“Hello?” he said, now with a note of impatience.
She cleared her throat. “I’m sorry to call you at home. Detective Rizzoli gave me your card. My name is Maura Isles, and I . . .” And I what? Want you to help me get through this night?
“I was expecting you to call, Dr. Isles,” he said.
“I know I should have waited till morning, but—”
“Not at all. You must have a lot of questions.”
“I’m having a really hard time with this. I never knew I had a sister. And suddenly—”
“Everything’s changed for you. Hasn’t it?” The voice that had sounded brusque only a moment before was now so quiet, so sympathetic, that she found herself blinking back tears.
“Yes,” she whispered.
“We should probably meet. I can see you any day next week. Or if you want to meet in the evening—”
“Could you see me tonight?”
“My daughter’s here. I can’t leave right now.”
Of course he has a family, she thought. She gave an embarrassed laugh. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking straight—”
“So why don’t you come here, to my house?”
She paused, her pulse hammering in her ear. “Where do you live?” she asked.
He lived in Newton, a comfortable suburb west of metropolitan Boston, scarcely four miles from her home in Brookline. His house was like all the other homes on that quiet street, undistinguished but well kept, yet another boxy home in a neighborhood where none of the houses were particularly remarkable. From the front porch, she saw the blue glow of a TV screen and heard the monotonous throb of pop music. MTV—not at all what she expected a cop to be watching.
She rang the bell. The door swung open and a blond girl appeared, dressed in ripped blue jeans and a navel-baring T-shirt. A provocative outfit for a girl who could not be much older than fourteen, judging by the slim hips and the barely-there breasts. The girl didn’t say a thing, just stared at Maura with sullen eyes, as though guarding the threshold from this new interloper.
“Hello,” said Maura. “I’m Maura Isles, here to see Detective Ballard.”
“Is my dad expecting you?”
“Yes, he is.”
A man’s voice called out: “Katie, it’s for me.”
“I thought it was Mom. She’s supposed to be here by now.”
Ballard appeared at the door, towering over his daughter. Maura found it hard to believe that this man, with his conservative haircut and pressed Oxford shirt, could be the father of a pubescent pop-tart. He held out his hand to shake hers in a firm grip. “Rick Ballard. Come in, Dr. Isles.”
As Maura stepped into the house, the girl turned and walked back to the living room, flopping down in front of the TV.
“Katie, at least say hello to our guest.”
“I’m missing my show.”
“You can take a moment to be polite, can’t you?”
Katie sighed loudly, and gave Maura a grudging nod. “Hi,” she said, and fixed her gaze back on the TV.
Ballard eyed his daughter for a moment, as though debating whether it was worth the effort to demand some courtesy. “Well, turn down the sound,” he said. “Dr. Isles and I need to talk.”
The girl grabbed the remote and aimed it like a weapon at the TV. The volume barely dropped.
Ballard looked at Maura. “Would you like some coffee? Tea?”
“No, thank you.”
He gave an understanding nod. “You just want to hear about Anna.”
“Yes.”
“I have a copy of her file in my office.”
If the office reflected the man, then Rick Ballard was as solid and reliable as the oak desk that dominated the room. He chose not to retreat behind that desk; instead he pointed her toward a sofa, and he sat in an armchair facing her. No barriers stood between them except a coffee table, on which a single folder rested. Through the closed door, they could still hear the manic thump of the TV.
“I have to apologize for my daughter’s rudeness,” he said. “Katie’s been going through a hard time, and I’m not quite sure how to deal with her these days. Felons, I can handle, but fourteen-year-old girls?” He gave a rueful laugh.
“I hope my visit isn’t making things worse.”
“This has nothing to do with you, believe me. Our family’s going through a tough transition right now. My wife and I separated last year, and Katie refuses to accept it. It’s led to a lot of fights, a lot of tension.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
“Divorce is never pleasant.”
“Mine certainly wasn’t.”
“But you did get past it.”
She thought of Victor, who had so recently intruded upon her life. And how, for a brief time, he had lured her into thoughts of reconciliation. “I’m not sure one ever gets past it,” she said. “Once you’ve been married to someone, they’re always part of your life, good or bad. The key is to remember the good parts.”
“Not so easy, sometimes.”
They were silent for a moment. The only sound was the TV’s irritating pulse of teen defiance. Then he straightened, squaring his broad shoulders, and looked at her. It was a gaze she could not easily turn away from, a gaze that told her she was the sole focus of his attention.
“Well. You came to hear about Anna.”
“Yes. Detective Rizzoli told me you knew her. That you tried to protect her.”
“I didn’t do a good enough job,” he said quietly. She saw a flash of pain in his eyes, and then his gaze dropped to the file on the coffee table. He picked up the folder and handed it to her. “It’s not pleasant to look at. But you have a right to see it.”
She opened the folder and stared at a photograph of Anna Leoni, posed against a stark white wall. She was wearing a paper hospital gown. One eye was swollen almost shut, and the cheek was bruised purple. Her intact eye gazed at the camera with a stunned expression.
