“Here.” I tap the sixth photo. “The camera’s facing the wrong way.” I’ve not recognized the silence just yet, my thoughts are still too loud. “Usually in these kinds of places you'd want to get a good look at your customers' faces. But the camera isn't pointed at the main area, it's pointing towards the exit.”
I look through the others, “After this point. They all are. They’re all facing the wrong way. Enough to not be noticeable, but enough to keep him out of sight. It’s why we only get bits and pieces of him.” But never his face.
“It makes sense then that he was able to evade you for five years.” I tap my findings twice with my knuckles as I step back, certain now, that I won’t be able to glean anything else.
“After the initial murders, he gained a backer. Someone expensive.”
“Or,” I drag my hand through my hair with a surge of new doubt, “maybe all the Syndicate episodes I watched with the kid are clogging my ass,” I mumble with a frown. Kai’s ability to watch TV for hours on end is a skill I can relate to at least. I can still recall the days I spent constantly consuming videos and books.
I’m finally noticing the silence when it becomes too uncomfortable. When it feels like a dagger at my back, I’m turning with furrowed brows to see if they’re still there. If they’ve heard a word I’ve said.
But they’re all staring at me strangely.
My heart immediately drops to my toes, “What?”
My palms suddenly feel clammy because they don’t answer. Did I say something wrong?
Maybe I’ve just embarrassed myself by making pointless conjectures.
Suddenly, I’m both mortified and ashamed of the complete fool I might have just made myself.
“We’ll pretend I didn’t say anything and I’ll put them back,” I turn away quickly to reach for the photos I’d separated from the rest, but Reuben grabs me by the shirt of my back and pulls me away before I can grab them.
“No, no.” His grin only makes me feel like an idiot. Like he’s having the time of his life watching me.
I can actuallyfeelhow red my face is. I snap, “You said you had nothing, so I was just—”
“You'refuckingshitting me.” Gabriel finally speaks out from his frozenness and it’s only when he drags a hand through his face that I realize he’s in a state of complete disbelief.
Tobias steps up to the photos from the corner of the room muttering his own curses under his breath. He stares at them for maybe three seconds before plopping into a chair and chuckling to himself.
Is he okay?
“We ran each of these photos through a hundred systems already.” Xavier’s voice is the smallest and my confusion worsens.
So these reactions arenotbecause I was talking nonsense?
Xavier himself looks broken for a single moment. Like the life in his eyes has completely died out, “How did it go unnoticed?”
Something is wrong. But still, even though I’m unsure, I answer as best as I can, “It’s really just… a jacket. A jacket worn by the same person. I’m not sure if your systems would highlight it as something important.” Or how ominous it is. “But it’s only after isolating them that I was able to notice the cameras. It became a lot more possible.”
I don’t know what kind of ‘systems’ they used, but I’m sure it wouldn’t be able to pick out this jacket, unless specifically told to do so.
But I can. After all, the concept of fashion is what prevented me from blending in with people in the first place.
I've been doing my homework at least, the past 1,374 days.
Xavier brushes past me weakly to get a closer look. Almost like a wraith.
He’s mumbling under his breath, “The same jacket. The cameras. A backer—”
He... doesn't look okay.
Xavier? I reach out to touch his shoulder, but before I can, his voice cuts through the air brokenly, “I've stared at these photos for five years.”
There’s a bad feeling in my chest.
“But you found him by looking at these once?”
