Malice

CHAPTER 24

Something was off.

Way out of kilter.

Bentz felt it in the air, in the silence of the night. When he pulled up in front of Lorraine’s home the street was empty-no silver Chevy prowling the neighborhood. A few lights glowed from the tri-level house, but the curtains were drawn. Hadn’t Lorraine said she’d seen Jennifer from her window? Worse yet, as he approached he noticed the front door was ajar.

Had she left it open for him?

No way. When he’d talked to her, Lorraine had been scared out of her mind. Every muscle in his body tensed. “Lorraine,” he called, slowly and silently withdrawing his weapon from his shoulder holster. “Lorraine? It’s Rick Bentz.”

Silence.

Carefully, sensing danger, he nudged the door further open with his weapon, and hearing no sound from within, slipped into the house. Lights were on in the living room, and he stiffened at a subtle movement across from him until he realized that it was his own reflection in the mirrored wall. The room was empty, a book facedown on the worn green sofa.

“Lorraine?” He listened but heard nothing.

Moving silently through the hallway toward the back of the house, Bentz passed an empty dining room with mail piled on the table. As he approached the darkened kitchen he smelled it.

The distinctive, metallic odor of blood.

His stomach dropped to the floor.

Bracing himself, he stepped into the kitchen doorway and caught a glimpse of feet, one slipper kicked off, poking out from behind a cabinet. He stepped closer. Her body lay facedown, blood matting the back of her head.

Lorraine.

Bile crawled up his throat. Bentz flicked on the light and quickly checked to make sure the room was empty before kneeling at her side. But he knew she was dead. He felt for a pulse.

Nothing.

“Holy Christ.” This was his fault. He knew it. “Son of a bitch.” Yanking his phone from his pocket, he dialed 9-1-1, identified himself, and gave the dispatcher the pertinent information.

Who had done this to Lorraine?

No doubt the same person who had offed Shana McIntyre. The connection was obvious: Rick Bentz.

And Bentz knew he was the cause. The catalyst. “Jennifer” had shown herself to Lorraine, knowing full well that Lorraine would phone him. Then, after Lorraine had reported the sighting, “Jennifer” had killed her with flawless dispatch. Even now she could be watching, enjoying the show.

Twisted bitch.

Though he sensed that the house was empty, the murderer long gone, he couldn’t be certain. He hung up and checked the rest of the house. Moving carefully, trying not to touch anything or disturb any fingerprints or evidence the killer may have left behind, he searched closets and did a perfunctory check of the back deck, but the perp had fled the scene. Of course. Bentz put in another call to Hayes and left his third message within an hour, then returned to the living room. A loud, unworldly screech reverberated through the room.

Bentz ducked behind the hallway wall, then peered out in time to see a gray cat streak from the back of the couch and bolt behind a plaid upholstered chair. From behind the worn cushions it hissed, glaring at him with glittering gold eyes.

Bentz’s skyrocketing pulse slowed a bit. He’d forgotten Lorraine had always kept cats, having seen no evidence of the animal when he’d visited.

Shaking inside, craving a cigarette, he waited outside on the porch near a grapefruit tree. His leg throbbed and he tried to maintain calm by focusing on the sounds of the night. Over the buzz of insects and the barking of a dog a few streets over, the wails of sirens split the night air. Good. He shoved his hair away from his face, noticing a nervous neighbor peeking out at him through blinds.

The show’s about to begin, he thought while a jogger ran past the entrance to the cul-de-sac. His eyes followed the movement. The runner was a slim woman-or was it a man?-in a baseball cap and dark clothes. No reflective gear. She glanced toward him, but she was too far away to see her features.

Yet, there was something about her that seemed familiar.

What? The thought stopped him cold. Familiar? Are you out of your mind? You can’t even make out the runner’s gender. Get a grip, Bentz, and figure this thing out before another one of the people you interviewed winds up dead. Think, for God’s sake. You’re going to have to answer a lot of questions.

As he watched, she turned down a side street. Maybe she’d seen a silver car cruising the neighborhood. “Hey!” he called after her, but she was too far away. He’d never catch her on foot, and he couldn’t leave in the car. Not after calling the cops, who, by the sound of screaming sirens, would arrive within the next thirty seconds.

Forget the runner for now.

Bentz turned off the voice in his head and, still longing for a cigarette or a stiff drink or both, walked toward the curb.

