"Steven Kolberg."
It takes Bellamy a second to place the voice as Monty's.
"Uh-"
"The guy that's been calling Clarke, his name is Steven Kolberg. He was working the night of the wedding."
Eddie shoves a cup of coffee in his face, and Bellamy takes it grudgingly. They're still in his hotel room, though he's finally changed out of his tux into jeans and a t-shirt. He still hasn't slept.
"They told you that?" He can't imagine a business giving up information like that without a warrant.
"Uh," Monty hesitates. "Not exactly. I may have hacked into their payroll software."
"You hacked it." Bellamy repeats. Maybe he should have been more worried about the people Octavia was hanging out with. They're all turning out to be delinquents.
Not that he minds right now.
"May have. Anyways, this guy's shifts line up with the phone calls. And when I mentioned him the manager got all weird. Like she was afraid to talk about him."
This news has his gut clenching anxiously. That doesn't sound good.
When he doesn't say anything, Monty speaks again.
"How long do you have left?"
Bellamy looks at the digital clock on the hotel nightstand.
"Two hours." Two hours until the police will do anything, until he can convince them to subpoena the hotel's security tapes, until-
Suddenly he has an idea.
"Monty," he mutters, ignoring the way Eddie looks up at the suddenly hopeful tone of his voice. "Do you think you could hack into this hotel's security system?"
.-.-.-.-.-.-.
"I thought about you, after Maya died."
Clarke shivers under his gaze, both wanting answers for why she's here, why this happened, and also terrified to know the truth.
"I was so lost in my grief, it felt like a part of me died when she did, you know?"
"I do," she says quietly. "I do know."
He continues as though she hadn't spoken.
"After a while I went to see someone, to talk. But it didn't help." The room is so small, the air so still that Clarke can practically feel his breath on her from here. His eyes never leave her face as he speaks, never change. They're dead eyes, and she realizes that the sadness she saw there before was a mask. It was a lie. "They gave me some pills, and I stopped feeling anything. And that was better, that was fine." He trails off, apparently lost in his own thoughts, his gaze finally drifting up, away from her. "But then I saw you."
"At the hotel," she realizes. He nods.
"Yeah. You looked so beautiful, so sad."
She'd been missing Bellamy, aching for him. She hadn't realized it was so obvious.
"I wasn't supposed to be there, that night. My shift ended right after he got there." His face darkens.
"He…after who got there?" She asks, confused.
"Bellamy." His name is a filthy curse in Steven's mouth. "And the blonde. I'd been working all morning."
"But-" her mouth feels dry again, so she sips at the water. "You were still there after the wedding. It must have been past midnight."
"It was. I stayed. I wanted to see you, to talk to you."
"Oh." She shouldn't be surprised, after all this is probably the least invasive thing he's done. But she can't help but feel like she should have known when she saw him. She'd even wondered at the fact that his shift seemed unusually long.
"It took me a while to get your phone number. And then every time I called you I didn't know how to tell you about us. I had to make you understand."
"That was you?" All the calls, sometimes a dozen a day, she imagines Steven on the other end, and feels her muscles coil with tension.
"At first I was calling because I wanted to talk to you. And then I realized it was the only way I could be a part of your life. I wanted to hear your voice."
Clarke fights the shiver crawling down her spine, struggling to keep her face calm.
"But it wasn't enough. I knew I needed a plan. I had to get you away from him."
Him, she realizes, is Bellamy. The knowledge that it hasn't just been her that Steven's been watching, that Bellamy's been caught up in it as well, that everyone she's spent time with might have been at risk, it makes bile rise in the back of her throat. Everyone she loves. She's put them in danger just by being with them.
"You've been stalking me."
It's the wrong thing to say, Steven's eyes narrow, jaw tensing angrily.
"I was doing what I had to. You were so blinded by your feelings for someone who doesn't deserve you, doesn't want you. You never would have agreed to go out with me without some convincing."
"Is that what this is?" She eyes him warily. "You convincing me?"
He shrugs, gesturing carelessly.
"No. This is…it's not ideal, but it's temporary. Once you're in a more cooperative mindset we can get you out of here."
He's not planning to let her go, far from it. But she can't help wondering where he's planning on moving her to. Or how he's planning on convincing her to go quietly.
"I brought you some clothes. I'm a big fan of that dress," Steven murmurs, eyes crawling over her. "But it doesn't look very comfortable." He tosses a bundle of cloth at her, and she wonders how she didn't notice it when he came in. Then she recognizes the articles of clothing in her hands. They're hers.
"What-" but one look at him and she doesn't need to ask how he got these. And she can tell by his expression that he's gauging her reaction to the realization that he broke into her loft. Probably repeatedly. So she does the stubborn thing, and puts on the best poker face she has. "Thanks."
He shrugs.
"I'll give you some privacy to get changed."
She knows he can watch her, if he wants to, he's obviously surveilling her somehow, but she's grateful for even the pretense of decency at this point. He leaves, and the following quiet, for the first time, is a relief. She pulls the dress off, wincing as her head spins as she stands up again. The fact that she hasn't eaten in hours, maybe days, adds an edge to her already unpleasantly woozy headache. The clothes Stephen brought are haphazard, a grey bra, some leggings, a t-shirt. But they are more comfortable than the gown, and she feels a little more like herself once she's changed, a little more grounded.
Her earlier sense of dread returns full force, heightened by an edginess brought on by hunger and fatigue. How the hell did she end up in this nightmare?