“That’s the way she looked when I first met her,” he said. “That photo was taken in the ER last year, after the man she’d been living with struck her. She’d just moved out of his home in Marblehead, and was renting a house here, in Newton. He showed up at her front door one night and tried to talk her into coming back. She told him to leave. Well, you don’t tell Charles Cassell to do anything. That’s what happened.”
Maura heard the anger in his voice, and she looked up. Saw that his mouth had tightened. “I understand she pressed charges.”
“Hell, yes. I coached her through it every step of the way. A man who hits a woman understands only one thing: punishment. I was going to make damn sure he faced the consequences. I deal with domestic abuse all the time, and it makes me angry every time I see it. It’s like flipping a switch inside me; all I want to do is nail the guy. That’s what I tried to do to Charles Cassell.”
“And what happened?”
Ballard gave a disgusted shake of his head. “He ended up in jail for one lousy night. When you have money, you can buy yourself out of just about anything. I hoped that would be the end of it—that he’d stay away from her. But this is a man who’s not used to losing. He kept calling her, showing up on her doorstep. She moved twice, but each time he found her. She finally took out a restraining order, but it didn’t stop him from driving past her house. Then, around six months ago, it started to get deadly serious.”
“How?”
He nodded at the file. “It’s there. She found it wedged in her front door one morning.”
Maura turned to a photocopied sheet. On it were only two typed words centered on a blank sheet of paper.
You’re dead.
Fear whispered up Maura’s spine. She imagined waking up one morning. Opening her front door to pick up the newspaper, and seeing this single sheet of white paper flutter to the ground. Unfolding it to read those two words.
“That was only the first note,” he said. “There were others that came afterwards.”
She turned to the next page. It had
the same two words.
You’re dead.
And turned to a third, and a fourth sheet.
You’re dead.
You’re dead.
Her throat had gone dry. She looked at Ballard. “Wasn’t there something she could do to stop him?”
“We tried, but we could never prove he actually wrote those. Just like we couldn’t prove he was the one who scratched her car or slashed her window screens. Then one day she opened her mailbox. Inside was a dead canary with its neck broken. That’s when she decided she wanted to get the hell out of Boston. She wanted to disappear.”
“And you helped her.”
“I never stopped helping her. I was the one she called whenever Cassell came by to harass her. I helped her get the restraining order. And when she decided to leave town, I helped her do that, too. It’s not easy to just disappear, especially when someone with Cassell’s resources is looking for you. Not only did she change her name, she set up a fake residence under that new name. She rented an apartment and never moved in—it was just to confuse anyone tracking her. The idea is that you go someplace else entirely, where you pay for everything in cash. You leave behind everything and everyone. That’s the way it’s supposed to work.”
“But he found her anyway.”
“I think that’s why she came back to Boston. She knew she wasn’t safe up there anymore. You know she called me, don’t you? The night before?”
Maura nodded. “That’s what Rizzoli said.”
“She left a message on my answering machine, told me she was staying at the Tremont Hotel. I was in Denver, visiting my sister, so I didn’t hear the message till I got home. By then, Anna was dead.” He met Maura’s gaze. “Cassell will deny he did it, of course. But if he managed to track her to Fox Harbor, then there has to be someone in that town who’s seen him. That’s what I plan to do next—prove that he was up there. Find out if anyone remembers him.”
“But she wasn’t killed in Maine. She was killed in front of my house.”
Ballard shook his head. “I don’t know where you come into this, Dr. Isles. But I don’t believe Anna’s death had anything to do with you.”
They heard the chime of the doorbell. He made no move to rise and answer it, but remained in his chair, his gaze on her. It was a gaze so intent she couldn’t turn away, could only stare back, thinking: I want to believe him. Because I cannot bear to think that her death was somehow my fault.
“I want Cassell put away,” he said. “And I’ll do everything I can to help Rizzoli do it. I watched the whole thing unfold, and I knew from the very beginning how it was going to end. Yet I couldn’t stop it. I owe it to her, to Anna,” he said. “I need to see this through to the end.”
Angry voices suddenly drew her attention. In the other room, the TV had gone silent, but Katie and a woman were now exchanging sharp words. Ballard glanced toward the door as the voices rose to shouts.
“What the hell were you thinking?” the woman was yelling.
Ballard stood up. “Excuse me, I should probably find out what the fuss is all about.” He walked out, and Maura heard him say: “Carmen, what’s going on?”
“You should ask your daughter that question,” the woman answered.
“Give it a rest, Mom. Just give it a fucking rest.”
“Tell your father what happened today. Go on, tell him what they found in your locker.”
“It is not a big deal.”
“Tell him, Katie.”
“You are totally overreacting.”
“What happened, Carmen?” said Ballard.
“The principal called me this afternoon. The school did a random locker check today, and guess what they found in our daughter’s locker? A joint. How the hell does that look? Here she’s got two parents in law enforcement, and she’s got drugs in her locker. We’re just lucky he’s letting us deal with it ourselves. What if he’d reported it? I can just see having to arrest my own daughter.”
“Oh, Christ.”
