Page 116 of Past Due

“Marley! Is it too early there?” she asked quickly. “I can call back later.”

“No, it’s fine.” I waited for the coffee machine to finish spluttering out my single serve cup of medium roast. “I’m having coffee and enjoying my morning.” I took my cup from the machine and carried it to the counter where I began to add creamer and sugar. “How are you?”

“I’m good. So is Lucky! He’s doing so well. I’ll send you some more pictures later.”

“Oh, please do! I miss his little snuggly face!”

“I think he misses you, too. After you left, he whined and whimpered.”

“Oh no,” I said, feeling sad. “Poor little thing!”

“Maybe the next time you’re in Albania, you can come visit me and Lucky.”

“Of course, I will! I can’t wait for you to meet Besian.”

“How is married life? The wedding photos you sent were so beautiful! You looked so happy, Marley.”

“I was happy. I am happy. Married life is great.” I blew on my coffee before taking a sip and deciding it needed a couple of ice cubes to bring it down to a palatable temperature.

“I’m glad. Really,” she emphasized. “I hope you have a wonderful, happy life together.”

“Thank you.” I dropped two ice cubes into my mug and gave it a stir.

“Marley,” she said in a tone that had me instantly on alert. “There’s something I noticed in the photos you sent me.”

“Oh?” I stopped stirring to pay closer attention. “What’s that?”

“I thought he was a tourist in the first few photos,” she explained. “The ones from before you started your hike and came to my farm,” she clarified. “But then I saw him in the background of the selfies you took while out dancing with your friends.”

“What? A man? In my photos?” I switched my phone to speaker. “Hang on. I have you on speaker. I’m going to look at the pics right now.”

“He has dark hair. He looks like a weasel. There’s something not right about him,” Agnesa decided. “You’ll understand what I mean when you see him.”

I found the photos from the night I had been out dancing with Rina and Stefana. At first, I didn’t see anything weird. It wasn’t until I got to the fourth photo that I spotted the man Agnesa had seen. He lurked in the background, close to the bar in the first club we had visited. He seemed completely out of place, too old for the crowd surrounding him. Agnesa was right. He did look like a weasel.

“Do you see him?”

“Yes,” I said, dragging my thumb across my screen to look at the other photos. He was in many of them, just barely visible in some and too close for comfort in others.

Was this the man who had taken photos of me? Of Rina? Was he tied to this crypto mess? To Adrian? To my mother?

“Agnesa, I’ll call you back later, okay? I need to show this to Besian.”

“It’s fine. Call me when you have time. Please be careful, Marley.”

“I will be careful,” I promised. “And thank you! For calling me and telling me what you found.”

We said goodbye and ended our call. I stared at the Weasel and shivered at the unsettling look in his beady eyes. Was he back in Tirana? Following Rina?

Or had he followed me home to Houston?

Dread washed over me as I stared at the windows looking out over the city. He could be out there, anywhere, watching and waiting.

But for what?

To kill me?

To kidnap me?

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