Why had Lorraine phoned him?

Had she really seen Jennifer?

Or was it all a ruse?

He stared down the dark street where the runner had disappeared just as flashing lights strobed the night and a police cruiser screamed around the corner.

Who had killed Lorraine?

Jennifer?

Bentz knew in his gut that Lorraine’s murder had everything to do with the death of Shana McIntyre. Both women were dead because of their relationship to his ex-wife. Both women were dead because of him. Because they’d spoken to him. Guilt squeezed the breath from his lungs. If he hadn’t called them, hadn’t shown up on their doorsteps, would Shana and Lorraine be alive today?

Bentz rose as the police car screeched to a stop at the curb. Two Torrance police officers exploded from their vehicle and wheeled toward him.

“You Bentz?” the driver asked, a young buck with his weapon drawn. His lips were tight, his eyes narrowed, suspicion giving him an edgy appearance.

“Yeah. I’m a cop. New Orleans PD. My firearm is in my shoulder holster. Badge in my wallet.”

“What happened here?” the second cop asked, a woman as in tense as her partner, her gun pointed dead center at Bentz’s chest.

“Shooting. Looks like a homicide.” The words rolled off his tongue, business as usual. So cold and routine, Bentz thought. But you knew her. You knew this woman. “She called me…was scared by some thing she saw. I came right over, found her dead.”

“The vic inside?”

“Yeah. In the kitchen. Back of the house. It’s clear, aside from a cat.”

“I’m on it,” the woman cop said as the wail of another siren cut through the night. She took off for the house.

Across the cul-de-sac a neighbor, a fat man in a tight sweatsuit, drifted onto his front porch, to eye what was happening while the male cop still kept his weapon at ready.

“Don’t move,” the first cop ordered Bentz. The muzzle of his pistol didn’t waver. “’Til we sort this all out, I don’t want you to friggin’ breathe.”

Olivia clicked off the television, stretched on the parlor sofa, and whistled to the dog. She’d stayed up later than usual, watching the end of a sappy movie she’d seen twenty years earlier.

Upstairs she changed into her nightgown, noting in the bathroom mirror that her body showed no signs of pregnancy. She was just turning down the bed, wishing Bentz were home, when the phone rang. “Speak of the devil,” she said to Hairy S, who was poised to jump onto the mattress. “Only someone on the West Coast would call after midnight. Right?”

But caller ID told her it was a restricted call and her insides tensed a bit as she said, “Hello?”

For a second no one responded, and Olivia felt that same drip of fear that was always with her when Bentz was on a dangerous case. “Hello?”

“He’s getting himself into trouble,” a woman’s voice rasped in her ear.

Olivia’s scalp prickled. For a second she couldn’t speak.

“People are dying,” the voice informed her.

“Excuse me? What?” Her heart was suddenly racing, her palms damp. She knew this was the same crank caller who had phoned a few days earlier. The woman intent on rattling her.

“There’s been another murder.” The voice was little more than a hiss.

“No!” Her stomach hit the floor. Rick? Had something happened to Rick? For the love of God, what was this woman saying? No, no…of course the caller had to be talking about Shana McIntyre. Right? “Who is this?” Olivia demanded, some of her fear bleeding into anger.

“Take a wild guess,” the sandpapery voice suggested. “Or ask RJ. He’ll know.”

“Ask whom?”

She heard a hollow, sultry laugh.

Jennifer. Bentz’s first love.

“Why are you doing this?”

Click.

The phone went dead in her hand. Olivia felt herself shaking inside, not from fear, but from rage, white hot and seething. A fury so deep it nearly blinded her. To think that someone would dare mess with her husband, then try to intimidate her in her own home. “You sicko,” she hissed, wishing she could confront the bitch, then slammed down the receiver.

Incensed, she wanted to punch out Rick’s number, then thought better of it. Whoever had called her expected her to go crying to RJ, as Jennifer used to call him. The caller wanted Olivia to play the role of the frightened little female.

No way.

Olivia wasn’t going to give the bitch the satisfaction.

For now she’d sit tight. But in the morning she would dial her own phone company and see if they could give her any information about this pathetic call. Until then, if the coward called back, Olivia was ready to tear into her.

“Get over it,” she muttered, either to herself or her tormentor, she didn’t know which.

