Reacher nodded. “He was a handyman. He killed her with his hammer.”
For the first time in thirty minutes, her eyes left the road. She stared at him. “You can’t possibly know that. It hasn’t been in the paper here.”
“Educated guess. The cloth over her face means she knew him and he knew her, and he was ashamed to leave her uncovered. Probably made him feel remorseful, maybe like she was watching him from beyond the grave or something. That kind of semifunctional thinking is indicative of a low IQ. The lack of forced entry and the lack of disruption to the house both mean he was familiar with the place. He’d been there many times before. Easy enough to figure.”
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“Why easy?”
“Because what kind of a guy with a low IQ has been visiting with a smart and pretty girl many times before? Got to be a gardener or a handyman. Probably not a gardener, because they work outside and they tend to come at least in pairs. So I figured a handyman, probably tormented by how young and cute she was. One day he can’t stand it anymore, he makes some kind of a clumsy advance, she’s embarrassed by it, she rejects it, maybe even laughs at it, he freaks out and rapes her and kills her. He’s a handyman, got his tools with him, he’s accustomed to using them, he’d use a hammer for a thing like that.”
Lamarr was silent. Reddening again, under the pallor.
“And you call that profiling?” Reacher asked. “It’s just common sense.”
“That was a very simple case,” she said quietly.
He laughed. “You guys get paid for this? You study it in college and all?”
They entered New Jersey. The blacktop improved and the shoulder plantings got tidier, like they always do. Every state puts a lot of effort into the first mile of its highways, to make you feel you’re entering a better place from a worse one. Reacher wondered why they didn’t put the effort into the last mile instead. That way, you’d miss the place you were leaving.
“We need to talk,” Lamarr said.
“So talk. Tell me about college.”
“We’re not going to talk about college.”
“Why not? Tell me about Profiling 101. You pass?”
“We need to discuss the cases.”
He smiled. “You did go to college, right?”
She nodded. “Indiana State.”
“Psychology major?”
She shook her head.
“So what was it? Criminology?”
“Landscape gardening, if you must know. My professional training is from the FBI Academy at Quantico.”
“Landscape gardening? No wonder the Bureau snapped you up in a big hurry.”
“It was relevant. It teaches you to see the big picture, and to be patient.”
“And how to grow things. That could be useful, killing time while your bullshit profiles are getting you nowhere.”
She was silent again.
“So are there many irrational phobic landscape gardeners at Quantico? Any
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bonsai enthusiasts scared of spiders? Orchid growers who won’t step on the cracks in the sidewalk?”
Her pallor was whitening. “I hope you’re real proud of yourself, Readier, making jokes while women are dying.”
He went quiet and looked out of the window. She was driving fast. The road was wet and there were gray clouds ahead. They were chasing a rainstorm south.
“So tell me about the cases,” he said.
She gripped the wheel and used the leverage to adjust her position in the seat.
“You know the victim group,” she said. “Very specific, right?”
He nodded. “Apparently.”
“Locations are obviously random. He’s chasing particular victims, and he goes where he has to. Crime scenes have all been the victim’s residence, so far. Residences have been basically various. Single-family housing in all cases, but varying degrees of isolation.”
“Nice places, though.”
She glanced at him. He smiled. “The Army paid them all off, right? When they quit? Scandal avoidance, they call it. A big chunk of money like that, a chance to settle down after a few footloose years, they probably bought nice houses.”
She nodded as she drove. “Yes, and all in neighborhoods, so far.”
“Makes sense,” he said. “They want community. What about husbands and families?”