Chapter Text
The elevator quietly dinged its way to the morgue as Maura evaluated her outfit for the 3rd time. The coffee stain would be covered by her lab coat, but she’d never get the blemish out of her shoes. Sighing at the fate of her Louboutins, she pushed open the morgue door and promptly stopped in her tracks.
“Detective Rizzoli.”
A tall lanky brunette hopped down from the sterile table where she had been casually swinging her legs. “Dr. Isles,” she smiled. “I think this is the first time I beat you down here. Was starting to think you had a cot or something.”
“I find the tables in the cooler much more comfortable.”
The detective blinked twice then grinned. “You have picked up on sarcasm. I knew hanging around us wouldn’t be a complete waste of time.” Jane watched her slip out of her coat and into her crisp white jacket. “Too bad in all that time you haven’t, you know, picked up my first name or anything.”
Maura took in the words and studied the speaker. While she may have improved her use of sarcasm these past 10 months, her comfort in gauging social cues was still in its infancy.
Jane took pity on her uncertainty. “‘Jane’,” she said, pointing to herself.
Maura's mouth twitched. “I see.” Making her way to the cooler, she checked the chart and threw over her shoulder, “What brings you here so early… Jane?” She could see the clenched fist of victory in her peripheral vision.
“Yes!” Jane celebrated. “I mean, I’m here because of the Legano case.”
Her fingers paused on the handle. “My assistant collected trace evidence, but I haven’t processed the body yet. It was only last night. I was about to-”
“Hey, hey,” Jane said, holding up her hands. “I know, I was there, remember? I figured you’d do the autopsy first thing. That’s why I’m here.”
“Oh.” She tilted her head. “Did you watch Dr. Yeaman’s autopsies?”
Jane scrunched up her face and looked at the ceiling. “No, I don’t think so. Why?”
The heavy clunk of the handle pulled back echoed in the room. “This is the 18th autopsy you’ve witnessed since I was promoted to the position.”
Pulling her head back, Jane asked, “Have you been keeping count?” She immediately answered her own question. “Of course you have, what am I saying?” She leaned against the stainless steel wall. “What can I say? You smell a hell of a lot better. Does that bother you?”
Maura swung open the door, showing no resentment. “Why would it? I spend a reasonable amount of time in the morning to ensure- oh, you were asking if your presence bothered me. No.”
“Good. Now where can I find one of those white paper coat thingies?”
Maura smiled but didn’t correct her. “You won’t need it to observe.”
“No, but I’ll need it to help you hoist the body on the table, right?” Her face must’ve been one of surprise because Jane said, “What? You’re not gonna throw it on there yourself, are you?”
“Well no, but-”
Jane was having none of it. “But nothing.”
She didn’t know much about the people she worked with beyond their qualifications, but she did know there was no use in arguing with the detective. The woman was as stubborn as she was talented.
Maura pointed to a shelf in the corner. “You’ll find the white paper coat thingies over there.”
…..
An hour went by with nothing but Maura’s meticulous dictation of organs and weights. Once the breastbone loudly submitted to the bone saw, the process was a succession of snips and cuts and slices. There was a certain rhythm to it that soothed Maura, enveloping her in its exacting routine. The detective watched without words. Over the course of the last few months, Jane had become part of the routine, and Maura was surprised to realize how easily she had let her settle in.
“I believe Detective Frost owes you some money,” she said, breaking the silence.
“How many?”
“Seventeen. I believe the ‘over/under’ was 15?” She tripped slightly over the term.
Jane grinned like a champion. “I knew it.” She saw Maura’s quiet confusion. “Let’s say the over/under in the Bruins game is 4.5, and you pick ‘over’ because you think there will be a lot of goals. Anything over 4.5, and you win. But if the score ends up being 4 or less, you lose.”
Maura nodded as the words began making sense. She smiled at this new knowledge, until she realized how it pertained to the case. “You and Detective Frost bet an ‘over/under’ on how many stab wounds the victim had?”
Unperturbed, Jane shrugged. “It’s a dark job, Maura. You gotta find something to lighten it up or you’ll go crazy.”
“Perhaps yoga might be a better option?”
