Reborn Before The Apocalypse

CHAPTER 12: CONVENIENT

"You're doing it again."

I looked up from my plate. Kyle was watching me over the top of his burger, looking amused, like I was some kind of novelty he'd just caught performing a trick.

"Doing what?"

"That thing where you disappear into your own head." He gestured vaguely toward my face with a fry. "Zoning out. You've been doing it for days now."

"Sorry." I forced out a small, easy laugh, the kind that sounds apologetic but doesn't mean a thing. "It's just been a long week."

"Every week is a long week for you," he said. He wasn't being mean, exactly, but he wasn't being kind either. It was more like he was noting a defect in a piece of property he owned. "You need a hobby, man. Something that isn't just work and constantly worrying about the rest of us." The rest of us. As if I were part of his staff. As if my entire role in his life had been whittled down to a chore he checked on occasionally, like making sure a smoke detector still had fresh batteries.

"Maybe," I said.

He grinned, looking satisfied, and went back to his burger as if the conversation had actually solved something instead of just confirming what I already knew.

[Truth Sight: Passive.]

[Subject: Kyle Marsh — No change.]

No change. He was still amused. Still certain.

My phone buzzed on the table. It was Lilly.

Running late tonight. Don't wait up. Grabbing drinks with a friend from work.

I stared at the screen for a long moment. No name for the friend. No context. It was just enough information to sound plausible, but not a single word more the exact architecture of a lie designed to survive a casual glance and nothing deeper.

"Everything okay?" Kyle asked, catching the look on my face.

"Lilly's grabbing drinks with a friend." I set the phone down, keeping my voice steady and light. "Should be a quiet night."

Something flickered in Kyle's eyes, a quick flash that was gone almost before I could process it. It wasn't guilt. It was something much closer to calculation.

"Cool," he said, a fraction of a second too fast. "Well. Hope she has a good time."

[Truth Sight: Active.]

[Subject: Kyle Marsh]

[Primary Emotion: Anticipation]

[Secondary Emotion: Concealment — Target: Jayden Cole]

Anticipation. He wasn't just curious about someone else's plans. He was anticipating his own.

I leaned back into the booth, letting a small, effortless smile settle on my face. I watched Kyle finish his burger, acting as if the conversation hadn't just confirmed exactly where Lilly's "quiet night" was actually headed.

--------------------------

I didn't head straight home.

Instead, I sat in my car outside the diner for a long time with the engine off, watching Kyle jog back to his car. He had a certain energy in his step that hadn't been there an hour ago.

[Location tracking unavailable.]

[Recommendation: Manual observation required.]

Manual observation. Fine. I'd become very good at that lately.

I followed him at a careful distance, staying three cars back, the way they do in movies I never thought I'd have a reason to reference in real life. He didn't head toward his apartment. He drove toward a bar on the edge of downtown, the kind of place with dim windows and no signage, the kind of place you pick specifically because no one you know would ever think to look for you there.

I parked across the street and waited.

Twenty minutes later, Lilly's car pulled into the lot.

She didn't use the front entrance. She circled to a side door, glancing over her shoulder once before slipping inside, moving with the practiced, quick ease of someone who had used that entrance many times before.

I sat there in the dark, my hands steady on the steering wheel, feeling something heavy and cold and certain settle in my chest.

[Restraint: MAXIMUM.]

[Reward accumulation: SIGNIFICANT]

The system’s words glowed patiently in the corner of my vision. For the first time, I didn't feel a shred of pain looking at that side door as it swung shut behind her.

I felt ready.

I started the engine, pulled out of the lot without a second glance, and drove back to my empty apartment to keep working on the one thing neither of them realized I already had.

A plan with their names written all over it.