The Mephisto Club

curious onlookers who’d spilled out of their houses into the cold to watch the excitement.
    “It was only a few minutes ago,” said Maura. “She can’t have gone far.”

THIRTY-FIVE
    Lily Saul darted down one side street, and then another, weaving ever deeper into the maze of an unfamiliar neighborhood. She did not know Boston, and she had no idea where she was going. She could hear the sirens of cruisers, circling like sharks. The flash of headlights sent her scrambling into an alley. There she crouched behind garbage cans as a patrol car slowly crept up the street. The instant it disappeared around the corner, she was back on her feet and moving in the other direction. She was going downhill now, slipping on cobblestones slick with ice, her backpack slapping against her shoulder blades. She was not dressed for this bitter weather, and already her feet stung from the cold, and her ungloved hands were numb. Her tennis shoes suddenly skated out from beneath her and she landed on her rump. The impact sent a spear of pain straight up her spine. She sat stunned for a few seconds, her skull ringing. When her vision finally cleared, she saw she was at the bottom of the hill. Across the street was a park, ringed with shrubs, bare trees casting their spindly gloom over ice-glazed snow. A glowing symbol caught her eye.
    It was a sign for the subway station.
    She’d just jump on a train and in minutes she could be on her way anywhere in the city. And she’d be warm.
    She clambered to her feet, her tailbone aching from the fall, her scraped palms stinging. She limped across the street, took a few steps along the sidewalk, and halted.
    A police cruiser had just rounded the corner.
    She dashed into the park and ducked behind the bushes. There she waited, her heart banging in her throat, but the cruiser did not pass. Peering through the branches, she saw that it was parked and idling outside the subway station. Damn. Time to change plans.
    She glanced around and spotted the glowing sign of yet another T station on the other side of the park. She rose to her feet and started across the common, moving beneath the shadow of trees. Ice crusted the snow, and every footstep gave a noisy crack as her shoe broke through the glaze into deep snow beneath. She struggled forward, almost losing a shoe, her lungs heaving now with the effort to make headway. Then, through the roar of her own breathing, she heard another sound behind her, a crunch, a creak. She stopped and turned, and felt her heart freeze.
    The figure stood beneath a tree—faceless, featureless, a black form that seemed more shadow than substance.
It’s him.
    With a sob, Lily fled, stumbling through the snow, shoes smashing through the icy crust. Her own breathing, the slamming of her own heart, drowned out any sound of pursuit, but she knew he was right behind her. He’d always been right behind her, every minute, every breath, dogging her steps, whispering her doom. But not this close, never this close! She didn’t look back, didn’t want to see the creature of her nightmares moving in. She just plunged ahead, her shoe lost now, her sock soaked with frigid water.
    Then, all at once, she stumbled out of a drift, onto the sidewalk. The T entrance was straight ahead. She went flying down the steps, almost expecting to hear the swoop of wings and feel the bite of claws in her back. Instead, she felt the warm breath of the subway tunnel on her face and saw commuters filing out toward the stairs.
    No time to fool with money. Jump the turnstile!
    She scrambled over it, and her wet sock slapped down onto the pavement. Two steps, and she skidded to a stop.
    Jane Rizzoli was standing right in front of her.
    Lily spun around, back toward the turnstile she’d just jumped. A cop stood barring her escape.
    Frantically she gazed around the station, looking for the creature that had pursued her, but she saw only startled commuters staring back at her.
    A handcuff closed over her wrist.
             
    She sat in Jane Rizzoli’s parked car, too exhausted to think of trying to escape. The wet sock felt like a block of ice encasing her foot, and even with the heater running, she could not get warm, could not stop shaking.
    “Okay, Lily,” said Jane. “Now you’re going to tell me the truth.”
    “You won’t believe the truth.”
    “Try me.”
    Lily sat motionless, tangled hair spilling across her face. It didn’t matter anymore. She was so tired of running.
I give