The Keepsake: A Rizzoli & Isles Novel

gavel banged down. “Mr. Whaley, you will approach the bench
now.”
    Maura sat stunned as both attorneys huddled with the judge. So it had come to this, the dredging up of her family. Every cop in Boston probably knew about her mother, Amalthea, now serving a life sentence in a women’s prison in Framingham. The monster who gave birth to me, she thought. Everyone who looks at me must wonder if the same evil has seeped into my blood as well. She saw that the defendant, Officer Graff, was staring at her. Their gazes locked, and a smile curled his lips.
Welcome to the consequences
, she read in his eyes.
This is what happens when you betray the thin blue line
.
    “The court will take a recess,” the judge announced. “We’ll resume at two this afternoon.”
    As the jury filed out, Maura sagged back against the chair and didn’t notice that Aguilar was standing beside her.
    “That was dirty pool,” said Aguilar. “It should never have been allowed.”
    “He made it all about me,” said Maura.
    “Yeah, well, that’s all he has. Because the autopsy photos are pretty damn convincing.” Aguilar looked hard at her. “Is there anything else I should know about you, Dr. Isles?”
    “Other than the fact that my mother’s a convicted murderer and I torture kittens for fun?”
    “I’m not laughing.”
    “You said it earlier. I’m not the one on trial.”
    “No, but they’ll try to make it about you. Whether you hate cops. Whether you have a hidden agenda. We could lose this case if that jury thinks you’re not on the level. So tell me if there’s anything else they might bring up. Any secrets that you haven’t mentioned to me.”
    Maura considered the private embarrassments that she guarded. The illicit affair that she’d just ended. Her family’s history of violence. “Everyone has secrets,” she said. “Mine aren’t relevant.”
    “Let’s hope not,” said Aguilar.



The Keepsake
is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
    Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

    Copyright © 2008 by Tess Gerritsen

    Excerpt from The Silent Girl copyright © 2011 by Tess Gerritsen.

    All rights reserved.

    Published in the United States by Ballantine Books, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.

    B ALLANTINE and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

    LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA
    Gerritsen, Tess.
    The keepsake: a novel / Tess Gerritsen.
    p. cm.
    1. Rizzoli, Jane, Detective (Fictitious character)—Fiction. 2. Policewomen—Fiction. 3. Women—Crimes against—Fiction. 4. Medical examiners (Law)—Fiction. 5. Women forensic scientists—Fiction. 6. Boston (Mass.)—Fiction. I. Title.
    PS3557.E687K45 2008                           813'.54—dc22                           2008028131

    www.ballantinebooks.com

    This book contains an excerpt from The Silent Girl by Tess Gerritsen. This excerpt has been set for this edition only and may not reflect the final content of the forthcoming edition.

    eISBN: 978-0-345-50939-0
    v3.0_r1