Here I am sat in a hospital chair next to the bed of my best friend, Jane Rizzoli. Detective Jane Rizzoli. She works for the Boston Homicide Division. I work as chief Medical Examiner for the Boston Police Department, Dr Maura Isles. You see I'm only sitting at her bedside now because she was stupid enough to shoot herself. Otherwise we'd be at my place watching movies and drinking wine. For you to fully understand I better start from the beginning.
The day started off normally. Me and Jane at the the gym. We were on the cross trainers when Jane went to say something to me, but instead she caught me staring.
"Maura," Jane said through gritted teeth. "You're staring at Chuck's biceps. Stop it."
"I am. Females are wanted to be attracted to the most strongest, most dominant males. It's natural selection at work." I finished with a small smile and turned my attention back to Chuck's biceps.
"You're making me uncomfortable. Stop." Jane whispered.
"What? I'm just appreciating his Sternocleidomastoid." I said to Jane. Then turned my attention back to Chuck once again. "Excuse me." I saw Jane look away shaking her head, while I waited for Chuck to look at me, once he did, I continued. "You have beautifully developed muscular." I looked back at Jane, "what am I embarrassing you?"
"Oh no, not at all. Why don't you tell him he's got a nice ass too." Jane's said, sarcastically.
"And a wonderfully portioned gluteus maximus." I told Chuck.
"I'm never working out with you again."
I stopped and started to step down off the cross trainer.
"Hey...where you going? It's only been twenty minutes."
I looked at her worried. "Oh, Bass is ill. He won't even eat any organic spinach. I gotta go check on him."
"You bought you're turtle to work?"
"Tortoise. I couldn't get his usual care giver." I have a drink, while Jane laughs and answers her phone.
"Rizzoli...Hey Murry, what's up?...Head count for what?...Surprise party for who?..."
"Whom." I whispered, before walking away.
Nothing that day started of wrong. I left Jane at the gym. The next time we saw each other I was crouched over a victim.
"Danny Clarke, Drug Control Unit." Korsak said.
"He was in my class at the academy." Jane said, putting on gloves. She sighed when she saw him. "Wife, two kids."
"Knew his father. Knew Danny since he was this tall. It's a damn shame." Korsak said, he sounded like he was going to cry. Jane put a comforting arm around his shoulder.
We all looked back at Danny. Lying there with a bullet hole in his head.
"One shot to the head." Jane said.
"Looks like a large calibre firearm." I said.
"It's a forty-five calibre." Jane said, tears threatening to fall.
I pull his shirt open. "Abrasions on his sternum." We all look more closely.
"There's some hairs missing." Jane said, looking around. She spots something. "There's a piece off tape. Hey Joe, photograph this, mark it and bag it, okay?" She looked back at Danny.
"He was wearing a wire." Korsak said.
"He was working for us." Cavanaugh said, walking up to us.
"Homicide?" Jane questioned.
"Yea." Cavanaugh sighed.
"Since when?" Korsak asked.
"Sent him in Monday to get information on the two dead truckers from Charlestown, you were working on." Cavanaugh replied.
"My case? Without telling me?" Korsak asked, a little bit angry.
"My decision." Cavanaugh replied. Anger in his voice as well. "Every one fall in over here."
"What the hell?" Jane whispered to Korsak.
"I want every cop and detective down here working the streets on this. Get everyone from headquarters. The only cop I want there is manning the front desk, until further notice." Cavanaugh said. He's stopped by another cop shouting stop.
"If you kept us together on this Danny wouldn't be dead." The other cop said. He's called Bobby Marino.
"Easy Bobby. Easy." Frost and Frankie said as they held Bobby back.
"You better have a good reason for sending him in alone." Bobby said to Cavanaugh. "Good reason."
"Look, I need you Rizzoli." Cavanaugh said.
"Yes sir." Jane replied.
"I want you to interview Bobby. He may not know what he knows." Cavanaugh told Jane, who just nodded. "You're the best at this. Take him to headquarters."
Jane sniffed. "I can interview him here."
