This psycho. Bentz had watched the damned video from the Department of Corrections so many times, he might as well have it on a loop.
The familiar image showed a prison cell. A female prisoner sat on the edge of her cot as a priest stepped inside the cell, the shadow of the bars striping his cassock. The prisoner looked up expectantly, ready to give her confession to the man of God, whose back was to the camera. As he stepped closer, she bent her head in prayer, probably hoping for absolution or some other damned thing. The priest appeared to say something softly to the confessor and then in one quick, sure movement, he reached down as if to bless her, but quickly, expertly snapped her neck.
She slumped quickly and Bentz noted that the priest didn’t use his trademark sharpened rosary beads to kill her. This time his actions were on camera; his image might be splashed on a monitor in the prison’s security hub, and he probably couldn’t risk his slower signature kill. The guards would have been upon him before he could finish. Instead of strangling the life out of her with a rosary constructed of piano wire and sharpened glass beads, he broke her neck, then left the rosary dangling between her fingers, the blood red beads sparkling as he glanced up at the camera he obviously knew was mounted near the cell door. Smiling triumphantly, he revealed himself.
Bentz’s stomach turned.
The sick son of a bitch actually grinned into the camera’s eye before disappearing from the cell.
Bentz’s jaw hardened.
Father John was back.
CHAPTER 2
Biting her lip, Zoe tried to figure out a way to save herself. To save Chloe. Somehow. Some way. First she had to get herself free.
While the whack job worked at his bench, she silently worked on the rope that bound her wrists and ankles. She had to make good her escape. Their escape. She wouldn’t leave Chloe. Not ever.
Once again, she tried to pull her hand to her abdomen. The tension on the rope intensified, so she relaxed. That wasn’t going to work. Think, Zoe, think. There has to be a way.
Again she tried to move. Again the bite of rough cord into her neck.
Damn!
She heard Chloe crying. Softly now, careful not to interrupt the freak from his task, she kept her gaze steady on his blocky body and the shadows he cast on the wall and tried again. This time, almost counterintuitively, she pulled her wrist closer to her naked back and upward toward her shoulders. It allowed her a range of movement, awkward though it was. She had trained as a gymnast in high school and also had double joints or hypermobility in her shoulders, elbows, and fingers—talents she assumed her abductor didn’t realize.
Still, it was hard work. But as she rotated her shoulders she felt the rope around her wrists give just a bit. She tried again, contorting, picking at the knot with her fingers. Noiselessly, knowing that time was running out, she gritted her teeth and kept picking.
Was it her imagination or did the rope move slightly?
Hope swelled. Heart thudding, she worked at the knots and remembered her capture. God, how could she have been so stupid to have been lured by him, to believe that her twin was in trouble?
She’d paid for her mistake, but she wasn’t going to docilely wait for whatever horror he meted out. No way! With an effort, she attempted to think clearly, to goddamned act despite the fear, deep and penetrating, cutting to her soul.
You have to get yourself free, Zoe. No one else is going to help you.
Silently, her jaw set, she picked at the huge knots in the semidarkness, working at the rope restraining her wrists, determined to break free.
Before it was too late. The clock on the wall counted off the seconds of her life.
Tick. Tick. Tick.
And still his sickening voice chanted the fateful song. “Happy birthday, dear twinsies,” he warbled tonelessly, then chuckled to himself, a freak to the core. Chloe’s sobbing continued, almost a countermelody to his grumbled refrain.
Shut up, Chloe! Don’t irritate him. He’s going to kill us, maybe torture and rape us first, so don’t hasten the process.
But her twin kept whimpering.
Zoe couldn’t see Chloe. She had tried, but the room was too dark; when she slid her gaze toward the sound of soft crying, she saw only a deep umbra.
