Before I Go: A dark and tense psychological crime thriller. by Marie Reyes (reading strategies book txt) 📕

seeing things. He was sleep deprived. His own face looked back up at him, a photograph of Josie next to him.

Wanted in connection with the disappearance of Julio Vasquez.

A rush of blood ran into his face as the sun burned down on him. The most trouble he had gotten into with the law, was the one time he tried shoplifting as a teenager. He felt exposed, like everyone passing on the street would recognize him at any second. “Is this some sort of joke?”

“If it is, I’m not fucking laughing.” She continued pacing and his eyes followed her, her pacing made him even more anxious.

“We really need to get to the embassy. Sort all this out. They’ll see through it. What were they thinking, though? Surely it’s not in Samuel’s interest to have them look into all this. But he’s forcing our hand. Giving us no choice but end up in jail.”

“Is he just trying to keep us busy? I don’t know.” She flung her hands up in the air, as if she was praying for the answers to come dropping down from the sky.

A figure appeared in Michael’s peripheral vision and he turned to see Aleksander stood in the doorway. “I know something is wrong, I’m not stupid. Please, let me help.”

“We need somewhere to stay. Somewhere private. Alex, someone’s after us.” Michael couldn’t keep it in any longer. They couldn’t do this by themselves.

“I’m moving into my long-term rental place tomorrow. I was supposed to move in today, but I was thinking to try my luck with this girl here. I was getting all the signals, you know. I was thinking of being a scuba instructor, thought I’d get a nice little place to stay, comes with a car too. You can stay as long as you want.”

“Why would you do that for me? You barely even know me?” The promise of somewhere safe to catch his breath was more than he could have hoped for.

“We travelers need to stick together, y’know.”

“Alex, there are things you don’t know. Things that if you knew, you would not want us staying with you.”

“Then you tell me tonight, I can at least give you a good night's sleep.” He walked up to the front desk. “Anita. Hola. I check out today after all. If Katie ask after me, do you think you could give her my number?”

“Sure Alex. This place won’t be the same without you. Hope the diving goes well.” She gave him a brief hug over the counter before serving a new guest that was waiting.

***

Michael leaned against the window of the taxi, pretending to be asleep as Aleksander sat in front, chatting with the driver like they were two old friends catching up. He was an easy guy to like and could talk to anyone. It was a talent Michael wished he could possess, but he struggled to relate to people he had little in common with. Usually he didn’t trust overly happy people. He felt they were lying to themselves, phony, projecting a fake version of themselves to get people to like them, yet he found Aleksander’s childlike optimism inexplicably endearing. Josie also kept her head down in the back of the cab. Nothing to see here, just two weary travelers, exhausted from all the overnight buses, activities and nights of endless drinking.

The taxi pulled in front of a white rectangular building with a mural of waves painted on the side in bold-blue. The entire process of checking in was discreet, involving no human interaction whatsoever. Aleksander put a code into the keypad of a lockbox to retrieve the front door and garage key, and a card with the Wi-Fi code sat in there with a handwritten note.

“Welcome to casa Janssen.” Alex announced as he struggled to get the knack of the stiff lock.

The guest suite was minimalist and clean. The main living space had a large, almost brand new sofa bed and an adjoining kitchen. The bedroom had just enough room for the king-size bed, but little else, and there was a small bathroom between them.

“So I guess you guys better fill me in.” Alex sat at the end of the sofa and cracked open a beer he got from his bag. Josie excused herself and went to the bathroom.

“I honestly don’t know where to begin. I met Josie in Tulum, at the hotel bar. We hit it off. It turned out she came to Mexico to find her sister. She got kidnapped a year ago, around here actually.”

“Oh my god. Are you for serious?”

“Unfortunately, yes. Anyway, I agreed to help her. She wanted to find out what happened. Go rogue, and somehow find out something the police couldn’t, or just didn’t want to find. I honestly didn’t think anything would come of it. We asked around. Got ourselves noticed. Alex, someone tried to kill us.”

“That’s insane. So what did you do?”

“That’s just it. There’s nothing we can do. Something bigger than us is going on here. That woman that got killed, she was not murdered by her husband like the girl at the hostel said. He was with us. He saved us. Now he’s been arrested, and they’re after us now. They’re looking for us, the cops are, and this other guy, Samuel Valentino Hernandez. He wants us gone. He has something to do with her sister going missing, I don’t know if he is cartel, or what.” Michael snatched in a breath.

“Slow down. This is a lot to take in. Jesus.” He got up from the sofa and started pacing whilst taking sips of his beer.

“You’ve got to help us. We need to get to the embassy, tell them our side of the story before any police involvement. All we need is the money to get there and we can be out of your hair.”

“I can drive you. It’s probably safer that way.”

“That is more than we would have ever asked for. Are you sure?” He tried to keep eye contact with Alex as