"No, no, no." Cavanaugh rushed out. "Get him out of here."
"Yes sir." Jane said before off. She came back to the body to get Bobby, who was leant over, crying. "Hey, come on."
I reached across Danny shirt and felt something in his pocket. I pulled out a packet of cigarettes. "Jane?"
"Yea," Jane said, closing the two steps between us.
I handed her the cigarette packet. "It's the only thing I found in his pockets."
"We'll bag it and get it to evidence." Jane said, leaning over to grab a bag. "Frankie, you wonna?" "Hey man, come on, let's go." Jane said to Bobby.
Jane left then. We met when we were both back at the precinct.It was in the café.
"What a Sunday." I said while I was trying to put some money in the coffee fund.
"What? No, no, no. No. A twenty is a overkill." Jane said, pulling my twenty out of the box before I pushed it all the way in. She handed it back to me. "You're only a jerk if you don't leave anything. Here." Jane stuffed some money in the tin. She tasted her coffee, and pulled a sour face. "God, when was that made? November?" She picks up the sugar. "Marino wants a cup off coffee, there's none upstairs. The guys a wreck."
"I've tried everything." I said. "British strawberries. Venal."
"Are we in the same conversation?" Jane asked, confused.
"Sorry...I...I was talking about Bass." I sighed pouring my coffee.
"Oh, you're obsessing over you're turtle again." Jane said, while pouring salt into Marino's coffee.
"Tortoise." I told her. "He...he likes salt in his coffee?"
Jane looked at me like I was going mad. Then looked down to see what she was doing. "Oh, damn it." She sighed, putting the salt shaker down.
"You know people who lock their keys in their cars, sprain the ankles, it usually indicates something significant is bothering them." I looked at her.
"A cop was murdered." She sighed, pouring another coffee.
"Yea, but that's not why you're salting you're coffee."
"It's my brother, Tommy." She met my gaze.
I took a sip of my coffee, nodding. "I always wondered about him."
"Well, Frankie and I became cops and Tommy went to prison for hitting a priest in a cross walk."
"Oh," I looked away.
"It's his third strike while driving under the influence." Jane said.
"You're poor parents."
"Oh and you know they keep saying if the priest he has hit has forgiven him, then why can't we? This isn't about forgiveness. You know Tommy is really troubled and the more they deny it the more he screws up." Jane let out.
"You really care about them."
"I just think we need to face reality. You know Tommy needs help, this isn't like he's broke his leg and it'll heal." Jane said, stirring her coffee.
"I'm really sorry." I said.
"Thank you. Don't worry about it. We've got too much to do today without worrying about Tommy." Jane said walking away.
I picked up my purse and followed her to the elevators.
"Wish you were out there?" Jane asked the cop on the front desk.
"Yea," he replied.
Jane tapped his shoulder. "We'll get the shooter."
"I'll call you as soon as I get the results." I told Jane, standing in front of the elevator I needed to get on.
Jane hit the button for the elevator she needed. "Alright." She sighed. "Oh, I've got to log this into evidence," Jane said about the cigarette packet I found on Danny. "I gotta take this to Marino." She said about the coffee she was holding. "I'll see you later."
"Jane," I shout.
"Yea," She spun around to face me.
"If you want to talk about you're brother or just avoid the subject, I'm here." I said.
"I know." Jane said.
We both smiled at each other then. We both went our separate ways. Jane went to interview Marino. I went to the morgue.I can't tell you what happened or what was said in that interview or what happened next, because I don't know. I was in the morgue when the power went out.
"Bass. It's just the power that's off. Okay, but I still need you to eat something." I held some spinach in front of him. "Sweetie, here you go. Come on, sweetie." That's when I heard someone talking about the evidence locker. I was still crouching front of Bass when I heard the locker doors opening and slamming shut again. Then I heard a gunshot. I sat next to Bass against a table. They were looking for something. I covered my ears as I heard another shot ring out. They left. I stayed on the floor as I slowly made my way to the phone. A tapped the button a few times. The lines were dead. I don't know how long I was sat behind the table next to Bass.
"Maura. Maura."
