She prayed she could find the guts to kill him.
Surprisingly, she had come to realize that she wasn’t the total coward he believed her to be. Now, with her situation so dire and with the realization that she couldn’t rely on Zoe or anyone else, she realized she could do it. She could attack.
If he came close and faced her, she’d give him a sharp, hard knee to the groin; she knew she could drive her leg upward with tremendous force.
Chloe, like her twin, had been a soccer player for years in junior high and high school. Hence, she’d developed thighs of steel. On the playing field she’d been much more aggressive than in day-to-day life, so she knew she had it in her. Hell, she would summon all her aggression and fear, and rocket his balls into the back of his brain. Bam!
Just give me the chance.
Guts grinding, nerves tight, so scared she wanted to fall into a million pieces, she clutched her bit of glass and decided after kicking him hard in the nuts, she’d find a way to gouge his eyes.
Oh, Jesus, she thought she might throw up as she watched him work.
After he’d tidied up, if that’s what it was, he began to fuss with their clothes again, patting and primping the items on his workbench. With an almost religious zeal he placed the thongs on the dresses, carefully making certain he’d placed hers on her red dress, then Zoe’s on the black one. The bras were next, hooked, lacy pushup cups pointing toward the grimy ceiling. He eyed her bra and clucked his tongue a bit before gently placing it over her thong. “Naughty girls,” he said.
Oh, yeah, wearing sexy underwear was “naughty,” but kidnapping, hog-tieing, and probably murdering a person in some sick ritual was okay? What kind of fucked-up thinking was that?
Anger sizzled through her blood.
Who was this guy?
Why did he think he had the right to do this to her? To torture her? To keep her captive? Expect her to pee in his awful pail and drink his goddamned protein drink and be grateful that he was keeping her alive for a few more hours or days in this damp, smelly, filthy dungeon? What kind of a neat freak was he? Folding clothes gently, sniffing crotches of panties, and keeping her captive in this sty?
She clutched the bit of glass.
Oh, hell, he was getting ready to leave! He’d straightened this prison cell as best he could and seemed agitated, angry. Muttering to himself, he patted his pockets and found a cell phone.
A cell phone!
Her heart leaped as he dragged the ladder into place and wedged the rails into the trapdoor above. Could she somehow get away and maybe steal his phone from him in the process?
Get the drop on him and call 9-1-1?
She couldn’t believe her good luck. Now, if she only had the nerve . . . God, help me. Her mouth grew dry, not a drop of spit in it.
She had to try. Before he left. It was her only hope.
Did his damned phone work underground? Where the hell would the nearest cell tower be?
Shit, shit, shit!
She amped herself up.
“I told you,” he was saying. “I’ll get her in the morning, yeah, yeah, with the damned dog . . . what? The other one? She’s here. Got her.” He glanced at Chloe over his shoulder. “Trust me, she’s no problem. It’s the other one. Zoe. That little cu—er, bitch that got free, but no worries. I’ll get her. First light.”
So he hadn’t caught Zoe. There was hope....
He fell quiet for a moment, then went on. “Yeah, I know, I know. For Christ’s sake I get it. She’s first . . .” Another pause. “No, no. This one will wait. Uh-huh. Second-born. Always weaker.” Then a merciless laugh. “Yeah, that’s right. Like the runt of the litter.” Another ugly chuckle.
He paced, listening, and Chloe quietly gathered her legs under her. If she could just catch him unaware, while he was on the phone, one hand busy holding the cell to his ear . . .
Do it. Do it now. Before he hangs up!
“Look, just have some faith, Myra. I’m on it,” he was saying as he turned his back to his captive.
Holding the shard in her palm, Chloe perched on her feet, still huddled down, and took a deep breath.
NOW!
Without another thought, she sprang.
CHAPTER 17
“Owwwwrrrrr!”
Son of a bitch!
The pathetic little bitch had blindsided him!
Launching herself at his back from the dark corner of the cell, she’d wrapped her legs around his torso and clamped herself on. Holding on with her legs, she’d reached over his shoulder and, using both hands, rammed something sharp and hard into his cheek.
