Double Exposure Pt 02

Double Exposure - Part 2: At Liberty

19 September 1981. 4:35 pm. Columbus, Ohio

Claire Weber just wanted to sit alone and have a drink in the booth at the nearly empty, off-campus dive bar. She was 20 years-old and a Junior at Ohio State. Classes started a few weeks ago and she was already late paying her this semester's tuition. What's even worse, she had no idea when or where she was going to get the money. In another month, she knew that OSU would become more and more diligent in their attempts to collect and Claire wasn't looking forward to it. She figured that she had at the most two more months before they kicked her out of school for non-payment.

Because she wanted to be left alone with her thoughts made her get especially annoyed when the stranger slid into her booth in the seat across from her. "Really?" she said. "The entire bar is fucking empty and you have to sit right there?"

The man simply smiled and then signaled to the bartender. "Barkeep, can I have an Old Fashioned, please? And bring the lady another of whatever she's having."

Claire looked at the man sitting across from her. Even though he was older than her, he was good looking. He was well dressed and impeccably groomed, all signs that he had money. On any other day, she might have flirted with him for some free drinks or a free dinner, but today she wasn't in the mood to play that game. "Listen, buddy, I'm not looking for any company. So just be on your way and your wife won't have to know that you were trolling for young coeds."

Before he could speak, the bartender arrived at their table with the drinks. The mysterious man took them and gave the bartender $10. "Keep it."

"Got to love college bar prices." he said. He slid Claire's beer over to her and then took a sip of his drink. His face scowled a bit. "That would explain why this cost $2." setting down his drink as he did.

"Thanks for the drink, but as I said, I just want to be left alone." she said sternly.

The man continued to look at her, unfazed. "Claire, you came to the attention of a colleague of mine who was on campus recently. This colleague was in town on business but had a night off and visited a local college bar. Now this colleague, being a typical red-blooded American male, decided to try to make acquaintances with a pretty young brunette. This colleague was extremely pleased with himself as he thought the night was going wonderfully. Only after she excused himself to use the restroom, never to return, did he discover that she had been playing him and there was money missing from his wallet."

Claire's stomach dropped when he said her name. "How the hell does he know my name?" she thought. Her eyes darted towards the bartender.

"Claire, don't worry. You're not in trouble. In fact, quite the opposite. I'm extremely impressed with what you did. You see, my colleague is very good at what he does, which includes knowing when people are trying to deceive him. So I am beyond impressed that not only were you able to convince him that you were interested in him, but you were able to take his wallet without him even knowing and you actually returned it without him realizing it either!" the man said, getting more excited. "And here's the thing that impressed me the most. There was quite a bit of money in that wallet, but you only took $40. Just enough that it wouldn't arouse suspicion. If all would have gone to plan, my colleague would have woken up the next morning, hungover, and if he even realized there was money missing, he would have assumed he spent it at the bar. But like I said, my colleague is very good at what he does and details matter to him. He noticed the money missing the moment he figured out that you weren't coming back. When he realized what happened, he found out your information and then relayed it back to me."

"So are you going to call the cops or something? You won't be able to prove anything." Claire said defiantly.

"No, nothing like that. I think we may have gotten off on the wrong foot. I apologize. My name is Elliot Graves, and I am kind of a recruiter of sorts. I'm always on the lookout for people like you. People with your skills and your profile. I might just have an opportunity for you if you are interested." he said.

Claire couldn't believe her ears with the sudden shift in conversation. Any job would be helpful with paying her tuition and keeping her in school. "What's the job?"

"Not so fast. It's not a job per se as it is a type of task. More of a test really. Are you interested in hearing more?" Elliot asked.

"Yeah, I suppose." she replied quietly.

"Good. Now here's the deal. There's a professor here at OSU, a nuclear engineering professor named Steven Gallo. 42 years old. Married. No kids. He mainly just does research for the university, but he does teach a few graduate level classes. Lives in Columbus but spends most of his time on campus. I will be back here at this bar a week from Sunday at this same time. It's up to you how you do it, but I want you to find me any interesting information about Professor Gallo." Elliot explained.

