<span style="font-size: 18px">The modesty, insincere or not, took him by surprise.  Blue eyes slid down to watch Cameron caress so close to the sliced flesh.  It felt intimate, that touch, like the detective might as well have been caressing Andreas’ own chest.  The coroner had been touching it, too, but not like this.  Not like a <i>lover</i> would.  The concept gave him chills.<br/>
<br/>
 “Third date…?” he inquired, a playful and curious response that also shaped his lips in an amused curl at the edges.  It deepened as the man continued, and Andreas looked away and let out the faintest puff of a laugh.  The way he was understanding it, no killer had ever managed to slide a third victim onto the slab before this detective caught up and brought them to whatever twisted idea of justice the world still believed in.  <br/>
<br/>
 So the modesty had been feigned, after all.  Cameron was good, and he <i>knew</i> it.  The assassin actually preferred it that way.  Even in an opponent, he’d take someone who believed in skill over luck any day.  Skill was easier to anticipate, to work around, and to counter.  <br/>
<br/>
 The room was filled with a new atmosphere in record time, though Andreas doubted the coroner noticed at all.  The resentment he could see in Cam at the way he was hindered and dismissed by a supposed colleague, the warning flash of that anger burning just below the surface, and something in his eyes that warned that something might’ve been loose in his head.  Andreas’ gaze followed the detective’s to the pretty little knives lined up.  They were razor sharp, ready and willing to part soft skin… muscle… organs…  And for just a moment, Andreas thought the man might do just that.  It was like a rubber band being pulled taught, and he was waiting for it to snap under the tension.<br/>
<br/>
 Disappointment surfaced when that didn’t happen.  Had he imagined the whole thing?  Perhaps his own nature of retribution had coloured his perception in that cold room, so close to a former outlet of his own inner rage.  <br/>
<br/>
 He gave a silent nod and followed when Cameron gave the signal, remaining quiet as they made their way back up.  All the while he continued to analyze what he knew, what he could see.  It wasn’t a figment of his imagination that Cam was highly irritated.  It wasn’t his brain playing tricks on him when the phone pulled out was an obvious secondary.  Fuck, he was an assassin.  He knew a burner when he saw one.  The trick was figuring out the why behind it.  Why did Cameron deem in necessary to carry one?  Was he crooked?  Being blackmailed?  Perhaps he was more into vigilante justice and wore the title of detective like a mask.  There were, of course, less exciting prospects.  He could’ve been cheating on a lover… or five.  Would a man like this even have time to string along multiple partners?  <br/>
<br/>
 Andreas made it obvious that he’d seen the phone.  He didn’t like playing oblivious when he didn’t have to, and there was no reason to make this one of those times.  He also didn’t ask about it.  There was time, and if his curiosity kept up then there would also be enough motivation later to find the answers to all these questions that kept piling up.  Cameron was one interesting fellow.<br/>
<br/>
 “I work better at night, to be honest,” he answered.  There was no give in it, either.  He wanted to see if Cam was trying to give him the slip for the evening.  If so, he wanted to see how desperate the man would become for that alone time.  “Mornings and I don’t get along.  Which is fine, because I find that most murderers prefer the dark.  Don’t you?”  There were two very different ways one could take that question, but Andreas just smiled as if he’d said nothing out of the ordinary.  “I’ll even buy you a drink after.”<br/>
</span>