Chapter One

"Janie, take these plates into the dining room." Mrs. Rizzoli handed her daughter a stack of dishes. "And you should change that shirt, sweetie. It's stained."

"Ma, you can't even see it." The fact that she had never noticed the stain was a testimony to Rizzoli's care about her appearance.

"How do you expect to attract..." Her mother lowered her voice dramatically, "Male attention wearing stained clothes? At least bleach it or something."

"I don't need 'male attention'." Rizzoli said stiffly, sidestepping her mother and dodging into the dining room. She took her time setting the table; no use in spending more time under her mother's scrutinizing eye. As she laid out forks and knives, Rizzoli wondered if her mother truly thought that she would forever be alone. That she needed so desperately a boyfriend or husband. As if little Janie couldn't take care of herself. Her stomach clenched at the thought.

"Hey, Jane!" Loud footfalls preceded Frankie's arrival, and moments later he stepped into the room, grinning over a bouquet of flowers. "How're you?"

"Fine." She set down some more forks. "Are those for ma?"

"No." He wore a boyish grin. "They're for this girl I'm seeing."

"Classy." Rizzoli said.

"Frankie!" Their mother swept through the door. "You bought those for a girl?"

"Yeah, Ma." He set the flowers on a sidetable. "Remember Josephine De Leur?"

"No—is she a friend of the family?"

"Ew!" Rizzoli barely suppresses a shocked laugh. "That girl on the bus who used to pick her nose?"

"Really, Jane? That was years ago." Frankie said hotly. "She's really nice now."

"Uh-huh." Rizzoli was not convinced. "Well, in third grade, she was gross."

"Jane Rizzoli!" Their mother protested loudly. "Your brother is seeing a very nice young woman. Why do you always have to butt in?"

"I don't!" Rizzoli felt trapped between her mother and brother. She breathed a sigh of relief when her phone rang.

"Rizzoli."

"Who is it?" Her mother asked from the other side of the room.

"Jane? This is Korsack. We've got a body downtown."

"I'll be there in ten." She hung up and turned to her mother. "Ma, I..."

"Janie! You're leaving already? We haven't eaten yet!" Her mother looked scandalized. "Why is your job more important than family?"

"It's not, Ma. I have a case."

"But Janie..." Her mother began. Janie gave her a lightening-fast hug, then hurried from the room.

...

The victim was young, strangled and dumped in an alleyway downtown. The sunlight overhead was harshly bright, and Rizzoli and Frost squinted as they approached the crime scene. Rizzoli sighed when she saw the boy's body. She hated seeing Boston's youth dead, and this boy was no exception.

"Just a kid." Frost said quietly. "Why the hell do people kill kids?"

It was a rhetorical question, and one that no one had an answer for. Rizzoli pressed her lips together.

"Isles, he have any ID?"

Dr. Maura Isles glanced up from her position beside the boy's body. "No ID, but I'm sure that if you show his picture to the local junior high-schools..."

"We will." Rizzoli sighed. "God, when I was in junior high, all I cared about was making the field hockey team and how much I hated my social studies teacher."

"For me, it was always science." Frost said. "Mrs. Hark seemed to hate me, but I could never see why."

"Really?" Isles stood up, snapping off her latex gloves. "I never had issues with my teachers."

"Of course you didn't." Rizzoli couldn't help but smile a little. "Look, I'll stop by later, see what you've got."

"See you then." Isles turned back to the body as Rizzoli and Frost stepped out of the alley's shade and into the sunlight, ready to find a killer.