If only she had some other means of escape aside from her own wits. A weapon. A club or a knife or a saw or a rake or an ax or . . . God, what she’d do for a damned gun. But as she squinted, her gaze scraping the walls and floor, there was only a meager array of tools on the wall and a cell phone that never seemed to ring, even though he talked on it often enough, always, it seemed to the same person. Now, he was using scissors, and she thought she spied screwdrivers and a crowbar on the wall, but she couldn’t be sure. The twilight was pervasive, the stale air close as she noiselessly picked at the knots. Feeling the rope shift, she tamped down a ray of hope that rose in her heart. No time to get ahead of herself. And she was sweating. Beads of perspiration rolled down toward the hard floor, her fingers slippery as she plucked at the braided nylon, her joints straining.
The rope shifted.
Loosened.
Or was it her mind?
Oh. God.
She pulled again on that end of the cord and again she felt the tension on her bonds lessen.
Chloe sniffed loudly, sobbed again.
Stop, Zoe wanted to shout. Don’t give this sicko the satisfaction of hearing your fear. Be strong. You can. You know you can.
But that was a lie, wasn’t it? Deep down Zoe had always known that she was the strong one, that her twin was weaker, always had been. Hadn’t Zoe played the role of protector since the day they were born, twenty-one years ago? Zoe had come into the world first, and according to their parents had let out a yowl that nearly shook the concrete and steel of the hospital. Minutes later her younger sister had entered this life with barely a peep. Chloe had been so quiet the maternity staff had to double-check to make certain the smaller baby had been breathing, her little heart beating.
Right now Zoe’s younger sister was certainly making up for that quiet entrance into St. Anthony’s Hospital, and it wasn’t a good thing.
Be quiet.
Please, please, please!
Be brave.
I’ll save you.
Zoe let go of the breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding.
If I can.
She, too, wanted to cry but knew it wouldn’t help. She, too, felt the need to scream and rail at the heavens, but again, that would do more harm than good. Zoe didn’t want the bastard to know what she was thinking or even that she was aware. She could not let him know she was plotting her escape. Let him believe her to be compliant and either still groggy from whatever drug he’d injected her with or so scared out of her mind that she couldn’t fight back. Let him think that she would be easy to deal with, that she would do exactly what he wanted without a fight.
As if!
Now, if she could just break free . . .
Somehow save herself and her twin. Jesus, could her sister please stop with the pathetic little sobs?
In the darkness, she stretched, trying to lengthen the cords holding her fast. She froze. The off-key singing was getting closer.
Her stomach crumpled in on itself and she almost gagged to think that the nut job had stopped whatever he was doing at the workbench and was drawing near. His footsteps padded on the ground, soft and frightening, but at least she had some idea of where he was in the gloom.
From the corner of her eye, she saw him reach for something on the wall above her—some new tool. Dear God, were there weapons just beyond her reach? Again, her heart leaped with hope as he turned back to the bench.
Come on. Come on.
Sweat drizzled down her back as once again she began to loosen the knotted cord.
“Hey!” His gravelly voice cut through the darkness. Sharp. Angry. The stupid song momentarily forgotten.
She froze. Oh, dear God, if he figured out that she was trying to escape—
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“Quit that!” he yelled.
She was doomed! Drenched in her own sweat, she didn’t so much as draw a single breath.
“All that cryin’ and sobbin’. Stop it. Won’t do no good anyhow. Besides,” he said, the edge in his voice giving way to a jovial tone. “It’s almost your birthday, so you should be happy. Right?” he cajoled Chloe, the evil in his voice dripping over his words.
Zoe’s skin crawled at his personal tone.
He glanced at the clock again and grunted. “Damn, the time.”
What the hell was his fascination with the time? Did he have to be somewhere? Was it important? Why was a clock mounted in this austere cave of a room?
“No more wailing!” And then he was back at it, humming and singing as he tinkered at the bench, working on . . . what? Nothing good, she thought. She didn’t want to go there, didn’t want to imagine what horrid, twisted fate he had plotted for Chloe and herself; the hollow pit in her stomach warned her that whatever he had in mind would be more horrible than she could imagine. A sick, slow torture and probable rape, considering the fact that he’d stripped her. No, she wouldn’t think of the possibilities, couldn’t go there.
