NINETEEN

They sat in Barry Frost’s car, parked just outside the Colonnade Hotel. Frost and Rizzoli were in the front seat, Maura in the back.

“Let me talk to him first,” said Maura.

“It’d be better if you stayed right here, Doc,” said Frost. “We don’t know how he’ll react.”

“He’ll be less likely to resist if I speak to him.”

“But if he’s armed—”

“He won’t hurt me,” said Maura. “And I don’t want you to hurt him, is that clear? You aren’t arresting him.”

“What if he decides he doesn’t want to come?”

“He’ll come.” She pushed open the car door. “Just let me handle it.”

They took the elevator to the fourth floor, sharing the ride with a young couple who probably wondered about the grim trio standing beside them. Flanked by Rizzoli and Frost, Maura knocked on the door to room 426.

A moment passed.

She was about to knock again when the door finally swung open and Victor stood looking at her. His eyes were tired, his expression infinitely sad.

“I wondered what you’d decide,” he said. “I was starting to hope that …” He shook his head.

“Victor—”

“But then, I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised.” He looked at Rizzoli and Frost, standing in the hallway. Gave a bitter laugh. “Did you bring handcuffs?”

“There’s no need for handcuffs,” said Maura. “They only want to talk to you.”

“Yes, of course. Just talk. Should I call a lawyer?”

“It’s up to you.”

“No, you tell me. Am I going to need a lawyer?”

“You’re the only one who knows that, Victor.”

“That’s the test, isn’t it? Only the guilty insist on a lawyer.”

“A lawyer is never a bad idea.”

“Then just to prove something to you, I’m not going to call one.” He looked at the two detectives. “I need to put on my shoes. If you have no objections.” He turned and walked toward the closet.

Maura said to Rizzoli, “Could you wait out here?” She followed Victor into the room, letting the door swing shut behind her for one last moment of privacy. He was sitting in a chair, lacing up his boots. She noticed his suitcase was lying on the bed.

“You’re packing,” she said.

“I’m booked on a flight home at four. But I guess those plans are about to change, aren’t they?”

“I had to tell them. I’m sorry.”

“I’m sure you are.”

“I didn’t have a choice.”

He stood. “You had a choice, and you made it. I guess that says it all.” He crossed the room and opened the door. “I’m ready,” he announced. He handed Rizzoli a key ring. “I assume you’ll want to search my rental car. It’s the blue Toyota, parked in the garage, third floor. Don’t say I didn’t cooperate.”

It was Frost who walked Victor down the hall. Rizzoli tugged on Maura’s sleeve, holding her back as the two men continued toward the elevators.

“Here’s where you have to back off,” Rizzoli said.

“I’m the one who gave him to you.”

“That’s why you can’t be part of this.”

“He was my husband.”

“Exactly. You have to step away and let us handle this. You know that.”

Of course she did.

She followed them downstairs anyway. Climbed into her own car and tailed them to Schroeder Plaza. She could see Victor in the back seat. Only once, as they waited at a stoplight, did he turn and look at her. Their gazes met, just for an instant, through the window. Then he turned away and did not look at her again.

By the time she found a parking spot and walked into Boston PD headquarters, they had already brought Victor upstairs. She took the elevator to the second floor and headed straight for the Homicide Unit.

Barry Frost intercepted her. “You can’t go back there, Doc.”

“He’s already being questioned?”

“Rizzoli and Crowe are handling it.”

“I gave him to you, goddamn it. At least let me hear what he has to say. I could watch from the next room.”

“You have to wait here.” He added, gently, “Please, Dr. Isles.”

She met his sympathetic gaze. Of all the detectives in the unit, he was the only one who, with just a kind look, could silence her protest.

“Why don’t you sit over there, at my desk?” he said. “I’ll bring you a cup of coffee.”

She sank into a chair and stared at the photo on Frost’s desk—his wife, she assumed. A pretty blonde with aristocratic cheekbones. A moment later, he brought her the coffee and set it in front of her.

She didn’t touch it. She just kept gazing at the photo of Frost’s wife, and thought of other marriages. Of happy endings.

         

Rizzoli did not like Victor Banks.

He sat at the table in the interrogation room, calmly sipping from a cup of water, his shoulders relaxed, his posture almost casual. A good-looking man, and he knew it. Too good-looking. She eyed the worn leather jacket, the khaki trousers, and was reminded of an upscale Indiana Jones, without the bullwhip. He had a medical degree to boot, with solid-gold humanitarian credentials. Oh yeah, the girls would go for this one. Even Dr. Isles, always so cool and levelheaded in the autopsy lab, had lost her heart to this man.