He roared and bucked, his cell phone flying from his hand.
Pain shot through his cheek and she thrust upward, slicing through skin and muscle, scraping against bone.
Jesus effin’ Christ, she was trying to put the knife or scissors or whatever it was into his eye, drag the blade into his orbital socket with the intent to blind him.
Goddammit, how had this happened?
“You little shit!” he screamed, grabbing hold of her hand, forcing it away from his face as blood poured from the wound.
“Die, die, die!” she shrieked, frantic.
Twisting in the air, he forced her arm backward and heard a sucking sound as her weapon was forced from his flesh. The pain! It felt like his face was ripped open. He bucked again. This time her legs lost their hold.
Squealing, she went flying across the room.
Thud!
Her body hit the concrete wall, probably rattling her bones, possibly cracking her skull as she slid limply to the floor.
“What the hell was that?” he demanded. He lunged at her, hot, sticky blood dripping from his chin. For the love of Christ, what was wrong with her? Didn’t she know he could snuff her life out in an instant? He could’ve killed her at any moment, but instead he’d kept her alive.
Because you have to. This one, she has to die second as she was born second. Besides, she’s bait for the other one.
Bleeding like a stuck pig, he reached down, intent on subduing her. But there was no need. She’d obviously been knocked senseless. But he could take no chances. This time he wouldn’t be so foolish. He would tie her as he had originally, feet and hands bound together behind her back. Fuck her need for food and water. So she had to piss or shit? Who cared? She could foul herself. No more Mr. Nice Guy.
He grabbed for her arms, intent on hauling her to her feet so he could adjust her manacles.
One leg shot upward. Bang! Her knee connected with his groin. “Owwwww!”heroared, fury and pain ripping through him, his crotch on fire. Immobilized, he doubled over. Held himself. Crumpled from the sheer agony radiating from the juncture of his legs.
“Bastard,” she hissed, and scrambled quickly away.
From the corner of his eye he saw her scuttle to the spot where his phone had landed.
No!
Through a veil of raw pain he saw her snag the cell, then clamber ungainly up the damned ladder.
For the love of Christ, why had he left it down? Holding his nuts and willing the pain to lessen, he could only ride the wave of pain and watch her flee. God, it hurt. It hurt so damned bad. But he couldn’t let her get away.
Sucking his breath through his teeth, he rolled to his knees and made the laborious crawl to the base of the ladder. But she was already up and out. Fuck! He nearly passed out again, and paused to drag in deep breaths.
He was trying to breathe through the searing pain when the ladder moved.
What?
The ends of the rails scraped against the floor and then slowly, the ladder started to lift. No! That little bitch was going to take away his only means of escape from this place? Leave him in here to wait to rot? All of a sudden his private sanctuary, where he’d always felt safe from the world, began to close in around him like a tomb. A dark, wet, hopeless dungeon.
Hell, no!
The end of the ladder was moving upward, inching its way through the opening. Christ Almighty
!
Forcing himself to his feet, he took a swing at the bottom rung.
Missed.
Up it went a bit farther.
“NO!”
Another swipe.
Another miss!
God, his balls ached. Shit! His heart was thudding, a new fear sweeping through him as the idea that he was going to be trapped like a rat became more of a reality. His groin throbbed as the ladder moved steadily upward.
He coiled, released, and jumped. This time, the fingers of one hand curled around the lowest rung. The ladder stopped—his weight was too much for her—but just then she gave it a shake and his hand started to slip.
No damned way.
With all his strength he grabbed hold with his free hand and then gave a loud, sharp whistle. A second later he heard a responsive bark and knew old Red had heard him.
The dog would come running. She would let the ladder slip through her fingers and—
Swish!
His fingers had slid from the ladder and he was falling backward. His feet slipped out from under him as he went down, hard.
Craaack! He landed hard on his back. His head slammed against the cement floor. For a second, blackness swirled around him. He blinked just as the ladder, a massive projectile, shot downward, straight at him.
