A Profiler's Case for Seduction(59)

“You can come to my place. I rent a little house off campus.” He rattled off an address that Mark easily stored in his memory bank. “Why don’t we say around seven?”

“Sounds good to me,” Mark replied.

With a hurried goodbye, Ben continued on his way. Mark watched him go, aware of the fact that like Andrew Peterson, Ben had the same medium build, medium height, as the person on the kidnapping videos.

Knowing that with Ben gone it was doubtful Melinda would send her other minion away, Mark pulled out his cell phone and punched in Joseph’s number. Joseph was the one who had done the background checks on Ben and Amanda.

“Yo, brother, where are you?” Joseph said when he answered his phone.

“On campus...what about you?”

“At the sheriff’s office with Nick Jeffries checking and cross-checking facts. What’s up?”

“Do you have Amanda Burns’s address?” Mark asked. He figured the best place to catch the assistant alone would be there. Sooner or later she would have to go home.

“Hang on.” There was a rustle of papers and then Joseph gave him the information he needed.

After thanking Joseph, he disconnected and headed off campus toward the apartment building where Amanda lived alone in apartment 114.

As he walked he picked through the information the morning meeting had yielded. Pulling the tail off Andrew Peterson didn’t mean the man was innocent. The fact that Peterson had been a good boy all week, coming and going to work and back home, didn’t clear his name. He was still definitely a potential player on Mark’s radar.

Mark knew Melinda’s class schedule was light on Wednesdays, but he also knew there was no telling what the taskmaster might have in store for Amanda throughout the day. The lecture they were currently in would only last an hour and he was hoping Amanda would return to her apartment after that.

It wasn’t a long walk to the apartment building, and once there, Mark found a shady place to sit near the door of Amanda’s and watch for her arrival.

It didn’t take him long to get lost in thoughts of both the murders that had occurred and his relationship with Dora. It was a strange mental combination that brought him both frustration and pleasure.

He had no idea how long he’d been seated when he saw Amanda approaching. She looked worse than the last time he’d seen her in the coffee shop, more exhausted, more stressed.

When she caught sight of him, she stumbled and righted herself. Her gaze shot all around and then back to him. “Agent...Mark,” she said. “Wha...what are you doing here?”

“I was wondering if I could have a chat with you?”

Once again Amanda looked around the area, as if afraid she might be seen with the FBI agent. She hurriedly unlocked the door to her unit and motioned him inside.

“A chat about what?” she asked once he was inside the small living room and the door was closed behind him. She laid her laptop and purse on a chair but offered no invitation for him to have a seat.

He took the initiative, sitting on the sofa and then pointing for her to sit down, as well. She seemed to slink across the room and sat on the farthest end of the sofa from him. She didn’t relax against the cushions but rather remained on the edge, as if poised to run at any moment.

She stared over his head at some indefinable point and waited, her silence like a scream of tension in the room.

“Amanda.” He said her name firmly, hoping to force her gaze to his. It worked. Her eyes met his and she reached a hand up to tuck a strand of her hair behind her ear. “You seem nervous.”

In truth she appeared to be a woman on the verge of a nervous breakdown. He couldn’t help but notice the ragged fingernails, bitten below the quick. Her eyes held the look of startled panic as a short burst of laughter escaped her.

“I am nervous,” she replied. “I’m not used to being questioned by the FBI. Have I done something wrong?”

Mark shrugged. “You tell me.”

She laughed again. “No, I can’t be in trouble because I haven’t done anything.”

“Actually, I’m here to talk to you about Professor Grayson,” Mark said, and instantly felt the tension in the air heighten.

“What about her?” Amanda’s face had paled slightly and once again her gaze shot over Mark’s head. No doubt, she was afraid of what Mark might see in the depths of her eyes.

“I heard she’s a tough taskmaster.”