Page 34 of X Marks the Stalker
The Gallery Killer wouldn’t miss the Frost exhibition. Not when these paintings mirror his own macabre aesthetic. A man who poses victims like art masterpieces craves this kind of validation.
My pulse races, fingers tingling with anticipation. The thought of cornering him, of demanding answers face to face, sends electricity through my body that settles low in my belly.
Every tuxedoed gentleman becomes a suspect. Could it be the silver-haired man appraising the abstract near the entrance? The bearded professor typing notes in a leather journal? The tall figure whose gaze lingers too long on the security exits?
My stomach flips. The man who brokeinto my home. Who installed the cameras. Who left me a cooked dinner and a folder of damning evidence. He terrifies me, but there’s a pull I can’t deny. A part of me wants to find him, to corner him in this gilded cage and demand answers.
Or let him corner me.
My black dress—a thrift store find I altered with passable stitching—serves its dual purpose. Elegant enough to blend with wealth, practical enough for what I’m really doing. Stalking a stalker.
“Extraordinary brushwork, don’t you think?” A woman in a peacock mask gestures at a painting beside me.
I nod, mumble agreement, and scan the room over her shoulder.
The guest list I’d bribed from a caterer’s assistant confirmed several Beacon Hill Gentlemen’s Association members would attend tonight. Through my mask’s eyeholes, I catalog faces against my mental gallery of surveillance photos.
Thorne Ravencroft stands by the bar—unmistakable even behind his gold-leafed mask. Navy Tom Ford tuxedo. Three fingers of scotch. The scar curling across the back of his right hand. I check his name on my mental list. Potential Gallery Killer? Perhaps. Shady? Without question.
But another figure draws my focus across the room.
A blond man studying a painting with the intensity of a predator tracking prey. His posture radiates power, his tuxedo fitting him like a second skin. His black mask obscures most of his face, but it’s the way he moves that captivates me—controlled, deliberate, like a dancer who knows where each muscle should be.
I drift closer, feigning interest in a nearby sculpture while eavesdropping.
“The brushwork suggests trauma translated through controlled violence,” he tells another patron, his voice flowing like expensive whiskey. “Note how it channels aggression into precision. A fascinating dichotomy.”
My breath catches. His analysis of violence speaks of intimate knowledge. Of someone who understands the transformation of brutality into beauty.
When I glance back, he’s vanished into the crowd.
I circle through the gallery’s main room, tracking faces, conversations, connections. The blond man reappears across the room, examining another painting with the same unnerving focus. I navigate toward him, brushing past a server.
By the time I reach his position, he’s disappeared again.
For thirty minutes, I play this strange game of cat and mouse. Each time I spot him and approach, he melts away before I get close enough for conversation.
Did he recognize me despite my mask? Or am I being paranoid?
The question sends electricity down my spine. Perhaps this is all part of his game.
I find a small cocktail table nestled between a ficus and an abstract sculpture—a perfect vantage point for surveilling the entire main gallery while remaining partially concealed.
The lights dim, sending a ripple of anticipation through the crowd. Conversations halt mid-sentence. My skin prickles with awareness as crystal glasses clink together in the new silence.
A spotlight illuminates the stage, and there he is. Blond hair. Black mask. My mystery man.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” announces a voice from hidden speakers. “Please welcome the visionary artist Calloway Frost.”
The blond man is Calloway Frost himself. I cross-reference his height, build, and mannerisms against my mental catalog. Art world darling. Beacon Hill member.
Gallery Killer suspect number one.
I dig through my purse for the tiny notebook where I’d scribbled observations about the club members. Could Frost be both a killer and a celebrated artist? The perfect cover—creating art inspired by his own murders.
A shadow falls across my notes. I glance up, startled.
A tall figure in a black mask materializes at my table, moving with such deliberate quietness that I never saw him approaching. Without asking permission, he pulls out the chair across from me and sits, as if we’d planned this meeting all along.