“Yeah, no.” She looked at the body. “So 17, huh? Not quite Lizzie Borden, but pretty damn close.”
“Closer than you think,” Maura said. “While the nursery rhyme claims 40 wounds-”
“Lizzie Borden took an axe and gave her mother forty whacks. When she saw what she had done, she gave her father forty-one,” Jane recited in a sing-song voice.
Maura held up a finger. “To clarify, it was a hatchet, not an axe.”
“Doesn’t have the same ring to it though, does it?” Jane winked at Maura’s displeasure. “Carry on.”
“Not 40 wounds, and not 41 for her father. Twenty and 10 respectively.”
“Still did the job, though.”
“Whoever killed the Borden family didn’t need to go that far. Based on the damage to their bodies, a half dozen would have sufficed. In our case, however, the killer may have required all 17. Though I can’t yet pinpoint the order of the wounds, many of them are fairly superficial, at least when it comes to the force necessary to kill someone.”
Jane crossed her arms in front of her belt buckle. “So… did she bleed out?”
“No. She suffocated.”
Jerking her head back, Jane raised an eyebrow. “Say again?”
“Stabbing from behind isn’t easy. Though I suppose stabbing from the front isn’t, either.”
Jane said, “The shoulder bones.”
“Scapula, yes. It takes a better than average knowledge of anatomy to know precisely where to slip in a blade.”
“And obviously, our killer had a less than average knowledge.”
“Based on the amount of attempts, yes. In the end, what killed her was a direct puncture of the trachea.”
“She suffocated on her own blood.”
“Yes.”
“Damn.”
“On the list of appealing deaths, this certainly wasn’t one of them.”
“Are any deaths appealing?”
Maura offered a conciliatory nod.
“Epithelials under her nails? Drugs in her system?” Jane caught the appreciative smile. “What? I watch CSI all the time.”
The smile grew into a laugh. “Waiting for the lab to come back with the results.”
“Just like on TV!” Jane flashed a smile of her own. Stretching the kink from her neck, she sighed. “Okay, I guess I should go do my gumshoe thing.”
“Gumshoe?”
“It’s… nevermind.” She pulled off the disposable smock and tossed it into the garbage can in the corner. After quietly congratulating herself on the shot, she said, “I never did ask- why were you late this morning? I was about to file a Missing Persons.” Maura could only shake her head and smile. “Don’t mind me- I’m a detective and I have an Italian mother. If I don’t ask questions, you know,” she closed her eyes and stuck out her tongue.
“You’ll die?” Maura finished. “So you’re like some species of shark that need to keep moving to stay alive?”
“Yes, exactly,” Jane said. “The cute species.”
Maura shook her head again. “To answer your question, I had an accident. Oh, nothing serious,” she assured Jane, seeing the concern. “At the coffee shop. I turned and inadvertently bumped into someone with my drink in hand. I’ll never get the stains out of my dress,” she lamented.
Jane slapped her forehead. “Coffee! Dammit! I brought you a coffee this morning. It’s in your office.”
A light dawned over Maura’s head. “That’s why the barista gave me an odd look.”
“She must’ve thought you were having a bad day, ordering another one,” Jane smiled. “I’m sorry about the coffee. It’s probably ice cold by now.”
Maura sensed this was a shift in their working relationship; she had seen enough to know the purchase of coffee was an invitation to a circle, a step up from acquaintance to accepted colleague. “I appreciate the gesture, regardless.” A thought occurred. “How did you know my coffee order?”
Jane shrugged, almost bashfully. “Did I mention I’m a detective?” she deflected.
“I see.”
“Anyway… you’ll text me when labs comes in?” Maura nodded and she did the same. “Great.” She walked to the door, a swagger in her step. “Talk to you later, Maura.”
If the overuse of her first name bothered her, she didn’t show it. “Have a good day. Jane.”
…..
“Someone’s in a good mood.”
The voice greeted Jane as she entered the bullpen, and her smile slipped. “Korsak,” she said in return. Fourteen months had passed since Charles Hoyt and 12 had passed since she had requested a new partner. Old wounds, both literal and figurative, were yet to heal. Her palms throbbed at the memory.
“I’m always happy to collect on a bet.” She turned to Barry Frost and pretended to shoot him with her thumb and forefinger.
