The Sinner (15 page)

“What do you want me to say?”

“He hasn’t been up here to see you lately. Has he?”

She didn’t answer, didn’t even look at him. She focused
instead
on the mural painted on the wall behind him. “We’ve both been
busy.”

Korsak sighed and shook his head, a gesture of pity.

“It’s not like I’m in love or anything.”
Mustering
her pride, she finally met his gaze. “You think I’m gonna fall apart
just
because some guy dumps me?”

“Well, I don’t know.”

She laughed, but it sounded forced, even to her ears.
“It’s
only sex, Korsak. You have a fling, and you move on. Guys do it all the
time.”

“You telling me you’re no different from a guy?”

“Don’t go pulling that double standard bullshit on
me.”

“No, come on. You mean there’s no broken heart? He walks
away, and you’re fine with it?”

She fixed him with a hard stare. “I’ll be fine.”

“Well, that’s good. Because he’s not worth it,
Rizzoli.
He’s not worth one minute of grief. And I’m gonna tell him that, next
time
I see him.”

“Why are you doing this?”

“Doing what?”

“Interfering. Bullying. I don’t need this. I’ve got
enough problems.”

“I know that.”

“And all you’re doing is making things worse.”

He stared at her for a moment. Then he looked down. “I’m
sorry,” he said quietly. “But you know, I’m only trying to be
your
friend.”

Of all the things he might have said, nothing could have affected
her
more. She found herself blinking away tears as she stared at the bald spot on
his
bowed head. There were times when he repelled her, times when he infuriated her.

And then there were times when she’d catch a startling
glimpse
of the man inside, a decent man with a generous heart, and she’d feel
ashamed
of her impatience with him.

They were silent as they pulled on their coats and walked out of
Doyle’s,
emerging from the cloud of cigarette smoke into a night that sparkled with fresh
snow. Up the street, a cruiser pulled out of the Jamaica Plain station, its blue
lights veiled by a beaded curtain of falling flakes. They watched the cruiser
swoop
away down the street, and Rizzoli wondered what crisis awaited it. Somewhere
there
was always a crisis. Couples screaming, wrangling. Lost children. Stunned
drivers
huddled beside their smashed cars. So many different lives intersecting in a
myriad
of ways. Most people were wrapped up in their own little corners of the
universe.
A cop sees it all.

“So what’re you doing for Christmas?” he said.

“Going to my parents’ house. My brother Frankie’s
in
town for the holidays.”

“That’s the one who’s a Marine, right?”

“Yeah. Whenever he shows up, the whole family’s supposed
to get down on our knees and worship him.”

“Ouch. Little sibling rivalry there?”

“Naw, I lost that contest a long time ago. Frankie’s
king
of the hill. So what’re you doing for Christmas?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know.”

There was an unmistakable plea for an invitation in that answer.
Save
me from a lonely Christmas. Save me from my own screwed-up life. But she
couldn’t
save him. She couldn’t even save herself.

“I got a few plans,” he quickly added, too proud to let
the
silence stretch on. “Maybe head down to Florida and see my sister.”

“That sounds good.” She sighed, her breath a cloud of
steam.
“Well, I gotta go home and get some sleep.”

“You want to get together again sometime, you got my cell
phone
number, right?”

“Yeah, I’ve got it. Have a great Christmas.” She
walked
to her car.

“Uh, Rizzoli?”

“Yeah?”

“I know you still got a thing for Dean. I’m sorry I said
those things about him. I just think you could do better.”

She laughed. “Like there’s a line of guys waiting
outside
my door.”

“Well,” he said, staring up the street. Suddenly
avoiding
her gaze. “There is one guy.”

She went very still, thinking: Please don’t do this to me.
Please
don’t make me hurt you.

Before she could respond, he abruptly turned to his car. He gave
her
a careless wave as he circled to his door and ducked inside. She stared as he
drove
away, his tires trailing a glittering cloud of snow.

