It was supposed to be my last trip of the night, the kind you accept without thinking because it’s on your way home and you’re already tired enough to stop caring. The pickup location was a quiet side street near a row of dim apartment buildings, the kind of place that felt half-asleep even in the middle of the night. When he opened the back door and slid into the seat, something immediately felt off—not in a dramatic way, not something you could point to right away, but enough to make me glance at him twice in the rearview mirror.
“Hey,” I said, keeping my tone neutral. “Long night?”