With renewed conviction, she worked at her bonds, feeling the cords on her wrists slacken a bit more. She didn’t have a plan. She knew only that the first step was to break free before he realized what was happening, somehow get the drop on him. Get herself and her sister out of here. Maybe lock him inside if it were possible.
But first, the rope. It cut deep into her wrists, rubbing her skin raw, stinging as she plucked at the knot. With her back to him, she could only hope her movements were veiled by the darkness. Her sister sobbed a little more softly now, though it was still enough to distract him.
“I said knock it off,” he yelled angrily over the steady ticking of the clock. “Fuck!”
Snap!
Her heart stopped. The earthy-smelling room seemed to close in on her.
Oh, no!
She hazarded a glance over her shoulder and again saw the thin belt in the dim light that fell softly over his massive shoulders and back. Looming in a pool of gray light, still holding the horrid belt, he placed his hands on his hips and stared into the darkness, no doubt toward her twin.
“Didn’t you fuckin’ hear me?”
Oh. Dear. God. Chloe!
Snap!
He moved so quickly to crack the belt again, Zoe nearly jumped. In the silence that followed, Zoe wanted to cry for her sister, who had probably just received the worst whipping of her life.
“Don’t make me use this again,” he warned, his voice low and gravelly. He raised his arm again, and the leather snaked from his clenched fist.
Her throat turned to sand.
Fear slid through her blood.
Frantically she worked, watching him while the rope began to give. A little. Then a little more. She could move her hands more freely, felt the blood pumping through her veins again, sensation returning to her tingling fingers.
And then, almost magically, the cord gave way. The tight manacle fell free into a loose braid, and the tension on her neck relaxed.
Hallelujah!
Shaking her hands free, she wondered—should she try to unbind her ankles? Crap! She had to. It was necessary if she wanted to walk out of here on her own. Adrenaline firing her blood, she bent over a little more, the fetal position a cover as she studied the cord on her ankles with her fingertips, finding the knots.
And still he sang, though he kept checking the clock as if it were important. What did it matter what time . . . oh, God. Suddenly she understood; he was going to do something to them at the exact time of their births. That had to be it. The clock displayed prominently. The song. Both of them here . . .
And there wasn’t much time left.
She’d been born at 1:21 a.m. Chloe had come along seventeen minutes later at 1:38.
Oh, God. Another look at the clock.
1:14.
If she was right, she only had seven more minutes to make a move! Frantically, she tore at the loosening knot. It began to unravel.
Come on, come on!
Viperlike, the braided cord slid from her ankles. Finally! Zoe held fast to one frayed end and pulled, wincing as the rope slid round her neck and fell away. She gripped the rope. Now she had a weapon.
“. . . birthday, dear Zoe,” he sang, striking fear into her heart as he singled her out. Of course. She was the firstborn. “Happy birthday to—”
She sprang!
He started to turn just as she landed on his back.
“Hey!” he yelled, startled. He dropped the scissors, then bellowed, “What the fu—”
He shifted, trying to throw her off, but she held on with a steely desperation and wrapped the rope around his neck. Roaring, grunting, jumping like a bucking bronco in a rodeo, he tried to fling her from his back. But she held on tight, anchoring the cord over her fingers and winding it around his thick neck. To anchor herself in place, she had to clench her legs around his gross, naked waist. The stench of him reached her nostrils as he tried to free himself, whipping his head back and forth.
The rope burned her hands but cut deep into his flesh. Clenching her jaw, she twisted it tighter, imagining a crushing force on his windpipe. He dug frantically at it with his fingers.
Chloe’s mewling turned to terrified screams.
