The Mephisto Club

survivors were seated around the kitchen table. Although it was warmer in the great room where the fire was burning, none of them wanted to move from the kitchen. None of them wanted to be in the same room with the corpses.
    Maura finished rebandaging Lily’s arm. “There’s damage to your flexor tendons. I think you’re going to need surgery. At the very least, antibiotics.” She looked at Jane. “When the road’s clear, the first thing we need to do is get her to a hospital.”
    “It won’t be too much longer,” said Jane. “The plow’s halfway up the mountain.” She sat down and looked at Lily. “You realize the police will have questions for you. A lot of them.”
    Maura said, “It can wait until after she gets medical attention.”
    “Yes, of course. But Lily, you know you’re going to get asked about what happened here last night.”
    “Can’t you back up everything she says?” said Maura.
    “I didn’t see it all,” said Jane. “I slept through half of it.”
    “Thank God you didn’t finish your wine. Or we’d all be ashes today.”
    “I blame myself,” said Sansone. “I shouldn’t have fallen asleep at all. That was my mistake, letting Edwina pour me a glass.”
    Jane frowned at Sansone. “You were planning to stay up all night?”
    “I thought someone should be awake. Just in case.”
    “Then you already suspected Edwina?”
    “No, I’m embarrassed to admit. You have to understand how careful we are when we bring in a new member. They come to us only through referrals, from people we know. And then we make inquiries, background checks. Edwina wasn’t the one I had doubts about.” He looked at Lily. “You were the one I didn’t trust.”
    “Why Lily?” asked Jane.
    “That night, when my garden window was forced open, you remember I told you that we always keep it locked?”
    “Yes.”
    “Which means that someone unlatched it from the inside, someone who was in my house that night. I assumed it was Lily.”
    “I still don’t understand,” said Maura. “If you’re that careful about who joins the foundation, how could you be so wrong about Edwina?”
    “That’s what Gottfried and I have to find out. How she infiltrated. How it was planned and executed. She didn’t just show up one day on our doorstep; she had assistance, from someone within Mephisto, someone who scrubbed away anything suspicious in her background check.”
    “It’s the last thing Dominic told us,” said Lily.
“We’re not the only ones.”
    “I’m sure there are more.” Sansone looked at Jane. “Whether you realize it or not, Detective, we’re engaged in a war. It’s been going on for centuries, and last night was just one of the battles. The worst is coming.”
    Jane gave a shake of the head, a tired laugh. “I see we’re talking about those demons again.”
    “I believe in them,” Lily declared, her jaw squared in certainty. “I know they’re real.”
    They heard the scrape of the snowplow over pavement, the approaching rumble of a truck engine. At last the road was clear and they could leave this mountain; they could return to their lives. Maura, back to the arms of Daniel Brophy, who could bring her either heartbreak or hope. Jane, back to the job of peacemaker between her battling mother and father.
    And I’m going home to Gabriel. He’s waiting for me.
    Jane rose and crossed to the window. Outside, sunshine sparkled on perfect snow. The skies were cloudless, and by now the road home would be plowed and sanded. It was a beautiful day to drive home. To hug her husband and kiss her baby.
I can’t wait to see you both.
    “You still don’t believe me, do you, Detective?” said Sansone. “You don’t believe there’s a war going on.”
    Jane looked up at the sky and she smiled. “Today,” she said, “I choose not to.”

THIRTY-NINE
    Dark clouds hung low, and Lily could smell the tang of impending snow in the air as she stared up at the house where she had grown up. She did not see it as it was today, a derelict shell, the porch sagging, the clapboards weathered to gray. No, she saw it as it once was in summertime, with clematis flowering on the lattice and pots of red geraniums hanging from the eaves. She saw her brother Teddy come out of the house, heard the squeal and the slap of the screen door swinging shut behind him as he ran grinning down the porch steps. She saw her mother in the window, waving, as she called out, “Teddy, don’t be late for dinner!”