Chapter 7: Not the Tea

Leander drove the brunch cup to a clinic three towns away, and I rode beside it like an escort.

I had walked out of the club with it under my jacket, still half full, with the spoon wrapped in a napkin.

My father's note was in my pocket. Three words, pressed through the page.

The clinic ran private toxicology panels for hospital staff. Leander knew a technician there from his army days.

He carried the cup in a sealed freezer bag on the back seat.

We left it at the desk with a form and a name that wasn't mine.

"Results by tomorrow noon," the technician said. "Sooner, if it's clean."

"And if it isn't?" I asked.

He gave me a flat look. "Then I call somebody who isn't you."

We were both starving, so we stopped at a diner on the main road.

It was crowded. A school bus had let out, and a row of kids sat at the counter. In the next booth two women split a pie and a loud argument.

Leander sat across from me with his back to the wall. He could see the door, the window and the kitchen pass.

I had taken the same seat on purpose.

"Eat," he said.

"I'm thinking."

"You're thinking at your fries."

The waitress topped up our coffee and left. Under the table my boot found his.

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