E
LEVEN

I
T WAS AFTER SEVEN
that evening when Maura finally
arrived
home. As she turned into her driveway, she could see lights blazing in her
house.
Not the paltry glow of a few bulbs switched on by automatic timers, but the
cheery
incandescence of many lamps burning, of someone waiting for her. And through the
living room curtains, she could make out a pyramid of multicolored lights.

A Christmas tree.

That was the last thing she had expected to see, and she paused in
the driveway, staring at the twinkling colors, remembering the Christmases when
she
had put up the tree for Victor, when she had lifted delicate globes from their
packing
nests and hung them on branches that perfumed her fingers with the tart scent of
pine. She remembered Christmases before that, when she was a child, and her
father
would lift her on his shoulders, so she could place the silver star on top of
the
tree. Not once had her parents skipped that happy tradition, yet how quickly she
had let it slip from her own life. It was too messy, too much work. The hauling
in
of the tree, the hauling out, and then it was just another dried brown discard
waiting
on the curb for trash pickup. She had let the troublesome aspects deter her. She
had forgotten about the joy.

She stepped from the cold garage into the house, and was greeted
by
the scent of roasting chicken and garlic and rosemary. How good it felt to be
greeted
by the smells of supper, to have someone waiting for her. She heard the TV on in
the living room, and she followed the sound, pulling off her coat as she headed
down
the hallway.

Victor was sitting cross-legged on the floor next to the tree,
trying
to untangle a clump of tinsel. He saw her and gave a resigned laugh.

“I’m no better at this than when we were married.”

“I didn’t expect all this,” she said, looking up at
the lights.

“Well, I thought, here it is, December eighteenth, and you
don’t
even have a tree yet.”

“I haven’t had time to put one up.”

“There’s always time for Christmas, Maura.”

“This is quite a change. You used to be the one who was
always
too busy for the holidays.”

He looked up at her from the tangle of silver. “And
you’re
always going to hold that against me, aren’t you?”

She fell silent, regretting her last comment. It was not a good
way
to start the evening, by bringing up old resentments. She turned to hang her
coat
in the closet. With her back to him, she called out: “Can I get you a
drink?”

“Whatever you’re having.”

“Even if it’s a girly drink?”

“Have I ever been sexist about my cocktails?”

She laughed and went into the kitchen. From the refrigerator she
took
out limes and cranberry juice. She measured Triple Sec and Absolut Citron into
the
cocktail shaker. Standing at the sink, she rattled together ice and liquor,
feeling
the metal container turn frosty. Shake, shake, shake, like the sound of dice in
a
cup. Everything’s a gamble, love most of all. The last time I gambled I
lost,
she thought. And this time, what am I gambling for? A chance to make things
right
between us? Or another chance to have my heart broken?

She poured the icy liquid into two martini glasses and was
carrying
them out when she noticed the trash can was filled with a jumble of restaurant
takeout
containers. She had to smile. So Victor had not magically transformed into a
chef
after all. Their dinner tonight was courtesy of the New Market Deli.

When she walked into the living room, she found Victor had given
up
on tinsel-hanging and was packing away the empty ornament boxes.

“You went to a lot of trouble,” she said, as she set the
martini glasses down on the coffee table. “Bulbs and lights and
everything.”

“I couldn’t find any Christmas stuff in your
garage.”

“I left it all in San Francisco.”

“You never bought your own?”

“I haven’t put up any trees.”

“It’s been three years, Maura.”

She sat down on the couch and calmly took a sip of her drink.
“And
when was the last time
you
took out that box of bulbs?”

He said nothing, but focused instead on stacking the empty boxes.
When
he finally answered, he did not look at her. “I haven’t felt much like
celebrating, either.”

The TV was still on, the sound now muted, but distracting images
flashed
on the screen. Victor reached for the remote and pressed
OFF
.
Then
he sat on the couch, a comfortable distance away, not touching her, yet close
enough
to leave open all possibilities.

He looked at the martini glass she’d brought him.
“It’s
pink,” he said, with a note of surprise.

