Part of Rizzoli & Isles, book 8.5
First published 2011
Detective Jane Rizzoli stares at the corpse of seventeen-year-old Kimberly Rayner, discovered in an abandoned church next to an open, empty coffin. The girl's emaciated body bears suspicious throat bruises that point to murder. Police catch Lucas Henry fleeing the scene. The pale, skeletal teenager was Kimberly's closest friend, and he confesses to an unusual obsession: he craves blood, a desire he shared with the dead girl. Lucas insists he's innocent of murder, but Kimberly's grieving father wants revenge and refuses to believe in vampires. Medical examiner Maura Isles joins Rizzoli to examine the evidence as another young life hangs in the balance. The investigation forces both women to confront possibilities that challenge everything they know about death and the living.
Genres: mystery, crime, horror, thriller, detective
Vibes: dark, emotional, suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: enemies-to-lovers, unreliable-narrator
Setting: Abandoned Church
29 pages · Kindle Edition · Ballantine Books
Content warnings: death, gore, graphic-violence, murder