The North Face of the Heart - Dolores Redondo Page 0,21

stood silent at her side. Behind them, the rest of the team emerged from the house and headed in their direction.

Amaia slipped down the slope, went forward on all fours, and looked under the edge of the roof. She stood up immediately and signaled to Dupree and the others. She commented to their huddle, “Where I’m from in Spain, there’s an old belief that the sacred space of a family home includes the foot or two just outside the walls. They call that outer perimeter itxusuria. If a family member was denied Christian burial in the village cemetery, they buried that person at home. In the shelter of the eaves.”

She stood watching as they spread out, crouched, and peered under the stranded roof. Someone took out a high-tech flashlight. Its dazzling beam played across the shrouded space until it came to rest on the bloody face of an elderly woman.

“There she is,” Amaia said. “The grandmother.”

7

DOUBT

Quantico, Virginia

Friday, August 26, 2005

Seated before a computer, Amaia again tried to keep her attention on the instructor’s explanation of how to structure case summaries in order to enter them into the international victimology registry. She was tired. She’d been up almost all night drafting her report and conclusions, and despite her best efforts, she knew that most of what was being said in class was escaping her. Her thoughts kept returning to her hypotheses, most of them disputed by the agents in Dupree’s unit. A good deal of her thinking was outside the box, driven by intuition.

But when all was said and done, that was what Dupree had demanded of her when they separated. He wanted three profiles on his desk by eight.

Amaia delivered them at seven. She checked her watch; it was past noon. She couldn’t get her profile of the killer out of her mind: White male, forty-five years or older. He has killed before using the same method. Organized and patient, waits for the right opportunity, unlike killers who seek victims. Caucasian who kills in his own racial group. Religious believer who may think the church is too indulgent of sin.

The class ended. The next one was underway before she had time to catch her breath.

Amaia was deeply fatigued, but she knew that was the price for being right, the unwelcome privilege of knowing where to find the piece that completed the puzzle. Irreverence for authority, the ability to detect the undetected and arrogantly contradict received wisdom, the courage to present those insights without ceremony or restraint—none of this was easy; it exacted a price.

Her discovery of the dead woman under the roof had sparked an open confrontation with Dupree’s team. The debate wasn’t theoretical anymore. The instant the light struck the smashed face of the old woman in that improvised tomb, Amaia felt the pieces of the puzzle snap into place and reveal the ferocity of the predator who had composed these dark tableaux. This crime scene was virtually untouched, unlike the living room, which had been trampled by so many law enforcement agents. She let her mind drift and saw the killer’s pursuit of the old woman, as well as the threats and coercion that forced her into this dark place.

He definitely wasn’t an annihilator. She was absolutely sure he wasn’t. His goal wasn’t to destroy families but instead to assemble one perfect family, its perfection cemented in death. Her intuition and ideas sparked an explosion of the resentment the FBI team had had trouble stifling since the meeting in Dupree’s office.

“They don’t have grandparents!” Johnson rebuked her, face to face, visibly angry but carefully controlled. “They were orphans; the parents of both spouses died long ago. Agent Tucker told you that!”

“This is the grandmother. Check it out and you’ll see,” she insisted. She stalked off toward the farmhouse.

“We did check!” Tucker called out angrily, following her. “I checked personally.”

“Then check again!” Amaia told her.

“Do you understand who you’re talking to?” Tucker snapped. “You have no authority here.”

Amaia stopped in her tracks and fixed her eyes on the ground, seeking calm. She was boiling inside. She was undecided whether to walk away across the field or just turn around, grab Tucker by the collar, and shake her until she saw the light.

She did neither. Without retreating an inch, she lowered her voice until it was almost inaudible, obliging the agents to lean in close to hear what she was saying. “Forget the official records. Ask the neighbors if that woman lived with them.”

Agent Johnson almost staggered back in astonishment