“A Cosmopolitan. I warned you it was a girly drink.”

He took a sip. “Tastes like the girls are having all the
fun.”

They sat quietly for a moment, sipping their drinks, the Christmas
lights twinkling on and off. A homey and comfortable scene, but Maura was
feeling
anything but relaxed. She didn’t know what to expect of this evening, and
didn’t
know what
he
expected either. Everything about him was disconcertingly
familiar.
His scent, the way his hair caught the lamplight. And the little details, which
she
always found endearing because they reflected his lack of pretension: the
well-worn
shirt, the faded jeans. The same old Timex that he’d been wearing ever
since
she’d met him. I can’t walk into a third world country and say
I’m
here to help you when there’s a Rolex on my wrist, he’d said. Victor
as
Man of La Mancha, tilting at the windmill of poverty. She may have grown weary
of
that fight long ago, but he was still in the thick of it.

And for that, she couldn’t help but admire him.

He put down the martini glass. “I saw more about the nuns
today.
On the news.”

“What are they saying?”

“The police were dragging a pond behind the convent.
What’s
that all about?”

She leaned back, the alcohol starting to melt the tension from her
shoulders. “They found a baby in the pond.”

“The nun’s?”

“We’re waiting for the DNA to confirm it.”

“But you have no doubt it’s her baby?”

“It has to be. Or this case gets unbelievably
complicated.”

“So you’ll be able to identify the father. If you have
DNA.”

“We need a name, first. And even if we do establish
paternity,
there’s always the question of whether the sex was consensual, or whether
it
was rape. How do you prove it, one way or another, without Camille’s
testimony?”

“Still, it sounds like a possible motive for murder.”

“Absolutely.” She drained the last of her drink and set
down
the glass. It had been a mistake to drink before dinner. The alcohol and lack of
sleep were conspiring to fog her thinking. She rubbed her temples, trying to
force
her brain to stay sharp.

“I should feed you, Maura. You look like you’ve had a
hard
day.”

She forced a laugh. “You know that movie, where the little
boy
says, ‘I see dead people’?”

“The Sixth Sense.”

“Well, I see them all the time, and I’m getting tired of
it. That’s what’s ruined my mood. Here it is, almost Christmas, and I
didn’t
even think about putting up a tree, because I’m still seeing the autopsy
lab
in my head. I’m still smelling it on my hands. I come home on a day like
this,
after two postmortems, and I can’t think about cooking dinner. I can’t
even look at a piece of meat without thinking of muscle fibers. All I can deal
with
is a cocktail. And then I pour the drink and smell the alcohol, and suddenly
there
I am, back in the lab. Alcohol, formalin, they both have that same sharp
smell.”

“I’ve never heard you talk this way about your
work.”

“I’ve never felt so overwhelmed by it.”

“Doesn’t sound like the invincible Dr. Isles.”

“You know I’m not.”

“You’re pretty good at playing the part. Smart and
bulletproof.
Do you realize how much you intimidated your students at U.C.? They were all
afraid
of you.”

She shook her head and laughed. “Queen of the Dead.”

“What?”

“That’s what the cops here call me. Not to my face. But
I’ve
heard it through the grapevine.”

“I kind of like that. Queen of the Dead.”

“Well, I hate it.” She closed her eyes and leaned back
against
the cushions. “It makes me sound like a vampire. Like something
grotesque.”

She didn’t hear him rise from the couch and move behind her.
So
she was startled when she suddenly felt his hands on her shoulders. She went
still,
every nerve ending alive and exquisitely sensitive to his touch.

“Relax,” he murmured, his fingers kneading her muscles.
“That’s
one thing you never learned to do.”

“Don’t, Victor.”

“You never drop your guard. You never want anyone to see you
as
less than perfect.”

His fingers were sinking deeply into her shoulders and neck.
Probing,
invading. She responded by tensing even more, her muscles snapping taut in
defense.

“No wonder you’re tired,” he said. “Your
shields
are always up. You can’t just sit back and enjoy it when someone touches
you.”

