“Ten minutes after leaving your house I got a call from my Interpol guy, probably the last one we’re going to get, from the tone of his voice. I’ve been pushing him pretty hard for every damn detail he could find in their old files on the Panikos family. Made a real pain in the ass of myself—which isn’t my true nature—but you wanted more information, and I live to be of service to my betters.”

“A very positive quality. And you found out what?”

“Remember the fire that destroyed the family gift shop in the village of Lykonos? Burned everyone to death, except the adopted firebug? Well, turns out it wasn’t just a gift shop. It had a little annex, a second business, run by the mother.” He paused. “Need I say more?”

“Let me guess. The annex was a flower shop. And the mother’s name was Florence.”

“Florencia, to be precise.”

“She died with the rest of the family, right?”

“Up in flames, one and all. And now little Peter likes riding around in a van with a sign that says FLOWERS BY FLORENCE. Any ideas about that, ace? You figure he just likes thinking about his mom while he’s killing people?”

Gurney didn’t answer right away. For the second time that day, someone’s use of a short phrase—earlier it was Esti’s comment on “those shots from the hill”—sent him off on a mental tangent. This time it was Hardwick’s “up in flames.”

The words brought to mind an old case involving a flaming auto wreck. It was one of the instructive examples he’d used in an academy seminar called “The Investigative Mind-set.” The odd thing was that this was the third time in as many days that something had brought that case to mind. In this instance, hearing “up in flames” seemed a simple enough trigger, but nothing so obvious had occurred on the two previous occasions.

Gurney considered himself as far from superstitious as a man could be, but when something like that—a specific case—kept intruding into his consciousness, he’d learned not to ignore it. The question was, what was he supposed to make of it?

“Hey, you still there, ace?”

“I’m here. Just got caught up thinking about something you said.”

“You thinking like me that our little maniac might have some mommy problems?”

“A lot of serial killers do.”

“That’s a fact. Maternal magic. Anyway, that’s it for now. Just thought you’d want to know about Florencia.”