And you betrayed her, you son of a bitch.

Darren Crowe sat to her right. By earlier agreement, she would do most of the talking. So far, Victor had been chilly but cooperative, answering her introductory questions with the curt responses of a man who wished to make quick work of this. A man who had no particular respect for the police.

By the time she was finished with him, he’d respect her, all right.

“So you’ve been in Boston for how long, Mr. Banks?” she asked.

“It’s Dr. Banks. And I told you, I’ve been here about nine days. I flew in last Sunday night.”

“You said you came to Boston for a meeting?”

“With the dean of the Harvard School of Public Health.”

“The reason for that meeting?”

“My organization has work-study arrangements with a number of universities.”

“Your organization being One Earth?”

“Yes. We’re an international medical charity. We operate clinics around the world. Of course we welcome any medical and nursing students who want to volunteer at our clinics. The students get some real-life experience in the field. We, in return, benefit from their skills.”

“And who set up this meeting at Harvard?”

He shrugged. “It was just a routine visit.”

“Who actually made the call?”

A silence. Gotcha.

“You did, didn’t you?” she said. “You called Harvard two weeks ago. Told the Dean you’d be coming to Boston anyway, and could you drop by his office.”

“I need to keep my contacts fresh.”

“Why did you really come to Boston, Dr. Banks? Wasn’t there another reason?”

A pause. “Yes.”

“And that was?”

“My ex-wife lives here. I wanted to see her.”

“But you haven’t spoken to her in—what? Nearly three years.”

“Obviously she’s already told you everything. Why do you need to talk to me?”

“And suddenly you want to see her so desperately that you fly across the country, without even knowing if she’ll see you?”

“Love sometimes demands we take risks. It’s a matter of faith. Believing in something you can’t see or touch. We just have to take the leap.” He looked her in the eye. “Don’t we, Detective?”

Rizzoli felt herself flush, and for a moment could not think of anything to say. Victor had just reversed the question, twisting it so that she suddenly felt the conversation was about her. Love demands risks.

Crowe broke the silence. “Hey, nice-looking lady, your ex-wife,” he said. Not hostile, but in the casual tone of one guy to another, the two of them now ignoring Rizzoli. “I can see why you’d fly all this way to try and patch things up. So did you manage to?”

“Things were working out between us.”

“Yeah, I hear you’ve been staying at her house for the last few days. Sounds like progress to me.”

“Why don’t we just get down to the truth,” Rizzoli cut in.

“The truth?” asked Victor.

“The real reason you came to Boston.”

“Why don’t you tell me which answer you’re fishing for, and I’ll just give it to you? It’ll save us both time.”

Rizzoli dropped a folder on the table. “Take a look at those.”

He opened it and saw it was the set of photographs from the devastated village. “I’ve already seen these,” he said, and closed the folder again. “Maura showed them to me.”

“You don’t seem very interested.”

“It’s not exactly pleasant viewing.”

“It’s not meant to be. Take another look.” She opened the folder, fished out one of the photos, and slapped it on top. “This one in particular.”

Victor looked at Crowe, as though seeking an ally against this unpleasant woman, but Crowe simply gave him a what-can-you-do? shrug.

“The photo, Dr. Banks,” said Rizzoli.

“Exactly what am I supposed to say about it?”

“That was a One Earth clinic in that village.”

“Is that so surprising? We go where people need us. Which means we’re sometimes in uncomfortable or even dangerous situations.” He was still not looking at the photo, still avoiding the grotesque image. “It’s the price we pay as humanitarian workers. We take on the same risks our patients do.”

“What happened in that village?”

“I think it’s pretty obvious.”

“Look at the picture.”

“It’s all in the police report, I’m sure.”

“Look at the goddamn picture! Tell me what you see.”

At last his gaze fell on the photograph. After a moment, he said: “Burned bodies. Lying in front of our clinic.”

“And how did they die?”

“I’m told it was a massacre.”

“Do you know that for a fact?”

His gaze snapped up to hers. “I wasn’t there, Detective. I was at home in San Francisco when I got the phone call from India. So you can hardly expect me to provide the details.”

“How do you know it was a massacre?”

“That was the report we got from the police in Andhra Pradesh. That it was either a political or religious attack, and there were no witnesses, since the village was relatively isolated. People tend to avoid having much contact with lepers.”

“Yet they burned the bodies. Don’t you find that odd?”

“Why is it odd?”

