Free The Sinner by Tess Gerritsen

watching her as well. She took a breath and
said,
more calmly: “Tell Dr. Banks I’m not available. And keep telling him
that
until he stops calling.”
    There was a pause. “Yes, Dr. Isles,” Louise finally
responded,
sounding more than a little stung by the exchange. It was the first time Maura
had
ever spoken sharply to her, and she’d have to find some way to smooth over
the
rift and repair the damage. The exchange left her flustered. She looked down at
the
torso of Camille Maginnes, trying to refocus her attention on the task at hand.
But
her thoughts were scattered, and her grip was unsteady around the scalpel.
    The others could see it.
    “Why’s One Earth bugging you?” asked Rizzoli.
“They
hitting you up for donations?”
    “This has nothing to do with One Earth.”
    “So what is it?” pressed Rizzoli. “Is this guy
harassing
you?”
    “He’s just someone I’m trying to avoid.”
    “Sounds like he’s pretty persistent.”
    “You have no idea.”
    “You want me to get him off your back? Tell him where to
go?”
This was more than just Rizzoli the cop talking; it was also Rizzoli the woman,
and
she had no tolerance for overbearing men.
    “It’s a personal matter,” said Maura.
    “You need help, all you have to do is ask.”
    “Thank you, but I’ll handle him.” Maura pressed the
scalpel to skin, wanting nothing more than to drop the subject of Victor Banks.
She
took a breath, and found it ironic that the scent of dead flesh was less
disturbing
to her than the mere utterance of his name. That the living tormented her far
more
than the dead ever could. In the morgue, no one hurt her, or betrayed her. In
the
morgue, she was the one in control.
    “So who is this guy?” asked Rizzoli. The question that
was
still on all their minds. The question Maura would have to answer, sooner or
later.
    She sank the blade into flesh and watched skin part like a white
curtain.
“My ex-husband,” she said.
     
    She cut her Y-incision, then reflected back flaps of pale skin.
Yoshima
used common pruning shears to cut through the ribs, then lifted the triangle of
ribs
and breastbone to reveal a normal heart and lungs, disease-free liver and spleen
and pancreas. The clean, healthy organs of a young woman who has abused neither
tobacco
nor alcohol, and who has not lived long enough for her arteries to narrow and
clog.
Maura made few comments as she removed organs and placed them in a metal basin,
moving
swiftly toward her next goal: the examination of the pelvic organs.
    A pelvic bloc excision was a procedure she usually reserved for
fatal
rape cases, as it allowed a far more detailed dissection of those organs than
the
usual autopsy did. It was not a pleasant procedure, this coring out of pelvic
contents.
As she and Yoshima sawed through the bony pubic rami, she was not surprised to
see
Frost turn away. But Rizzoli, too, shrank from the table. No one spoke now of
the
calls from Maura’s ex-husband; no one pressed her for personal details. The
autopsy had suddenly turned too grim for conversation, and Maura was perversely
relieved
by this.
    She lifted the entire bloc of pelvic organs, external genitalia,
and
pubic bone, and moved it to a cutting board. Even before she sliced into the
uterus,
she knew, just by its appearance, that her fears were already confirmed. The
organ
was larger than it should be, the fundus well above the level of the pubic bone,
the walls spongey. She slit it open, to reveal the endometrium, the lining still
thick and lush with blood.
    She looked up at Rizzoli. Asked, sharply: “Did this woman
leave
the abbey at any time during the last week?”
    “The last time Camille left the abbey was back in March, to
visit
her family on Cape Cod. That’s what Mary Clement told me.”
    “Then you have to search the compound. Immediately.”
    “Why? What are we looking for?”
    “A newborn.”
    This seemed to hit Rizzoli with stunning force. She stared,
white-faced,
at Maura. Then she looked at