Vanish

Jane was still staring at the ceiling, trying to understand what she was now seeing. Needle-thin lines of vapor were streaming silently from above. Gas. They are pumping gas into the room.

She looked at her husband. Did he know this was about to happen? Did he know this was the plan? No one else seemed aware of the silent invader. No one else realized that the assault was now beginning, heralded by those fine streams of gas.

We are all breathing it in.

She tensed as she felt another contraction. Oh god, not now, she thought. Not when all hell is about to break loose. She gripped the couch cushion, waiting for the contraction to peak. The pain had her in its jaws now, and all she could do was grip the cushion and hang on. This one’s going to be bad, she thought. Oh, this one’s really bad.

But the pain never reached its climax. Suddenly the cushion seemed to melt away in Jane’s fist. She felt herself being dragged downward, toward the sweetest of sleep. Through the gathering numbness, she heard banging, and men’s shouts. Heard Gabriel’s voice, muffled, calling her name from across a great distance.

The pain was almost gone now.

Something bumped up against her, and softness brushed across her face. The touch of a hand, the faintest caress on her cheek. A voice whispered, words that she did not understand, soft and urgent words that were almost lost in the banging, in the sudden crash of the door. A secret, she thought. She is telling me a secret.

Mila. Mila knows.

There was a deafening blast, and warmth splashed her face.

Gabriel, she thought. Where are you?

TWENTY-ONE

At the sound of the first gunshots, the crowd standing in the street gave a collective gasp. Maura’s heart froze to a standstill. Tactical Ops officers held the police line as fresh gunfire thudded inside. She saw looks of confusion on the officers’ faces as the minutes passed, everyone waiting for word of what was happening inside. No one was moving; no one was rushing the building.

What are they all waiting for?

Police radios suddenly crackled: “Building secure! The entry team is out, and the building is now secure! Roll medical. We need stretchers-”

Med-Q teams rushed forward, pushing through the police tape like sprinters crossing the finish line. The breaking of that yellow tape touched off chaos. Suddenly reporters and cameras surged toward the building as well, as Boston PD struggled to hold them back. A helicopter hovered overhead, blades thumping.

Through the cacophony, Maura heard Korsak shout: “I’m a cop, goddammit! My friend’s in there! Let me through!” Korsak glanced her way and called out: “Doc, you gotta find out if she’s okay!”

Maura pushed ahead, to the police line. The cop gave her ID a harried glance, and shook his head.

“They need to take care of the living first, Dr. Isles.”

“I’m a physician. I can help.”

Her voice was almost drowned out by the chopper, which had just landed in the parking lot across the street. Distracted, the cop turned to yell at a reporter: “Hey, you! Get back now.”

Maura slipped past him and ran into the building, dreading what she would find inside. Just as she turned into the hallway leading to Diagnostic Imaging, a stretcher came barreling toward her, wheeled by two EMTs, and her hand flew to her mouth to stifle a gasp. She saw the pregnant belly, the dark hair, and thought: No. Oh god, no.

Jane Rizzoli was covered in blood.

At that instant, all of Maura’s medical training seemed to abandon her. Panic made her focus on the blood, and only the blood. So much of it. Then, as the stretcher rolled past her, she saw the chest rise and fall. Saw the hand moving.

“Jane?” called out Maura.

The EMTs were already hurrying the stretcher through the lobby. Maura had to run to catch up.

“Wait! What’s her condition?”

One of the men glanced back over his shoulder. “This one’s in labor. We’re moving her to Brigham.”

“But all the blood-”

“It’s not hers.”

“Then whose?”

“The gal back there.” He cocked a thumb down the hallway. “She’s not going anywhere.”

She stared after the stretcher as it rattled out the door. Then she turned and ran up the hallway, moving past EMTs and Boston PD officers, toward the heart of the crisis.

“Maura?” a voice called, oddly distant and muffled.

She spotted Gabriel struggling to sit up on a stretcher. An oxygen mask was strapped to his face, and an IV line tethered his arm to a bag of saline.

“Are you all right?”

Groaning, he lowered his head. “Just… dizzy.”

The EMT said: “It’s the aftereffects of the gas. I just gave him some IV Narcan. He needs to take it easy for a while. It’s like coming out of anesthesia.”

Gabriel lifted the mask. “Jane-”

“I just saw her,” said Maura. “She’s fine. They’re moving her to Brigham Hospital.”

“I can’t sit here any longer.”

“What happened in there? We heard gunshots.”

Gabriel shook his head. “I don’t remember.”

“Your mask,” said the EMT. “You need that oxygen right now.”

“They didn’t have to do it this way,” said Gabriel. “I could have talked them out of there. I could have convinced them to surrender.”

“Sir, you need to put your mask back on.”

“No,” snapped Gabriel. “I need to be with my wife. That’s what I need to do.”

“You’re not ready to go.”

“Gabriel, he’s right,” said Maura. “Look at you, you can barely sit up. Lie down for a while longer. I’ll drive you to Brigham Hospital myself, but not until you’ve had a chance to recover.”

“Just a little while,” said Gabriel, weakly settling back onto the stretcher. “I’ll be better in a while…”

“I’ll be right back.”

She spotted the doorway to Diagnostic Imaging. As she stepped through, the first thing her eyes fixed on was the blood. It was always the blood that demanded your attention, those shocking splashes of red that shout out: Something terrible, truly terrible, has happened here. Though half a dozen men were standing around the room, and debris from the ambulance crews still lay scattered across the floor, she