“The bodies were dragged into large piles before they were set on fire. You’d think that no one would want to touch a leper. So why stack the bodies together?”

“It would be more efficient, I suppose. To burn them in groups.”

“Efficient?”

“I’m trying to come at this logically.”

“And what’s the logical reason for burning them at all?”

“Rage? Vandalism? I don’t know.”

“All that work, moving the dead bodies. Hauling in the cans of gasoline. Building wooden pyres. And the whole time, the threat of discovery was hanging over them.”

“What are you getting at?”

“I’m saying the bodies had to be burned. To destroy the evidence.”

“Evidence of what? It’s clearly a massacre. No fire’s going to hide that.”

“But a fire would hide the fact it’s not a massacre.”

She was not surprised when his gaze dropped away, his eyes suddenly reluctant to meet hers.

“I don’t know why you’re asking me these questions,” he said. “Why don’t you believe the police report?”

“Because either they got it wrong, or they were bribed.”

“You know this, do you?”

She tapped the photo. “Look again, Dr. Banks.”

“I’d rather not.”

“These aren’t just human corpses burned here. The goats were slaughtered and burned as well. So were the chickens. What a waste—all that nutritious meat. Why kill goats and chickens, and then burn them?”

Victor gave a sarcastic laugh. “Because they might have had leprosy too? I don’t know!”

“That doesn’t explain what happened to the birds.”

Victor shook his head. “What?”

Rizzoli pointed to the clinic’s corrugated tin roof. “I bet you didn’t even notice this. But Dr. Isles did. These dark blots on top of the roof here. At first glance, they just look like fallen leaves. But isn’t it strange, that there are leaves here, when there don’t seem to be any trees nearby?”

He said nothing. He was sitting very still, his head bowed so that she could not read his face. His body language alone told her he was bracing for the inevitable.

“They’re not leaves, Dr. Banks. They’re dead birds. Some kind of crows, I believe. Three of them are lying there at the edge of the photo. How do you explain that?”

He gave a careless shrug. “They could have been shot, I suppose.”

“The police didn’t mention any evidence of gunfire. There were no bullet holes in the building, no recovered cartridge cases. No bullet fragments found in any of the victims. They did report that several of the corpses had fractured skulls, so they assumed the victims were all clubbed to death while they slept.”

“That’s what I would assume, too.”

“So how do we explain the birds? Surely those crows didn’t just sit on that roof, waiting for someone to climb up there and whack them over the head with a stick.”

“I don’t know what you’re getting at. What do dead birds have to do with this?”

“They have everything to do with it. They weren’t clubbed, and they weren’t shot.”

Victor gave a snort. “Smoke inhalation?”

“By the time that village was torched, the birds were already dead. Everything was dead. Birds. Livestock. People. Nothing moving, nothing breathing. It was a sterilized zone. All life was wiped out.”

He had no response.

Rizzoli leaned forward, getting right into his face. “How much did Octagon Chemicals donate to your organization this year, Dr. Banks?”

Victor lifted the cup of water to his lips and took his time sipping it.

“How much?”

“It was in the … tens of millions.” He looked at Crowe. “I could use a refill of water, if you don’t mind.”

“Tens of millions?” said Rizzoli. “Why don’t you try eighty-five million dollars?”

“That could be right.”

“And the year before that, they gave you nothing. So what changed? Did Octagon suddenly develop a humanitarian conscience?”

“You should ask them.”

“I’m asking you.”

“I really would like some more water.”

Crowe sighed, picked up the empty cup, and walked out. Only Rizzoli and Victor were left in the room now.

She leaned even closer, a frontal assault on his comfort zone. “It’s all about that money, isn’t it?” she said. “Eighty-five million dollars is one hell of a big payoff. Octagon must have had a lot to lose. And you obviously have a lot to gain, by cooperating with them.”

“Cooperating in what?”

“Silence. Keeping their secret.”

She reached for another file folder and tossed it on the table in front of him.

“That was a pesticide factory they were operating. Just a mile and a half away from Bara village, Octagon was storing thousands of pounds of methyl isocyanate in their plant. They closed down that plant last year, did you know that? Right after the village of Bara was attacked, Octagon abandoned that factory. Just packed up all their personnel and bulldozed the plant. Fear of terrorist attack was their official explanation. But you don’t really believe that, do you?”

“I have nothing more to say.”

“It wasn’t a massacre that destroyed the village. It wasn’t a terrorist attack.” She paused. Said, quietly: “It was an industrial catastrophe.”