The Mephisto Club (9 page)

“Of course it does. Kassovitz tails O’Donnell here. The killer sees her, chooses her as his next victim. It still gets back to O’Donnell.”

“Or he could have seen Kassovitz on Christmas Eve. She was there at the crime scene. He could have been watching Lori-Ann Tucker’s house.”

“You mean, enjoying all the action?” said Tripp.

“Yes. Enjoying the fact that all the excitement, all the cops, were because of
him.
Because of what he’d just done. What a sense of power.”

“So he follows
Kassovitz
here,” said Tripp, “because she caught his eye that night? Man, that puts a different spin on this.”

Jane looked at Maura. “It means he could’ve been watching any one of us. He’d know all our faces now.”

Maura bent down and pulled the sheet back over the body. Her hands were numb and clumsy as she stripped off the latex gloves and pulled on her wool ones. “I’m freezing. I can’t do anything else out here. We should just move her to the morgue. And I need to defrost my hands.”

“Have you already called for pickup?”

“They’re on their way. If you don’t mind, I think I’ll wait for them in my car. I want to get out of this wind.”

“I think we should
all
get out of this wind,” said Tripp.

They walked back along the side yard and stepped through the iron gate into the liverish glow of the gas lamp. Across the street, silhouetted in strobe by cruiser rack lights, was a huddle of cops. Daniel stood among them, taller than the other men, hands buried in the pockets of his overcoat.

“You can come inside with us and wait,” said Jane.

“No,” said Maura, her gaze on Daniel. “I’ll just sit in my car.”

Jane was silent for a moment. She’d noticed Daniel, too, and she could probably guess why Maura was lingering outside.

“If you’re looking to get warm, Doc,” said Jane, “you’re not going to find it out here. But I guess that’s your choice.” She clapped Tripp on the shoulder. “Come on. Let’s go back inside. See how Pretty Boy’s doing.” They walked up the steps, into the house.

Maura paused on the sidewalk, her gaze on Daniel. He did not seem to notice that she was there. It was awkward with all those cops standing around him. But what was there to be embarrassed about, really? She was here to do her job, and so was he. It’s the most natural thing in the world for two acquaintances to greet each other.

She crossed the street, toward the circle of cops. Only then did Daniel see her. So did the other men, and they all fell silent as she approached. Though she dealt with police officers every day, saw them at every crime scene, she had never felt entirely comfortable with them, or they with her. That mutual discomfort was never more obvious than at this moment, when she felt their gazes on her. She could guess what they thought of her. The chilly Dr. Isles, never a barrel of laughs. Or maybe they were intimidated; maybe it was the MD behind her name that set her apart, made her unapproachable.

Or maybe it’s just me. Maybe they are afraid of me.

“The morgue van should be here any minute,” she said, opening the conversation on pure business. “If you could make room for it on the street.”

“Sure thing, Doc,” one of the cops said, and coughed.

Another silence followed, the cops looking off in other directions, everywhere but at her, their feet shuffling on cold pavement.

“Well, thank you,” she said. “I’ll be waiting in my car.” She didn’t cast a glance at Daniel, but simply turned and walked away.

“Maura?”

She glanced back at the sound of his voice, and saw that the cops were still watching.
There’s always an audience,
she thought.
Daniel and I are never alone.

“What do you know so far?” he asked.

She hesitated, aware of all the eyes. “Not much more than anyone else, at this point.”

“Can we talk about it? It might help me comfort Officer Lyall if I knew more about what happened.”

“It’s awkward. I’m not sure…”

“You don’t have to tell me anything you don’t feel comfortable revealing.”

She hesitated. “Let’s sit in my car. It’s right down the street.”

They walked together, hands thrust in pockets, heads bent against icy gusts. She thought of Eve Kassovitz, lying alone in the courtyard, her corpse already chilled, her blood freezing in her veins. On this night, in this wind, no one wanted to keep company with the dead. They reached her car and slid inside. She turned on the engine to run the heater, but the air that puffed through the vents offered no warmth.

“Officer Lyall was her boyfriend?” she asked.

“He’s devastated. I don’t think I was able to offer much comfort.”

“I couldn’t do your job, Daniel. I’m not good at dealing with grief.”

“But you do deal with it. You have to.”