Reflexively, his arms flew up.
Too late! The wooden missile twisted, the bottom of the side rail, ramming his throat. Pain exploded in his neck. For a split second he thought his Adam’s apple and larynx had been crushed.
The room went dark and he fought to stay conscious. Struggled to breathe.
Overhead he heard the dog’s warning growl.
Old Red had come to save the day. If only it wasn’t too late. Over the throbbing in his body, he felt a moment’s relief. If he could just pull himself to his feet, ignore the pain radiating from his skull, throat, and groin, then he might be able to set the ladder up and—
“Good boy, it’s all right,” Chloe was saying, actually trying to talk to the dog.
No!
“Red, attack! Sic ’em!” He tried to call out to the dog, but his voice failed him, and all that came was a whistle of air from his lungs. Damn! He tried again. “Red! Attack!” But once more all that he was able to do was a whistle.
He hoped the dog would understand and detain her. Even if she managed to get away, Red would track her down. The dog had been trained that way. He found the ladder and started to right it when he heard the dog bark an alarm. Good. Probably had the bitch pinned down.
In the next moment a banging sound startled him as the trapdoor overhead dropped into place.
Wait! She couldn’t . . . wouldn’t . . .
Over Red’s now-muted but furious barking, he heard the trapdoor shut with a heavy thunk. Then, the distinctive click of a lock snapping shut.
Shit!
That fuckin’ little bitch, the girl he thought was a complete wimp, an absolute coward, had not only duped him. She’d locked him in his own damned dungeon.
Worse yet, she had his cell phone.
True to his word, Jonas Hayes had sent over the 21 Killer file via the Internet. For the second night in a row, Bentz sat at his computer, but instead of drinking beer, he was letting a cup of coffee go cold on a side table. Also, tonight he wasn’t staring at footage of Father John exiting the prison where he’d left his last victim, but was skimming the reports and notes on the Diana and Delta Caldwell murders. Trial testimony was included, as well as interviews with Donovan Caldwell, who repeatedly maintained his innocence.
Hayes had also sent information on Lucy and Laney Springer, twenty-one-year-old twins who had been killed more recently in the same ritualistic manner as the Caldwell sisters. Although the DA did not have a strong enough case to indict Donovan Caldwell for the Springer twins’ homicides, it had been generally assumed that Caldwell was the murderer. Evidence at the Springer crime scene and the circumstances of the killing followed the patterns of the Caldwell homicides.
Not only were both the crime scenes in the Caldwell and Springer homicides nearly identical, down to the way the victims were found hog-tied and naked near their neatly stacked clothes, but the same kind of heavy-duty Christmas ribbon had been found at each scene. The ribbon of choice was red, with wires running through it. This detail had been hidden from the press and public until Donovan Caldwell’s trial, of course, when all of the evidence had been presented. The differences in the ribbon, Bentz figured, was one of the reasons that the prosecution did not try Caldwell for both sets of murders at the same time, as it wasn’t an exact match. Very close, but not from the same “batch.” And the DA hadn’t wanted to give the defense any discrepancies that might weaken the charges against Caldwell. They only needed the killer to be found guilty of one set of murders to get him off the streets.
Bentz’s chair groaned in protest as he leaned back and sorted through some of the images on file, stopping at a series of photos of the victims, their naked bodies bruised with ligature marks that indicated how they’d been held captive before they died.
“Sick son of a bitch,” he said, and felt his stomach turn just as it did when he first visited a crime scene and saw the victims. It was literally a gut reaction, one he couldn’t control, and had been the cause of many a sneering joke from Brinkman.
“What’s wrong, Bentz? Can’t keep your cornflakes down this morning?” Brinkman had asked at one scene where the victim’s head was nearly severed and Bentz’s stomach had roiled. Watching Bentz turn green, Brinkman had smirked and smoked a cigarette. At another gruesome crime scene where a domestic dispute had turned deadly and both husband and wife lay dead in their blood-soaked bed, their flesh turning fetid from the days of summer heat, their bodies bloated, Bentz had fought to keep the contents of his stomach down. But Brinkman had waltzed in, noticed that Bentz was struggling, and said, “Smells great in here, doesn’t it? Makes me want a ham sandwich. How ’bout you, Bentz? Or is your system too delicate for it?”