Die, freak! Zoe thought as he twisted and turned, gasping, falling against the workbench, sending his scissors and ribbons, wire, and a stack of clothes—her damned clothes, the dress she’d been wearing when he’d abducted her—flying and scattering onto the floor. One of his arms flailed, hitting the domed light. It fell from the ceiling, skittering across the floor and cracking, giving off a sick bluish hue. Still he bucked. Jumping up and down, he clawed at the rope with one hand. The other big paw flailed backward, his fist swishing the air over his head in a wild attempt to connect with any part of her.
No way! No frickin’ way!
She threw her weight backward, pulling with all her strength, trying to cut off his air supply or sever his windpipe or break his damned neck.
Letting out a garbled growl, he stamped his powerful legs, then threw them both back against the wall, squeezing her body between his muscular back and the rough cement.
Bam!
Pain jolted down her spine.
Her teeth rattled.
The breath was forced from her lungs in a whoosh and a groan.
She felt her grip begin to slip.
No!
She held on as he pounded her, taking a step forward, then throwing all his weight backward once more as he clawed at the rope and gasped.
“Die, bastard!” she hissed.
“Zoe?” Chloe cried.
Crack! The back of her head slammed against the wall.
Pain exploded through her skull. Lights flashed behind her eyes. She thought she might pass out and the rope began to slip in her hands.
For the love of God, just die!
As Chloe cried out again, Zoe snapped back to awareness and yanked hard on the rope. She wound it tighter until her shoulder muscles screamed and the nylon cut into her fingers.
The beast responded by clawing at the rope. Sputtering and moaning, he staggered away from the wall, a little less steady this time.
She braced herself, pulled back so hard that her arm muscles ached.
His muscles bunched. With a muffled roar, he threw himself backward again. She banged against the wall and he pinned her, squeezing her against rough concrete. Every bone in her body rattled and her bare skin felt scraped raw.
She felt the rope slipping. No, no, no!
Desperately she clung on. Tried to breathe.
“Zoe!” Chloe screamed from the shadows in the corner. “Help me!”
Oh, Jesus, what do you think I’m trying to do?
Zoe’s fingers were cramped and bleeding. She dragged in a breath, determined to hold on.
The monster’s back sl
ackened. He stumbled slightly and then caught his balance as he gasped and sputtered. He was strong, but his knees were giving out.
Good! Gritting her teeth, she wound the rope around her fingers and yanked even tighter. Both his hands were on the noose, scraping and pulling. He rocked to and fro, his legs wobbling.
That’s it, you sick whack job. Die! Take your last damned breath.
Wobbling, he sank to his knees.
Still, she clung to the rope as his throat rattled, a hiss of air still escaping. Damn it! With all her strength, she wrenched the cord so hard she was certain the bones in her hands would break. She didn’t care. “Chloe!” she yelled. “Get yourself free.”
More wailing.
Sometimes her twin was such a wimp!
“Pull yourself together! The scissors. Cut yourself free! Come on, Chloe! Do it! Do it now!” She was barking orders as the big man teetered on his knees. “Die, you son of a bitch,” she growled into his ear as gravity dragged him to the ground. “Just frickin’ die!”
As he slumped to the floor, pinning her leg, she didn’t let go, wasn’t about to take any chances. Still holding tight to the cord, she searched the gloom and ignored the pain screaming up her thigh. Damn it all to hell, he was a heavy bastard.
With difficulty, she unwrapped the cord from one hand, then in the gloom, gripped both ends with the other. Slapping and sweeping the floor with her free arm, she frantically searched for a weapon.
When he moaned, she tugged the rope again, but her strength was nearly zapped. Chloe was still whimpering in a far corner. Shit! As usual, Zoe had to do everything. Scrabbling wildly with her free hand, she hit something sharp. Metal. The scissors!
She slid backward and kicked at the beast of a man with her free foot to roll him off her leg. Finally, she let go of the cord around his neck. Then she curled her bloody fingers through the eye ring of the scissors, turned, and with all her might, stabbed him in the throat. The blades went deep into the soft tissue, right into the welt created by the cord.