“What’s going on?”
I looked over my shoulder at Byron then to her. “I asked Byron to look into Knox’s mom. He couldn’t find anything on her. Not a thing.”
“So she disappeared. That isn’t news,” Raye said.
“Nothing, Raye. No trace,” I replied.
“Is that weird?” she asked softly.
“I’m making Byron’s dirty chai to go because he’s going to NI&S. So yeah. That’s weird.”
She pressed her lips together.
I gave Byron his chai.
He took off.
“Hold the fort?” I asked.
She nodded.
I slipped back to the employee room and pulled out my phone.
I called Knox.
“Hey, gorgeous,” he greeted.
“Hey, honey, um…well, just to say, I wanted to maybe get on top of your mom sitch in case something happened with that, so I asked Byron to look into her.”
“Coulda saved you the trouble. Brody did a deep dive into her when they were vetting me.”
Good to know.
However…
“Byron’s coming in,” I informed him. “He, Tex and Tito are tweaked that there isn’t more on her.”
“I know. She erased herself.”
“Entirely?”
“Brody couldn’t find anything, so yeah.”
“You don’t think this is weird?”
“I think Dad was pissed she left. He’s an asshole, but he didn’t marry her because she was good at laundry. He loved her. He didn’t want her to go. I think she probably knew he’d look for her so she took care. I explained this to the guys.”
I didn’t reply.
“You’re tweaked,” he noted.
“I’m tweaked because Tex, Tito and Byron are tweaked.”
“They should have called and asked me. I would have—” he stopped talking abruptly.
“What?” I prompted.
He didn’t say anything.
