The Apprentice: A Rizzoli & Isles Novel

warmed to Rizzoli’s Boston bluntness, just as she had never warmed to his formality.
The only thing they had in common was the human remains that passed across Dr. Tierney’s autopsy table. But as she helped him to his feet, she was saddened by his frailty and reminded of her own grandfather, whose favorite grandchild she had been, perhaps because he’d recognized himself in her pride, her tenaciousness. She remembered helping him out of his easy chair, how his stroke-numbed hand had rested like a claw on her arm. Even men as fierce as Aldo Rizzoli are ground down by time to brittle bones and joints. She could see its effect in Dr. Tierney, who wobbled in the heat as he took out his handkerchief and dabbed the sweat from his forehead.
    “This is one doozy of a case to close out my career,” he said. “So tell me, are you coming to my retirement party, Detective?”
    “Uh . . . what party?” said Rizzoli.
    “The one you all are planning to surprise me with.”
    She sighed. Admitted, “Yeah, I’m coming.”
    “Ha. I always could get a straight answer from you. Is it next week?”
    “Two weeks. And I didn’t tell you, okay?”
    “I’m glad you did.” He looked down at the asphalt. “I don’t much like surprises.”
    “So what do we have here, Doc? Hit-and-run?”
    “This seems to be the point of impact.”
    Rizzoli looked down at the large splash of blood. Then she looked at the sheet-draped corpse, which was lying a good twelve feet away, on the sidewalk.
    “You’re saying he first hit the ground here, and then bounced way over there?” said Rizzoli.
    “It would appear so.”
    “That’s got to be a pretty big truck to cause this much splatter.”
    “Not a truck,” was Tierney’s enigmatic answer. He started walking along the road, eyes focused downward.
    Rizzoli followed him, batting at swarms of flies. Tierney came to a stop about thirty feet away and pointed to a grayish clump on the curb.
    “More brain matter,” he noted.
    “A truck didn’t do this?” said Rizzoli.
    “No. Or a car, either.”
    “What about the tire marks on the vic’s shirt?”
    Tierney straightened, his eyes scanning the street, the sidewalks, the buildings. “Do you notice something quite interesting about this scene, Detective?”
    “Apart from the fact there’s a dead guy over there who’s missing his brain?”
    “Look at the point of impact.” Tierney gestured toward the spot in the road where he’d been crouching earlier. “See the dispersal pattern of body parts?”
    “Yeah. He splattered in all directions. Point of impact is at the center.”
    “Correct.”
    “It’s a busy street,” said Rizzoli. “Vehicles do come around that corner too fast. Plus, the vic has tire marks on his shirt.”
    “Let’s go look at those marks again.”
    As they walked back to the corpse, they were joined by Barry Frost, who had finally emerged from the car, looking wan and a little embarrassed.
    “Man, oh man,” he groaned.
    “Are you okay?” she asked.
    “You think maybe I picked up the stomach flu or something?”
    “Or something.” She’d always liked Frost, had always appreciated his sunny and uncomplaining nature, and she hated to see his pride laid so low. She gave him a pat on the shoulder, a motherly smile. Frost seemed to invite mothering, even from the decidedly unmaternal Rizzoli. “I’ll just pack you a barf bag next time,” she offered.
    “You know,” he said, trailing after her, “I really do think it’s just the flu. . . .”
    They reached the torso. Tierney grunted as he squatted down, his joints protesting the latest insult, and lifted the disposable sheet. Frost blanched and retreated a step. Rizzoli fought the impulse to do the same.
    The torso had broken into two parts, separated at the level of the umbilicus. The top half, wearing a beige cotton shirt, stretched east to west. The bottom half, wearing blue jeans, lay north to south. The halves were connected by only a few strands of skin and muscle. The internal organs had spilled out and lay in a pulpified mass. The back half of the skull had shattered open, and the brain had been ejected.
    “Young male, well nourished, appears to be of Hispanic or Mediterranean origin, in his twenties to thirties,” said Tierney. “I see obvious fractures of the thoracic spine, ribs, clavicles, and skull.”
    “Couldn’t a truck do this?” Rizzoli asked.
    “It’s certainly possible a truck could have caused massive injuries like