Chapter 6

The fourth letter arrived wrapped in a silence different from the previous ones.

It wasn't the envelope itself that altered the office routine that morning, but the way Castel walked in unannounced, skipping the receptionist, crossing the hallway with steps that weren't meant to seem casual. Irene saw him through the frosted glass before he reached the door, and something about his posture—his shoulders stiffer than usual, his jaw clenched—told her that the investigation had progressed through the night without her.

"I need to talk to you. Alone. Castel didn't even greet Ivo, who looked up from his desk with that frightened dog-like expression that Irene had already learned to interpret in two possible ways: genuine innocence or an extraordinarily well-calibrated performance. Castel, however, gave her a brief but charged look, the kind of look that Irene would later recognize, in retrospect, as something beyond professional suspicion.

They closed the office door. Castel left a folder on the desk, thin, just a few pages, but the way he slid it into her had the weight of something much bigger.

Sandoval's record. He sat across from her, without asking permission, occupying the chair he normally reserved for his patients. There are gaps. Two years, between when he finished university and when he started working with you, which I can't verify. His resume says he worked at a consulting firm in Yerevan. I called. No one with that name ever worked there.

Irene opened the folder slowly, as if the paper could burn her fingers. The photocopies of Ivo's employment references, the employment contract, a copy of his ID. Everything seemed in order at first glance, but when he looked up at Castel, he understood that the problem was not in what the document said, but in what it did not say.

"Did you falsify the references?"

"Or someone forged them for him." Castel leaned forward, elbows on his knees. There is something else. I reviewed the access records to the building where Miranda Cruz lived. There is an entry, three weeks before his death, of a visitor who signed with the name of "I. Sandoval". The lobby's security camera was out of commission that night. Coincidence, if you believe in those kinds of coincidences.

"I don't believe in them.

"Neither do I. Castel leaned back in his chair, crossing his arms, and Irene recognized the gesture: it was the same one she used when she separated instinct from evidence so she could think more clearly. But I need her to be honest with me about something. Have you ever given them reason to think they're interested in you? Comments, looks, something that at the time he discarded?

The question made her more uncomfortable than she expected, and something in Castel's tone—a barely contained tension, different from the professional coldness she usually handled—made her look at him more carefully.

"Why do you ask it that way?" she said, almost without thinking. It sounds like you don't just care about the profile of the case.

"I care about the case. But he said it too quickly, and a muscle tensed in his jaw, barely noticeable. I also care that a man who works fifteen meters from your desk, who brings you coffee every day, who knows what time you go out and who you talk to, turns out to have gaps in his history that coincide with the death of your patient. Forgive me if that generates more than clinical curiosity.

Irene got up, surprised by the vehemence, and walked to the window of her office. "Are you jealous, Damian?" In the midst of this?

"I'm furious that someone has been so close to you, every day, for eighteen months, without anyone questioning it. He stood up too, his voice dropping in volume but not in intensity. And yes, if I'm honest, a part of me hates the idea that that "someone" brought you coffee with a smile every morning while maybe, perhaps, writing letters about what you dream about when you're alone.

"That's not fair. We still don't know if it's him.

"I know. He ran a hand over his face, something like embarrassment crossing his expression. And I'm sorry. You shouldn't mix this up. But every time I walk in here and see him look at you as if he has some claim to your attention, I find it harder to separate the researcher from the man who can't stand the idea of someone else watching you with that kind of interest.

She studied it for a moment, the initial irritation giving way to something softer, almost moved by the raw honesty of the confession. —A few months ago you told me that you thought it was admirable how I could "get into the heads of such twisted people without losing my own." He said it slowly, reconstructing the memory. At the time I thought it was a clumsy compliment. Now I don't know how to interpret it.

I don't know how to interpret it either, and that's exactly the problem. Castel's jaw tightened again. Anything else?

"I once found a book of poetry on your desk. Neruda. I asked him if it was his and he said it had been lent to him by a friend. He turned to Castel, and felt his stomach contract as he said the next sentence. I didn't connect the dots until now. Miranda had Neruda on her lips when she was found.

Castel said nothing for several seconds. He approached her by the window, and this time he did not keep the professional distance he had taken care of until then: he took her hand, a gesture that was both possessive and protective.

"This is not enough for an arrest warrant. Not even for a formal interrogation. His voice had dropped, deeper, more deliberate. But it's enough to get us to start moving more carefully. I need him to act normally today. No questions, no suspicious messages. I'm going to request unofficial surveillance on him.

"Unofficial surveillance?" That sounds like something that could cost you your job.

"It has already cost me worse things. He sketched something that was not a smile. And if I'm honest, in this particular case, I wouldn't mind spending every favor I have accumulated in order to get him out of your office as soon as possible, whether or not he's guilty of the murders.