“Dr. Death give you a COD on the Legano case?” Korsak asked with more than a touch of surprise.
“First, it’s ‘Queen of the Dead’,” Jane corrected. “Second, yeah, she’s got a preliminary cause of death, but she’s waiting for trace. Third, could we maybe not call her that?”
Korsak snorted. “Oooh, look who’s sticking up for Dr. D-Isles. Weren’t you the one who came up with that name?”
“Yeah, well, it’s been 10 months. She’s done enough to prove she’s not another Yeaman. We should start taking her seriously.”
“Besides,” Frost piped up, “she takes fashion seriously. That’s good enough for me.”
Korsak rolled his eyes. “Mr. Fashion Plate over here.”
Jane wasn’t about to get between the two men. Instead, she held out her hand to Frost and snapped her fingers lightly. “Pay up.”
“More than 15? Damn.”
“Seventeen,” Jane told him after she kissed the bill and tucked it into her pocket.
“If you could stay at a crime scene for more than 30 seconds, you wouldn’t lose these bets all the time,” Korsak said.
Jane smothered the fire before it could begin. “Find anything?” she asked Frost.
“Got a list of Rachel Legano’s family and associates,” he replied, glaring at Korsak. “Parents are back home in Nebraska. Sent a local uniform out to give the bad news.”
She shook her head. “I hate those calls.”
Nodding, Frost continued, “She worked at Traywood Tech for 5 years. Model employee, though office gossip says she was thinking of filing a sexual harassment suit against her boss, Edwin Reuss.”
“There’s a start. How about boyfriends? Girlfriends? Disgruntled exes?”
He flipped through his notepad. “Found both. A boyfriend and an ex. Had a 2 year relationship with Kyle Graham. By all accounts, he was the one who did the breaking up. Current boyfriend of 8 months is Gary Raines.”
There was a short bark from Korsak. “Ha! Mr. Makin’ it Raines?” Frost raised an eyebrow. “The weatherman for Channel 4? Real name’s Gary Renkelberg. Doesn’t have the same catchy feel, I guess.”
“That smarmy guy on the morning show?” Jane asked. “He’s never right.”
“But the ladies love him!” Korsak looked at Frost. “None of this is ringing any bells, is it?”
“First off, I believe they call them ‘meteorologists. Second,” he held up his phone, “who watches TV anymore?”
“It’s the only way Korsak can watch episodes of The Dog Whisperer.”
“Ha ha. Just for that, you two can go talk to the employer. I’ll go talk to Mr. Hollywood. Maybe get my face on TV.’
“They’ve already made a sequel to ‘Grumpy Old Men’.”
Jane reached across her desk to high-five Frost. “Good one, partner.” Saving Korsak from further embarrassment, she stood and threw on a coat. “See that vein in his forehead, Frost? That’s our cue to go.”
…..
“Traywood Tech,” Frost read from his notes. “Named after its founder, Edwin Traywood Reuss.” He laughed at Jane’s eyeroll. “Started in the telecommunications business 20 years ago. Small stuff like automated voice messages for emergency broadcast systems.”
“If this had been an actual emergency,” Jane intoned.
“Exactly. But I’m guessing you do one, there’s not much repeat business.”
Jane weaved them through mid-day traffic. “Yeah. I’m pretty sure it’s the same message now that it was when I was a kid. So what does Traywood Tech do now?”
“Automated telemarketers.”
“You’re kidding.”
“Nope. So when you get a call at dinner telling you you’ve won a trip to the Bahamas, that’s the guy to thank.”
“Between ‘Traywood’ and telemarketers, I don’t like him already.” She pulled into a spot in front of an imposing building. “Let’s hope he’s our killer. I’d feel like I’d be doing the citizens of Boston two favours.”
Finding the glass door locked, she pressed a nearby button.
“If you have forgotten your code, please press ‘1’. If you’re a visitor, please press ‘9’.”
“Automated voice message,” Frost said.
“I hate them,” Jane whispered. “What ever happened to real people?”
“Cost-effective measures.”
She grunted, not liking the answer, but pressed ‘9’. A moment passed, then the door clicked open. The floor was empty and quiet, and they walked several feet before Jane caught their movements.
