Garcia had been right – Hunter did end up working on what was supposed to have been their day off. Despite his best efforts, his brain simply couldn’t disconnect, always finding a way to bring his thought processes back to the investigation. This, he knew, was like fighting insomnia. It was a pointless effort because he knew he wouldn’t win.
As his ‘day off’ began, Hunter took a trip to the LAPD Criminalistics Lab at California State University, in the University Hills district. There, he dropped off the wine glass that he had taken from ‘Sleazy Mark’ at the Exchange restaurant the night before, putting in a request for DNA and fingerprint analysis. Sure, as of yet, they didn’t have a DNA sample or any fingerprints from the Mentor. Hunter was simply playing the odds game.
In his head, Hunter had replayed his conversation with Mark more times than he cared to admit, and he could recall everything – Mark’s voice intonation, his movements, his expressions, the look in his eyes, what he’d said… all of it.
Mark was a womanizer. There was no doubt about that, but during those few minutes that they sat face-to-face, Hunter got the impression that Mark had somehow managed to assert almost total control over his physiological and psychological motor responses – something that was terribly hard to do.
Hunter had caught glimpses of Mark’s ability throughout their conversation, but it was really when he had showed Mark Kirsten Hansen’s photograph that it became more apparent. As Mark’s eyes had settled on the photo for the first time, they had widened ever so slightly, which didn’t indicate recognition. With recognition, a person’s eyes tended to narrow – sometimes almost imperceptibly, sometimes visibly. The interrogator would have to be specifically looking for it to pick it up and even then, it could be easily missed.
Narrowing of the eyes indicated concentration. It happened when a person searched his or her memory for an identical or similar image – ‘recognition’ – but the real giveaway would usually come with the movement of the eyes. Up and to the right denoted that the person was trying to engage their memory for visually remembered images – something they’d seen before. Up and to the left suggested that the person was trying to access their visual constructive cortex – creating an image or memory that was never there in the first place.
At the Exchange restaurant, Mark’s eyes had narrowed before barely moving up and to the right when Hunter had first showed him Melissa Hawthorne’s picture. He clearly remembered seeing her somewhere and was trying hard to place her. With Kirsten Hansen’s photograph, Mark eyes had moved neither left nor right – they had stood perfectly still, but also widened almost imperceptibly. Hunter had only caught it because he was looking straight at Mark. Widening of the eyes indicated surprise or shock, but it was also an indication of admiration or approval – the kind a person shows when they see someone who their brain perceives as attractive. Mark had followed the widening of his eyes with a comment that had sounded totally natural and unforced, also indicative of his womanizer personality – that Kirsten was ‘very pretty’.
Those types of automatic reactions and micro-reactions were examples of physiological and psychological motor responses to stimuli. Most of us don’t even know we do it, that’s why they are so difficult to control. How do you control something you don’t even know is there?
But Hunter also knew that though difficult, it was possible to control them. It took a lot of concentration… tens, maybe hundreds of hours of practice… and a lot of discipline, but it could be done. And if those reactions could be controlled, then they could also be altered to give out the wrong signal.
There was a lot that Hunter still didn’t know about this killer, but what he did know was that the Mentor was tremendously disciplined, systematic, creative and patient. That, in itself, was an indication that the Mentor had above average intelligence, something that Hunter knew was an absolute must if anyone wanted to develop the ability to control their physiological and psychological motor responses.