"It's Jane." I told Bass tapping his shell. Running into the morgue. "Jane. I was hiding, there are men...there are men shooting in here." I told her.
"Yea. Both off them have been shot." Jane said.
"No,no. I'm fine. Take care off him." Marino said, pointing to Frankie.
"Oh my God, what happened?" I said looking at Frankie's vest. He'd been shot, twice.
"He's been shot twice." Jane said, worried.
"It's alright my vest stopped them." Frankie said.
"Alright get him up here." I told both Jane and Marino.
"The table already? Really the dead person table?" Frankie complained.
I covered the body that was on another table. "Be careful."
"Oh, ouch." Frankie took a sharp intake of breath.
Marino went to give Jane a gun.
"Keep this and watch the doors. I'm gonna stay with Frankie." Jane said.
"Take his vest off." I told Jane. "Jane, what is going on? The phone's don't work. We have men shooting in here."
"I know. I know. I think we're trapped in here." Jane said placing a radio on the table.
"What about that?" I asked when she put it down.
"No. That's only for Homicide cops and no one's in range." Jane rushed out.
"There at the warehouse."After getting Frankie out of his vest and uniform, I told Jane, "okay, lift his shirt up." I go to grab some medical supply's.
"I think I've just got the wind knocked out off me, that's all." Frankie said. Both him and Jane lifting his shirt up.
"Pass us that binder. That binder on the desk." I told Marino.
You know when Jane lifted Frankie's shirt and saw the bruising already there, she looked terrified. Never, since I have known her have I seen that look. It scared me. Anyway...
"We need to keep his head up. Give me you're jacket." I said.
"Okay," Jane whispered, taking of her jacket and placing it on the table.
"Okay, we're going to put you down." I told Frankie, both Jane and me lowering him down, slowly.
"Alright." Frankie replied.
Frankie was in pain. So much pain.
"ABC's. Airways, breathing, circulation. I should have taken an emergency medicine rotation. Right take a deep breath." I tell Frankie.
"I...I can't." Frankie said.
I listen to his breathing, then I feel his stomach.
"What are you hearing?" Jane asks, concerned.
I stop what I'm doing and look at Jane. I nod my head, silently telling her to follow me. She does.
"Janie..." Frankie started.
"Hey, hey. It's fine. It's fine." Jane said to Frankie. "It's bad isn't it?" She whispered to me.
"Massive blunt force trauma, causing internal bleeding. It's worse than bad."
Back at Frankie's side. "I need an MRI scan, CT scan an X-ray machine or something. I need to check his internal injuries." I place my fingers to Frankie's neck. "I was afraid off that."
"What?" Jane asked, concerned.
"Tension pneumothorax." I said.
"He's having trouble breathing. Do something." Jane said.
"I'm a pathologist Jane, not a surgeon. I could make it worse." I told Jane, who was currently running around another autopsy table.
Frankie was getting worse by the second.
"What is it again? Say it again." Jane demanded. She had one of my medical books.
"Tension pneumothorax. What are you doing?" I asked.
Jane found it. "Tension pneumothorax result's in dead, if not...if not treated immediately." Jane rushed out. "Maura...God."
"Jane, I'm just guessing. Okay? I would need to confirm it." I tell her.
"You don't have time to confirm it. You're guess is better than most doctors." Jane yelled.
"I could be wrong."
"manage with needle decompression to chest." Jane read from the book.
"I've never done it." I yelled.
Jane shot around the table back to standing in front of me. "Maura. Please, get a needle, do it." Jane looked from me to Frankie then back to me again. "DO IT NOW." She yelled.
"Okay, get alcohol, cotton ball and tape." I tell Jane. We both went in search for different things.
"I got it. I got it." Jane rushed out.
So there I was, standing over Frankie, getting ready to do a procedure I had never done before. I was only doing it because my best friend had asked me to. It was her brother, really I had no choice but to do it. I hesitated before I pushed the needle through Frankie's chest. I was scared. If I messed this up I could lose everything, Jane included. I was relieved when Frankie started breathing a bit better. But I couldn't relax. He had a broken rib that had already breached his chest wall. He needed too get to a hospital, and fast. We couldn't, we were trapped.