"Well that's a bit vague. What do you consider 'interesting'? That could be anything." she said.

"Well that's part of the test. You have to figure out what might be interesting. And I'll give you a bit of advice, it's not his dry cleaning bill or grocery shopping lists. It's going to be things he doesn't want people to know about." Elliot explained. "On Sunday if the information you bring me is useless, then I'll walk away and this will be just some adventure you tell your friends about for years to come. But - if you bring me something that I think is useful or interesting, then I will pay for this semester and next semester's tuition. And maybe then we can talk about other opportunities."

Claire tried not to show any reaction when she heard the offer, but the fact that she could get her tuition paid for the year would be life-changing for her.

She studied the man's face and contemplated what he was asking. Basically she needed to get some sort of dirt on this professor. She surmised that Elliot was some sort of private detective most likely working for the professor's wife. His wife was probably looking for proof that he was cheating or something. That scenario made sense except for one thing that bugged Claire, Elliot was dressed far too impeccably for a private detective who worked in Columbus, Ohio. But for two semesters of tuition, she really didn't care who Elliot was.

"I'll do it." Claire said with confidence.

"Good. I was hoping that you would." Elliot finally smiled and drank the rest of his Old Fashioned.

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27 September 1981. 6:30 pm. Columbus, Ohio

Claire stretched out at the Quad, ready for a run. She had carefully picked her outfit, loose fitting red Umbro soccer shorts and snug t-shirt from a fraternity dance she went to last year. The outfit was meant to draw the attention from someone without being too obvious about it. She didn't particularly like to jog, but today was different. Today she had to execute a carefully laid plan.

It was Saturday and Claire had spent the entire week observing Professor Steven Gallo. She watched from a distance to determine his routines, she sat in on his lecture to observe his demeanor, she followed him as he walked home one night just to see where he lived. In fact she got so into it, Claire didn't bother attending her classes this week so she could concentrate on Professor Gallo. Now it was Saturday and she was ready to put her plan into motion and that's why she was in the Quad ready to start a run.

Professor Gallo always did a nightly jog, rain or shine. And that jog would always begin and end at the Quad, which was close to his office. His jog always started right around 6:30 pm every night, give or take a few minutes. And like clockwork, she saw him approaching now. Getting ready to begin his stretching before his run.

Professor Steven Gallo was on the youngish side for a professor with tenure, which showed his importance to the university. From what she learned from sitting in on his lecture, Claire knew he was a brilliant man doing important research, although she wasn't quite sure what that was. The obvious guess was that it had something with nuclear energy. He was relatively good looking and often caught the eye of a few of his students in his class which never went unnoticed by him. He used every opportunity to flirt back with them. It was obvious to see that he was a man who was full of himself.

Claire made her way towards the bench that he was using to stretch out on. "Excuse me." she said, interrupting his routine. "Professor Gallo?"

He looked up when he heard the woman's voice and his eyes brightened when he saw the young, beautiful coed. Unconsciously, he began to fidget with his wedding band, wishing that he would have removed it prior to his run. "Yes?" he replied. He ogled the girl in her modest but sexy outfit, obviously she was ready for a run as well. He knew she wasn't one of his students because there's no way he would have ever forgotten a body like that.

"I'm sorry to interrupt your warm-up, but when I saw you here I just had to come up to you" she said, beaming. "My name is Claire Weber and I'm a Junior here, majoring in Chemical Engineering. I happened to catch a lecture you gave on Nuclear Engineering and I was fascinated by it. I am considering pursuing Nuclear Engineering in graduate school and I was wondering if I could pick your brain about it."

"Oh, definitely!" Gallo couldn't contain his excitement. Very rarely did people want to ask him about his expertise away from the classroom and it was never a beautiful coed. "It looks like you're about to run too. Do you want to take a jog together and we can talk and run at the same time?"

"That would be absolutely wonderful! Thank you so much!" Claire touched his arm as she responded, sending chills through Gallo. "Let me just tighten my laces and I'll be ready to go." Claire then bent over, her nylon Umbro shorts stretching taunt over her buttocks. Gallo stared hungrily as she was bent over in front of him.

