Rizzoli & Isles 8-Book Set

comes an attractive stranger who suggests a little drive out of town. Ditch the old plans and have a little adventure.
    Maybe she had an adventure with the wrong man
.
    Gabriel came back into the living room, carrying the portable phone. “He’ll call us right back.”
    “Who?” asked Brophy.
    “The detective in Jackson. He said they’ve had no traffic fatalities over the weekend, and he’s not aware of any hospitalized patients who remain unidentified.”
    “What about …” Brophy paused.
    “Or bodies, either.”
    Brophy swallowed and slumped back into the chair. “So we know that much, at least. She’s not lying in some hospital.”
    Or the morgue
. It was an image Jane tried to block out, but there it was: Maura stretched out on the table like so many other corpses that Jane had stared down at. Anyone who’d ever stood in an autopsy room and watched a postmortem had surely imagined the nightmarish scene of someone they knew or loved lying on the table. No doubt it was the same image that was now tormenting Daniel Brophy.
    Jane brewed another pot of coffee. Out in Wyoming, it would be eleven PM. The phone remained ominously silent as they watched the clock.
    “You never know, she may surprise us.” Jane laughed, jittery from too much caffeine and sugar. “She may turn up at work tomorrow, right on time. Tell us that she lost her cell phone or something.” It was a lame explanation, and neither man bothered to respond.
    The ringing phone made them all snap straight. Gabriel picked up the receiver. He did not say much; nor did his face reveal what information he was hearing. But when he hung up and looked at Jane, she knew the news was not good.
    “She never returned the rental car.”
    “They checked with Hertz?”
    Gabriel nodded. “She picked it up Tuesday at the airport, and was supposed to return it this morning.”
    “So the car’s missing as well.”
    “That’s right.”
    Jane did not look at Brophy; she didn’t want to see his face.
    “I guess that settles it,” said Gabriel. “There’s only one thing we can do.”
    Jane nodded. “I’ll call my mom in the morning. I’m sure she’ll be happy to watch Regina. We can drop her off on the way to the airport.”
    “You’re flying to Jackson?” asked Brophy.
    “If we can find two seats on a flight tomorrow,” said Jane.
    “Make it three,” Brophy said. “I’m coming, too.”

M AURA AWAKENED TO THE SOUND OF A R LO’S CHATTERING TEETH. Opening her eyes, she saw it was still dark, but sensed that dawn was near, that the blackness of night was just starting to lift to gray. In the glow from the hearth, she could count the sleeping bodies: Grace curled up on the sofa; Doug and Elaine sleeping close together, almost touching. Always almost touching. She could guess who had migrated toward whom in the night. It was so obvious, now that she was aware of it: the way Elaine looked at Doug, the way she so frequently touched him, her eager acquiescence to everything he suggested. Arlo lay alone beside the hearth, the blanket molding his body like a shroud. His teeth clattered together as a fresh chill gripped his body.
    She rose, her back stiff from the floor, and placed more wood in the fireplace. Crouching close, she warmed herself as the fire crackled to life, bright and fierce. Turning, she looked at Arlo, whose face was now illuminated by the flames.
    His hair was greasy and stiff with sweat. His skin had taken on the yellowish cast of a corpse. If not for his chattering teeth, she might have thought him already dead.
    “Arlo,” she said softly.
    Slowly, his eyelids lifted. His gaze seemed to come from some deep and shadowy pit, as though he had fallen far beyond all reach of help. “So … cold,” he whispered.
    “I’ve built up the fire again. It’ll be warmer in here soon.” She touched his forehead, and the heat of his skin was so startling that she felt as if her hand were seared. At once she went to the coffee table, where they had lined up all the medicines, and struggled to read the labels in the dark. She found the bottles of amoxicillin and Tylenol, and shook out capsules into her hand. “Here. Take these.”
    “What is it?” Arlo grunted as she lifted his head to help him swallow the pills.
    “You have a fever. That’s why you’re shivering. These should make you feel better.”
    He swallowed the pills and slumped back, seized by another chill so violent that she thought he might be convulsing. But his