"No, no, no. He looks better." Jane said, placing her hand on Frankie's cheek.
"No, not for long. I think he has a partial tear on one off his lungs maybe other internal organs." I rushed out.
"Which...which means what?" Jane asked, scared.
"It means he needs surgery."
"How soon?"
"Now." My voice louder than I intended it to be. We both looked back to Frankie.
If I could have took any of Jane's pain away that day, I would have. It was Frankie laying there. He's Jane's brother. He's my family. I couldn't stand seeing him like that. But I knew I had to stay strong. I knew Jane needed me to be strong for the both off us. She couldn't be the strong one this time.
"It's okay, buddy. I'm going to get you out off here, okay?" Jane said, leaning closer to Frankie.
"There's blood clotting it." I said as I removed the needle from Frankie chest.
That's when Frankie coughed up blood. We turned him on his side, as two more gunshots rang out. I think I might have heard Marino telling us that it was at least two floors away, but I couldn't be sure. I wasn't listening.
"His lung is filling up with blood." I rushed out, placing a cotton ball near Frankie's mouth.
"Well how do we stop it?" Jane asked, panicked.
"We can't. We need a trauma centre. I...I don't have equipment for all this."
"But you helped him before." Jane pleaded.
"No. No the problem isn't his heart right now Jane, okay, there's too much pressure from the bleeding his heart can't pump."
"Please don't let him die Maura, please." Jane begged.
It was that moment when Jane begged me not to let her brother die that I really started to panic.
"We can't get him out of here, okay. What can you do right now that will help him?" Jane asked surprising calm. But her eyes were telling a different story.
"I don't know. I don't know what more I can do with what I have." I yelled the last part.
"Okay, he's going to die, right here on this table, if you don't do something. THINK."
"Okay." I took a deep breath. "Okay."
"You're the only one that can save him." Jane whispered. "It's alright, bud. It's alright." Jane told Frankie.
So there I was again less then thirty minutes later, preparing Frankie the best I could, so preform another procedure on him.
"This is a hospital procedure." I told Jane, wetting a cotton ball with some alcohol.
"Okay, just do it." Jane replied, holding Frankie's hand.
"I don't have any anaesthetic."
"It's alright Maura. Just do the best you can okay." Jane told me.
"Frankie. This is gonna hurt, okay? I have to drain the blood from you're lungs so you can breath."
Frankie nodded.
"Maura, hurry." Jane whispered.
"I need you to hold him down for me." I told Jane.
"Okay." Jane muttered, placing her free hand on Frankie's arm next to his head, holding him in place. "It's okay bud, it's alright."
"I have to insert the tube to drain the blood."
"We trust you." Jane told me, tears falling down her face.
"This is painful." I whispered to Jane.
"Okay bud, listen to me. Hey, Hey. Look at me alright, this is gonna hurt okay? But I want you to squeeze my hand, okay as hard as you can, okay?" Jane sobbed.
"Okay." Frankie muttered. "Do it." He said through gritted teeth. Two seconds later he screamed through gritted teeth.
After I finished the procedure, Korsak's voice filled the autopsy room.
"Korsak is that you?" Jane asked through the radio.
"Jane, where are you?" Korsak asked.
"Were in the autopsy room."
"Are you okay?" Frost asked.
"We've got at least two dead, two wounded. Marino's got a gunshot wound to the thigh, Frankie's took two to the chest, he's hurt real bad."
"Can you hold them off Jane?" Frost asked.
"Not for long. There looking for something." Jane looked at me.
"Oh, wait, wait, wait." I rushed out. "They...they were looking for something in the evidence lockers. But...but they didn't find whatever it was."
"You tell me this now?" Jane asked.
"I'm sorry. I kind of had my hands full." I replied.
"Jane, did you log in any evidence from the crime scene?" Korsak asked.
"Eh...erm...only the...the pack of cigarettes. But...but I haven't logged them in yet. Why? What do they want with Danny's cigarettes?" Jane asked, confused.
