The Sinner: A Rizzoli & Isles Novel

lungs.”
    “Never bothered you before.”
    “Yeah, well, that’s when I used to
be
one of those assholes.”
    Nothing like a coronary to turn a chain-smoker into a health freak, thought Rizzoli as she followed in the wake left by Korsak’s substantial frame. Although he’d lost weight since his heart attack, he was still heavy enough to double for a linebacker, which was what he reminded her of as he bulldozed through the Friday evening crowd.
    They stepped through a doorway into the nonsmoking section, where the air was marginally clearer. He chose a booth beneath the Irish flag. On the wall were framed and yellowed clippings from the
Boston Globe
, articles about mayors long gone, politicians long dead. The Kennedys and Tip O’Neill and other fine sons of Eire, many of whom had served with Boston’s finest.
    Korsak slid onto the wooden bench, squeezing his generous girth behind the table. Heavy as he was, he still looked thinner than he’d been back in August, when they had worked a multiple homicide investigation together. She could not look at him now without remembering their summer together. The buzzing of flies among the trees, the horrors that the woods had yielded up, lying among the leaves. She still had flashbacks to that month when two killers had joined to enact their terrible fantasies on wealthy couples. Korsak was one of the few people who knew the impact that the case had had on her. Together, they had fought monsters and survived, and they had a bond between them, forged in the crisis of an investigation.
    Yet there was so much about Korsak that repelled her.
    She watched him take a gulp of ale, and flick his tongue over the mustache of foam. Once again she was struck by his simian appearance. The heavy eyebrows, the thick nose, the bristly black hair covering his arms. And the way he walked, with thick arms swinging, shoulders rolled forward, the way an ape walks. She knew his marriage was troubled, and that, since his retirement, he had far too much time on his hands. Looking at him now, she felt a twinge of guilt, because he had left several messages on her phone, suggesting they meet for dinner, but she’d been too busy to return his calls.
    A waitress came by, recognized Rizzoli, and said, “You want your usual Sam Adams, Detective?”
    Rizzoli looked at Korsak’s glass of beer. He had spilled it on his shirt, leaving a trail of wet spots.
    “Uh, no,” she said. “Just a Coke.”
    “You ready to order?”
    Rizzoli opened the menu. She had no stomach for beer tonight, but she was starved. “I’ll have a chef’s salad with extra Thousand Island dressing. Fish and chips. And a side of onion rings. Can you bring it all at the same time? Oh, and could you bring some extra butter with the dinner rolls?”
    Korsak laughed. “Don’t hold back, Rizzoli.”
    “I’m hungry.”
    “You know what that fried stuff does to your arteries?”
    “Okay, then. You don’t get any of my onion rings.”
    The waitress looked at Korsak. “What about you, sir?”
    “Broiled salmon, hold the butter. And a salad with vinaigrette dressing.”
    As the waitress walked away, Rizzoli gave Korsak an incredulous look. “Since when did you start eating broiled fish?” she asked.
    “Since the big guy upstairs whacked me over the head with that warning.”
    “Are you really eating that way? This isn’t something just for show?”
    “Lost ten pounds already. And that’s even off cigarettes, so you know it’s, like,
real
weight off. Not just water weight.” He leaned back, looking just a little too satisfied with himself. “I’m even using the treadmill now.”
    “You’re kidding.”
    “Joined a health club. Doing cardio workouts. You know, check the pulse, keep tabs on the ticker. I feel ten years younger.”
    You look ten years younger
was what he was probably fishing for her to say, but she didn’t say it, because it would not have been true.
    “Ten pounds. Good for you,” she said.
    “Just gotta stick with it.”
    “So what’re you doing, drinking beer?”
    “Alcohol’s okay, haven’t you heard? Latest word in the
New England Journal of Medicine
. Glass of red wine’s good for the ticker.” He nodded at the Coke that the waitress set in front of Rizzoli. “What’s with that? You always used to order Adams Ale.”
    She shrugged. “Not tonight.”
    “Feeling okay?”
    No, I’m not. I’m knocked up and I can’t even drink a beer without wanting to puke.
“I’ve been