The door flew open seconds later. “What time did you say it was?” Her eyes were wide.

“It’s nine thirty.” He slid past her, closing the door behind him.

Steve came out a few minutes later. His clothing disheveled and he looked around the room. “I missed my first class.” He gathered his things.

“I don’t have my schedule with me.” Jennifer looked at him as she hand combed her hair.

“Neither do I.”

They stopped frantically running around the cabin and looked at each other. He started laughing first and then she joined in.

“No, you don’t understand,” he said through the laughter. “My boss is teaching the eight o’clock class.”

Her eyebrows went up as she continued to laugh. “Oooo, you’re in trouble,” she taunted.

He shot across the room and wrapped his arms around her. “It was worth it waking up with you.” He kissed her and took her hand as he led her out of the cabin. “But I am going to get reamed, truly reamed,” he added locking the door.

“The food?”

“I’ll clean up later. I have to shoot over to the frat house and get my damn schedule.” He slid into his car and took off like a bat out of hell, leaving a dust cloud in his wake.

Chapter 13

Steve skidded to a halt in front of the fraternity house and ran in. Quickly changing into a pair of shorts and a t-shirt, he reached for his schedule and a notebook, and flew back out. His cell began to ring as he turned the key in the ignition. He flipped the phone open and put it on speaker. “What?”

“It’s Professor Murphy. You missed my class this morning.”

“I overslept,” Steve grumbled, shifting gears. Late for his third class of the day—so much for being the model college student.

“Please tell me you at least have more information for me than you did yesterday,” Agent Murphy snapped into the phone.

“No,” Steve replied, and slid into a spot in the student parking lot. “I have to go. I’m late for my next class.” He heard his superior swear under his breath. “Pledging starts this week,” he added as he closed the door. “I’m sure I’ll have some more information for you before the end of the week.” He flipped the phone closed, consulted his schedule and headed in the general direction of the lecture hall. Many of the people he passed stopped and stared at him. Entering the building, he glanced down at his shirt and almost laughed aloud. It was inside out. Veering into the bathroom, he stripped and slipped the shirt on the right way and glanced in the mirror. His eye and cheek were purple with blue around the edges and his hair disheveled to the point of unruly. “No wonder everyone was staring.” He wet his hands and smoothed his hair back, combing it into place. Satisfied, he slipped out and into the back row of the lecture hall, hoping he’d go unnoticed.

“Good of you to join us. Mr. Williams, I presume?” The professor turned and stared him down.

Steve smiled awkwardly. “Sorry,” he mumbled. Every eye in the class turned in his direction.

“If you can’t make it in time for my class, you’d better drop out now because I will not tolerate tardiness. This is your one and only warning.” He turned back and continued where he had left off.

Steve opened his notebook and glanced around. Everyone had turned his or her attention back to the professor. Glancing at his schedule, he grimaced. He had public relations next. That must be a mistake. He closed his eyes for a moment and took a deep breath, trying to concentrate on the lecture, but his mind was restless. It kept wandering back to Jennifer.

“Are we boring you, Mr. Williams?”

Steve’s eyes flew open. “No, I listen better with my eyes closed.”

The professor pursed his lips. “If that is the case, what was I just discussing?”

“The Miranda rights and the effect they have on the interrogation process.”

The professor’s face turned red. With a nod of satisfaction, he continued the lecture.

Steve glanced at the student next to him and offered her a shrug. He focused his attention on the lecture and closed his eyes again, leaning back in the seat. As he half listened, his mind rattled off everything he learned the last couple of days. A nagging feeling gnawed in the pit of his stomach, masked by the pangs of hunger. Damn it, I’m missing something significant here. He leaned forward, doodling in his notebook.

He needed to get back in the good graces of his fraternity brothers in the next couple of days. He had alienated Bill and that wasn’t a wise thing to do—after all, he was the president of the fraternity. Click. Steve looked up. How was it that the president of his fraternity wasn’t dating a sorority girl? He leaned back in the seat and pretended to focus on the professor. He couldn’t play this game with Jennifer anymore, not if he wanted to remain close to Bill Tyler. He closed his eyes at the next thought, his head dipping slightly. I’m gonna need to use my relationship with Jennifer. He smiled slightly. Sometimes this job does suck.

Steve checked his watch. He still had a few minutes until class was over. He took the syllabus out. Damn, he’d have to do some work this semester if he couldn’t crack the case before long. He sighed, looking back at his notebook. He stared at the paper. His eyes darted around the room and back down at his doodling. He blinked and looked again. Scrawled across the middle of the paper in red were words that stunned him.

She is mine.

The handwriting definitely wasn’t his. He had written Jennifer’s name several times on the paper and they all had the crisp sharp edges of the blue ballpoint pen he held. Those words hadn’t been there when he opened the notebook. Fuzzy edges, like a felt tip pen on a paper towel. He flipped the page, and then flipped through all the pages. The deep red scrawl reminding him of blood graced every single page in the composition booklet. He slammed the notebook closed, gaining the attention of the room once again.

“Is there a problem, Mr. Williams?” The professor asked, obviously annoyed at the interruption.

Steve fumbled this time. He looked down at his notebook and back up again, trying not to shiver noticeably. “I…ah…no. No problem.”

The professor studied him and then looked around. “That concludes today’s lecture.”

Steve bolted out of the room before the professor could get another barb in. He walked unsteadily out of the building and toward the adjacent lecture hall where his next class was. Preoccupied with the crimson scribbles in his notebook, he nearly plowed someone over. “Sorry,” he mumbled absently without really seeing the person he had almost flattened.

“Steve?”

Her voice brought him back and he snapped his head toward her. His eyes still haunted by what he had seen.

“Are you ok?” Jennifer asked. He hadn’t even noticed her. He hadn’t noticed anyone.

“I…ah...” His eyes shot between her and the notebook. “I don’t know.”

“What’s wrong?”

He glanced at the notebook, afraid to open it.

“What happened?”

He shook his head and looked around. “Something really weird. It doesn’t fit in my black and white world.”

Jennifer raised her eyebrows.

He took a breath and held it opening the notebook. The words glared out among the doodles.

She is mine.

He flipped through the pages, showing her the bleed-through letters gracing each sheet. “It wasn’t there when I opened the notebook.”

Jennifer stared at his doodles then up at him in confusion. “You wrote my name, several times.”

Steve blinked and stepped back. He looked from the page to her. He flipped to a page he hadn’t doodled on and held it up for her to see.

“It’s blank,” she replied, looking at him like he was just shy of a full deck.

“You can’t see that?” He stepped back again.