“Don’t.”
She pulled away and rose to her
feet.
Turning to face him, she could still feel her skin tingling from his touch.
“What’s
going on here, Victor?”

“I was trying to help you relax.”

“I’m relaxed enough, thank you.”

“You’re wound up so tight your muscles feel like
they’re
ready to snap.”

“Well, what do you expect? I don’t know what you’re
doing here. I don’t know what you want.”

“How about just to be friends again?

“Can we be?”

“Why not?”

Even as she met his gaze, she could feel herself reddening.
“Because
there’s too much history between us. Too much . . .”
Attraction
was
what she thought, but she cut off the word. She said, instead: “I’m
not
sure men and women can be just friends, anyway.”

“That’s a sad thing to believe.”

“It’s realistic. I work with men every day. I know
they’re
intimidated, and I want them to be. I want them to see me as an authority
figure.
A brain and a white coat. Because once they start thinking of me as a woman, sex
always gets in the picture.”

He snorted. “And that would contaminate everything.”

“Yes, it would.”

“It doesn’t matter what kind of authority you wave over
their
heads. Men will look at you, and every one of them will see an attractive woman.
Unless you put a bag over your head, that’s how it is. Sex is always in the
room. You can’t lock it out.”

“That’s why we can’t be just friends.” She
picked
up the empty glasses and walked back to the kitchen.

He didn’t follow her.

She stood by the sink, staring down at the glasses, the taste of
lime
and vodka still tart in her mouth, his scent still a fresh memory. Yes, sex was
in
the room all right, performing its mischief, dangling images that she tried to
shut
out, but couldn’t. She thought about the night they had come home late from
the movies, and had started pulling off each other’s clothes the instant
they’d
stepped into the house. How they had made frantic, almost brutal love right
there
on the hardwood floor, his thrusts driving so deep she’d felt taken, like a
whore. And had enjoyed it.

She grasped the sink and heard her own breathing deepen, felt her
body
making its own decision, rebelling against whatever logic had kept her celibate
all
these months.

Sex is always in the room.

The front door thudded shut.

She turned, startled. Hurried into the living room to see only the
twinkling tree, but no Victor. Glancing out the window, she saw him climb into
his
car, and heard the roar of the engine starting.

She dashed out the front door, her shoes sliding on the icy
walkway
as she hurried toward his car.

“Victor!”

The engine suddenly shut off, and the headlights went dark. He
stepped
out and looked at her, his head only a shadowy silhouette above the car roof.
The
wind blew, and she blinked against stinging needles of snow.

“Why are you leaving?” she asked.

“Go inside, Maura. It’s freezing.”

“But why are you leaving?”

Even through the shadows, she saw the frosty cloud of his breath,
exhaled
in frustration. “It’s clear you don’t want me here.”

“Come back. I do want you to stay.” She walked around
the
car and stood facing him. The wind pierced her thin blouse.

“We’d just tear into each other again. The way we always
do.” He started to climb back into the car.

She reached for his jacket and tugged him toward her. In that
instant,
as he turned to look at her, she knew what would come next. Reckless or not, at
that
moment, she wanted it to happen.

He didn’t have to pull her into his arms. She was already
there,
burrowing into his warmth, her mouth seeking his. Familiar tastes, familiar
smells.
Their bodies fitting together, as they always had. She was shaking now, both
from
cold and excitement. He folded his arms around her, and his body shielded her
from
the wind as they kissed their way back to the front door. They brought a dusting
of snow into the house, bits of glitter that slid to the floor as he shrugged
off
his jacket.

They never made it to the bedroom.

Right there, in the entryway, she fumbled at the buttons of his
shirt,
tugging it free from his trousers. The skin beneath felt searing to her
cold-numbed
fingers. She peeled away the fabric, craving his warmth, desperate to feel it
against
her own skin. By the time they made it into the living room, her own blouse was
unbuttoned,
her slacks unzipped. She welcomed him back into her body. Into her life.