"Yeah, nice to see you, too," said Detective Crowe. "I guess this must be where all the action is."
"I could've blown off your fucking head," said Rizzoli. "You should have warned us you were coming in . . ." Her voice trailed off. She went very still as another silhouette appeared. A tall man moved with catlike grace past Crowe, and into the circle of Rizzoli's flashlight beam. The light suddenly wavered, her hand shaking too much to hold it steady.
"Hello Jane," said Gabriel Dean.
The darkness only seemed to magnify the long silence.
When Rizzoli finally managed to respond, her tone was strangely flat. Businesslike.
"I didn't know you were in town."
"I just flew in this morning."
She reholstered her weapon. Drew herself up straight. "What are you doing here?"
"The same thing you are. Detective Crowe is walking me through the scene."
"The FBI's coming in on this? Why?"
Dean glanced around their shadowy surroundings. "We should talk about this somewhere else. Somewhere warm, at least. I'd like to hear how your case intersects with this one, Jane."
"If we talk, the info has to go both ways," said Rizzoli.
"Of course."
"All cards on the table."
Dean nodded. "You'll know everything that I know."
"Look," said Crowe, "Let me finish walking Agent Dean through here. We'll meet you back at the conference room. At least we'll have enough light to see each other. And we won't be standing around, freezing our asses off."
Rizzoli nodded. "The conference room, two o'clock. We'll see you there."
FOURTEEN
RIZZOLI FUMBLED for her car keys and dropped them in the snow. Cursed as she squatted down to retrieve them.
"Are you okay?" asked Maura.
"He took me by surprise. I wasn't expecting . . ." She stood up and huffed out a cloud of steam. "Jesus, what is he doing here? What the hell is he doing here?"
"His job, I imagine."
"I'm not ready for this. I'm not ready to work with him again."
"You may not have a choice."
"I know. And that's what pisses me off, that I don't have a choice." Rizzoli unlocked her car and they both slid inside, onto icy seats.
"Are you going to tell him?"asked Maura.
Grimly Rizzoli started the engine. "No."
"He'd want to know."
"I'm not sure he would. I'm not sure any man would."
"So you're just writing off the happy ending? Not even giving it a chance?"
Rizzoli sighed. "Maybe, if we were different people, there would be a chance."
"The affair didn't happen to other people. It happened to you two."
"Right. What a surprise, huh?"
"Why?"
For a moment Rizzoli was silent, her gaze fixed on the road ahead. "You know what my two brothers used to call me when we were growing up?" she said softly. "The frog. They said no prince would ever want to kiss a frog. Much less marry me."
"Brothers can be cruel."
"But sometimes they just tell you the brutal truth."
"When Agent Dean looks at you, I don't think he sees a frog."
Rizzoli shrugged. "Who knows what he sees?"
"An intelligent woman?"
"Yeah, that's really sexy."
"To some men, it is."
"Or so they claim. But you know what? I have a hard time believing it. Given the choice, men always go for the tits and ass."
Rizzoli focused with angry intensity on the road as they drove down streets where dirty snow crusted sidewalks and the windows of parked cars were frosted white.
"He saw something in you, Jane. Enough to want you."
"It was the case we were working. The excitement of the hunt. It makes you feel alive, you know? When you start to close in, the adrenaline gets pumping and everything looks different, feels different. You're working with someone around the clock, working so close to him that you know his scent. You know how he drinks his coffee and how he ties his tie. Then the case turns hairy, you get angry together and scared together. And pretty soon it starts to feel like love. But it isn't. It's just two people, working in a situation so intense that they can't tell the difference between lust and the thrill of the chase. That's what I think happened. We met over a few dead bodies. And after a while, even I started to look good to him."
"Is that all he was to you? Someone who started to look good?"
"Well, shit. He does look good."
"Because if you don't love him—if you don't even care about him—then seeing him now shouldn't be all that painful. Should it?"
"I don't know!" was Rizzoli's exasperated response. "I don't know what I feel about him!"