“Not on the level you do, when it’s still so raw, so fresh. I’m the one they expect all the answers from, not the one they call in to give comfort.” She looked at him. In the gloom of her car he was just a silhouette. “The last Boston PD chaplain lasted only two years. I’m sure the stress contributed to his stroke.”

“Father Roy
was
sixty-five, you know.”

“And he looked eighty the last time I saw him.”

“Well, taking night calls isn’t easy,” he admitted, his breath steaming the window. “It’s not easy for cops, either. Or doctors or firemen. But it’s not all bad,” he added with a soft laugh, “since going to death scenes is the only time I ever get to see you.”

Although she could not read his eyes, she felt his gaze on her face and was grateful for the darkness.

“You used to visit me,” he said. “Why did you stop?”

“I came for midnight Mass, didn’t I?”

He gave a weary laugh. “Everyone shows up at Christmas. Even the ones who don’t believe.”

“But I
was
there. I wasn’t avoiding you.”

“Have you been, Maura? Avoiding me?”

She said nothing. For a moment they regarded each other in the gloom of her car. The air blowing from the vent had barely warmed and her fingers were still numb, but she could feel heat rise to her cheeks.

“I know what’s going on,” he said quietly.

“You have no idea.”

“I’m just as human as you are, Maura.”

Suddenly she laughed. It was a bitter sound. “Well,
this
is a cliché. The priest and the woman parishioner.”

“Don’t reduce it to that.”

“But it is a cliché. It’s probably happened a thousand times before. Priests and bored housewives. Priests and lonely widows. Is it the first time for you, Daniel? Because it sure as hell is the first time for me.” Suddenly ashamed that she had turned her anger on him, she looked away. What had he done, really, except offer her his friendship, his attention?
I am the architect of my own unhappiness.

“If it makes you feel any better,” he said quietly, “you’re not the only one who’s miserable.”

She sat perfectly still as air hissed from the vents. She kept her gaze focused straight ahead, on the windshield now fogged with condensation, but all her other senses were painfully focused on him. Even if she were blind and deaf, she’d still know he was there, so attuned was she to every aspect of his presence. Attuned, as well, to her own pounding heart, to the sizzling of her nerves. She’d felt a perverse thrill from his declaration of unhappiness. At least she was not the only one suffering, not the only one who lay sleepless at night. In affairs of the heart, misery yearns for company.

There was a loud rapping on her window. Startled, she turned to see a ghostly silhouette peering in through the fogged glass. She lowered her window and stared into the face of a Boston PD cop.

“Dr. Isles? The morgue van just arrived.”

“Thank you. I’ll be right there.” Her window hummed shut again, leaving the glass streaked with watery lines. She shut off the car engine and looked at Daniel. “We have a choice,” she said. “We can both be miserable. Or we can move on with our lives. I’m choosing to move on.” She stepped out of the car and closed the door. She took one breath of air so cold it seemed to sear her throat. But it also swept any last indecision from her brain, leaving it clearer and focused with laser intensity on what she had to do next. She left her car and did not look back. Once again, she headed up the sidewalk, moving from pool to pool of light as she passed beneath streetlamps. Daniel was behind her now; ahead waited a dead woman. And all these cops, standing around. What were they waiting for? Answers that she might not be able to give them?

She pulled her coat tighter, as though to ward off their stares, thinking of Christmas Eve and another death scene. Of Eve Kassovitz, who’d lingered on the street that night, emptying her stomach into the snowbank. Had Kassovitz experienced even a flicker of a premonition that she would be the next object of Maura’s attention?

The cops all gathered in silence near the house as the morgue team wheeled Eve Kassovitz along the side yard. When the stretcher bearing the shrouded corpse emerged through the iron gate, they stood with heads bared in the frigid wind, a solemn blue line honoring one of their own. Even after the stretcher had disappeared into the vehicle and the doors had swung shut, they did not break ranks. Only when the taillights winked away into the darkness did the hats go back on, and they began to drift back to their cruisers.

Maura, too, was about to walk to her car when the front door of the residence opened. She looked up as warm light spilled out and saw the silhouette of a man standing there, looking at her.

“Excuse me. Are you Dr. Isles?” he asked.

“Yes?”

“Mr. Sansone would like to invite you to step inside the house. It’s a great deal warmer in here, and I’ve just made a fresh pot of coffee.”