"Ok, I'm ready! Let's go!" Claire said and began to jog. Gallo couldn't believe his luck and quickly followed her. Watching her breasts gently bounce as she ran.

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Throughout the run, Claire peppered Professor Gallo with prepared questions that she had been formulating all week. The questions were designed to trigger Gallo to do most of the talking, thus allowing her not to reveal her lack of knowledge about any kind of engineering. He often got caught up in the excitement of what he was saying and would talk uninterrupted for extended periods of time. Claire ignored most of what he said and concentrated on her plan on getting any kind of useful information out of him.

When the run was nearing its end and they were approaching the Quad, Claire knew that they were running right by the building that housed Professor Gallo's office. It was time for the next step in her carefully laid out plan.

"Ow!" she wailed and then feigned a fall to the ground.

Professor Gallo immediately stopped and ran towards her. "Oh my God! Are you ok?" he said in a panic.

"Ow, ow, ow." Claire cried holding her ankle. "I stepped on a rock or something and I think I twisted my ankle."

Gallo got down on his knees and held Claire's foot in his hand. "Ow!" Claire yelled when he touched it.

"Ok." he said, thinking of what to do. "This is going to need some ice. My office is right here. I can help you and we can ice your ankle there."

Claire smiled inwardly. As she observed Gallo this entire week, she saw that he spent a majority of his time at his office, oftentimes until late at night. If there was any interesting information to be found, it would most likely be there. "That would be great." Claire said.

Professor Gallo bent down and grabbed Claire's hand, guiding her arm around his neck. He then reached down and grabbed around her waist, lifting her up gently. She did not protest when he subtly lowered his hand to the bottom half of her hip when he helped her up, squeezing gently as he did. "Let's hurry up and get you off of your feet and put some ice on that ankle." They slowly made their way to his building, a few people looking at them curiously as they did.

Within minutes, Professor Gallo was unlocking his office door and helping Claire inside. Claire quickly looked around and assessed the space. It was a well-appointed office fitting for a respected professor at the university. The windowed office contained a mahogany desk strewn with papers, shelves filled with various academic books, a white board with complex formulas written on it that Claire couldn't possibly begin to understand, and a large leather couch, which Professor Gallo guided her towards.

Once they were close enough, Professor Gallo lowered Claire carefully onto the couch allowing her to swing her legs onto it once she was sitting. "Let's check out that ankle." Gallo said as he slid down towards her feet. Gently he untied her laces and carefully removed each shoe. He held her left foot, the supposedly injured one, almost caressing it while he examined it. "Hmmm. I don't see any redness or swelling. I hope it's nothing serious." he said with a concerned look. Claire noticed that he did not remove his hands from her foot after he made his observation.

"All I know is that it hurts." Claire said, grimacing.

Gallo continued holding her leg but slowly he moved his hands away from her ankle and up her calf. "Is this sore at all?" the professor said with a sly grin.

"No, that part is quite alright." Claire laughed in a flirty tone. "Weren't you supposed to get me some ice?"

"Oh yeah. I almost forgot. Let me head down to the lounge area. I can get some ice there." Professor Gallo looked around his office for something to hold the ice before finally picking up an empty wastebasket. "I'll be right back!" he said as he headed out, closing the door behind him.

Claire waited and listened for a few seconds before she sprung up and made her way to Professor Gallo's desk. The desk was strewn with all sorts of papers, most of them appeared to be student assignments that he was grading. "None of this is of use." Claire thought to herself. She didn't think it would be that easy. She then turned to his shelves and looked at all the various items on there. The shelves were mostly filled with academic books, various awards, and various knick-knacks. She cared about none of it. Suddenly she heard Professor Gallo speaking to someone in the hall. She hurried back to the couch and resumed her state of feigned injury.

The door opened as Professor Gallo was just ending his conversation with whoever it was out in the hallway. He entered the room and closed the door, still holding the wastepaper basket, but it was now full of ice. Smiling he said "Found some ice!" He also managed to get a small towel from the lounge as well and started placing the ice into that. He wrapped up the ice in the towel and made a bag, putting it gently on Claire's ankle.