"Does it depend on whether he loves you?"
"I'm sure not going to ask him."
"It's one way to get a straight answer."
"How does that old saying go? If you don't want to hear the answer, then you shouldn't ask the question?"
"You never know. The answer might surprise you."
At Schroeder Plaza, they stopped in the cafeteria to pick up coffee and carried their cups upstairs, to the conference room. While waiting for Crowe and Dean to arrive, Maura watched Rizzoli rustle through papers and search through files as though they held some secret she was desperate to uncover. At two fifteen, they finally heard the faint chime of the elevator bell, and then Crowe's laughter in the hall. Rizzoli's spine went rigid. As the men's voices drew nearer, her gaze remained fixed on the papers. When Dean appeared in the doorway, she did not immediately look up, as though refusing to acknowledge his power over her.
Maura had first met Special Agent Gabriel Dean in late August, when he had joined the homicide team investigating the slayings of wealthy couples in the Boston area. A man of imposing stature and quiet intelligence, he had quickly come to dominate that team, and his conflict with Rizzoli, the lead investigating officer, was almost guaranteed from the start. Maura had been the first to watch that conflict transform into attraction. She had noticed the first sparks of their affair, had seen their gazes meet over the bodies of victims. She had taken note of Rizzoli's blushes, her uncertainty. The first stages of love were always fraught with confusion.
As were the last stages of love.
Dean came into the room, and his gaze immediately fixed on Rizzoli. He was dressed in a suit and tie, his crisp appearance a contrast to Rizzoli's wrinkled blouse and unruly hair. When at last she looked up at him, it was almost with an air of defiance. So here I am. Take it or leave it.
Crowe swaggered to the head of the table. "Okay, the gang's all here. It's time for show and tell." He looked at Rizzoli.
"Let's hear from the FBI first," she said.
Dean opened the briefcase he'd carried into the room. He took out a folder and slid it across the table to Rizzoli.
"That photograph was taken ten days ago, in Providence, Rhode Island," he said
Rizzoli opened the folder. Maura, sitting beside her, had a full view of the photograph. It was a death scene photo, taken of a man curled into a fetal position inside the trunk of a car. Blood was splattered across the fawn-colored carpet. The face of the victim was surprisingly intact, the eyes open, the dependent skin suffused purple from lividity.
"The victim's name was Howard Redfield, age fifty-one, a divorced white male from Cincinnati," said Dean. "The cause of death was a single gunshot wound, fired through the left temporal bone. In addition, he had multiple fractures of both kneecaps, administered with a blunt weapon, possibly a hammer. There were also severe burns to both hands, which were bound with duct tape behind his back."
"He was tortured," said Rizzoli.
"Yes. At great length."
Rizzoli swayed back in her chair, her face pale. Maura was the only person in the room who knew the reason for that pallor, and she watched her with concern. She saw the desperate battle play out on her face, saw her struggle against nausea.
"He was found de
ad in the trunk of his own car," Dean continued. "The car was parked about two blocks from the bus station in Providence. That's only about an hour, hour-and-a-half drive from here."
"But a different jurisdiction," said Crowe.
Dean nodded. "That's why this death didn't come to your attention. The killer could very well have driven that car down to Providence with the victim in his trunk, left it there, and caught a bus back to Boston."
"Back to Boston? Why do you think this is where he started from?" asked Maura.
"It's just a guess. We don't know where the killing actually took place. We can't even be sure of Mr. Redfield's movements over the last few weeks. His home is in Cincinnati, but he turns up dead in New England. He left no credit card trail, no record of where he's been staying. We do know he withdrew a large amount of cash from his account a month ago. And then he left home."
"Sounds like someone who's on the run and doesn't want to be traced," said Maura. "Or someone who's scared."
Dean looked at the photo. "Obviously, he was right to be."
"Tell us more about this victim," said Rizzoli. She was back in control now, and able to gaze, without flinching, at the photo.
