Chapter 48 Chapter 48 Oyster Bay is not a place to stay overnight...

"Seriously?" Elio said. "You followed me all this way just to tell me this?"

Reese's tense nerves relaxed. The voice belonged to a young man who was teasing him. It was a low, perhaps unpleasant one; but most importantly, Reese could tell he had no intention of starting a fight. Men like them, if they wanted to kill, wouldn't waste a single word.

"Isn't it possible?" Reese replied.

He looked up and saw Elio, sitting high up, grinning. The "professional killer" pulled his phone and wallet from his pocket and tossed them away. Reese didn't move, reaching out to catch them.

"Of course. But if you just want to have a 'friendly' chat with me," Elio said, looking at him, "you don't need to hack into my phone."

Reese looked down and saw that his phone was still stuck on the "pairing failed" screen.

"…Sorry," he said, "I can explain that."

"Please. I'm waiting for you to do that."

"Are you sure you want to do that?" Finch heard all this. "Mr. Reese?"

Finch undoubtedly wouldn't approve of this. But then again, this wasn't the first time they'd had such a harmless disagreement. Reese paused for a few seconds, choosing his words. Elio, sitting there, tilted his head to look at him, waiting calmly.

"…For some reason," Reese said gently, "I thought something bad was happening around you. I wanted to stop it, but I didn't know what it was." He tapped the screen of his phone. "That was the first step in my investigation."

Normally, no one would believe such a thing right away. Initially, not even Reese himself believed it. For what reason? What bad things would happen? Why would they happen? If they could see it coming, why couldn't they have "seen" more?

Honestly, it sounded more like some ridiculous excuse from a stalker or a frivolous prank by a billionaire. If Elio thought so, Reese wouldn't be surprised at all. But this time, he noticed a serious change in Elio's expression.

"No one usually believes me when I say that," Reese continued calmly, "so I have to resort to some... less legal means."

"You said bad things were going to happen," Elio said, jumping down from the tree. "Was it going to happen to me, or to the people around me?"

"On you."

Elio breathed a sigh of relief. The serious expression quickly faded from his face, but he still took out his phone and typed out a few text messages.

"Oh, it's no big deal then," he said without looking up. "I'm used to it. However you got the news, don't take it to heart. Spend your time with others. I'll take care of everything myself."

"That's what I'm worried about, Elio."

The leaves rustled. Elio looked up and saw the light and shadows flickering vaguely on Reese's face. They stared at each other in silence until a cricket in the distance began to play its violin, and Elio slowly let out an "oh."

"You're not worried about the bad things happening around me," he concluded, "You're worried about... me."

The words were spoken at an unusually slow pace, and everyone present understood what they meant. They meant that Reese thought he might be the attacker, and Elio had discovered this.

But no one took the initiative. Reese simply stood there, motionless as a rock. The only part of him that moved was his eyes, those silent gray-green orbs that rolled gently as Elio's gaze followed them, finally settling on where Elio stood.

Elio's position was clever. He wasn't facing Reise directly, but he wasn't completely away from him either; if one looked from the weed-covered avenue they'd come from, their figures would partially overlap. This meant that from Elio's perspective, there were two paths before him: one leading to Reise, the other to the exit.

The cool night breeze swept between Elio and Reese, and the rustling white noise of Oyster Bay sang of the deaths they witnessed so often.

Finch, sitting in front of the screen, noticed the unusual silence. He subconsciously straightened his back and stared at the signal on the screen, his hand already reaching for the phone beside him in case he needed to call for backup for Reese.

"I'm indeed worried about you, Elio," Reese replied, unmoved in the center of the invisible storm. "I'm worried you'll go further and further down this path. An unfortunate, false start led you down this path. I wish someone had been there to stop it in time, but no one did. But perhaps, today we can still seize the opportunity to prevent the next mistake."

As Elio silently scanned him, Reese said nothing more. He simply stared at Elio silently, never drawing his weapon or making any attempt to attack. The young man, whom Reese considered "extremely dangerous," turned his head after a brief standoff.

