Finding Nouf Read Online Free Page B

Maamoon in from Riyadh, and he decided the death was caused by drowning. So drowning it is. No need to ask questions. It's done."
    The sarcasm in her voice surprised him. "You think it is a cover-up?" he asked. She shrugged.
    If it was true, then the family would have to be behind it. They were the only people powerful enough. He could think of a few reasons the Shrawis would want to hide the truth, but the biggest reason of all was right in front of him.
    He hesitated before asking. "She wasn't a virgin?"
    Miss Hijazi finished the fingerprints and packed up the kit. She stood and returned the kit to the wall. Nayir waited, hoping she would give him something, but when she turned back in his direction, he quickly looked away. He wished he could persuade her to trust him, but she was right not to. He was a stranger, and a man. Grudgingly, he acknowledged the decency of her silence, rebellious though it seemed.
    He looked at his watch. It was three-fifteen. Nouf had to be in the ground by sunset. He had less than an hour to get the body to the Shrawi estate; the family would need another hour to prepare it for burial.
    Maamoon came bustling in with a glass of water. It tasted like
soap, but Nayir didn't complain. The old man clapped him on the back and gave a sympathetic frown. "It's not that bad when they're alive, you know—don't let it spoil you."

    The best of women,
the Prophet said,
is the one who is pleasing to look at, who carries out your instructions when you ask her.
The phrase ran through his mind as he pulled his Jeep from the cargo bay at the back of the building and took a left into traffic. Although the Prophet was right, it seemed there was also a way of being righteous without being obedient. Miss Hijazi's silence at the end of the visit weighed on him.
    He thought back on her earlier behavior, which he still considered brazen, although he wondered if that too was conducted in the spirit of protecting Nouf. Miss Hijazi had argued with Maamoon about how Nouf had died, about her camel, about the cause of the wound on her head. Nayir couldn't be sure whether her boldness was in Nouf's best interests or whether it was carried out because of professional egotism or because that's simply the sort of person she was. His instincts told him that the former was the case, and that she was guarding secrets for Nouf's sake.
    Anyway, she was right about one thing. Defensive wounds, head trauma, drowning, no camel—it sounded strange. The camel part was especially troubling, because if he knew anything, he knew that no one lost a camel in the desert.

3
    D RIVING SOUTH along the beachfront road, Nayir watched the city's skyscrapers and jumbled urban scabbing give way to a lazy desert sprawl. To the left, tiny cottages dotted fields that lay barren in the afternoon sun, and to the right, the sea fluttered like a blue satin scarf. Keeping his eyes on the landscape, he was hoping to forget that Nouf's body was in the back. But he couldn't ignore it. He drove slowly, took turns carefully, and obeyed every traffic light despite an absence of traffic, for though it might not be possible to upset the dead, it would certainly be horrible to upset the living by injuring or mauling a beloved daughter's corpse.
    He left the freeway and turned onto an access road that followed the shoreline south. Here a magnificent mosque stood alone by the beach, its dome pure white, its minaret slim. The road turned into a private drive marked by a wooden no trespassing sign, and he drove until he reached the tower gates, two white concrete sentinels with an iron fence between them. An ancient, broken video camera hung askew from one of the gates.
    Nayir took a few deep breaths and tried to focus. A two-kilometer bridge stretched out before him. It was narrow—barely wide enough for a pickup truck—and from the shoreline it appeared to be made of rubber. Maybe it was only the heat, but the macadam rippled like a roller coaster. The chainlink