jacket pocket during my stalker manoeuvres. “This is yours!”

No, no, no.

She was being loud. Too bloody loud. Her voice carried across the quiet street like a foghorn, cutting through the evening air with all the subtlety of a fire alarm.

What if Felix turned around? What if he saw me standing here, obviously following him and his—

I snatched my wallet and jumped backwards away from her, and—

CRASH.

—promptly collided with something metal and solid.

Three wheelie bins toppled like dominoes, metal lids clanging against the pavement with the kind of racket that could wake the dead. The sound echoed off the buildings, a symphony of chaos that might as well have been accompanied by flashing neon signs reading, “STALKER ALERT.”

Shit. Shit, shit, shit.

Terror flooded my system. My vision tunnelled. Without thinking, I dived behind the fallen bins like they were black metal fortresses that would save me from certain death.

I crouched behind them, pressing my back against the middle bin and trying to make myself as small as possible. Which was difficult, considering I was six foot two and built like a bloody rugby player.

The smell hit me properly then. Bin juice and decay and something that definitely used to be alive but absolutely wasn’t anymore.

I closed my eyes and prayed for a sinkhole to open up and swallow me whole.

“Oh my god, are you okay?” The jogger shouted. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you!”

But I wasn’t listening to her anymore. Because underneath her concerned chatter, I heard something far worse.

Wren’s voice, curious and amused: “Hey, isn’t that your work colleague? What’s he doing?”

Everything inside me went cold and still.

No. No, no, no.

“What?” Felix’s voice. Soft, confused.

“Rory’s brother. The big, grouchy one. The one you say is always a bit weird with you.”

A pause. Then Felix, recognition dawning in his tone: “Kit?”