Tess Gerritsen - The Mephisto Club

But here on Brattle Street, there were no such gaudy spectacles, only understated elegance. No Johnny Silvas lived here. She’d rather have that moron Johnny for a neighbor than the woman who lived in this house.

“She knows more about this case than she’s telling us.”

“How do you draw that conclusion?” asked Frost.

“Instinct.”

“I thought you didn’t believe in instinct. That’s what you always tell me. That it’s nothing better than a lucky guess.”

“But I know this woman. I know what makes her tick.” She looked at Frost, whose winter pallor seemed even more pronounced in the weak sunshine. “She got more than a hang-up call from the killer last night.”

“You’re guessing.”

“Why did she erase it?”

“Why wouldn’t she? If the caller left no message?”

“That’s her story.”

“Oh man. She got to you.” He shook his head. “I knew she would.”

“She didn’t get close.”

“Yeah? When she started talking about Regina, that didn’t light your fuse? She’s a shrink. She knows just how to manipulate you. You shouldn’t even be dealing with her.”

“Who should? You? That weenie Kassovitz?”

“Someone who doesn’t have a history with her. Someone she can’t touch.” He gave Jane a probing look that made her want to turn away. They had been partners for two years now, and even though they were not the closest of friends, they understood each other in a way that mere friends or even lovers seldom did, because they had shared the same horrors, fought the same battles. Frost, better than anyone, even better than her husband, Gabriel, knew her history with Joyce O’Donnell.

And with the killer known as the Surgeon.

“She still scares you, doesn’t she?” he asked quietly.

“All she does is piss me off.”

“Because she knows what does scare you. And she never stops reminding you of him, never forgets to bring up his name.”

“Like I’m the least bit afraid of a guy who can’t even wiggle his toes? Who can’t pee unless some nurse shoves a tube up his dick? Oh yeah, I’m real scared of Warren Hoyt.”

“You still having the nightmares?”

His question stopped her cold. She couldn’t lie to him; he’d see it. So she said nothing at all, but just looked straight ahead, at that perfect street with its perfect houses.

“I’d be having them,” he said, “if it’d happened to me.”

But it didn’t, she thought. I’m the one who felt Hoyt’s blade at my throat, who bears the scars from his scalpel. I’m the one he still thinks about, fantasizes about. Though he could never again hurt her, just knowing that she was the object of his desires made her skin crawl.

“Why are we talking about him?” she said. “This is about O’Donnell.”

“You can’t separate the two.”

“I’m not the one who keeps bringing up his name. Let’s stick to the subject, okay? Joyce P. O’Donnell, and why the killer chose to call her.”

“We can’t be sure it was the perp who called her.”

“Talking to O’Donnell is every pervert’s idea of great phone sex. They can tell her their sickest fantasies, and she’d lap it up and beg for more, all the while taking notes. That’s why he’d call her. He’d want to crow about his accomplishment. He’d want a willing ear, and she’s the obvious person to call. Dr. Murder.” With an angry twist of the key, she started the car. Cold air blasted from the heating vents. “That’s why he called her. To brag. To bask in her attention.”

“Why would she lie about it?”

“Why wouldn’t she tell us where she was last night? It makes you wonder who she was with. Whether that call wasn’t an invitation.”

Frost frowned at her. “Are you saying what I think you’re saying?”

“Sometime before midnight, our perp does his slice-and-dice on Lori-Ann Tucker. Then he makes a phone call to O’Donnell. She claims she wasn’t home-that her answering machine picked up. But what if she was at home at the time? What if they actually spoke to each other?”

“We called her house at two A.M. She wasn’t answering then.”

“Because she was no longer at home. She said she was out with friends. ” Jane looked at him. “What if it was just one friend? One bright, shiny new friend.”

“Come on. You really think she’d protect this perp?”

“I wouldn’t put anything past her.” Jane let out the brake and pulled away from the curb. “Anything.”

“This is no way to spend Christmas day,” said Angela Rizzoli, glancing up from the stove at her daughter. Four pots simmered on the burners, lids clattering, as steam curled in a wispy wreath around Angela’s sweat-dampened hair. She lifted a pot lid and slid a plateful of homemade gnocchi into the boiling water. They plopped in, their splash announcing that dinner was now imminent. Jane gazed around the kitchen at endless platters of food. Angela Rizzoli’s worst fear was that someone, someday, would leave her house hungry.

Today was not that day.

On the countertop was a roasted leg of lamb, fragrant with oregano and garlic, and a pan of sizzling potatoes browned with rosemary. Jane saw ciabatta bread and a salad of sliced tomatoes and mozzarella. A green bean salad was the lone contribution that Jane and Gabriel had brought to the feast. On the stove, the simmering pots released yet other aromas, and in the boiling water, tender gnocchi bobbed and swirled.

“What can I do in here, Mom?” asked Jane.

“Nothing. You worked today. You sit there.”

“You want me to grate the cheese?”

“No, no. You must be tired. Gabriel says you were up all night.” Angela gave the pot a quick stir with a wooden spoon. “I don’t see why you had to work today, too. It’s unreasonable.”

“It’s what I gotta do.”

“But it’s Christmas.”

“Tell it to the bad guys.” Jane pulled the grater from the drawer and began scraping a block of Parmesan cheese across the blades. She could not just sit still in this kitchen. “How come Mike and Frankie aren’t helping in here, anyway? You must’ve been cooking all morning.”

“Oh, you know your brothers.”

“Yeah.” She snorted. Unfortunately.

In the other room, football was blaring from the TV, as usual. Men’s shouts joined the roar of stadium crowds, all cheering some guy with a tight butt and a pigskin ball.

Angela bustled over to inspect the green bean salad. “Oh, this looks good! What’s in the dressing?”

“I don’t know. Gabriel made it.”

“You’re so lucky, Janie. You got a man who cooks.”

“You starve Dad a few days, he’ll know how to cook, too.”

“No, he wouldn’t. He’d just waste away at the dining table, waiting for dinner to float in all by itself.” Angela lifted up the pot of boiling water and turned it upside down, dumping the cooked gnocchi into a colander. As the steam cleared, Jane saw Angela’s sweating face, framed by tendrils of hair. Outside, the wind sliced across ice-glazed streets, but here in her mother’s kitchen, heat flushed their faces and steamed the windows.

“Here’s Mommy,” said Gabriel, walking into the kitchen with a wide-awake Regina in his arms. “Look who’s up from her nap already.”

“She didn’t sleep long,” said Jane.

“With that football game going on?” He laughed. “Our daughter is definitely a Patriots fan. You should have heard her howl when the Dolphins scored.”

“Let me hold her.” Jane opened her arms and hugged a squirming Regina against her chest. Only four months old, she thought, and already my baby is trying to wriggle away from me. Ferocious little Regina had come into the world with fists swinging, her face purple from screaming. Are you so impatient to grow up? Jane wondered as she rocked her daughter. Won’t you stay a baby for a while and let me hold you, enjoy you, before the passing years send you walking out our door?