The Mephisto Club

Lily cringe against her and thought that the young woman would now surely turn and retreat to Jane’s car. But Lily managed to hold her ground as the crane swung its burden away from the quarry and gently lowered it onto the snow.
    A workman released the cable. Another rev of the engines, a nudge from the crane, and the car rolled right side up. Water streamed from the vehicle, staining the snow a dirty brown.
    For a moment, no one approached it. They let it sit there, draining water. Then Dr. Kibbie pulled on gloves and trudged across the now-muddy snow to the driver’s door. He gave it a tug, but it would not open. He circled to the passenger side and yanked on the handle. He jumped back as the door swung open, releasing a sudden rush of water that drenched his boots and trousers.
    He glanced at the others, then focused again on the open door, which continued to drip. He took a breath, steeling himself against the view, and leaned inside the car. For a long moment he held that pose, his body bent at the waist, his rump poking out of the vehicle. Abruptly he straightened and turned to the others.
    “There’s nothing in here,” he said.
    “What?” asked Jane.
    “It’s empty.”
    “You don’t see
any
remains?”
    Dr. Kibbie shook his head. “There’s no body in this car.”
             
    “The divers came up with nothing, Lily. No body, no skeleton. No evidence at all that your cousin was ever in that water.”
    They sat in Jane’s parked car as flakes of falling snow gently settled on the windshield in an ever-thickening veil of lace.
    “I didn’t dream it,” Lily said. “I know it happened.” She looked at Jane with haunted eyes. “Why would I make it up? Why would I confess to killing him if it wasn’t true?”
    “We have confirmed it’s your mother’s car. The registration hasn’t been renewed in twelve years. The keys are still in the ignition.”
    “I told you they would be. I told you exactly where you’d find the car.”
    “Yes, everything you said has checked out, except for that one small detail. There’s no body.”
    “It could have rotted away.”
    “There should still be a skeleton. But there’s nothing. No clothing, no bones.” Jane paused. “You know what that means.”
    Lily swallowed and stared at the windshield, now blanketed in snow. “He’s alive.”
    “You haven’t been running from a ghost or an evil spirit. He’s still living flesh and blood, and I’d guess he’s pretty damn pissed at you for trying to kill him. That’s what this is all about, Lily. Revenge. Twelve years ago, he was only a kid. But now he’s a man, and he can finally get his payback. Last August, he lost your trail in Italy and had no idea how to find you. So he went after Sarah and Lori-Ann for information. But they didn’t know where you were, either; they were useless to him. He had to figure out another way to locate you.”
    “The Mephisto Foundation,” Lily murmured.
    “If Mephisto’s as well regarded as Sansone claims, then its reputation has probably spread beyond law enforcement. Clearly, Dominic’s heard about them, too. He certainly knew how to entice them. That phone call to Joyce O’Donnell. The Latin words, the seashell, the satanic symbols—it made Mephisto think they were finally tracking Satan. But I think they were being played.”
    “Dominic used them to find me.”
    “And they did a good job, didn’t they? In just ten days, Mephisto found you.”
    Lily thought about this for a moment. She said, “There’s no body. You can’t charge me with any crime now. You can’t hold me any longer.”
    Jane stared into eyes glittering with fear and thought:
She wants to run.
    “I’m free to go, right?”
    “Free?” Jane laughed. “You call it freedom, to live like a scared rabbit?”
    “I’ve survived, haven’t I?”
    “And when are you going to fight back? When are you going to take a stand? This isn’t the Devil we’re talking about, this is a man. He can be brought down.”
    “Easy for you to say. You’re not the one he’s hunting!”
    “No, but I’m hunting
him,
and I need your help. Work with me, Lily. You know him better than anyone.”
    “That’s why he can’t afford to let me live.”
    “I promise, you’ll be safe.”
    “You can’t keep that promise. You think he doesn’t already know where I am? You don’t know how meticulous he is. He misses no detail, no opportunity. He may be alive and breathing. But you’ll never