Page 108 of Letters From A Stalker

Ghost has no problem with that idea.

Go closer.

No. She agreed to my eyes, and I don’t get to turn one yes into five more just because I want them. Ghost is far less interested in the distinction, but I remain exactly where she allowed me to be.

Her eyes close briefly before opening again. She remembers what I asked.

Keep your eyes on the trees.

A smile threatens the corner of my mouth. “Good girl.”

She can’t hear me, which is probably for the best. The words belong to the man she thinks is hidden out here, not the psychiatrist she sat across from earlier, although the line separating those two versions of me is becoming harder to believe in every time I come back to this place.

Julia keeps looking. Whatever uncertainty she carried when she first approached the window gradually disappears as the pace of her hand changes beneath the fabric. Her posture loosens even while the tension elsewhere in her body builds, and I can see the exact moment curiosity stops being the thing keeping her there. She wants it now. That affects me more than the view. I never wanted her performing because she thought an anonymous man had ordered her to entertain him. I wanted to know whether the knowledge of being watched would change something for her, whether having another person attached to the wanting would make the release feel different from whatever she had been trying to accomplish alone last Sunday. Apparently it does. Last time, she looked afterward as though she had scratched an itch and found the result barely worth the effort. Tonight there is nothing casual about the way her forehead drifts closer to the glass while her breath creates a faint patch of fog in front of her mouth.

Her fingers tighten around the window frame. Her eyes find the trees again.

Mine.

The thought comes so easily now that I barely bother pretending to be surprised by it. I know Julia isn’t mine. Ghost sees her standing in front of a window because of a letter I wrote, touching herself while searching the darkness for one specific man, and seems to consider the technicalities settled. For tonight, I’m not arguing very hard.

I shift my weight against the tree, and the pistol tucked into the back of my waistband presses harder against me beneath the jacket. I’d almost forgotten it was there. A county social worker I’ve worked with before called late this afternoon about a woman in temporary housing on the north side who was spiraling badly enough that she wanted another opinion before pushing for an emergency evaluation. The building itself didn’t worry me, but the surrounding blocks after dark were a different story, especially when I was showing up alone on the bike, so I took the gun from the safe before I left. The visit ran longer than either of us expected, and by the time I walked back outside, going home first would have meant missing Julia. So I came straight here, and the pistol came with me. I have a permit, I’ve carried it on late solo rides often enough that the weight doesn’t usually register once I’m moving, and tonight taking it had seemed no more dramatic than taking my gloves.

My attention returns to Julia. She is beautiful when she walks into my office dressed for work, and I noticed that from the first day even before noticing it became something I had to actively stop myself from doing. Still, I prefer this version of her far more than I should — bare legs, damp hair, oversized shirt, not a single obvious effort made for another person’s attention. She looks fucking sexy without trying and maybe exactly because she isn’t trying.

Her hips move forward again, subtle enough that another person might miss the shift but clear enough from where I stand to tell me she wants more pressure from her own hand. My mouth goes dry. I picture replacing it. The thought has been somewhere in my head since Sunday, but tonight it grows teeth. My fingers between her thighs instead of hers, close enough to hear what happens to her breathing when she stops trying to control it. My mouth near her ear while I tell her exactly what I want and know that the second she says stop, everything does. That last part matters more now. Julia told me she likes giving up control when she knows she is the one who handed it over. She likes the intensity because it keeps her present, because surrender does not feel like surrender when she knows she can take it back whenever she wants. Ghost takes that information somewhere considerably less clinical than the office ever allowed me to. She wants somebody who knows what to do once she gives it to him. I know exactly what I would do.

The sound of running shoes reaches me before that thought has a chance to go any farther. At first it blends with everything else around me, nearly swallowed by the faint movement of leaves overhead and the distant sound of cars somewhere beyond Julia’s neighborhood, but within seconds the steady rhythm against pavement becomes unmistakable. Someone is coming along the path near the edge of her property. I shift deeper into the trees automatically. A man appears beneath one of the streetlights, probably somewhere in his thirties or early forties, dressed in running shorts and a lightweight jacket with wireless earbuds in his ears. His pace is steady and his breathing controlled enough that he has clearly been out for a while. There is nothing unusual about him being here, people use this path. He will pass. At least, he should.

When he reaches the portion closest to Julia’s property, his head automatically turns toward the light spilling from her living room, and my stomach tightens before he even slows.

Keep running.

His stride shortens as he looks toward the window, toward her.

No.

For a second, I tell myself it means nothing. Anybody passing a brightly lit window at night might glance over, especially when there is movement behind the glass, and an accidental look is not the same thing as deliberately standing there. Then he stops. Every muscle in my body goes tight. Julia doesn’t notice him because her attention is still directed toward the trees, toward the place where she believes the only man watching her is the one she chose. The jogger keeps staring. A wave of anger goes through me hard enough that my jaw locks. He does not get to see this. The hypocrisy of the thought is immediate and ugly, because I watched her before she knew I existed. I stood in these same trees and took something private simply because I wanted it badly enough to ignore the fact that she had never given it to me. Tonight is different, though, and that difference suddenly matters more than anything else.

I give the jogger a chance to correct the mistake on his own because a glance is one thing and what he does next will decide everything else. All he needs to do is turn his head and keep running. Instead, he reaches up and pulls one earbud out. My patience starts disappearing. He shifts his body more fully toward the house and steps closer to the edge of the property.

That is fucking enough.

I leave the trees. The earth beneath my shoes is damp, and a fine drizzle has started falling without me noticing it while my attention was fixed on Julia. Wet leaves soften the sound of my steps as I move behind him, and because his attention is still completely locked on the window, I am almost within reach before he senses anything.

His head starts to turn. Too late.

I grab him before he can finish the movement, hooking one arm across his upper chest while the other locks around him, then pull him backward off the path before he has enough air in his lungs to shout properly. His hands fly up immediately and one catches my sleeve.

“What the fuck?!”

His foot catches on an exposed root, and when I release him with enough momentum behind the movement, he stumbles forward and lands hard with one knee and both hands against the wet forest floor. For a moment there is nothing between us but his harsh breathing and the quiet tap of rain gathering in the leaves overhead.

Then he twists around. “What the hell is wrong with you?”

Anger gets there before fear, although judging by the way his eyes move across me as he pushes himself upright, that confidence isn’t nearly as solid as he wants it to look.

I step closer.