Odessa smiled and put her credentials back inside her left front pocket. She stepped inside a small office. Photographs taped to the wall around the Portuguese flag showed that the marine patrol safety officer, Mariella Parra, had once been a swordfish boat captain.

She shook Odessa’s hand with a manly grip, flecks of gray in her short, butch haircut, the corners of her eyes creased by the years and by the sun.

“My boss is giving me the next few days off,” said Mariella, dumping things into a canvas bag. “Just trying to get away from here. Do I have to tell what happened again?”

Odessa shrugged. “I’ll take the short version if there is one.”

“What does the FBI want with this?”

“We are investigating a rash of similar rampage killings.”

Mariella took a surprised step back. “You think there was something more to it?”

“No,” said Odessa, “but part of what we do is compile crime statistics in an effort to spot trends.” She was bullshitting behind a smile. “I know this has been traumatic for you.”

“It’s pretty simple.” Mariella shrugged. “I had to check a few permits and stopped into the town hall about twenty minutes before closing. I heard some yelling and I guess at first I thought it was somebody’s birthday or something…you know, a celebration. Maybe my ears wanted them to be happy noises. When the raised voices became screams…I think I stood there for another ten, fifteen seconds, still trying to believe it wasn’t happening. It’s not like on TV, where there’s a buildup. Where you know something is about to happen. Suddenly it was happening and I was in it.”

Odessa nodded. She understood this much better than Mariella knew.

“When I started moving, my blood was cold, and I had my service weapon in my hand. I was so freaked out. I saw the first body, the lady on the floor. She was bleeding out. The man paying his taxes, he was still clutching his bill in one hand, crawling alligator-style down the hall, leaving a trail of blood. The town supervisor, when I saw him, Mr. Colina—he was stabbing the third woman—that poor, poor woman—in the lower back, just over and over with that long screwdriver. At one point…” She choked up, then continued. “At one point the screwdriver jammed on the backbone and—and kind of lifted the whole body, for a brief moment—maybe an inch or two—and then he pried it loose and went back at it. Mechanically—no emotion there…”

Odessa was riveted, reexperiencing her own trauma as she listened. “What did he look like? His expression?”