To cool off, she headed downstairs and double-checked all the locks on the doors and windows. A little obsessive, but it helped her feel safe. Reassured that everything was in order, she climbed the steep steps back to her room, the bedroom she shared with Rick.

She hated to do it, but for the first time in a long, long while, Olivia shut her bedroom window. Somehow it felt like giving in and that really pissed her off, but she flipped the latch, wanting to play it safe. No longer was there a cooling breeze off the bayou slipping into the room, no rustle of the cottonwood leaves, no scent of magnolia drifting inside. Nor could she hear the soothing sounds of chirping crickets and croaking frogs.

Irritated that she had to change her routine for some whacko, she slid between the sheets and patted the mattress. Hairy S didn’t need a second invitation. He hopped onto the bed and burrowed deep under the covers to lie unperturbed next to Olivia. “Good boy,” she said absently as she scratched his furry little head. He let out a soft grunt of pleasure, but Olivia didn’t even smile. She was too aggravated, too frustrated. She thought again of flying to California to tell Bentz about her pregnancy.

She was tired of this separation.

Sick of the secrets.

Maybe she should leave tomorrow. Or at least in the next few days…

Plumping her pillow, she decided that first thing in the morning she’d go online and buy herself a damned airline ticket. She’d fly to L.A. and reconnect with her husband. Whether he wanted to or not.

That was what marriage was all about, wasn’t it? Connection. Communication. Trust. Oh, God…she was losing him; she could feel it in the emptiness of their dark bedroom.

But not without a fight, damn it. She wasn’t going to give up on him.

She closed her eyes, willing herself to sleep, and was about to drop off when the phone blasted again.

“Son of a…”

Before the second ring, she steeled herself for another creepy onslaught and yanked the phone from its cradle. “Now what?” she snapped.

“And I love you, too,” Bentz said.

Her heart softened instantly and her throat grew thick at the sound of his deep voice. God, she missed him. “Hey,” she whispered, tears burning her eyes. Good Lord, she was acting crazy. Tears? It had to be her hormones, right? But it was just so damned good to hear his voice. Clearing her throat and pushing herself to a sitting position, she asked, “What’s going on?”

“Nothing good.”

Her heart turned to stone.

“I’m at the Torrance Police Department.”

“Torrance?”

“Yeah. I thought you should know. Hear it from me.”

“Hear what?” she asked, suddenly frightened.

“Oh, Jesus, Livvie, it’s a mess,” he said and she heard the weariness in his voice. “I got a call from Lorraine, Jennifer’s stepsister, saying she’d spotted Jennifer outside her house. I drove down there and when I got to the house, Lorraine was dead. Homicide.”

“Oh dear God,” Olivia whispered, holding the phone against her head in one hand, twisting the covers with her other. This couldn’t be happening. Couldn’t! “Jennifer?” she asked, but felt the truth hit her deep inside. Jennifer Bentz, real or imagined, ghost or person, was behind the carnage.

“Who knows?” He explained the events of the night while Olivia, feeling cold as death inside, listened, trying to concentrate while feeling as if a vise were tightening around her chest. Though she no longer had visions of murders from the victim’s eyes, she still felt the mind-numbing dread run through her as she thought of the dead women and the torture they’d gone through.

Bentz was saying that his friend Jonas Hayes had driven down from L.A. He’d been sympathetic when Bentz had complained about having his firearm confiscated and being forced to endure questioning in the interrogation room. For the first time in his life, Bentz had been questioned on the other side of the mirrored window.

The Torrance police had believed his story, though there were still a lot of questions in the air because Bentz had visited both Shana and Lorraine in the past week and since then both women had been murdered. Bentz was, without too many doubts, under suspicion.

Olivia felt sick inside.

“…it took hours,” he said, his voice tense with a hardly-restrained anger, “to explain about the whole Jennifer-thing and how someone wanted me in the L.A. area, the murderer most likely, so he could start his rampage. The long and the short of it is, I’m being used as the excuse, or even motive, for the killer to strike.”

“Wait a minute. You’re saying you think Jennifer or whoever is impersonating her is killing people and trying to make you look like you’re involved?”

“That’s about it.”

“Good Lord, Bentz. That’s not only far-fetched. It’s just plain nuts.”

“And would take incredible planning, as well as luck.” He paused as if thinking things over. “Look, as I said, I just wanted you to hear it from me, rather than from someone else or on the news. Once the media ties Shana to Lorraine to me and Jennifer, things are really going to heat up.” He hesitated and she imagined him running one hand in frustration through his thick hair, his eyebrows drawn together, his jaw set.

