Page 90 of Finding Amanda

Mark asked for Roxanne, gave his name, and waited. A moment later, she came on the line, her cigarette-damaged voice gravelly in the phone. "Mark, did something happen?" she asked. "Is Amanda okay?"

"She's fine."

"Phew. You scared me. What's up?"

"First of all, I assume you're up to speed on what happened last weekend with Sheppard."

There was a pause. "She told me, but . . . Mark, I've always liked you, so don't take this the wrong way, but I know you and Amanda are separated. I can't give you any information?—"

"I don't need information. I need to tell you something.You've got a man working for you." Mark glanced at the pad of paper in his hand. "His name is Baxter McIlroy."

Her voice was guarded when she responded. "What about him?"

"He has a connection to Amanda's psychiatrist, Gabriel Sheppard."

"No. Not Baxter."

"He worked as a TA for the guy in college."

"That doesn't mean anything, though. I mean, lots of people?—"

"Roxie, we've been looking for a connection, and now we've found one."

"But Baxter wouldn't harm a fly. You don't know him. He's a really sweet, gentle guy."

"Oh yeah?" Mark paused. He had to keep the sneer out of his voice. This wasn't Roxie's fault. "Did he tell you he was accused of rape?"

"I don't believe it."

"It's true. We have to assume he's the connection between them. Did he know Amanda would be at the conference in New York?"

"Um . . ."

Mark doodled on his notepad while he waited. He wroteSheppardacross the top of the page, opposite Baxter's name, and drew a line between them.

Finally Roxie continued. "Maybe. I mean, he's sort of my apprentice, so he sits in on a lot of my conversations, and I talked to Amanda about it. It's possible he knew."

Mark wroteprobably knew about NY.

"Did he know about the memoir?"

"Oh, yeah. In fact . . . I'm sorry. I mean, I didn't know . . . He read it. I'm trying to teach him how to evaluate a manuscript, so we talked about where we could shop it. If I'd had any idea?—"

"It's not your fault," Mark said. "Can you tell me when that was?”

"Well, let's see, Amanda sent it to me around the first of September, so it would have been back then."

"So before New York."

"Definitely."

Mark wroteknew about memoir 9/1on his sheet. The connection seemed strong enough, but Amanda had been careful to keep Sheppard's name out of the memoir. How would McIlroy have known the psychologist in the book was his former professor?

Mark tapped his paper and considered the mystery. "Okay, so here's the million dollar question: Does he know Amanda's decided not to publish it?"

"Yes, he does. In fact, when we were at the house last week?—"

"At whose house?" he asked, gripping the paper in his fist.

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