Grave of Hummingbirds Read Online Free Page B

substitute for Nita’s fragrance, but it eased his pain. His eyes rested on a photograph of her, arms wide, as though to embrace everything around her—him—after he’d caught her image inside his Nikon.
    “Now you have me,” she’d whispered, wrapping her arms around his head. Her feet, small, with high arches that he’d touched with his lips many times, cleared the ground as he held her close.
    “You say that every time.” He’d smiled into her hair. “I have hundreds of photographs of you.”
    “Well then. I must truly be yours.”
    Never. She had never been his. If she had, he’d have kept her with him, kept her safe from illness and spat in the face of a cruel god who’d torn her away when she was just thirty-four.

SIX
    A ll the police were able to establish was the murdered woman’s identity. She came from Búho, and her family had reported her missing a few days after Independence Day celebrations had ended.
    Days after Gregory handed the body over to Búho’s medical examiner, her father came to show him a photograph before the wings, tattoos, and shaved head had transformed her. Enrique Torres Arroyo wore an ill-fitting suit, short at the wrists and ankles and chafing his neck. The padding beneath his skin had shrunk into uneven clumps, as though grief had worn his face to resemble the stuffing of old upholstery.
    They sat together in Gregory’s study, where they abandoned coffee for tequila.
    “She was still a young woman,” the man said into his drink.
    Gregory strained to hear him but said nothing and waited for him to go on.
    When Senor Arroyo spoke again, his voice cracked. “You know her name? Her name is Gabi. Gabriela. Did they tell you that?” He scraped his forearm across his eyes. “She was accepted, just before she came here, she was accepted to the university. It was her dream.”
    Empathy and compassion made Gregory slow to respond. “I’m sorry,” he said at last. “You have my deep condolences. It’s a terrible loss.”
    “We couldn’t send her after she left high school. She had to save the money herself. Three jobs she worked. For what?” Senor Arroyo’s glass shook. He raised it to his mouth and concentrated on drawing the alcohol in, holding it in his mouth before he swallowed. “Why, why? She was . . .” His voice broke. “She was . . . ,” he said and then heaved the word out. “Loved.”
    Gregory gave up searching for the right thing to say and chose instead to sit quietly and listen.
    Senor Arroyo shook his head. “I thought at first, maybe it was political. But Gabriela wasn’t mixed up in politics. The police think it’s one man who did this. You saw her, Doctor. You examined her. Please tell me why he did such things. Terrible things. He hurt her. Why? Why? You have to tell me something, you hear me? You understand?” His voice rose, and he controlled it with a ragged hiccup. “I mean no disrespect, but I have nothing. Give me something. I beg you.”
    Gregory had nothing to offer. “I know this is cold comfort,” he said, “but I think Gabriela wasn’t aware of what was happening to her.” He touched the man’s shoulder, where the slump of his back strained the seams of his suit. “The pathologist found traces of morphine.”
    “What kind of a man does this to a woman? A monster. A monster. You would think such evil would stand out; he would have a mark or something. How can a man hide such a nature?”
    Gregory shook his head.
    “They said he hadn’t . . . interfered with her. You know. Sexually . . .”
    “No,” Gregory responded quickly. “There was none of that.”
    The man sighed and passed a frayed handkerchief over his face. “Do you have any idea who could have done this to my child? Any suspicions?”
    “No, I cannot imagine. But the police will keep the case open. They’ll keep looking.”
    “And so will I.” Senor Arroyo got up to leave and placed his glass on Gregory’s desk with care. “I will come back and