With a soft sigh, Reese's tense shoulders and back relaxed. Finch, who was standing in front of the screen, sensed the change in atmosphere, finally breathed a sigh of relief and sank back into his chair.

"Even though you followed me all the way for no apparent reason and tried to hack into my phone," Elio pinched his shoulder, "and even claimed to know everything about me, but you didn't even tell me a name—"

"You can call me John," Reese raised an eyebrow at Elio's look, "I promise that's my real name."

"Okay, John." Elio gently pushed Reese's shoulder away and walked towards the exit first. "No matter what you think, I don't like staying here and getting bit by bugs."

“Oyster Bay is really not a good place to spend the night,” Reeser said, “especially while we’re still alive.”

Elio glanced back at him with a strange expression, "Did you just tell a bad joke?"

"Isn't it possible?" Reese asked back.

"No, oh, I mean, nothing," Elio said, "I just didn't think you were that type."

He didn't explain what "this type" was, and Reese didn't ask. Just as if he didn't care about this detail, Reese's expression didn't change at all. He just paused briefly, then quickly walked out of the dense, insect-infested woods with Elio, one foot deep and one foot shallow.

"I appreciate your kindness, John," Elio said, taking the driver's seat first. "But I have to say you're a little late. I can't imagine what other accident I could be involved in, even though I've been in one almost every day for the past few months."

"I don't know either," Reese, who had been deliberately blocked by Elio and had to move into the passenger seat, replied, "So I can only follow you closely and see what happens."

Elio gave him a silent look. Reese understood. "Usually, it happens within a day or two. Don't worry about your freedom."

"I'm not worried about my freedom anymore," Elio muttered, "but honestly, I'm a little worried about my privacy. Is this what your job requires you to do? Track, hack, and investigate what might happen?"

It also involves breaking into homes, colluding with police officers, spending huge sums of money, and occasionally being forced to sell sex.

"And try to prevent accidents as much as possible," Reese replied calmly, "Yes."

Elio turned on his high beams. "Okay. Sounds like my job."

This time it was Reese's turn to look at him wordlessly. Elio pretended not to notice his gaze and rolled down the car window. The night wind rushed up from there, caressing their cheeks.

"So what's the plan?" Elio looked at the road ahead. "You're just going to stay by my side and wait for something to happen?"

"Yeah," Reese said. "That's pretty much it."

"Is there really no other option than waiting?" Elio complained. "I prefer to attack."

"I don't know exactly what's going on, or why," Reese said. "I just know you're the key, Elio. You live in the Continental Hotel, rarely go out, and when you do go out you're heavily armed, so the surveillance has a hard time tracking you down. You have virtually no acquaintances in New York, let alone enemies, unless you're kind enough to alert me."

Elio pondered for a moment, "Actually, I have quite a lot of enemies."

"Seriously?"

"Seriously," Elio said, "but I don't think they can exact revenge on me anymore—at least not most of them."

But then again, he hadn't completely dealt with all the Templars yet. In the meeting that had appeared in Neumann's memory, there had been nine people in total; those who had already fallen included Dr. Blackwood, Dean Neumann, Little Quinn, Dr. Kirk, and Mitchell, so there were only five people here (not including Leopold, who wasn't at the meeting, and of course, not including Willow).

Elio thought, tapping the steering wheel unconsciously.

Excluding Galahad, the undercover agent—Elio wasn't quite sure what he was, but he counted him as one of the assassins—there were still three alive.

Unlike the Templars active in Blüdhaven, they only participated in the meeting remotely via stereo projection, which made Elio's search extremely difficult.

But Reese's arrival gives Elio a new idea. Could it be possible that one of the Templars is located in New York?

"Any idea?" Reese said.

Elio glanced at him and found that Reese's eyes were on his fingers tapping the steering wheel. Under Reese's meaningful gaze, Elio calmly retracted his fingers and gripped the steering wheel tightly.

"You said it's hard to find me through surveillance?" Elio raised an eyebrow at him. "Thanks for the reminder. I have an idea."