"Mr. Redfield was formerly a senior VP of Octagon Chemicals, in charge of their overseas operations," said Dean. "Two months ago, he resigned from the company, ostensibly for personal reasons."
"Octagon?" said Maura. "They've been in the news. Aren't they currently under investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission?"
Dean nodded. "The SEC enforcement division has filed a civil action against Octagon, alleging multiple violations involving billions of dollars in illegal transactions."
"Billions?" said Rizzoli. "Wow."
"Octagon is a huge multinational, with annual sales of twenty billion dollars. We're talking about a very big fish."
Rizzoli looked at the death scene photo. "And this victim was swimming in that pond. He'd know the inside scoop. You think he was a problem for Octagon?"
"Three weeks ago," said Dean, "Mr. Redfield made an appointment to speak with officials from the Justice Department."
"Yep," said Crowe with a laugh. "He was definitely a problem for them."
"He asked that Justice officials meet him here, in Boston."
"Why not Washington?" asked Rizzoli.
"He told them there were other parties who wished to make statements. That it had to be done here. What we don't know is why he contacted the Justice Department, rather than go directly to the SEC, since we assume it had to do with the Octagon investigation."
"But you don't know that for certain?"
"No. Because he never kept the appointment. By then, he was dead."
Crowe said, "Hey, if it looks like a paid hit and it smells like a paid hit . . ."
"What does any of this have to do with Rat Lady?" asked Rizzoli.
"I'm just getting to that," said Dean. He looked at Maura. "You performed the autopsy. What was her cause of death?"
"A gunshot wound to the chest," said Maura. "Bullet fragments penetrated her heart, and there was massive bleeding into the pericardial sac, preventing the heart from pumping. It's called pericardial tamponade."
"And what type of bullet was used?"
Maura remembered the X ray of Rat Lady's chest. The spray of shell fragments, like a galaxy of stars scattered through both lungs. "It was a Glaser blue-tip," she said. "A copper jacket containing metal pellets. It's designed to fragment inside the body, with little chance of through and through penetration." She paused, and added: "It's a devastating projectile."
Dean nodded at the photo of Howard Redfield, lying curled and bloody in the trunk of his car. "Mr. Redfield was killed with a Glaser blue-tip. A bullet fired from the same gun that killed your Jane Doe."
For a moment, no one spoke.
Then Rizzoli said, in disbelief, "But you just laid the case for a contract killing. Octagon's way of dealing with a whistle-blower. This other victim, Rat Lady—"
"Detective Rizzoli's right," said Maura. "Rat Lady is the most unlikely target of a corporate hit that I could imagine."
"Nevertheless," said Dean, "The bullet that killed her was fired by the same weapon that killed Howard Redfield."
Crowe said, "That's how Agent Dean came into the picture. I requested a DRUGFIRE search on that blue-tip copper jacket you took out of her chest."
Similar to the FBI's national AFIS database for fingerprints, DRUGFIRE was a centralized database for firearm-related evidence. Marks and striations found on bullets from crime scenes were stored as digitized data, which could then be searched for matches, linking all crimes committed by the same firearm.
"DRUGFIRE came up with the match," said Dean.
Rizzoli shook her head in bewilderment. "Why these two victims? I don't see the connection."
"That's what makes Jane Doe's death so interesting," said Dean.
Maura did not like his use of the word interesting. It implied that some deaths were not interesting, not worthy of special attention. Those victims would certainly not agree.
She focused on the photo, an ugly splash of gore lying on the conference table. "Our Jane Doe doesn't belong in this picture," she said.
"Dr. Isles?"
"There's a logical reason why Howard Redfield was killed. He may be a whistle-blower in an SEC investigation. The evidence of torture tells us his death wasn't just a case of robbery gone wrong. The killer wanted something from him. Retribution, maybe. Or information. But how does our Jane Doe—most likely an illegal immigrant—fit in? Why would anyone want her dead?"
"That's the question, isn't it?" Dean looked at Rizzoli. "I understand you have a case which may tie into this as well."