“Why are we sneaking around?” she asked, and Frost chuckled at her discovery. Attempting to walk like normal people, they proceeded down the hall, following the signs that pointed them left, then right until they finally came to a desk. “Great. A real person.”
A woman in her 40s greeted them with a smile. “Welcome to Traywood Tech. How can I help you today?”
Jane and Frost exchanged a look. “Detective Rizzoli, Homicide,” she said, pulling back her jacket to reveal her badge. “My partner, Detective Frost. We’re here to see Edwin Reuss.”
The woman flipped through an appointment book. “I don’t see your name.”
“The badge is my appointment,” Jane replied with a steely edge.
The woman didn’t seem phased by the thinly veiled statement. “Let me see if Mr. Reuss is available.”
“What floor is he on?”
“The top, of course, but I’m afraid you can’t just-”
“Thank you.” Before the secretary had a chance to object any further, Jane and Frost were already in a nearby elevator.
“‘The top, of course’,” Jane mimicked behind closed doors.
“Maybe we should’ve left bread crumbs.”
The doors opened to a small foyer that led them to another door that was ajar. The gold nameplate was ornately inscribed with ‘Edwin T. Reuss’. Jane gave it a soft knock before poking her head inside.
“You must be Detective Rizzoli,” the company’s namesake said without standing up. “Jennifer informed me of your… arrival.” His emphasis on the last word made no secret of what he thought of their tactics.
Jane let the accusation roll off her back. “Yeah, well a murder investigation has a tendency to make me kinda pushy. Edwin Reuss?”
He nodded dumbly at the question before asking one of his own. “A murder investigation?”
“Just wondering where you were last night, Mr. Reuss.”
“You’re asking me if I killed someone?” he scoffed.
“No,” she replied with feigned patience. “I’m asking you where you were last night.”
Sitting back, he laced his fingers together and shrugged. “I had a client until 8pm, then went home.”
“That’s not what your wife said.” She ignored Frost’s quick look and instead kept a level stare on Reuss. When the businessman’s jaw dropped, she smiled.
“There’s no way…” he stammered.
“That she knows you’re having an affair?” Jane finished. “No, she probably doesn’t, though I’ve seen enough murder cases to know you should never rule it out.” She waited for the words to sink in before continuing, “I didn’t speak to your wife and she didn’t tell me anything. But you just did. Maybe you’ve been away from real people too long, Mr. Reuss. So let me ask you again, where were you last night?”
He tried to reclaim some dignity by sitting up straight. “I had a client until 8pm,” he repeated. “Then… I went to the Marriott.”
“How long were you there?”
“I made it home for the 11 o’clock news, so, I don’t know, 10:45?”
Frost referenced the Reuss address on his phone and nodded to Jane. “Sounds about right.”
“What’s her name?”
Reuss shook his head. “There’s no reason to get her involved.”
With an arched brow, Jane said, “Should I ask your wife?”
“Gretchen Miller.”
“The model?” Frost whistled, then quickly covered a cough.
Jane shot him a look before asking Reuss, “What do you know about Rachel Legano?”
He frowned. “Rachel Legano? The looker in R&D?”
His description earned him a glare. “Yeah,” Jane replied, “the looker in R&D. The one who was going to file a sexual harassment suit against you. Can’t imagine why.”
He snorted at the accusation. “Detective. I just admitted to sleeping with Gretchen Miller, one of the most beautiful women in the world. Isn’t that right, Detective Frost?” When he got no reply, he shrugged. “Why would I bother with Rachel Legano when I can have any woman?”
Jane clenched her jaw. “Maybe that’s why you thought you could harass Rachel? You felt entitled.”
“Being the 23rd richest man in America does make me somewhat entitled,” he agreed without remorse. “But I don’t take what I want when I can just buy it.” If he derived any pleasure from Jane’s disdain, it wasn’t enough to stop him from asking, “I trust this stays between us, detectives.”
“You mean, I won’t tell your wife?” Jane asked. “It’ll be a surprise. I bet you don’t get many of those being the 23rd richest man in America, do you?” Without waiting for a reply, she looked at Frost, jerked her head towards the door and left.
“Asshole,” she said, as the elevator closed.
…..