A Profiler's Case for Seduction(29)
“I’ve never seen your gun before,” she finally said.
“Does it bother you?” His brows lifted with concern. “I can take my holster off while we have our coffee.”
“No, it’s fine. I just never really thought about you being a gun-toting kind of guy. So, how’s the investigation going?” she asked once the coffee had begun dripping into the glass carafe and she’d gotten out two mugs and a sugar bowl.
“We have a new person of interest.”
His words spun her around to look at him. “Really? Who?”
“His name is Troy Young, a local rancher. He was in Johnnie’s Tavern last night spouting off how the killer had done everyone a favor. I decided this morning that we needed to look closer at him.”
Dora poured the coffee and carried his cup along with the sugar bowl and a spoon to the table. “And what did you find?” she asked. She quickly grabbed her own cup and sat down across from him.
“We’re just starting the dig, but I don’t want to talk about that right now. What I want to know is what had you so freaked out when you were walking home.”
Dora’s stomach tightened and she gazed down into her mug. “It’s nothing really.” She was hoping he’d forgotten all about it.
“Dora, I felt you. I felt the emotion that wafted off you.” She looked up in surprise, right into that piercing gaze of his. “It’s what I do, Dora. This is what I’m trained for, to feel emotion, to get into people’s heads and to become the killer.”
“I’m no killer,” she mumbled.
He smiled at her, a gentle smile that threatened to be her undoing. “I know that, but something had you spooked out there as we walked home. Tell me why you were afraid.”
His gaze had her captured, like a trembling bird in the palm of his hand, and to her horror tears welled up in her eyes to blur her vision. She hadn’t realized how fear had simmered inside of her the past week or so until this very moment with the tall, handsome FBI agent looking at her with concern.
“Dora.” He instantly got up, walked around the table and pulled her to her feet. He cupped her face with his strong hands. “Talk to me. What’s going on?”
“I know it sounds crazy, but I think I’m being stalked.” The fear she’d tried to swallow against for the past week exploded out of her on a choking sob.
Mark could climb into the head of a psychopath, and he could reasonably anticipate the next move of a serial killer, but despite his brief marriage to Sarah, he’d never known much about women, especially crying women.
As Dora began to tremble and cry in earnest, he acted only on instinct. He quickly took off his gun and holster, laid them on the table and then tugged her against him and wrapped her tight in his arms.
With her shapely body filling his arms, fitting just beneath his chin as he’d thought she would, for a moment all he could think about was the sensory pleasure.
She fit perfectly and, just as he suspected, her hair smelled of the sweetness of a field of flowers. She was warm and soft as she buried her head in the crook of his neck.
He caressed a hand up and down her back, tearing his thoughts away from how right she felt in his arms and instead focusing on why she was crying, what she had just said to him.
Stalked?
Why would somebody be stalking Dora? As she finished her crying she stumbled back from him, her cheeks damp and flushed with embarrassment. “I’m sorry,” she said as she swiped her cheeks. She gestured him back to his chair at the table, but he ignored her.
Instead he grabbed her by the hand and led her back into the living room and pulled her down next to him on the comfortable sofa. “Tell me,” he said as he twisted his body to face her and took both her hands in his. “Why do you think you’re being stalked?”
She squeezed his hands and gave a small self-conscious laugh. “I don’t know, maybe I’m just being paranoid because of what happened to Melin...Professor Grayson.” She pulled her hands from his and leaned back against the cushions. “The last week or so when I’ve walked home after work, I’ve been sure somebody was following me. I’ve heard their footsteps behind me, but when I turn around nobody is there. When I’m walking between classes I get that prickly feeling of uneasiness and my chest tightens up with fear. The other night I was certain that there was a person hiding behind the tree in the neighbor’s yard, watching me.” She shivered and once again released a small laugh as if to dismiss her fears.