"Danny doesn't smoke. His old man died off lung cancer." Korsak told us.
"So there's something in that cigarette pack," Jane said.
"Yea, like what? Where is it?" Marino asked.
"Erm...it's right here." Jane leant over to her jacket which was still under Frankie's head.
Jane took the cigarette packet from her jacket, when we all heard the autopsy door open. We all turned around to be greeted with a man carrying a gun. He walked around the table to face us all. He asked Jane for the cigarettes, and pushed his gun into Frankie's side. Jane went to pass him the packet when he told her to give them to Bobby. Realisation dawned on both Jane and me. Bobby was dirty. He opened the packet and told us to smile, we were on Danny's camera.
"Danny didn't know that you were one of the drug ring men. He must have suspected something. This is why he was wearing a wire and carrying a hidden camera." Jane said.
"He just could stop digging. That was Danny. I wasn't planning on killing him but...he showed up at the warehouse. He didn't leave me any choice." Marino said.
"You killed the other witness to didn't you?" Jane asked.
"What's one less crack whore right?" Marino said.
"Son of a bitch." Jane muttered.
"Nah. I'm not a son of a bitch..." Marino laughed, before rising his gun and pulling the trigger.
The shot ran through the middle of Jane and me, successfully hitting the other bad guy in the chest. Jane ducked to one side, I went to the other, turning around as I did, so I could protect Frankie. Jane recovered the quickest. Taking a step to be next to me, covering more of Frankie. She placed her hand on my back, silently telling me to keep down. I couldn't move even if I wanted too, she was pushing me down with a force I didn't know Jane Rizzoli had.
"...I'm a fricking hero." Marino continued.
I don't know why I thought of it that second, because I didn't even see the radio on the floor, bit I managed to find it and push it against the bottom off the table, and hold it there. Hoping that Korsak and Frost were still listening. I knew it was nearly impossible for them not to be.
"And now that I've got what I need, I'm just gonna sit tight and wait to be rescued." Marino said, as he walked around the table to the dead guy laying on the floor.
Jane moved her hand of my back to my arm, as she tried desperately to get me behind her.
"That is after I shoot the three of you." Marino said, after he picked up the larger weapon.
"I wouldn't do that Bobby." Korsak's voiced filled the room.
Jane looked from Bobby, to me, to the floor, eyes finally landing on my foot pressing the radio to against the table.
"Bobby, it's over." Korsak said.
We all heard the gunshot's upstairs. But this time it was me who placed my hand on Jane's back as Bobby approached us. I tried to grab hold of Jane's shoulder then arm as Bobby pulled her away from me with her hair. I saw it in her eyes, as he was pulling Jane away, she was doing this to make sure Frankie and me got out safely. She did it without thinking. She didn't it without thinking about any of us. But Jane never thinks about anything before she puts her life in danger to try and keep the people she loves safe.
"No, no, no. Jane..." I whimpered.
"Sshh. It's fine." Jane told me.
"Jane..." I whimpered again.
Then I heard another bang, working on auto pilot I used myself to cover Frankie. It was the S.W.A.T. Team. It took me less than two minutes to get to the front of the police headquarters. I was just pushing the door open when I saw Jane had her own gun pressed against her stomach.
"Jane..." I half whispered, half shouted.
But it was too late. The gun was fired. In that split second I saw a thousand routes that bullet could have gone. I saw Bobby jump back, with the force of the bullet entering him. I didn't give him a second thought. I ran straight for my best friend. My best friend who has just forced me to see her shoot herself to kill the bad guy. The dirty cop. My best friend who at this moment is laying in a hospital bed. I'd give anything to change places with her.
Yes I am a doctor, but I think you should know that if Bobby was still alive when I reached them, I wouldn't have treated him. I can honestly say if you were in my shoes I very much doubt that you would have done either.
My best friend pleaded with me that day to save her brother. I did. She pleaded with me to do a procedure I had never done before. It worked. If it wasn't for Jane that day I don't think I would have had the courage to do that.
That's how we ended up where we are today.