Body Double (18 page)

A pair of headlights cut through the silvery downpour.

She stood perfectly still on the porch, her heart pounding like the rain, as the car pulled up in front of the house. Ballard stepped out, carrying a large sack and a six-pack of beer. Head bent under the torrent, he splashed to the porch and up the steps.

“Didn’t know I’d have to swim here,” he said.

She laughed. “Come on, I’ll get you a towel.”

“Do you mind if I jump into your shower? I haven’t had a chance to wash up yet.”

“Go ahead.” She took the grocery sack from him. “The bathroom’s down the hall. There are clean towels in the cabinet.”

“I’ll get my overnight bag out of the trunk.”

She carried the food into the kitchen and slid the beer into the refrigerator. Heard the screen door clap shut as he came back into the house. And then, a moment later, she heard the shower running.

She sat down at the table and released a deep breath. This is only dinner, she thought. A single night under the same roof. She thought of the meal she’d cooked for Daniel only a few days ago, and how different that evening had felt from the start. When she’d looked at Daniel, she’d seen the unattainable.
And what do I see when I look at Rick? Maybe more than I should.

The shower was off. She sat very still, listening, every sense suddenly so acute she could feel the air whisper across her skin. Footsteps creaked closer, and suddenly he was there, smelling of soap, dressed in blue jeans and a clean shirt.

“I hope you don’t mind eating with a barefoot man,” he said. “My boots were too muddy to wear in the house.”

She laughed. “Then I’ll just go barefoot too. It’ll feel like a picnic.” She slipped out of her sandals and went to the refrigerator. “Are you ready for a beer?”

“I’ve been ready for hours.”

She uncapped two bottles and handed one to him. Sipped hers as she watched him tilt his head back and take a deep gulp. I will never see Daniel looking like this, she thought. Carefree and barefoot, his hair damp from a shower.

She turned and went to look in the grocery sack. “So what have you brought for dinner?”

“Let me show you.” Joining her at the counter, he reached into the sack and took out various foil-wrapped packets. “Baked potatoes. Melted butter. Corn on the cob. And the main event.” He produced a large Styrofoam container and flipped it open to reveal two bright red lobsters, still steaming.

“How do we get those open?”

“You don’t know how to crack one of these critters?”

“I hope you do.”

“Nothing to it.” He pulled two nutcrackers out of the sack. “You ready for surgery, Doctor?”

“Now you’re making me nervous.”

“It’s all in the technique. But first, we need to suit up.”

“Excuse me?”

He reached in the sack and came out with plastic bibs.

“You’ve got to be kidding.”

“You think restaurants give these things out just to make tourists look like idiots?”

“Yes.”

“Come on, be a sport. It’ll keep that nice dress clean.” He circled around behind her and slipped the bib over her chest. She felt his breath in her hair as he fastened the ties behind her neck. His hands lingered there, a touch that made her shiver.

“It’s your turn, now,” she said softly.

“My turn?”

“I’m not going to be the only one wearing one of these ridiculous things.”

He gave a sigh of resignation and tied a bib around his own neck. They looked at each other, wearing matching cartoon lobsters on their chests, and they both burst out laughing. Kept on laughing as they sank into chairs at the table. A few sips of beer on an empty stomach and I’m out of control, she thought.
And it feels so good.

He picked up a nutcracker. “Now, Dr. Isles. Are we ready to operate?”

She reached for hers, holding it like a surgeon about to make the first incision. “Ready.”

The rain pounded its steady drumbeat as they pulled off claws, cracked shells, and teased out sweet chunks of meat. They did not bother with forks but ate with their hands, their fingers slick with butter as they opened fresh bottles of beer and broke apart baked potatoes to expose the warm and yeasty flesh within. Tonight manners didn’t matter; this was a picnic, and they sat barefoot at the table, licking their fingers. Stealing glances at each other.

“This is a lot more fun than eating with a knife and fork,” she said.

“You’ve never eaten lobster with your bare hands before?”

“Believe it or not, this is the first time I’ve encountered one that wasn’t already out of its shell.” She reached for a napkin and wiped the butter from her fingers. “I’m not from New England, you know. I moved here only two years ago. From San Francisco.”

