Teresa saw how surprised Marini seemed at Parri’s tone, but his unflinching honesty was something she’d become used to. Parri was her friend, and he’d been worrying about her for what felt like an eternity. Teresa could still remember what he’d said to her one night many years ago as they stood by the corpse of a victim she had been too late to save: one day, this job is going to hurt you one too many times.

Teresa wondered if that moment had finally come. She looked at her reflection in the window.

“How can you tell?” she said, examining the bags under her eyes. “Is it because I look like shit?”

Parri burst out laughing, but his eyes retained a trace of concern.

“I was about to call you,” he told her. “The results of the tests on Roberto Valent’s body have come in.”

Teresa regained her focus.

“And?”

“He died from cardiac arrest, I would say about an hour or two after the attack.”

She looked at him in surprise.

“That means the killer must have stayed with him all that time.”

“Yes. It’s unbelievable.”

“He doesn’t kill. He never meant to. The death was unintentional,” Teresa deduced.

Parri nodded his agreement.

“What do you make of it?” he asked.

“Maybe it’s a refusal to accept what he’s done? But it can’t be, it doesn’t make any sense. Nothing does. Serial killers aren’t conscious of the seriousness of their actions. They regard their victims as objects. They don’t feel empathy; they’ve never developed it, often because of some kind of trauma in their past. They don’t show remorse because for them, killing is a necessity.”

“Perhaps this is not your typical serial killer,” Marini suggested.

Teresa shook her head.

“Avoidance of a violent act is just not compatible with the profile of a serial killer,” she noted. “The ultimate aim of their actions is always to bring death. It’s their only relief, the only thing that can temporarily quieten them.”

“I guess the only person who could help you make sense of it is the woman, Lucia Kravina’s mother,” said Parri. “But they’ve put her in an induced coma, and I think it’ll be a while yet before they bring her out of it.”

Marini looked at Teresa. “You told me about Igor Rosman and about his collection of feet,” he said. “What if our killer’s doing the same?”

Teresa tried to look at the facts from a fresh perspective.

“He’s not collecting human limbs, it’s something else,” she said. “He’s taken eyes . . .”

“Nose and ears.”

“And now skin. What will it be next time?”

Marini picked up her coat and put on his own.

“We still haven’t found Lucas Ebran,” he said. “And it’s the fifth of December today—Saint Nicholas’s Day: the perfect night to kill undisturbed.”

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