Page 132 of Demo
I shake my head. “Just water. And coffee. Lots, and lots of coffee. Please.”
Knox pulls a mug down from a top cupboard and fills it with coffee from the pot he must have brewed this morning. Then he grabs the half-and-half from the fridge, sets both on the island, and pushes them toward me.
“Thanks,” I murmur.
Knox rests his hands wide on the island on the other side of me, so he’s looking right at me. “You’re welcome,” he says, then waits for me to look up at him and meet his eyes, and he holds it for a moment before he turns back toward the stove and picks the spatula back up.
I pick up a pancake, tear off a piece and stuff it into my mouth, grateful for the dry, fluffy, sweet sustenance to put in my body. Anything else would surely be rejected this morning.
“What time do you have to be at work?” Knox asks without turning around.
I swallow a large bite, then take a sip of coffee after adding half-and-half. “Um, I don’t really have any appointments today, so I guess I can mosey on in whenever.”
After a moment of silence, I ask, “You?”
Knox turns to flop two more pancakes on the plate. “I told Tommy and Gino I’d be a little late today. But I should probably be there no later than ten. We’ve got roofers coming today and they need instruction.”
I swallow quickly. “Well, don’t keep them waiting on my account. You didn’t have to make breakfast. I mean, I’m grateful you did, but I can clean up if you have to run.”
Staring right at me, Knox waits a beat before he answers. “I’ve got time.”
I look down because I don’t know what to say. Then I pick up a pancake and toss it in his direction. He catches it awkwardly between his hand and his chest, then tears a bite off with his teeth. “Mmm, damn! I really do make good pancakes!” he says through a mouthful.
“It’s a box mix, Chef Gordon Ramsey. Don’t pat yourself too hard on the back.”
We both laugh, and then it’s quiet for a few minutes. Awkward.
Knox clears his throat, and I start to panic because I know that means he’s about to talk, and I’m sure he’s going to want to talk about last night, or us, or something else I don’t have the capacity to discuss right now, but thankfully our attention is drawn to Kennedy scratching at the floor under the fridge.
“Good grief, buddy, what is it? What is under there that you want so badly, huh?” I ask. “There must be food or something under there that he smells, because—”
“It’s your wedding band,” Knox interrupts me, and I just stare at him. “When you threw them at me, your wedding band rolled under there and I couldn’t get it. I tried, but my arms are too big.”
I think about it for a minute, stunned that we are going to talk about that night so casually, then shake my head. “That can’t be it. He can’t possiblysmellmy wedding band.” I get up and round the island and start trying to tug the refrigerator out of place.
“No,” Knox says, joining me. “But he can probably see it.”
“Yeah, but his scratching only just started,” I grunt out.
Together we heave the refrigerator, inch by inch, away from the wall and out of the little nook it sits in. Once it’s out of place we both stand there and stare at what’s underneath. There sits my wedding band, and next to it is a little baggie filled with clouded crystals.
Slowly, I bend down to pick up both the ring and the baggie. I trap the wedding band in my palm as I examine the contents of the bag, without opening it. Then I snap my eyes up.
“What the fuck is this, Knox?!”
He actually takes a step back, and puts up his hands. “Whoa! No! No way! That is not mine. Lizzie, I swear to God on … on … on my mother’s grave! That is not mine!”
For some reason, I believe him. “Well, then how the hell did it get here?”
Knox takes the baggie from my hands and turns it over in his own. “Looks like crystal meth,” he says, and my heart breaks at the realization that he even knows what that looks like. He must read the look on my face, because he shakes his head, his silent way of telling me he’s never touched that stuff. “It’s just a guess,” he says. “How long has Kennedy been scratching under the refrigerator?”
“Um,” I chew my lip in thought as I cross my arms over my chest. “Ever since the break in, I guess. Yeah, since Sanders and that other guy broke in.”
“Sanders? How do you know it was Sanders?”
“Oh, well, the chief showed me a shot from a surveillance video from down the street that shows Sanders and some other guy walking away from the apartment right about the time they believe the intrusion happened.”
Knox tosses the drugs onto the counter and runs both his hands down his face while leaning against the kitchen island, so he’s standing opposite me. “What about the other guy? Any idea who he was?”
