Tess Gerritsen - The Mephisto Club

“To Oliver,” Sansone murmured.

They raised the glasses in a sad and silent tribute. Jane took only a sip. Craving a beer instead, she slid her glass to Maura.

Edwina said, “We need fresh blood, Anthony. I’ve been thinking of candidates.”

“I can’t ask anyone to join us. Not now.” He looked at Maura. “I’m just sorry you got pulled into this. You never wanted to be part of it.”

“I know a man in London,” said Edwina. “I’m sure he’d be willing. I’ve already suggested his name to Gottfried.”

“This isn’t the time, Winnie.”

“Then when? This man worked with my husband years ago. He’s an Egyptologist, and he can probably interpret anything that Oliver-”

“ No one can replace Oliver.”

Sansone’s curt response seemed to take Edwina aback. “Of course not,” she finally said. “I didn’t mean it that way.”

“He was your student at Boston College?” asked Jane.

Sansone nodded. “He was only sixteen, the youngest freshman on campus. I knew he was gifted from the first day he wheeled into my class. He asked more questions than anyone else. The fact he was a math major turned out to be one of the reasons he was so good at what he did. He’d take a look at some obscure ancient code and immediately see the patterns.” Sansone set down his wineglass. “I’ve never known anyone like him. From the moment you met him, you just knew he was brilliant.”

“Unlike the rest of us,” said Edwina with a wry laugh. “I’m one of the unbrilliant members who had to be recommended by someone first.” She looked at Maura. “I guess you know that you were Joyce O’Donnell’s suggestion?”

“Maura has mixed feelings about that,” said Sansone.

“You didn’t like Joyce very much, did you?”

Maura finished off Jane’s wine. “I prefer not to speak ill of the dead.”

“I don’t mind being up front about it,” said Jane. “Any club that would have Joyce O’Donnell as a member isn’t one that I’d want to join.”

“I don’t think you’d join us anyway,” said Edwina as she opened a new bottle, “since you don’t believe.”

“In Satan?” Jane laughed. “No such guy.”

“You can say that even after all the horrors you’ve seen in your job, Detective?” said Sansone.

“Committed by regular old human beings. And no, I don’t believe in satanic possession, either.”

Sansone leaned toward her, his face catching the glow of the flames. “Are you familiar with the case of the Teacup Poisoner?”

“No.”

“He was an English boy named Graham Young. At fourteen, he began to poison members of his own family. His mother, father, sister. He finally went to jail for the murder of his mother. After he was released years later, he went right back to poisoning people. When they asked him why, he said it was all for fun. And fame. He was not a regular human being.”

“More like a sociopath,” said Jane.

“That’s a nice, comforting word to use. Just give it a psychiatric diagnosis, and it explains the unexplainable. But there are some acts so terrible you can’t explain them. You can’t even conceive of them.” He paused. “Graham Young inspired another young killer. A sixteen-year-old Japanese girl, whom I interviewed last year. She’d read Graham Young’s published diary and was so inspired by his crimes, she decided to emulate him. First she killed animals. Cut them up and played with their body parts. She kept an electronic log, describing in meticulous detail what it was like to plunge a knife into living flesh. The warmth of the blood, the shudder of the dying creature. Then she advanced to killing humans. She poisoned her mother with thallium and recorded in her diary every painful symptom her mother suffered.” He leaned back, but his gaze was still on Jane. “You’d call her merely a sociopath?”

“And you’d call her a demon?”

“There’s no other word for what she is. Or for what a man like Dominic Saul is. We know they exist.” He turned and stared into the fire. “The problem is,” he said quietly, “they seem to know we exist, too.”

“Have you ever heard of The Book of Enoch, Detective?” asked Edwina, refilling wineglasses.

“You’ve mentioned it before.”

“It was found among the Dead Sea Scrolls. It’s an ancient text, pre-Christian. Part of the apocryphal literature. It foresees the destruction of the world. It tells us that the earth is plagued by another race called the Watchers, who first taught us to make swords and knives and shields. They gave us the instruments of our own destruction. Even in ancient times, people clearly knew about these creatures and recognized that they were different from us.”

“The sons of Seth,” said Lily softly. “The descendants of Adam’s third son.”

Edwina looked at her. “You know about them?”

“I know they have many names.”

“I never heard that Adam had a third son,” said Jane.

“He actually appears in Genesis, but the Bible conveniently glosses over so many things,” said Edwina. “There’s so much history that’s been censored and suppressed. Only now, nearly two thousand years later, are we able to read the Gospel of Judas.”

“And these descendants of Seth-these are the Watchers?”

“They’ve been called so many different names through the centuries. The Elohim, the Nephilim. In Egypt, the Shemsu Hor. All we know is, their bloodline is ancient, its origins in the Levant.”

“Where?”

“The Holy Land. The Book of Enoch tells us that ultimately we will have to fight them for our own survival. And we’ll suffer terrible miseries while they slaughter and oppress and destroy.” Edwina paused to refill Jane’s glass. “Then, in the end, it will all be decided. There’ll be the final battle. The Apocalypse.” She looked at Jane. “Whether you believe it or not, the storm is coming.”

The flames seemed to blur before Jane’s tired eyes. And just for a moment she imagined a sea of fire, consuming everything. So this is the world you people inhabit, she thought. A world I don’t recognize.

She looked at Maura. “Please don’t tell me you believe this, Doc.”

But Maura simply finished her glass of wine and stood up. “I’m exhausted,” she said. “I’m going to bed.”

Someone was tapping at the edge of Lily’s consciousness, asking to be admitted into the secret landscape of her dreams. She came awake in darkness and felt a moment’s panic when nothing seemed familiar. Then she saw the glow of moonlight and remembered where she was. Through the window, she gazed out at startlingly bright snow. The storm had blown past, and the moon now shone down on a pure white world, silent and magical. For the first time in months, she felt safe. I’m not alone anymore, she thought. I’m with people who understand my fears, people who’ll protect me.

She heard a click-click move past the room and fade away down the hallway. It was just one of the Dobermans, she thought. Bakou and Balan. What hideous names. She lay in bed, listening for the claws to tap their way past the door again, but the dog did not return.

Good. Because she needed to use the bathroom and didn’t want to face either one of those animals in the hallway.

She climbed out of bed and crossed to the door. Poking her head into the hallway, she looked around for the dogs but saw no sign of them, heard no tapping of claws. Light glowed faintly from the stairway, enough to help her navigate up the hall to the bathroom. Just as she reached the threshold, her bare foot touched something wet. She looked down, saw the faint gleam of a puddle, and pulled her foot back in disgust. The dogs, of course. What other accidents had they left on the floor? She didn’t want to step in anything worse.