“Jerk,” Bentz said to himself. He studied the bodies and listened with half an ear to Midnight Confessions as once more Dr. Sam gave out advice over the airwaves. Somewhere, Bentz was certain, Father John was also listening intently. Bentz was so caught up in his thoughts, he didn’t notice his wife step into the room.
“Rick?”
He glanced up.
Olivia was standing on the other side of the desk. In her arms was their daughter, Ginny, all of eight months, with what little hair she had sticking up as if she’d just put her finger in a light socket.
His heart melted at the sight of his sleeping child, tiny head resting on her mother’s breast.
“Hey.” He met his wife’s sleepy eyes. “What about our vow to let sleeping kids lie?”
Dressed in oversized pajamas, her own hair a crown of wild curls, Olivia didn’t crack a smile. “I took that oath when I thought there was a chance our daughter might actually get to see her father once in a while.”
“Oooh. Low blow.”
“Not low enough,” she muttered, and rounded the desk to perch on the extension that had once housed a typewriter. With a glance at the computer screen and a view of the photo of Laney Springer’s corpse, Olivia scowled.
“Nice,” she said. “Healthy environment for our daughter to grow up in, don’t you think?”
He clicked off the monitor. “You knew I was a homicide cop,” he said, touching her knee. “If you don’t remember, that’s how we met.”
“Oh, I remember.” A little smile toyed at her lips and she met his gaze with the gorgeous round eyes that had seen into a killer’s mind. “Like it was yesterday.” She handed the baby off to him. “And it’s not a good thing.”
“Our meeting?”
“The circumstances of it.” Cradling his child against him, he felt the ruffle of Ginny’s downy hair against his neck, smelled her clean baby scent, watched in fascination as rosebud lips let out a sigh.
“I know it bothers you—”
“A lot,” she responded quickly.
“Okay, I get it. Really. But this is my job for now. And I can’t just turn my back on my cases. You know that. And come on, how would you have felt if I’d ignored you when you came storming into my office, ranting and raving about seeing women as they were being murdered?”
She winced at the memory. “I know.”
“Look, if I hadn’t followed my gut, if I hadn’t believed in you and tried to help you, a murderer might still be stalking the streets of New Orleans.”
“Another murderer,” she corrected.
“Yeah, another one.”
“I know your job’s important. Don’t get me wrong. But you’ve done it a long time.” She let out a sigh through her nose. “Let someone else do it. There are other cops at the department. Younger cops.”
“They have families, too.” His daughter nestled closer to him, and he felt her soft breath against the base of his neck.
“Are you going to try and make me feel guilty for wanting you to be around to watch your daughter grow up?” Olivia cocked her head to look at him more closely. “Is that what you’re trying to do? Because it won’t work.”
“It’s my—”
“Yeah, I know. You’ve already said. But think about it. You’ve got enough years in. You could retire.”
He thought for a second. The same old arguments played through his head. “I’m not even fifty.”
“I’m not saying quit working, I’m just saying change jobs. Do consulting. Become a PI. Go back to school. Teach. Whatever.” She threw up a hand. “Just something less dangerous. Okay?” Little worry lines appeared between her eyebrows. “I’d like you to see Ginny graduate from college and become the greatest nuclear physicist, or a senator, or the researcher who cures cancer.”
“Not the first female president of the United States?”
“Hopefully by then, the second or third woman who’s been elected, but, sure, Ginny could handle that in her spare time.”
He chuckled and the baby reacted, startled a bit, but didn’t wake. “Lofty aspirations, Mom.” He pressed his lips to Ginny’s head.
“Don’t be obtuse. You know what I mean. Your job is dangerous. Dear God, I almost lost you a few years back.”