A Mystery Unfolds

Today's writing prompt was a "first line" meaning the random sentence had to be the first line of my story (I know, not hard to figure that out, right?).  I didn't time myself this time.  I started at work, but I was interrupted. I'm not sure how much time I actually spent writing this.  Some spots were written several times, since my Word program kept crashing and, of course, didn't save my work. Grrr.  Oh well. Here's the result of today's writing exercise.  My story starter was "Someone must have seen him because the police were at his door:"  Enjoy!

Someone must have seen him because the police were at his door. He thought he had been careful,  and timed it right. There must have been someone lurking in a dark shadow while he has visited the freshly dug grave last night.  They pounded at the door again.  Better answer it, before they break down the door.  His bike was parked out front, giving it away that he was home. He never went anywhere without that bike. It had been his brother's and he had inherited it when his brother was killed overseas five years ago.  He threw on a shirt and padded down the stairs, the 3rd one from the bottom creaking like it had done since he was in third grade.
"What can I help you with, officers?" he said as he opened the door. 
"We have a couple questions for you, son. Wanna invite us in?"
"Uh yeah, sure, ok," he replied, running a hand through his hair, which was already standing on end. It looked like he had been doing that a lot lately. Stress does that to a person. And when your girlfriend dies mysteriously, and the whole town starts pointing their fingers at you, it causes a fair share of stress.
He moved the laundry basket off the couch, and cleared the magazines off the chair.  "Have a seat gentlemen. Um, can I get you something to drink? I've got....um, I've got water. And a couple of clean glasses." He shrugged aplogetically. "Keeping up with the house chores hasn't been high on my priority list, what with burying Jess and all"
"We're fine, thank you. Let's cut to the chase, Cody. Where were you last night?"
"Last night.....when last night?" He could hear the tremble in his voice, and hoped they couldn't.
"Around 3am. We have a witness report of someone in the cemetery around that time. Going back to the crime scene?  I hear some criminals do that. Some sick need to relive the crime or something."
Cody was relieved and confused at the same time.  It wasn't him they were looking for. He had been back from the cemetery and curled up on his bed, drunk and passed out, by 3am.  But who was in the cemetery after him? And why?
"Officers, I may be a night owl, but I don't go lurking about the town in the middle of the night.  Last night, I drowned my sorrows in more beers than I'd like to admit.  Last time I saw the clock it showed quarter to one. Next thing I know, you're waking me up pounding on my front door.  As for returning to the scene of the crime, you'd have to find the actual criminal and ask him.  I didn't kill Jessi."  The two cops glanced at each other briefly before the older one pulled something out of his pocket.
"There was a crudely made stick cross on Jessi's grave.  This was hanging on it.  What can you tell us about it?"
He held up a long piece of red ribbon, tied in a knot like it had been worn as a necklace.  Hanging on the ribbon was a ring. Cody's heart stopped for a moment, then tried to jump right out of his chest.
"That's.....that's not.....possible!" Cody choked out.  It was the ring he had quietly purchased over a month ago.  The ring he had been carrying around in his pocket everyday, waiting for the right moment. The ring he was going to give Jessi when he asked her to be his wife.  The right moment never came, and now it never would.  The ring had been in his jeans pocket last night, as he stood over her grave and wept in the privacy of darkness.
"What's not possible, son?"
"That ring. I.....I bought that ring, last month. I was going to ask Jess to marry me. I never got the nerve to pop the question before..." He swallowed the lump forming in his throat. "Before she died. I've been carrying it around in my pocket. Yesterday....it was in my pocket yesterday. I put it....." He stopped. The blood drained from his face.
"Where, Cody? Where did you put it?"
"On the pillow, her pillow, beside me when I went to bed last night."
He looked at the cops, his eyes round with fright and shock.  Someone had been in his house, in his bedroom. As he snored, sleeping off his drunken stupor, someone had come in and stolen the ring, off the pillow next to his head.