The ban on sharing case information with Flora

The ban on sharing case information with Flora is Amaia Salazar’s absolute prohibition against Fermín Montes passing anything concerning any case to her sister. Its force comes from both its breadth and its personal stakes: Amaia demands an unconditional promise, and warns that a breach could end Fermín’s police career.

Scope and Terms

The order covers anything that occurs or is said in connection with any case, whether inside the police station or elsewhere. Amaia emphasizes that there are no exceptions. The rule is not limited to a particular investigation or to formal police information; its wording extends to case-related events and conversations beyond the station as well.

The Confrontation

Amaia delivers the instruction after she and Fermín have separated from one another and begun walking together in silence toward Santiago Street. At the bridge, she stops and makes him promise never to let information about the cases reach her sister. When he agrees, she insists that he repeat the promise. Fermín gives his word and acknowledges that he has learned the lesson.

Amaia makes the consequence explicit: if she has even the slightest suspicion that he has broken the rule, her affection for him will not protect him. She will arrange for him to be removed not merely from a case, but from the police permanently. The warning makes the order an assertion of professional authority as well as a demand for personal loyalty.

Family and Investigative Boundaries

The rule arises within a family in which police work and private life repeatedly come close to one another. Amaia’s sister is Flora, and Amaia addresses Fermín directly rather than treating confidentiality as an informal understanding. The bridge-side exchange turns that boundary into an explicit obligation between colleagues: family closeness cannot justify passing along case information.

The breadth of the rule matters against the investigations Amaia is pursuing. Her inquiries connect Elena Ochoa, Rosario, and the deceased Doctor Berasategui to a former sectarian group and to suspected infant deaths; elsewhere, she discusses links among the Argi Beltz and Lesaka groups and people under investigation. The prohibition does not establish that Flora received any particular piece of this information. It establishes instead that none of it, nor information concerning any other case, is to reach her through Fermín.

Enforcement and Significance

Amaia’s threat is deliberately severe: a suspected breach could cost Fermín his position in the police altogether. His promise and admission that he has learned the lesson indicate that the demand responds to an earlier failure, but the exchange does not specify its circumstances. Amaia leaves no room for an informal exception based on trust or affection. The rule protects the separation between her family relationships and the circulation of investigative information by making that separation both explicit and enforceable.