“We have to deal with this together, Rick. We have to agree on how to handle it.”
Maura rose from the couch and went to the door, unsure of how to politely make her exit. She did not want to intrude on this family’s privacy, yet here she was, listening to an exchange she knew she shouldn’t be hearing. I should just say good-bye and go, she thought. Leave these beleaguered parents alone.
She walked into the hall and paused as she approached the living room. Katie’s mother glanced up, startled to see an unexpected visitor in the house. If the mother was any indication of what Katie would one day look like, then that sullen teenager was destined to be a statuesque blonde. The woman was almost as tall as Ballard, with the rangy leanness of an athlete. Her hair was tied back in a casual ponytail, and she wore no trace of makeup, but a woman with her stunning cheekbones needed little enhancement.
Maura said, “Excuse me for interrupting.”
Ballard turned to her, and gave a weary laugh. “I’m afraid you’re not exactly seeing us at our best. This is Katie’s mom, Carmen. This is Dr. Maura Isles.”
“I’m going to leave now,” said Maura.
“But we hardly got a chance to talk.”
“I’ll call you another time. I can see you have other things on your mind.” She nodded to Carmen. “Glad to meet you. Good night.”
“Let me walk you out,” said Ballard.
They stepped out of the house, and he gave a sigh, as though relieved to be away from the demands of his family.
“I’m sorry to intrude on that,” she said.
“I’m sorry you had to listen to it.”
“Have you noticed we can’t stop apologizing to each other?”
“You have nothing to apologize for, Maura.”
They reached her car and paused for a moment.
“I didn’t get to tell you much about your sister,” he said.
“Next time I see you?”
He nodded. “Next time.”
She slid into her car and closed the door. Rolled down her window when she saw him lean down to talk to her.
“I will tell you this much about her,” he said.
“Yes?”
“You look so much like Anna, it takes my breath away.”
She could not stop thinking of those words as she sat in her living room, studying the photo of young Anna Leoni with her parents. All these years, she thought, you were missing from my life, and I never realized it. But I must have known; on some level I must have felt my sister’s absence.
You look so much like Anna, it takes my breath away.
Yes, she thought, touching Anna’s face in the photo. It takes my breath away, too. She and Anna had shared the same DNA; what else had they shared? Anna had also chosen a career in science, a job governed by reason and logic. She too must have excelled in mathematics. Had she, like Maura, played the piano? Had she loved books and Australian wines and the History Channel?
There is so much more I want to know about you.
It was late; she turned off the lamp and went to her bedroom to pack.
EIGHT
PITCH BLACK. Head aching. The scent of wood and damp earth and . . . something else that made no sense. Chocolate. She smelled chocolate.
Mattie Purvis opened her eyes wide, but she might as well have kept them tightly closed because she could see nothing. Not a glimmer of light, not a wisp of shadow on shadow. Oh god, am I blind?
Where am I?
She was not in her own bed. She was lying on something hard, and it made her back ache. The floor? No, this wasn’t polished wood beneath her, but rough planks, gritty with dirt.
If only her head would stop pounding.
She closed her eyes, fighting off nausea. Trying, even through the pain, to remember how she could have arrived at this strange, dark place where nothing seemed familiar. Dwayne, she thought. We had a fight, and then I drove home. She struggled to retrieve the lost fragments of time. She remembered a stack of mail on the table. She remembered
crying, her tears dripping onto envelopes. She remembered jumping up, and the chair hitting the floor.
I heard a noise. I went into the garage. I heard a noise and went into the garage, and . . .
Nothing. She could remember nothing after that.
She opened her eyes. It was still dark. Oh, this is bad, Mattie, she thought, this is very, very bad. Your head hurts, you’ve lost your memory, and you’re blind.
“Dwayne?” she called. She heard only the whoosh of her own pulse.
She had to get up. She had to find help, had to find a phone at the very least.
She rolled onto her right side to push herself up, and her face slammed up against a wall. The impact bounced her right onto her back again. She lay stunned, her nose throbbing. What was a wall doing here? She reached out to touch it and felt more rough wooden planks. Okay, she thought, I’ll just roll the other way. She turned to the left.
And collided with another wall.
Her heartbeat thudded louder, faster. She lay on her back again, thinking: walls on both sides. This can’t be. This isn’t real. Pushing up off the floor, she sat up, and slammed the top of her head. Collapsed, once again, onto her back.
No, no, no!
Panic seized her. Arms flailing, she hit barriers in every direction. She clawed at the wood, splinters digging into her fingers. Heard shrieks but did not recognize her own voice. Everywhere, walls. She bucked, thrashed, her fists pummeling blindly until her hands were bruised and torn, her limbs too exhausted to move. Slowly her shrieks faded to sobs. Finally, to stunned silence.
A box. I am trapped in a box.
She took a deep breath and inhaled the scent of her own sweat, her own fear. Felt the baby squirm inside her, another prisoner trapped in a small space. She thought of the Russian dolls her grandmother had once given her. A doll inside a doll inside a doll.
We’re going to die in here. We’re both going to die, my baby and me.