Chapters (48)
- also by patricia cornwell
- title page
- copyright
- dedication
- contents
- prologue
- one
- two
- three
- four
- five
- six
- seven
- eight
- nine
- ten
- eleven
- twelve
- thirteen
- fourteen
- fifteen
- sixteen
- seventeen
- eighteen
- nineteen
- twenty
- twenty-one
- twenty-two
- twenty-three
- twenty-four
- twenty-five
- twenty-six
- twenty-seven
- twenty-eight
- twenty-nine
- thirty
- thirty-one
- thirty-two
- thirty-three
- thirty-four
- thirty-five
- thirty-six
- thirty-seven
- thirty-eight
- thirty-nine
- forty
- two nights later
- credits
His voice sounds loudly, tragically from the doorway that adjoins my office with his, and I unzip the gray liner and hurry out of it, leaving it in a pile on my bathroom floor.
“Calling my cell phone, too, at least those reporters who have my number. There’s huge speculation that the old lady you just pulled out of the bay is Mildred Lott. . . .”
“No evidence of it.” I run a washcloth under hot water and clean up as best I can, and of course a shower right now is impossible.
“You know? That someone obviously was holding her hostage all this time, or maybe her disappearance was faked back in the spring or how she’s been hiding and finally drowned herself? You should hear the theories.”
“There’s nothing to make me think it’s her.” I pull on a new pair of pantyhose I retrieve from a cabinet.
“Meaning her husband, Channing Lott, couldn’t have had anything to do with her death, since he’s considered a flight risk and has been in jail without bond since April?” Bryce has the remarkable ability of talking nonstop without seeming to take a breath. “So how could he possibly have killed her or paid someone else to some six months after she supposedly vanished?”
I step into my pin-striped skirt and yank up the zipper in back. “I don’t want you releasing any information at all, not one word about this case, please.” I hurry into my blouse, fumbling with the buttons and tucking it in, disgusted by how quickly rumors can start and how difficult it is to disarm them. “Not even a hint of an opinion about whether the dead lady might be Mildred Lott or Emma Shubert or anyone. Understood?”
“Well, of course. I didn’t just fall off the turnip truck. I know what the press does with the slightest nothing.”
I turn on the vanity light, dismayed by my reflection in the mirror over the sink. Pale. Completely washed out. Hair flat from wearing a neoprene dive hood and submerging my head in cold salt water. I drip Visine into my eyes.
“I’m just warning you I’ve got no idea what might come up when you get in the stand, because they can ask you anything they want.” Bryce is still talking.
I rub a dab of gel in my hair and muss it up to give it a little lift, and it still looks awful.
sixteen
sixteen
TRAFFIC IS BAD IN BOSTON, AND AVAILABLE PARKING IS nowhere to be seen at the John Joseph Moakley U.S. Courthouse, an architectural marvel of dark red brick and glass that embraces the harbor like graceful arms. I tell Marino to let me out.
“Park where you can or drive around and wait for me. I’ll call you when I’m on my way down.” I have my hand on the door.
“Hell, no.”
“Right here is fine.”