She hesitated at the foot of the steps, looking up at the warm glow that framed the manservant. He stood very straight, watching her with an eerie stillness that made her think of a life-size statue she’d once seen in a gag store, a papier-mâché butler holding a tray of fake drinks. She glanced down the street toward her car. Daniel had already left, and she had nothing to look forward to but a lonely drive home and an empty house.

“Thank you,” she said, and started up the steps. “I could use a cup of coffee.”

TWELVE

She stepped into the warmth of the front parlor. Her face was still numb from the bite of the wind. Only as she stood before the fireplace, waiting for the butler to notify Mr. Sansone, did sensation slowly creep back into her cheeks; she felt the pleasant sting of reawakened nerves, of flushing skin. She could hear the murmur of conversation in another room—Detective Crowe’s voice, pointed with questioning, answered by a softer response, barely audible. A woman’s. In the fireplace, sparks popped and smoke puffed up, and she realized these were real logs burning, that it was not the fake gas fireplace she’d assumed it was. The medieval oil painting that hung above the hearth might well be authentic as well. It was a portrait of a man wearing robes of wine-red velvet, with a gold crucifix around his neck. Though he was not young, and his dark hair was woven with silver, his eyes burned with a youthful fire. In that room’s flickering light, those eyes seemed piercingly alive.

She shivered and turned away, strangely intimidated by the stare of a man almost certainly long dead. The room had other curiosities, other treasures to examine. She saw chairs upholstered in striped silk, a Chinese vase that gleamed with the patina of centuries, a rosewood butler’s table that held a cigar box and a crystal decanter of brandy. The carpet she stood on bore a well-worn path down its center, evidence of its age and the countless shoes that had trod across it, but the relatively untouched perimeter revealed the unmistakable quality of thick wool and the craftsmanship of the weaver. She looked down at her feet, at a tapestry of intricate vines twining across burgundy to frame a unicorn reclining beneath a bower of trees. Suddenly she felt guilty that she was standing on such a masterpiece. She stepped off it, onto the wood floor, and closer to the hearth.

Once again, she was facing the portrait over the mantelpiece. Once again, her gaze lifted to the priest’s piercing eyes, eyes that seemed to stare straight back at her.

“It’s been in my family for generations. It’s amazing, isn’t it, how vivid the colors still are? Even after four centuries.”

Maura turned to face the man who had just stepped into the room. He had entered so quietly, it was as though he had simply materialized behind her, and she was too taken by surprise to know quite what to say. He was dressed in a dark turtleneck, which made his silver hair all the more striking. Yet his face looked no older than fifty. Had they merely passed each other on the street, she would have stared at him because his features were so arresting and so hauntingly familiar. She saw a high forehead, an aristocratic bearing. His dark eyes caught the flicker of firelight, so that they seemed lit from within. He had referred to the portrait as an heirloom, and she saw at once the familial resemblance between the portrait and the living man. The eyes were the same.

He held out his hand. “Hello, Dr. Isles. I’m Anthony Sansone.” His gaze was focused with such intensity on her face that she wondered if they had met before.

No. I certainly would have remembered a man this attractive.

“I’m glad to finally make your acquaintance,” he said, shaking her hand. “After everything I’ve heard about you.”

“From whom?”

“Dr. O’Donnell.”

Maura felt her hand go cold in his grasp, and she pulled away. “I can’t imagine why I’d be a subject of conversation.”

“She had only good things to say about you. Believe me.”

“That’s a surprise.”

“Why?”

“Because I can’t say the same thing about her,” she said.

He gave a knowing nod. “She can be off-putting. Until you get the chance to know her. Value her insights.”

The door swung open so quietly, Maura did not hear it. Only the gentle clink of chinaware alerted her to the fact that the butler had stepped into the room, carrying a tray with cups and a coffeepot. He set them on an end table, regarded Sansone with a questioning look, then withdrew from the room. Not a single word had passed between them; the only communication had been that look, and the returning nod—all the vocabulary needed between two men who obviously knew each other well enough to dispense with unnecessary words.

Sansone gestured for her to sit down, and Maura sank into an empire armchair upholstered in striped silk.

“I apologize for confining you to the front parlor,” he said. “But Boston PD seems to have commandeered the other rooms while they conduct their interviews.” He poured coffee and handed her a cup. “I take it you’ve examined the victim?”