“That surprises me somehow.”

“Why?”

“You strike me as such a typical Yankee.”

“Meaning?”

“Self-contained. Reserved.”

“I try to be.”

“Are you saying that it’s not the real you?”

“We all play roles. I have my official mask at work. The one I wear when I’m Dr. Isles.”

“And when you’re with friends?”

She sipped her beer, then quietly set it down. “I haven’t made that many friends in Boston, yet.”

“It takes time, if you’re an outsider.”

An outsider. Yes, that’s what she felt like, every day. She’d watch cops slap each other on the back. She heard them talk about barbecues and softball games to which she’d never be invited because she was not one of them, a cop. The M.D. behind her name was like a wall, shutting them out. And her doctor colleagues in the M.E.’s office, all of them married, didn’t know what to do with her, either. Attractive divorcées were inconvenient, discomfiting. Either a threat or a temptation no one wanted to deal with.

“So what brought you to Boston?” he asked.

“I guess I needed to shake up my life.”

“Career blahs?”

“No, not that. I was pretty happy at the medical school there. I was a pathologist at the university hospital. Plus I got the chance to work with all these bright young residents and students.”

“So if it wasn’t the job, it must have been the love life.”

She looked down at the table, at the leavings of her dinner. “Good guess.”

“This is where you tell me to mind my own business.”

“I got divorced, that’s all.”

“Something you want to talk about?”

She shrugged. “What can I say? Victor was brilliant, incredibly charismatic—”

“Gee, I’m already jealous.”

“But you can’t stay married to someone like that. It’s too intense. It burns out so fast you end up exhausted. And he . . .” She stopped.

“What?”

She reached for the beer. Took her time sipping it before she set it down. “He wasn’t exactly honest with me,” she said. “That’s all.”

She knew he wanted to know more, but he had picked up on that note of finality in her voice.
This far, no further.
He stood up and went to the refrigerator for two more beers. Popped off the caps and handed a bottle to her.

“If we’re gonna talk about exes,” he said, “we’ll need a lot more beer than this.”

“Let’s not, then. If it hurts.”

“Maybe it hurts because you
don’t
talk about it.”

“No one wants to hear about my divorce.”

He sat down and met her gaze across the table. “I do.”

No man, she thought, had ever focused on her so completely, and she could not look away. She found herself breathing deeply, inhaling the smell of rain and the rich animal scent of melted butter. She saw things in his face she had not noticed before. The streaks of blond in his hair. The scar on his chin, just a faint white line below his lip. The chipped front tooth. I’ve just met this man, she thought, but he looks at me as though he’s known me forever. Faintly she heard her cell phone ringing in the bedroom, but did not want to answer it. She let it keep ringing until it fell silent. It was unlike her not to answer her phone, but tonight, everything felt different.
She
felt different. Reckless. A woman who ignored her phone and ate with her bare hands.

A woman who just might sleep with a man she scarcely knew.

The phone started ringing again.

This time, the urgency of that sound finally drew her attention. She could no longer ignore it. Reluctantly she stood up. “I guess I should answer that.”

By the time she got to the bedroom, the phone had once again stopped ringing. She dialed up her voice mail and heard two different messages, both from Rizzoli.

“Doc, I need to talk to you. Call me back.”

The second message, recorded in a more querulous voice: “It’s me again. Why aren’t you answering?”

Maura sat down on the bed. Couldn’t help thinking, as she gazed at the mattress, that it was just big enough for two. She shook the thought from her head, took a deep breath, and dialed Rizzoli’s number.

“Where are you?” Rizzoli demanded.

“I’m still in Fox Harbor. I’m sorry, I didn’t get to the phone in time to answer it.”

“Have you seen Ballard up there yet?”

“Yes, we just finished dinner. How did you know he was here?”

“Because he called me yesterday, asking where you’d gone. He sounded like he might head up that way.”

“He’s right in the other room. Do you want me to get him?”

“No, I want to talk to you.” Rizzoli paused. “I went to see Terence Van Gates today.”

