The comments started almost immediately. At first, they’d sounded curious. Then the speculation started.
The comments always followed the same arc—just what I wanted.
Someone mentioned the tour schedule. Someone else listed cities. Another asked—casually, innocently—why the same group always seemed to be nearby when things went wrong.
No proof. No facts.
Just doubt.
I scrolled slowly, watching the story assemble itself without me touching it again. It never took much. People liked believing they were smarter than everyone else—liked it even more when that belief let them point a finger.
Especially at people who told stories for a living.
Especially at people the public already watched.
Perfect.
I paused the audio and glanced around the small kitchen in the house I’d rented—paying with cash, of course.
Kate would be waking up by now.
Or maybe she already had.
I wondered if she’d figured out the rules yet. Gina eventually had.
They always did—right around the point it stopped helping them.
I didn’t care anymore if Gina was okay.
I’d already moved on. Already lined up the next place.
Short-term rental. Cash. No name that mattered.
I restarted the episode and leaned back, listening to my own voice ease into bolder territory. Still careful. Still clean. Just a question asked the right way.
I didn’t need to accuse them.
I just needed to sound reasonable.
The timing was better than I’d expected. Faster too. Which made it more interesting. They were scrambling now—reacting instead of directing.
Everyone deserved to be handled with equal treatment. Everyone.
How was it fair that some news stories went national while others weren’t covered at all? Why were some people deemed more important than others?
It wasn’t right.
People needed to learn that lesson.
The game was unfolding exactly as it should.
And no one—not the audience, not the police, not even the ones caught at the center of it—seemed to understand yet how little it mattered who committed the crimes.
Only who controlled the story that followed.
CHAPTER
FIFTY