“I saw her.”

“What did you think?”

“You know I can’t comment.”

He leaned back in his chair, looking perfectly at ease against blue and gold brocade. “I’m not talking about the body itself,” he said. “I perfectly understand why you can’t discuss your medical findings. I was referring to the scene itself. The gestalt of the crime.”

“You should ask the lead investigator, Detective Rizzoli.”

“I’m more interested in your impressions.”

“I’m a physician. Not a detective.”

“But I’m guessing you have a special insight into what happened in my garden tonight.” He leaned forward, coal-dark eyes riveted on hers. “You saw the symbols drawn on my back door?”

“I can’t talk about—”

“Dr. Isles, you won’t be giving away anything. I saw the body. So did Dr. O’Donnell. When Jeremy found the woman, he came straight into the house to tell us.”

“And then you and O’Donnell tramped outside like tourists to have a look?”

“We’re the furthest thing from tourists.”

“Did you stop to think about the footprints you might have destroyed? The trace evidence you’ve contaminated?”

“We understood exactly what we were doing. We had to see the crime scene.”

“Had to?”

“This house isn’t just my residence. It’s also a meeting place for colleagues from around the world. The fact that violence has struck so close alarms us.”

“It would alarm anyone to find a dead body in their garden. But most people wouldn’t troop outside with their dinner guest to look at it.”

“We needed to know if it was merely an act of random violence.”

“As opposed to what?”

“A warning, meant specifically for us.” He set down his coffee cup and focused his attention so completely on her that she felt pinned to the silk-upholstered chair. “You did see the chalk symbols on the door? The eye. The three upside-down crosses?”

“Yes.”

“I understand there was another slaying, on Christmas Eve. Another woman. Another crime scene with reverse crosses drawn on the bedroom wall.”

She didn’t need to confirm it; this man had surely read the answer in her face. She could almost feel his gaze probing deep, and seeing too much.

“We might as well talk about it,” he said. “I already know the pertinent details.”

“How do you know? Who told you?”

“People I trust.”

She gave a disbelieving laugh. “Dr. O’Donnell being one of them?”

“Whether you like her or not, she is an authority in her field. Look at her body of work on serial murderers. She understands these creatures.”

“Some would say she identifies with them.”

“On some level, you’d have to. She’s willing to crawl inside their heads. Examine every crevice.”

The way Maura herself had felt examined by Sansone’s gaze only moments ago.

“It takes a monster to know one,” said Maura.

“You really believe that?”

“About Joyce O’Donnell, yes. I do believe that.”

He leaned even closer, and his voice dropped to an intimate murmur. “Could your dislike of Joyce be merely personal?”

“Personal?”

“Because she knows so much about you? About your family?”

Maura stared back, stunned into silence.

“She told us about Amalthea,” he said.

“She had no right to.”

“Your mother’s incarceration is a matter of public record. We all know what Amalthea did.”

“This is my private life—”

“Yes, and she’s one of your personal demons. I understand that.”

“Why the hell is this of any interest to you?”

“Because
you’re
of interest. You’ve looked evil in the eye. You’ve seen it in your own mother’s face. You know it’s there, in your bloodline. That’s what fascinates me, Dr. Isles—that you come from such violent stock, yet here you are, working on the side of the angels.”

“I work on the side of science and reason, Mr. Sansone. Angels aren’t involved.”

“All right, so you don’t believe in angels. But do you believe in their counterparts?”

“Do you mean
demons
?” She gave a laugh. “Of course not.”

He regarded her for a moment with a look of vague disappointment. “Since your religion seems to be science and reason, as you put it, how does science explain what happened in my garden tonight? What happened to that woman on Christmas Eve?”

“You’re asking me to explain evil.”

“Yes.”

“I can’t. Neither can science. It just
is.
”

He nodded. “That’s exactly right. It just is, and it’s always been with us. A real entity, living among us, stalking us. Waiting for its chance to feed. Most people aren’t aware of it, and they don’t recognize it, even when it brushes up against them, when it passes them on the street.” His voice had dropped to a whisper. In the momentary hush, she heard the crackle of flames in the hearth, the murmur of voices in the other room. “But
you
do,” he said. “You’ve seen it with your own eyes.”