Rizzoli’s abrupt change in subject gave Maura a case of mental whiplash. “What?” she asked, bewildered.

“Van Gates. You told me he was the attorney who—”

“Yes, I know who he is. What did he tell you?”

“Something interesting. About the adoption.”

“He actually talked to you about it?”

“Yeah, it’s amazing how some people open up when you flash a badge. He told me your sister went to see him months ago. Just like you, she was trying to find her birth mother. He gave her the same runaround he gave you. Records were sealed, the mother wanted confidentiality, blah, blah, blah. So she returned with a friend, who finally convinced Van Gates it was in his best interests to give up the mother’s name.”

“And did he?”

“Yes, he did.”

Maura had the phone pressed so hard to her ear that she could hear her own pulse thumping in the receiver. She said, softly: “You know who my mother is.”

“Yes. But there’s something else—”

“Tell me her name, Jane.”

A pause. “Lank. Her name is Amalthea Lank.”

Amalthea. My mother’s name is Amalthea.

Maura’s breath whooshed out on a tide of gratitude. “Thank you! God, I can’t believe I finally know—”

“Wait. I haven’t finished.”

The tone of Rizzoli’s voice held a warning. Something bad was coming. Something that Maura would not like.

“What is it?”

“That friend of Anna’s, the one who spoke to Van Gates?”

“Yes?”

“It was Rick Ballard.”

Maura went very still. From the kitchen came the clatter of dishes, the hiss of running water. I have just spent a whole day with him, and I suddenly learn I don’t know what kind of man he really is.

“Doc?”

“Then why didn’t he tell me?”

“I know why he didn’t.”

“Why?”

“You’d better ask him. Ask him to tell you the rest of it.”

When she returned to the kitchen, she saw that he had cleared the table and thrown the lobster shells in a trash bag. He was standing at the sink washing his hands and did not realize she was in the doorway, watching him.

“What do you know about Amalthea Lank?” Maura said.

He went rigid, his back still turned. A long silence passed. Then he reached for a dish towel and took his time drying his hands. Buying time before he answers me, she thought. But there was no excuse that she would accept, nothing he could say that could reverse the sense of distrust she now felt.

At last he turned to face her. “I was hoping you wouldn’t find out. Amalthea Lank is not a woman you want to know, Maura.”

“Is she my mother? Goddamn it, tell me that much.”

A reluctant nod. “Yes. She is.”

There, he’d said it. He’d confirmed it. Another moment passed while she absorbed the fact he had kept such important information from her. The whole time he was watching her with a look of concern.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” she asked.

“I was thinking only of you, Maura. What’s in your best interests—”

“The truth isn’t in my best interests?”

“In this case, no. It isn’t.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“I made a mistake with your sister—a serious one. She wanted so badly to find her mother, and I thought I could do her that favor. I had no idea it would turn out the way it did.” He took a step toward her. “I was trying to protect you, Maura. I saw what it did to Anna. I didn’t want the same thing to happen to you.”

“I’m not Anna.”

“But you’re just like her. You’re so much like her, it scares me. Not just the way you look, but the way you think.”

She gave a sarcastic laugh. “So now you can read my
mind
?”

“Not your mind. Your personality. Anna was tenacious. When she wanted to know something, she wouldn’t let go. And you’ll just keep digging and digging, until you have an answer. The way you dug out there in the woods today. That wasn’t your job, and it wasn’t your jurisdiction. You had no reason to be out there at all, except for sheer curiosity. And stubbornness. You wanted to find those bones, so you did. That’s how Anna was.” He sighed. “I’m just sorry she found what she was digging for.”

“Who was my mother, Rick?”

“A woman you don’t want to meet.”

It took a moment for Maura to fully register the significance of that answer.
Present tense.
“My mother is alive.”

Reluctantly he nodded.

“And you know where to find her.”

He didn’t answer.

“Goddamn it, Rick!” she exploded. “Why don’t you just
tell me
?”

He went to the table and sat down, as though suddenly too tired to continue the battle. “Because I know you’re going to find it painful, hearing the facts. Especially because of who you are. What you do for a living.”

“What does my job have to do with it?”