The Mephisto Club

She spun around to flee. But someone else had magically materialized in the tunnel behind her. It was the nun who had admitted Lily’s group into the underground passage. The woman stood very still, watching her. Blocking her way.

His demons have found me.

Lily made her choice in an instant. She lowered her head and slammed straight into the woman, sending her sprawling backward in a swoop of black fabric. The nun’s hand clawed at her ankle as Lily stumbled forward, kicking free.

Get to the street!

She was at least three decades younger than the German. Once outside, she could outrun him. Lose him in the crowds milling near the Coliseum. She scrambled up the steps, bursting through a door into the stunning brightness of the upper basilica, and ran toward the nave. Toward the exit. She managed only a few steps across the brilliant mosaic floor when, in horror, she slid to a halt.

From behind marble columns, three men emerged. They said nothing as they closed in, drawing the trap shut. She heard a door slam behind her and footsteps approach: the German and the nun.

Why are there no other tourists? No one around to hear me scream?

“Lily Saul,” said the German.

She turned to face him. Even as she did so, she knew the other three men were moving in even more tightly behind her. So this is where it ends, she thought. In this holy place, beneath the gaze of Christ on the cross. She did not ever imagine it would happen in a church. She’d thought it would be in a dark alley, perhaps, or in a dreary hotel room. But not here, where so many had looked up to the light.

“We’ve finally found you,” he said.

She straightened, her chin lifting. If she had to face the Devil, she’d damn well do it with her head high.

“So where is he?” the German asked.

“Who?”

“Dominic.”

She stared at him. This question she had not expected.

“Where is your cousin?” he said.

She shook her head in bewilderment. “Isn’t he the one who sent you?” she asked. “To kill me?”

Now the German looked startled. He gave a nod to one of the men standing behind Lily. She flinched in surprise as her arms were yanked behind her, as handcuffs snapped shut over her wrists.

“You will come with us,” the German said.

“Where?”

“A safe place.”

“You mean…you’re not going to-”

“Kill you? No.” He crossed toward the altar and opened a hidden panel. Beyond was a tunnel that she had never known existed. “But someone else very well may.”

THIRTY-TWO

Lily stared through the limousine’s tinted windows as the Tuscan countryside glided past. Five months ago, she had traveled south down this very road, but under different circumstances, in a rattling truck driven by an unshaven man whose only goal had been to get inside her pants. That night she had been hungry and exhausted, her feet sore from trudging half the night. Now she was on the same road, but heading north, back toward Florence, not a weary hitchhiker this time, but traveling in style. Everywhere she looked, in the backseat of the limo, she saw luxury. The upholstery was black leather, supple as human skin. The seat pocket in front of her held a surprising range of newspapers: today’s issues of the International Herald Tribune, the London Times, Le Figaro, and Corriere della Sera. Warm air whispered from heating vents, and in a refreshment rack were bottles of sparkling water and wine and a selection of fresh fruits, cheese and crackers. But comfortable though it was, it was still a prison, for she could not unlock the door. Shatterproof glass separated her from the driver and his companion in the front seat. For the past two hours, neither man had bothered to glance back at her. She couldn’t even be sure they were human. Maybe they were just robots. All she’d seen was the backs of their heads.

She turned and looked through the rear window at the Mercedes following them. She saw the German man stare back at her through his windshield. She was being escorted north by three men in two very expensive cars. These people had resources, and they knew what they were doing. What chance did she have against them?

I don’t even know who they are.

But they knew who she was. As careful as she’d been all these months, somehow these people had managed to track her down.

The limo took a turn off the highway. So they were not going all the way to Florence. Instead they were headed into the countryside, climbing the gentle hills of Tuscany. Daylight was almost gone, and in the thickening dusk she saw bare grapevines huddled on windswept slopes and crumbling stone houses, long abandoned. Why take this road? There was nothing out here except farms gone fallow.

Maybe that was the point. Here there’d be no witnesses.

She had wanted to believe the German when he’d said he was taking her to a safe place, had wanted it so badly that she had let herself be temporarily lulled by a little luxury, a comfortable ride. Now, as the limo slowed down and turned onto a private dirt road, she felt her heart battering against her ribs, felt her hands turn so slick she had to wipe them on her jeans. It was dark enough now. They’d take her on a short walk into the fields and put a bullet in her brain. With three men, it would be quick work, digging the grave, rolling in the body.

In January, the soil would be cold.

The limo climbed, winding through trees, the headlights flashing across gnarled undergrowth. She saw the brief red reflection from a rabbit’s eyes. Then the trees opened up, and they were stopped at an iron gate. A security camera glowed above an intercom. The driver rolled down his window and said, in Italian, “We have the package.”

Blinding floodlights came on, and there was a pause as the camera panned the occupants of the car. Then the gate whined open.

They drove through, followed by the Mercedes that had tailed them all the way from Rome. Only then, as Lily’s vision readjusted back to the darkness, did she see the silhouettes of statuary and clipped hedges lining the drive. And ahead, looming at the end of the gravel road, was a villa with lights blazing. She leaned forward in astonishment, staring at stone terraces and enormous urns and tall cypresses, like a row of dark spears pointing at the stars. The limo pulled up beside a marble fountain, now dry and silent for the winter. The Mercedes parked behind them, and the German stepped out and opened her door.

“Ms. Saul, shall we go into the house?”

She looked up at the two men flanking him. These people were taking no chances that she might escape. She had no choice but to go with them. She stepped out, her legs stiff from the ride, and followed the German up stone steps to the terrace. A cold wind swept leaves across her path, scattering them like ashes. Even before they’d reached the entrance, the door swung open and an elderly man stood waiting to greet them. He gave Lily only a cursory glance, then turned his attention to the German.

“The room is ready for her,” he said in Italian-accented English.

“I’ll be staying as well, if that’s all right. He’ll arrive tomorrow?”

The elderly man nodded. “A night flight.”

Who was coming tomorrow? Lily wondered. They climbed a magnificent balustrade to the second floor. As their party swept past, hanging tapestries stirred, trembling against stone walls. She had no time to ogle the artwork. They hurried her up a long hallway now, past portraits with eyes that watched her every step.

The elderly man unlocked a heavy oak door and gestured for her to enter. She stepped into a bedroom that was ponderously furnished with dark wood and thick velvets.

“This is only for tonight,” said the German.