Vanish

Maura’s head snapped up. She looked at Gabriel, and for the first time he saw unease flicker in her eyes. She set down the scalpel, stripped off her gloves, and crossed to pick up the phone.

“This is Dr. Isles,” she said. Though Gabriel could not hear the other half of the conversation, it was clear just by Maura’s body language that this was not a welcome phone call. “Yes, I’ve already started it. This is in our jurisdiction. Why does the FBI think they can…” A long pause. Maura turned to face the wall, and her spine was now rigid. “But I haven’t completed the postmortem. I’m about to open the cranium. If you’ll just give me another half hour-” Another pause. Then, coldly: “I understand. We’ll have the remains ready for transfer in an hour.” She hung up. Took a deep breath, and turned to Yoshima. “Pack her up. They want Joseph Roke’s body as well.”

“What’s going on?” Yoshima asked.

“They’re being shipped to the FBI lab. They want everything-all organs and tissue specimens. Agent Barsanti will be assuming custody.”

“This has never happened before,” said Yoshima.

She yanked off her mask and reached back to untie the gown. Whipping it off, she tossed it in the soiled linens bin. “The order comes straight from the governor’s office.”

TWENTY-THREE

Jane jerked awake, every muscle snapping taut. She saw darkness, heard the muted growl of a car passing on the street below, and the even rhythm of Gabriel’s breathing as he slept soundly beside her. I am home, she thought. I’m lying in my own bed, in my own apartment, and we’re all safe. All three of us. She took a deep breath and waited for her heart to stop pounding. The sweat-soaked nightgown slowly chilled against her skin. Eventually these nightmares will go away, she thought. These are just the fading echoes of screams.

She turned toward her husband, seeking the warmth of his body, the familiar comfort of his scent. But just as her arm was about to drape around his waist, she heard the baby crying in the other room. Oh please, not yet, she thought. It’s only been three hours since I fed you. Give me another twenty minutes. Another ten minutes. Let me stay in my own bed just a little while longer. Let me shake off these bad dreams.

But the crying continued, louder now, more insistent with every fresh wail.

Jane rose and shuffled from the darkness of her bedroom, shutting the door behind her so that Gabriel would not be disturbed. She flipped on the nursery light and looked down at her red-faced and screaming daughter. Only three days old, and already you’ve worn me out, she thought. Lifting the baby from the crib, she felt that greedy little mouth rooting for her breast. As Jane settled into the rocking chair, pink gums clamped down like a vise on her nipple. But the offered breast was only temporary satisfaction; soon the baby was fussing again, and no matter how closely Jane cuddled her, rocked her, her daughter would not stop squirming. What am I doing wrong, she wondered, staring down at her frustrated infant. Why am I so clumsy at this? Seldom had Jane felt so inadequate, yet this three-day-old baby had reduced her to such helplessness that, at four in the morning, she felt the sudden, desperate urge to call her mother and plead for some maternal wisdom. The sort of wisdom that was supposed to be instinctual, but had somehow skipped Jane by. Stop crying, baby, please stop crying, she thought. I’m so tired. All I want to do is go back to bed, but you won’t let me. And I don’t know how to make you go to sleep.

She rose from the chair and paced the room, rocking the baby as she walked. What did she want? Why was she still crying? She walked her into the kitchen and stood jiggling the baby as she stared, dazed by exhaustion, at the cluttered countertop. She thought of her life before motherhood, before Gabriel, when she would come home from work and pop open a bottle of beer and put her feet up on the couch. She loved her daughter, and she loved her husband, but she was so very tired, and she did not know when she’d be able to crawl back into bed. The night stretched ahead of her, an ordeal without end.

I can’t keep this up. I need help.

She opened the kitchen cabinet and gazed at the cans of infant formula, free samples from the hospital. The baby screamed louder. She didn’t know what else to do. Demoralized, she reached for a can. She poured formula into a feeding bottle and set it in a pot of hot tap water, where it sat warming, a monument to her defeat. A symbol of her utter failure as a mother.

The instant she offered the bottle, pink lips clamped down on the rubber nipple and the baby began to suck with noisy gusto. No more wailing or squirming, just happy-baby noises.

Wow. Magic from a can.

Exhausted, Jane sank into a chair. I surrender, she thought, as the bottle rapidly emptied. The can wins. Her gaze drifted down to the Name Your Baby book lying on the kitchen table. It was still open to the L’s, where she’d last left off skimming the names for girls. Their daughter had come home from the hospital still nameless, and Jane now felt a sense of desperation as she reached for the book.

Who are you, baby? Tell me your name.

But her daughter wasn’t giving away any secrets; she was too busy sucking down formula.

Laura? Laurel? Laurelia? Too soft, too sweet. This kid was none of those. She was going to be a hell-raiser.

The bottle was already half empty.

Piglet. Now there was an appropriate name.

Jane flipped to the M’s. Through bleary eyes she surveyed the list, considering each possibility, then glancing down at her ferocious infant.

Mercy? Meryl? Mignon? None of the above. She turned the page, her eyes so tired now that she could barely focus. Why is this so hard? The girl needs a name, so just choose one! Her gaze slid down the page and stopped.

Mila.

She went stock-still, staring at the name. A chill snaked up her spine. She realized that she had said the name aloud.

Mila.

The room suddenly went cold, as though a ghost had just slipped through the doorway and was now hovering right behind her. She could not help a glance over her shoulder. Shivering, she rose and carried her now-sleeping daughter back to the crib. But that icy sense of dread would not leave her, and she lingered in her daughter’s room, hugging herself as she rocked in the chair, trying to understand why she was shaking. Why seeing the name Mila had so disturbed her. As her baby slept, as the minutes ticked toward dawn, she rocked and rocked.

“Jane?”

Startled, she looked up to see Gabriel standing in the doorway. “Why don’t you come to bed?” he asked.

“I can’t sleep.” She shook her head. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”

“I think you’re just tired.” He came into the room and pressed a kiss to her head. “You need to go back to bed.”

“God, I’m so bad at this.”

“What are you talking about?”

“No one told me how hard it would be, this mommy thing. I can’t even breast-feed her. Every dumb cat knows how to feed her kittens, but I’m hopeless. She just fusses and fusses.”

“She seems to be sleeping fine now.”

“That’s because I gave her formula. From a bottle.” She gave a snort. “I couldn’t fight it anymore. She was hungry and screaming, and there’s that can sitting right there. Hell, who needs a mommy when you’ve got Similac?”

“Oh, Jane. Is that what you’re upset about?”

“It’s not fu

“I’m not laughing.”

“But you’ve got that tone of voice. This is too stupid to be believed.”

“I think you’re exhausted, that’s all. How many times have you been up?”

“Twice. No, three times. Jesus, I can’t even remember.”

“You should have given me a kick. I didn’t know you were up.”