Tess Gerritsen - The Apprentice

“So the trail’s gone cold.”

“The trail was never there to begin with. He kills three people in the O.R., turns into the invisible man, and walks out of the hospital. Fitchburg and State Police canvassed the whole neighborhood, set up roadblocks. His face is all over the evening news. Nothing.”

“There’s one place he’ll be drawn to. One person…”

“Your building’s already staked out. Hoyt goes anywhere near it, we’ve got him.”

There was a long silence. Then Moore said, quietly: “I can’t bring her home. I’m keeping her right here, where I know she’s safe.”

Rizzoli heard fear in his voice, not for himself but for his wife, and she wondered, with a twinge of envy: What would it be like to be loved so deeply?

“Does Catherine know he’s out?” she asked.

“Yes. I had to tell her.”

“How’s she taking it?”

“Better than I am. If anything, she’s trying to calm me down.”

“She’s already faced the worst, Moore. She’s beaten him twice. Proven she’s stronger than he is.”

“She thinks she’s stronger. That’s when things get dangerous.”

“Well, she has you now.” And I have only myself . The way it had always been and probably always would be.

He must have heard the note of weariness in her voice, for he said: “This has got to be hell on you, too.”

“I’m okay.”

“Then you’re handling it better than I am.”

She laughed, a sharp and startling sound that was all bluster. “Like I’ve got time to worry about Hoyt. I’m riding herd on a new task force. We found a body dump over at Stony Brook Reservation.”

“How many victims?”

“Two women, plus a man he killed during the abduction. It’s another bad one, Moore. You know it’s bad when Zucker gives him a nickname. We’re calling this unsub the Dominator.”

“Why the Dominator?”

“It’s what he seems to get off on. The power trip. The absolute control over the husband. Monsters and their sick rituals.”

“It sounds like a replay of last summer.”

Only this time you’re not here to watch my back. You’ve got other priorities.

“Any progress?” he asked.

“Slow. We’ve got multiple jurisdictions involved, multiple players. Newton P.D.‘s on it, and-get this-the friggin’ Bureau’s stepped in.”

“What?”

“Yeah. Some fibbie named Gabriel Dean. Says he’s an adviser , but his hands are all over this case. You ever had that happen before?”

“Never.” A pause. “Something’s not right, Rizzoli.”

“I know.”

“What does Marquette say?”

“He’s rolled over and playing dead, ‘cause OPC’s ordered us to cooperate.”

“What’s Dean’s story?”

“We’re talking tight-lipped here. You know, the if-I-tell-you-then-I’ll-have-to-kill-you kind of guy.” She paused, remembering Dean’s gaze, his eyes as piercing as shards of blue glass. Yes, she could imagine him pulling a trigger without even flinching. “Anyway,” she said, “Warren Hoyt’s not my number one concern right now.”

“But he’s mine,” said Moore.

“If there’s any news, you’ll be the first one I call.”

She hung up, and in the silence the bravado she’d felt, talking to Moore, instantly collapsed. Once again she alone with her fears, sitting in an apartment with the door barred and the windows latched and only a gun to keep her company.

Maybe you’re the best friend I have, she thought. And she picked up the weapon and carried it back to her bedroom.

“Agent Dean came to see me this morning,” said Lieutenant Marquette. “He has doubts about you.”

“The feelings are mutual,” Rizzoli said.

“He’s not questioning your skills. He thinks you’re a fine cop.”

“But?”

“He wonders if you’re the right detective to be lead on this one.”

She said nothing for a moment, just sat calmly facing Marquette’s desk. When he’d called her into his office this morning, she had already guessed what the meeting was about. She had walked in determined to maintain ironclad control over her emotions, to offer him no glimpse of what he was waiting for: a sign that she was already over the edge, in need of being replaced.

When she spoke, it was in a quiet and reasonable voice. “What are his concerns?”

“That you’re distracted. That you have unresolved issues having to do with Warren Hoyt. That you’re not fully recovered from the Surgeon investigation.”

“What did he mean by not recovered ?” she asked. Already knowing exactly what he’d meant.

Marquette hesitated. “Jesus, Rizzoli. This isn’t easy to say. You know it isn’t.”

“I’d just like you to come out and say it.”

“He thinks you’re unstable, okay?”

“What do you think, Lieutenant?”

“I think you’ve got a lot on your plate. I think Hoyt’s escape knocked the wind out of you.”

“Do you think I’m unstable?”

“Dr. Zucker has also expressed some concerns. You never went for counseling last fall.”

“I was never ordered to.”

“Is that the only way it works with you? You have to be ordered?”

“I didn’t feel I needed it.”

“Zucker thinks you haven’t let go of the Surgeon yet. That you see Warren Hoyt under every rock. How can you lead this investigation if you’re still reliving the last one?”

“I guess I’d like to hear it from you, Lieutenant. Do you think I’m unstable?”

Marquette sighed. “I don’t know. But when Agent Dean comes in here and lays out his concerns, I’ve got to take notice.”

“I don’t believe Agent Dean is an entirely reliable source.”

Marquette paused. Leaned forward with a frown. “That’s a serious charge.”

“No more serious than the charge he’s leveling at me.”

“You have anything to back it up?”

“I called the FBI’s Boston office this morning.”

“Yes?”

“They know nothing about Agent Gabriel Dean.”

Marquette sat back in his chair and regarded her for a moment, saying nothing.

“He came here straight from Washington,” she said. “The Boston office had nothing to do with it. That’s not the way it’s supposed to work. If we ask them for a criminal profile, it always goes through their area field division coordinator. This didn’t go through their field division. It came straight from Washington. Why is the FBI mucking around in my investigation in the first place? And what does Washington have to do with it?”

Still, Marquette said nothing.

She pressed on, her frustration building, her control starting to crack. “You told me the order to cooperate came through the police commissioner.”

“Yes, it did.”

“Who in the FBI approached OPC? Which part of the Bureau are we dealing with?”

Marquette shook his head. “It wasn’t the Bureau.”

“What?”

“The request didn’t come from the FBI. I spoke to OPC last week, the day Dean showed up. I asked them that same question.”

“And?”

“I promised them I’d keep this confidential. I expect the same from you.” Only after she’d given a nod of assent did he continue. “The request came from Senator Conway’s office.”

She stared at him in bewilderment. “What does our senator have to do with all this?”

“I don’t know.”

“OPC wouldn’t tell you?”

“They may not know, either. But it’s not a request they’d brush off, not when it comes direct from Conway. And he’s not asking for the moon. Just interagency cooperation. We do it all the time.”

She leaned forward and said, quietly: “Something’s wrong, Lieutenant. You know it. Dean hasn’t been straight with us.”