"There. That should make it a little bit better." he said. As he held the makeshift ice pack on her ankle, he couldn't help but admire this beauty currently convalescing on his couch. She mentioned that she was a Junior, so he figured that she was 20 years old. She had long wavy dark hair and bright blue eyes, an absolute killer combination in his opinion. Her legs were long and smooth and her hips created pleasant outlines in her nylon shorts. Her breasts were magnificent. They nicely filled out the tight t-shirt she was wearing. He began to imagine what was underneath it all. He began to lean in.

[RING]

The sound of the telephone ringing in his office startled them both and it broke Professor Gallo's concentration.

"Shit!" he said. "Who the hell is calling here on a Saturday evening?" He quickly got up and answered the phone hoping to quickly dismiss the person calling. Claire was a bit relieved because she saw the look in his eyes just now, and she was unsure how she was going to divert his attention. She needed a plan.

"Hello." Gallo said into the phone. Even though Claire couldn't make out what was being said on the other end of the line, it was obvious to tell whoever Professor Gallo was speaking to was not happy. She heard a male voice yelling through the phone.

"Sergei...Sergei..." Gallo kept saying as he tried to interrupt the caller's diatribe.

Finally after a few minutes of continued harassment, Professor Gallo was finally able to speak. "I will have it for you, but I'm a bit busy right now. Can I give you a call later tonight with the details?" Gallo waited for a response. Then finally he said "If you want to meet in person, I can't do it until Saturday. Fine. Bye." Professor Gallo then hung up the phone.

"Sorry about that." he said, turning his attention back towards Claire.

"Who was that? He sounded mad." Claire said, digging for any information.

"Oh, no one important. He's just really impatient. But forget about him. Let me look at that ankle." Gallo said as he neared Claire.

"One second." Claire said, stopping him. "You said there's a lounge downstairs? I got super hungry. I didn't eat before the run and I thought I'd be back at my apartment already. If the lounge has a vending machine, could you grab me some chips and a soda or something? I'm starving."

Professor Gallo smiled and bowed. "You wish is my command." he said cornily and then headed back out of the office once again.

Claire instantly sprung up from the couch and made her way to his desk again, this time going around and sitting in his chair. She saw five drawers and opened them one at a time.

She quickly rifled through the top left drawer, it was filled with various office supplies. Pens, a stapler, paper clips, etc. When she opened the bottom left drawer, it was filled with things related to his class, handouts, papers, a grade book, etc. She closed it realizing it was also useless. She quickly turned and tried to open the bottom right drawer, only to realize that it was locked. She pulled on it a few times for good measure, but it didn't budge. There had to be things of importance in there. A key had to be nearby. She flung open the top right drawer with the hope that the key would be in there. The rush of the excitement of it all was intoxicating for Claire. Oddly enough, this almost seemed like an exciting complex game that she was playing and it was up to her to bend the rules to make sure she would win.

Then, without warning, the office door opened. Professor Gallo was in the doorway, holding two bags of chips and a couple of sodas, staring at her in confusion as she was rifling through his desk. "What are you doing?" Professor Gallo said in astonishment.

Claire could always think quickly on her feet in any situation and right now was no exception. "Well I went to try to find some aspirin...but I think I found something that might work just as well!" She then pulled a bottle of whiskey out of the drawer that she had just opened. She had a plastered smile on her face even though her stomach was doing summersaults.

Professor Gallo smiled broadly as he shut and locked the door behind him. "Take a seat back on the couch, and I'll grab us some glasses." He liked how this evening was progressing.

Claire set the bottle of whiskey on his desk and then fake hobbled over to the couch, sitting on one end. Professor Gallo then grabbed two glasses from one of his shelves and blew out any dust that might have collected in them.

He then poured a generous amount of whiskey in each glass, topping each drink with some Coke that he just got from the vending machine. He then picked up the glasses and the bags of chips, and sat next to Claire on the couch.