Die Again (Rizzoli & Isles, #11)(13)

“So going to California is all about avoiding him.”

“And temptation,” Maura said softly.

“To go back to him?” Jane shook her head. “You made your decision. Stick with it and move on. That’s what I would do.”

And that’s what made them so different from each other. Jane was quick to act, and always certain about what needed to be done. She wasted no sleep second-guessing herself. But uncertainty was what kept Maura awake at night, mulling over choices, considering their consequences. If only life were like a mathematical formula, with just one answer.

Jane stood up. “Think about what I said, okay? It’d be way too much work for me to break in another ME. So I’m counting on you to stay.” She touched Maura’s arm and added quietly: “I’m asking you to stay.” Then, in typical Jane Rizzoli fashion, she brusquely turned to leave. “See you tomorrow.”

“Autopsy’s in the morning,” said Maura as they walked to the front door.

“I’d rather skip it. I’ve seen more than enough maggots, thank you.”

“Surprises might turn up. You wouldn’t want to miss it.”

“The only surprise,” Jane said as she stepped outside, “will be if Frost shows up.”

Maura locked the door and returned to the kitchen, where the eggplant casserole had cooled. She slid it back into the oven to reheat. The cat had once again jumped onto the table and draped himself over the laptop keyboard, as if to say: No more work tonight. Maura snatched him up and dropped him to the floor. Someone had to exert authority in this house, and it most certainly was not going to be a cat. He’d reawakened the screen, which was now lit with the last image she’d been studying. It was the photo of the viscera, the undulated surface emphasized by shadows cast in the slanting light. She was about to close the laptop when she focused on the liver. Frowning, she zoomed in and stared at the surface curves and fissures. It was not just a trick of the light. Nor was it distortion caused by bacterial swelling.

This liver has six lobes.

She reached for the phone.





BOTSWANA

“WHERE IS HE?” SYLVIA IS SCREAMING. “WHERE’S THE REST OF HIM?”

She and Vivian stand a few dozen yards away, under the trees. They are staring down at the ground, at something hidden from my view by knee-high grass. I step over the camp’s perimeter wire, where the bells still hang, bells that gave no warning clang in the night. Instead it is Sylvia who has given the alarm, her shrieks pulling us out of our tents in various states of undress. Mr. Matsunaga is still zipping up his trousers as he lurches out through his tent flap. Elliot doesn’t even bother to pull on pants, but stumbles out into the cold dawn wearing only boxer shorts and sandals. I’ve managed to snatch up one of Richard’s shirts and I pull it over my nightdress as I wade into the grass, my boots still untied, a trapped pebble biting into my bare sole. I spot a bloody shred of khaki, tangled like a snake around the branch of a bush. Another few steps closer, and I see more ripped cloth, and a clump of what looks like black wool. I take another few steps, and I see what the girls are staring at. Now I know why Sylvia is screaming.

Vivian turns and throws up into the bushes.

I am too numb to move. Even as Sylvia whimpers and hyperventilates beside me, I am studying the various bones scattered in that flattened area of grass, feeling strangely remote, as if I am inhabiting someone else’s body. A scientist’s, perhaps. An anatomist, who looks at bones and feels compelled to fit them together, to announce: This is the right fibula and that is the ulna and that is from the fifth right toe. Yes, definitely the right toe. Although in truth I can identify almost nothing of what I’m looking at, because there is so little left, and it is all in pieces. All I can be sure of is that there is a rib, because it looks like ribs that I have eaten, slathered in sauce. But this is not a pork rib, oh no, this gnawed and splintered bone is human, and it belonged to someone I knew, someone I spoke to not nine hours ago.

“Oh Jesus,” groans Elliot. “What happened? What the f*ck happened?”

Johnny’s voice booms out: “Get back. Everyone get back.”

I turn to see Johnny pushing into our circle. We are all here now—Vivian and Sylvia, Elliot and Richard, the Matsunagas. Only one person is missing, but not really, because here is his rib and a clump of Clarence’s hair. The smell of death is in the air, the smell of fear and fresh meat and Africa.

Johnny crouches down over the bones and for a moment does not speak. No one does. Even the birds are quiet, rattled by this human disturbance, and all I hear is the grass rustling in the wind and the faint rush of the river.

“Did any of you see anything last night? Hear anything?” Johnny asks. He looks up, and I notice that his shirt is unbuttoned, his face unshaven. His eyes lock on mine. All I can do is shake my head.

“Anyone?” Johnny scans our faces.

“I slept like a rock,” says Elliot. “I didn’t hear—”

“We didn’t, either,” says Richard. Answering, in his usual annoying way, for both of us.

“Who found him?”

Vivian’s answer comes out barely a whisper. “We did. Sylvia and I. We both had to use the toilet. It was already getting light, and we thought it would be safe to come out. Clarence usually has the fire started by now, and …” She stops, looking sick that she has said his name. Clarence.