“I’ve only seen what every homicide cop has seen.”

“I’m not talking about everyday crimes. Spouses killing spouses, drug dealers shooting the competition. I’m talking about what you saw in your mother’s eyes. The gleam. The spark. Not divine, but something unholy.”

A draft moaned down the flue, scattering ashes against the fire screen. The flames shuddered, quailing before an invisible intruder. The room suddenly felt cold, as though all heat, all light, had just been sucked from it.

“I understand perfectly,” he said, “why you wouldn’t want to talk about Amalthea. It’s a terrible bloodline to inherit.”

“She has nothing to do with who I am,” Maura said. “She didn’t raise me. I didn’t even know she existed until a few months ago.”

“Yet you’re sensitive about the subject.”

She met his gaze. “I really don’t care.”

“I find it strange that you don’t care.”

“We don’t inherit our parents’ sins. Or their virtues.”

“Some legacies are too powerful to ignore.” He pointed to the painting over the hearth. “Sixteen generations separate me from that man. Yet I’ll never escape his legacy. I’ll never be washed clean of the things he did.”

Maura stared at the portrait. Once again, she was struck by the resemblance between the living man sitting beside her and the face on the canvas. “You said that painting was an heirloom.”

“Not one that I was happy to inherit.”

“Who was he?”

“Monsignore Antonino Sansone. This portrait was painted in Venice in 1561. At the height of his power. Or, you might also say, at the depth of his depravity.”

“Antonino Sansone? Your name?”

“I’m his direct descendent.”

She frowned at the painting. “But he—”

“He was a priest. That’s what you’re about to say, isn’t it?”

“Yes.”

“It would take all night to tell you his story. Another time, maybe. Let’s just say that Antonino was not a godly man. He did things to other human beings that would make you question the very meaning of—” He paused. “He’s not an ancestor I’m proud of.”

“Yet you have his portrait hanging in your house.”

“As a reminder.”

“Of what?”

“Look at him, Dr. Isles. He looks like me, don’t you think?”

“Eerily so.”

“In fact, we could be brothers. That’s why he’s hanging there. To remind me that evil has a human face, maybe even a pleasant face. You could walk past that man, see him smile back at you, and you’d never imagine what he’s thinking about you. You can study a face all you want, but you never really know what lies beneath the mask.” He leaned toward her, his hair reflecting firelight like a silvery helmet. “They look just like us, Dr. Isles,” he said softly.

“They? You make it sound like a separate species.”

“Maybe they are. Throwbacks to an ancient era. All I know is, they are not like us. And the only way to identify them is to track what they do. Follow the bloody trail, listen for the screams. Search for what most police departments are too overwhelmed to notice: the patterns. We look beyond the background noise of everyday crimes, of routine bloodshed, to see the hot spots. We watch for the footprints of monsters.”

“Who do you mean by
we
?”

“The people who were here tonight.”

“Your dinner guests.”

“We share a belief that evil isn’t just a concept. It’s real, and it has a physical presence. It has a
face.
” He paused. “At some time in our lives, we’ve each seen it in the flesh.”

Maura’s eyebrow lifted. “Satan?”

“Whatever name you want to use.” He shrugged. “There’ve been so many names, dating back to the ancients. Lucifer, Abigor, Samael, Mastema. Every culture has its name for evil. My friends and I have each personally brushed up against it. We’ve seen its power, and I’ll admit it, Dr. Isles. We’re scared.” His gaze met hers. “Tonight, more than ever.”

“You think this killing in your garden—”

“It has to do with us. With what we do here.”

“Which is?”

“We monitor the work of monsters. Around the country, around the world.”

“A club of armchair detectives? That’s what it sounds like to me.” Her gaze moved back to the portrait of Antonino Sansone, which was no doubt worth a fortune. Just a glance around this drawing room told her that this man had money to burn. And the time to waste on eccentric interests.

“Why was that woman killed in my garden, Dr. Isles?” he said. “Why choose my house, on this particular evening?”

“You think it’s all about you and your club?”

“You saw the chalk drawings on my door. And the drawings at the Christmas Eve slaying.”

“And I have no idea what any of them mean.”

“The upside-down crosses are common satanic symbols. But what interests me is the chalk circle in Lori-Ann Tucker’s house. The one drawn on her kitchen floor.”