The Lies That Bind

27: I'll Take An Existential Crisis With My Pancakes, Please

Cooper woke the next morning to an empty bed.

He stretched out his arm, dragging a hand along the empty sheets Calla usually occupied. Harsh winter sunlight slanted through the blinds, striping the carpeted floor, effectively blinding him. He blinked, bleary-eyed, trying to shake off the last dredges of sleep that clung to him.

He might have given in, too—if it weren't for the tempting, sugary-sweet aroma of something on the air, chasing him out of bed and into the kitchen.

That was where he found her: Calla, standing by the sink, her expression one of immense disapproval as she frowned down at a mixing bowl tucked in the crook of her elbow. She'd stacked an assortment of pans on the stove, little blue flames burning beneath each of them.

Cooper smiled, though there was something...off about the otherwise idyllic scene. Maybe it was the newspaper—an honest-to-God newspaper—spread out on the counter between the pancake mix and the milk, a dozen obituaries having been torn out and scattered. Discarded. Or it could have been the calendar next to the mangled newspaper, with several dates marked up in vivid red ink. Mrs. Henschel, Blackwell Cemetery, Sunday @ 4:00 PM, he read. And many others besides.

Or maybe—and this was the likeliest answer—it was the knife thrown carelessly in the sink. A rather familiar knife with a bone white handle, its blade smeared with bits of orange pulp. Cooper recognized it immediately.

Calla had been using an old murder weapon to slice fucking oranges.

Padding barefoot across the icy kitchen floor, Cooper joined her at the sink and wrapped his arms around her waist. Okay, so maybe this wasn't exactly like any other quaint Sunday morning. There were one too many obituaries for that. But, well...

He'd take it.

Cooper propped his chin against her shoulder. "Why are you ripping obituaries out of the morning paper?"

"Aren't you going to ask how I even got the morning paper?"

He paused. "Actually, yes. I haven't seen a newspaper in years, now that you mention it." He frowned as a memory came to him. "Except for this one old guy who always brought one in to the Diner—"

"They still come in the mail." She returned her attention to the pancake mix in her arms. "The more you know."

"Random. But okay." He eyed the open flames on the stove. "Would you like some help with your would-be pancakes?"

"No, I most certainly do not need your help." She scowled, angrily churning the mix around and around. Then she stopped. Sighed. Turned and shoved the bowl against his chest. "Fine. You do it."

He grinned. "You forgot the milk." He grabbed the carton she'd left out on the counter and measured out a cupful, her dark eyes watching his every move.

They had more important things to do than sit around and whip up pancakes—like, figure out how to twist Michaels' dirty little secret against him, for starters. But Cooper couldn't muster the energy to care. For now, he was content just to be here with Calla, doing something so completely...normal.

Still. Something about the obituaries and their not normalness nagged at him.

The professor will be dead soon.

He stopped his mixing. "Calla?"

"Hmm?" When he looked up, he found her staring down at her work schedule, frowning as she crossed out one date and then another. And another.

He may not have heard exactly what Michaels said to Calla over the phone yesterday, but he'd gotten the basic gist of it. Professor Li was still alive. And that needed to change.