“I’m glad you called. I’ve been worried.”

“Is that why you answered like you did?”

“Wait? What? How did I answer?” she asked.

“Like you were all pissed off. What was that all about?”

She hadn’t wanted to confide in him, to worry him, but since he asked, she saw no read to lie or sugar coat what was going on. “Well, Hotshot, you weren’t the first call I had tonight.”

“No?”

She wanted to lie to him. The last thing he needed was any more stress, but she already felt guilty enough about keeping the news of the baby a secret. They couldn’t have any more secrets between them. Their relationship was fragile enough already. “My favorite prank caller phoned earlier tonight.”

“Who?” His voice was low. Hard.

“I don’t know.”

“The same woman who called before?”

“I think so. No caller ID and she didn’t say who she was.”

“Damn it, Livvie. You can’t stay there. Not alone.”

“This is my home. And besides Hairy S-”

“Is useless. We’ve had this conversation. I’m coming home now…Or tomorrow. With everything that’s going on here, people being killed, I don’t like the fact that you’re alone.”

“It’s all happening in California, which is, what? Fifteen hundred miles away? Someone committing murders in L.A. isn’t dangerous to me.”

“It’s a plane ride.”

“But you’re in L.A. She won’t leave.”

“Humph.” He hesitated, as if tossing that over in his mind.

Olivia finally reached over and flipped on the bedside light, and the dog crawled upward, his wet nose peeking out of the covers.

Bentz asked, “So what did she say when she called?”

“That ‘he’s getting himself into trouble.’ I figured she meant you, since she called you RJ. And then she said there was another murder. I thought she was talking about Shana.”

“Not likely. She was probably patting herself on the back for Lorraine. Damn it, I just don’t understand what she’s doing.”

“No one does, but you will. You’re like a dog with a bone when you go after something.”

“What time did the call come in?”

“After midnight, maybe a quarter to one. I’d stayed up watching a movie. Just a minute, let me check.” She hit a few keys on the phone pad, read the display for the restricted call, then clicked back to him. “Yeah, twelve fifty-two, I was just going to bed. The call was short. Twenty-eight seconds. I plan to call the phone company in the morning to find the source of the call even if the number is restricted.”

“Good idea, but I still think you should leave.”

“It’s the middle of the night. I’ve locked up, double-checked the windows. Besides, the murderer is in California. You have more to worry about than I do.”

“There’s a pistol in our room. Locked in the closet.”

“I know.”

“Get it out and keep it in the nightstand.”

“Rick-” she protested. Now he was beginning to sound crazy. “I don’t even know how to shoot it.”

“It’s easy. Aim. Pull the trigger.”

“After I load it and flip off the safety.”

“You lied; you do know how.”

“But-”

“Humor me. Just until I get home, okay?”

“And when will that be?”

“Soon,” he vowed, conviction ringing in his voice.

“Okay. Good. We have a lot to talk about.”

“I know.” He hesitated a second. “Be safe, Livvie. I love you.”

A pang of emotion tightened in her chest. Stupid tears again stung her eyes. “Love you, too. You be careful.”

She hung up and stared at the ceiling. Maybe she should have begged him to give up his damned quest and come home. Not that he could now, with those women he’d talked to now murder victims. Unfortunately, he needed to stay there. She wanted him to finish whatever it was that had drawn him to L.A. Then he could come home for good and she’d tell him about the baby. Not before. She knew that if she had mentioned her pregnancy he would have been on the next plane home. If that were the case, he would always regret that he hadn’t been able to find out what the hell had happened to Jennifer.

She switched off the light.

Olivia wanted this murderous, heart-wrenching rampage over. Forever. Never did she want Bentz to have regrets, to think he’d abandoned someone who needed him, to wonder if he’d left a part of him, his heart and dreams, in sunny California.

She needed all of him, or none of him. She wasn’t willing to settle for second best to his ex-wife.

Jennifer.

“Damn you,” Olivia whispered to the empty, dark room. How the hell did Bentz’s ex-wife figure into all of this?

She rolled over and stared through the window to the inky Louisiana night.

Bentz needed to finish this. Put Jennifer’s damned ghost to rest.

Before anyone else died.

Before Olivia lost him forever.