His gaze seemed to rattle her. She gave a nervous shake of the head. "It's another one that seems completely unrelated."
"Detective Crowe told me that two nuns were attacked in their convent," said Dean. "In Jamaica Plain."
"But that perp didn't use a firearm. The nuns were bludgeoned, we think with a hammer. It looked like a rage attack. Some wacko who hates women."
"Maybe that's what he wanted you to think. To hide any connection to these other homicides."
"Yeah, well, it worked. Until Dr. Isles came up with Jane Doe's diagnosis of leprosy. It turns out one of the nuns who was attacked, Sister Ursula, used to work in a leper village, in India."
"A village that no longer exists," Maura said.
Dean looked at her. "What?"
"It may have been a religious massacre. Nearly a hundred people were slaughtered, and the village was burned to the ground." She paused. "Sister Ursula is the only one from that village who survived."
She had never seen Gabriel Dean look so taken aback. Usually, Dean was the one who held the secrets and doled out the revelations. This new information temporarily stunned him into silence.
She hit him with another one. "I believe our Jane Doe may have been from that same village in India."
"You told me earlier you thought she was Hispanic," said Crowe.
"It was only a guess, based on her skin pigmentation."
"So are you changing the guess to make it fit the circumstances?"
"No, I'm changing it because of what we found at autopsy. Remember that strand of yellow thread adhering to her wrist?"
"Yeah. Hair and Fiber said it was cotton. Probably just a piece of string."
"Wearing a loop of string around your wrist is supposed to ward off the evil eye. It's a Hindu custom."
"India again," said Dean.
Maura nodded. "It does keep going back to India."
"A nun and an illegal immigrant with leprosy?" said Crowe. "How do we link them to a corporate hit?" He shook his head. "Professionals don't get hired unless someone has a lot to gain."
"Or a lot to lose," said Maura.
"If these are all contract killings," said Dean, "you can be sure of one thing. That the progress of your investigations will be tracked very carefully. You need to control any an
d all information about these cases. Because someone's watching everything Boston P.D. is doing."
Watching me too, thought Maura, chilled at the thought. And she was so visible. At crime scenes, on the TV news. Walking to her car. She was accustomed to being in the eye of the media, but now she considered the other eyes that might be watching her. Tracking her. And she remembered what she had felt in the darkness at Mama Cortina's: the prey's cold sense of dread when it suddenly realizes it is being stalked.
Dean said, "I need to see that other death scene. The convent, where the nuns were attacked." He looked at Rizzoli. "Could you take me through it?"
For a moment, Rizzoli did not respond. She sat unmoving, her gaze fixed on the death photo of Howard Redfield, curled in the trunk of his car.
"Jane?"
She took a breath and sat up straight, as though she'd suddenly found some new well of courage. Of fortitude.
"Let's go," she said, and rose to her feet. She looked at Dean. "I guess we're a team again."
FIFTEEN
I CAN DEAL WITH THIS. I can deal with him..
Rizzoli drove to Jamaica Plain with her eyes on the road, but her mind on Gabriel Dean. Without warning, he had stepped back into her life, and she was still too stunned to make sense of what she was now feeling. Her stomach was knotted, her hands numb. Only a day ago, she had thought that she was over the worst of missing him, that with a little time and a lot of distraction she could put their affair behind her. Out of sight, out of mind.
Now he was back in her sight, and very much on her mind.
She was first to arrive at Graystones Abbey. She sat in her parked car and waited for him, every nerve humming, her anxiety turning to nausea.
Pull it together, goddamn it. Focus on the job.
She saw his rental car park behind her.
At once she stepped out and welcomed the punishing wind on her face. The more brutal the cold, the better, to slap some sense into her. She watched him emerge from his car and greeted him with the crisp nod of a fellow cop.
Then she turned and rang the gate bell. No pause for conversation, no fumbling for words. She went straight to business, because it was the only way she knew how to cope with this reunion. She was relieved when a nun soon emerged from the building and began shuffling through the snow, toward the gate.