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Mara blossomed, knowing herself loved. Even though Trace had not touched her since that time at his cabin, these were halcyon days for her, each one more special than the day before, and each one leading to the inevitable conclusion. And though part of her was impatient for the words of love, another part of her was content to let Trace tell her when he was ready. She just wished it would be soon. Andre never asked when they spoke on the phone, never pushed her for details in any way, but it had been more than five weeks since she’d told him she was in love, and she knew he was waiting for her to tell him more. There just wasn’t anything to tell him...yet.
* * *
“Given the acceleration, which is a second-order differential equation,” Mara explained, writing with a dark blue erasable marker on the whiteboard in the small classroom where she taught her grad students, “if you integrate you get the velocity.” She quickly added several more figures and symbols, the marker squeaking slightly in her writing haste. “If you integrate again, you get the distance traveled.”
She glanced back at her students. “See how that works?” Expressions of intense concentration and comprehension met her questioning gaze. “Remember, while pure mathematics has a beauty and meaning of its own, it is applied mathematics that drives our world.” She smiled at them. “Engineers in the room, take heart. We are heading into your territory now.”
Mara glanced regretfully at the clock. “And that, I think, is all for today.” She held up one hand to hold the class for a moment. “Do not forget, your term papers are due next Friday. No excuses,” she warned, but with the understanding smile that reminded her students she was available if any of them were struggling with the concepts and needed assistance. She placed the marker in the little trough beneath the whiteboard as the room exploded with sudden chatter and the noise of a dozen students slinging textbooks and notebooks into backpacks or briefcases and surging toward the door.
Trace rose from his seat near the front of the room as they did so, moving quickly yet with an apparent lack of haste toward Mara’s side, his own backpack slung over his left shoulder and his right hand casually tucked inside his jacket. Two students whom Mara knew were engineering grad students and study partners stayed back and approached her with questions, which she answered after giving each question careful thought. A third student, a young man of obvious Arabic descent hovered by the door, waiting, and when Mara was free he darted forward to pose his question. After a long and detailed discussion that involved use of the whiteboard again to demonstrate what she meant, the student eventually left.
Through it all, Trace’s eyes had never left the face of the young man talking with her. Now he followed the student to the classroom door, closed it behind him and locked it while Mara wiped the eraser over the whiteboard until it was clean. She drew a deep breath and exhaled slowly with a little sound of satisfaction, allowing herself to relax finally as another strenuous week came to an end. She loved teaching, but her students kept her on her toes, especially her grad students. Their questions sometimes stretched her brain to its limit, but tough questions were a good sign. It proved she was reaching them. It proved she was making them think, and that was even more important than the concepts she was trying to impart.
Now that they were alone, she turned to Trace and allowed herself to smile at him in a more intimate fashion than she did when others were around. Sometimes he smiled back, but today wasn’t one of those days, and Mara hid a sigh. “What is it?” she asked.
“We have new intel on that man,” he said curtly, indicating the student who’d just left with a tilt of his head.
Mara’s brow wrinkled. “Intel? What is that?”
“Intelligence.” When she still looked at him with confusion, he added, “Military speak for information gathering.”
Comprehension dawned. “My students?” she asked in disbelief. “You are spying on my students?”
“Not me personally, but yes, the State Department has a dossier on every one of your students. What did you expect?”
Mara sank onto the edge of the desk and removed her eyeglasses, staring at him dumbfounded. “I...I had no idea.” She gazed up at Trace. “Why?”
“To keep you safe, of course.”
“But...they are students.” Mara knew her dismay was obvious. “They would not harm me.”
Trace shook his head. “You can’t know that for sure.” He hesitated for a moment. “That young man who was just here, for example. Good student, right? Head of the class. Applies himself diligently. But what do you really know about him? Did you know, for instance, that he has a second cousin in Lebanon with suspected ties to Hezbollah?”
