I waited for Agent Locke to reply. She didnt. Neither did Dean.
To fill the silence, I added one last observation. She gets cold really easily.
There was no other excuse for wearing a fleeceeven indoorsin July.
What makes you think shes a student? Agent Locke asked finally.
I met Deans eyes and knew suddenly that he saw it, too. Its ten thirty in the morning, I said, and shes not at work. Its too early for a lunch break, and shes not dressed like someone whos on the job.
Agent Locke raised an eyebrow. Maybe she works from home. Or maybe shes between jobs. Maybe she teaches elementary school and shes on summer vacation.
Those objections were perfectly valid, but somehowto methey still felt wrong. It was hard to explain; I thought of Michael warning me that the FBI would never stop trying to figure out how I did what I did.
I thought about Agent Locke saying shed learned profiling the hard wayone class at a time.
Shes not even looking at them.
To my shock, Dean was the one who came to my rescue.
Pardon? Agent Locke turned her attention to him.
The other people here in her age range. Dean nodded toward a couple of young moms with small children, plus several department store employees lined up for coffee. Shes not looking at them. They arent her peers. She doesnt even realize theyre the same age. She pays more attention to college students than to other adults, but she clearly doesnt consider herself one of them, either.
And that was the feeling I hadnt been able to put into words. It was like Dean could see into my head, make sense of the information bouncing around my brainbut, of course, that wasnt it. He hadnt needed to get into my head, because hed been thinking the exact same thing.
After a long moment of silence, Dean flicked his eyes over to me. Why med school?
I glanced back at the girl. Because shes a runner.
Dean smiled, ever so slightly. You mean shes a masochist.
Across the room, the girl wed been talking about rose, and I was able to make out the bags in her hand, the stores shed shopped at. It fit. Everything fit.
I wasnt wrong.
What makes you think she has a boyfriend? Dean asked, and under his quiet drawl I could hear curiosityand maybe even admiration.
I shrugged in response to his questionmainly because I didnt want to tell him that the reason Id been sure this girl wasnt single was the fact that the entire time wed been there, she hadnt so much as glanced at Dean.
From a distance, he would have looked older.
Even in jeans and a faded black T-shirt, you could see the muscles tensing against the fabric of his sleeves. And the muscles not covered by his sleeves.
His hair, his eyes, the way he stood, and the way he movedif shed been single, she would have
looked.
Wed been at the mall for three hours. Id thought coming out to the parking lot had signaled the end of todays training, but apparently I was wrong.
That one, Cassie. Go.
I opened my mouth, then shut it again. I was used to starting with people: their posture, the way they talked, their clothes, their occupations, their gender, the way they arranged a napkin on their lapthat was my language. Starting with a car was like flying blind.
In our line of work, Agent Locke told me as I stared at a white Acura, debating whether it belonged to a shopper or someone who worked at the mall, you dont get to meet the suspect before you profile the crime. You go to the scene and you rebuild what happened. You take physical evidence, you turn it into behavior, and then you try to narrow down the range of suspects. You dont know if youre looking for a man or a woman, a teenager or an old man. You know how they killed, but you dont know why. You know how they left the body, but you have to figure out how they found the victim. She paused. So, Cassie. Who owns this car?
The make and model werent telling me much. This car could have belonged to either a man or a woman, and it was parked in front of the food court, which meant that I had no idea what the owners destination inside the mall was. The parking space wasnt a good one, but it wasnt bad. The parking job left a little to be desired.
They were in a hurry, I said. The parking job is crooked, and they didnt bother cruising for a better space. That also told me that the driver didnt have the kind of ego that would push a person to hunt for a prime spot, as if getting a great parking place at the mall was an indicator of personal worth. No car seat, so no young children. No bumper stickers, relatively recently washed. Theyre not here for foodno reason to hurry for thatbut they parked at the food court, so either they dont know where theyre going once they get inside the mall or their store of choice is close by.
I paused, waiting for Dean to pick up where I had left off, but he didnt. Instead, Agent Locke gave me a single piece of advice.
Dont say they.
I didnt mean they as in plural, I said hastily. I just havent decided yet if its a man or a woman.
Dean glanced at the mall entrance and then back at me. Thats not what she means. They keeps you on the outside. So do he and she.