Cold Blooded (3 page)

"You're pretty enough," Bernadette finally allowed, straightening and flicking ashes into the sink, "and if you use your head and don't go spouting off all this crazy talk, you'll land yourself a good man, maybe even a rich man.

So don't go scarin' ' off with all this weird talk, y'hear me? No decent man'll have you if ya do." She'd rolled the drink in her hands and watched the ice cubes clink together.

"Believe me, I know." A sad smile had curved her lips, which showed only a hint of lipstick applied much earlier in the day. "Someday, honey, you're gonna git yerself outta this dump"--she fluttered her fingers to take in all of Grannie Guy's cabin--"and into a fancy house, just like Scarlett Damned O'Hara." She managed a wider grin, showing off straight, impossibly white teeth. "And when you do, you're gonna take care of your mama, y'hear?"

Now, thinking back, Olivia sighed. Oh, Mama, if you only knew. Olivia would have done anything to make the demons in her mind be still. But lately, those dreams she'd repressed had come back with a vengeance.

Ever since she'd returned to Louisiana.

She had to do something about the visions. She had to do something about tonight.

The woman's dead, Olivia. There's nothing you can do for her and no one's going to believe you. You know that.

You've tried to contact the authorities before. You've tried to convince your family, your friends, even your damned fiance. No one believed you then. No one will now.

Besides, it was a dream. That's all. Just a dream.

Slowly she edged off the bed, dragging her grandmother's quilt with her, then unlocked the French doors to the verandah.

The dog trotted after her as Olivia stepped into the cool winter of early morning, the floorboards smooth beneath her bare feet. The bayou was quiet, mist rising slowly, huge cypress trees guarding the sluggish waters that lapped near the back of the house. She leaned a hand against the rail, worn smooth by the touch of human hands over the past hundred years. Some creature of the darkness scuttled through the brush, rustling dry leaves and snapping thin branches on its way into the swamp. Goose bumps sprouted on Olivia's arms. As she gazed across the still, dark waters, she tried to shake the dream from her mind, but it remained steadfast, clinging with razor-sharp talons, digging deep into her brain, refusing to be dismissed.

It was more than a nightmare.

Olivia knew it with horrid certainty.

It wasn't the first time she'd "witnessed" someone's death. They had

come and gone over the years, but whenever she was here, in this part of bayou country, the visions had preyed upon her. It was one of the reasons she'd stayed away so long.

Yet, here she was. Once again in Louisiana. And the nightmares had already begun, back with a blinding, soulscraping fury that scared her to death. "It's your fault," she muttered as if Grannie Guy bless her voodoo-lovin' soul, could hear her.

Olivia's fingers gripped the railing. As clearly as if she'd been in that minuscule bathroom, Olivia saw the murder again. Smoke rose as the masked priest lifted his sword and swung downward, not once, but three times ... Olivia squeezed her eyes shut, but the vision wouldn't go away. A priest. A man of God!

She had to do something.

Now.

Somewhere tonight a woman had been murdered. Violently.

By rote Olivia sketched a quick sign of the cross over her chest. She rubbed her arms and pulled the quilt more snugly around her as a soft November breeze sighed through the trees overhead and the dank smell of the swamp filled her nostrils. She couldn't pretend this hadn't happened even though no matter what, no one would believe her.

Turning quickly, she hurried inside, Grannie's quilt billowing after her. Hairy was right on her heels, toenails clicking across the hardwood floor as she made her way to the desk. Flipping on a small lamp, she scrounged through the dusty cubbyholes, discarding pens, note cards, thimbles and rubber bands until she found the scrap of paper she'd been looking for, a tattered piece of newspaper. It was an article that had been in the Times-Picayune after the latest rash of murders in the Crescent City had occurred. According to the report, a detective by the name of Rick Bentz had been instrumental in solving the bizarre killings. He'd been the man who had discovered the link in the crimes and how they were related to Dr. Sam, Samantha Leeds, host of the talk-radio program Midnight Confessions.

The same radio show Olivia had heard tonight in the vision.

She shuddered as she scanned the article she'd torn from the paper months ago.

Bentz and his partner Ruben Montoya, were given credit for breaking the "Rosary Killer" case where several prostitutes had been killed by "Father John," a man who had stalked the city of New Orleans a few months back. Father John. The killer who was obsessed with Dr. Sam and her radio show, a sadist who would demand his victims don red wigs so that they would look like Dr. Sam, a murderer who scripted the dialogue for his victims, insisting they repent for their crimes ... just as she'd seen the priest in her vision demand his victim's pleas for mercy and forgiveness.

Her blood turned to ice.

First a man calling himself Father John and now a priest.

She had to talk to Detective Bentz. ASAP. No one else at the police station had even listened to her--just written her off as a lunatic. But then, she was used to the ridicule.

Maybe Rick Bentz would be different. Maybe he'd listen to her.

He had to.

She dropped the blanket and reached for her jeans and a sweatshirt she'd tossed over the bedpost and grabbed a bottle of ibuprofen from the night table. She downed four tablets dry and hoped they'd take the edge off her headache. She had to think clearly, to explain ... Slinging the strap of her purse over her shoulder, she slid into a pair of moccasins and flew down the stairs. Hairy scrambled after her. But as she dashed past the bookcase in the alcove near the front door, she felt a draft--a whisper across her skin, something evil.

She stopped short. Glanced out the window. The dog growled, the hairs on the back of his neck standing up.

Again, through the open window, she heard the rustle of dry leaves, a gust of wind through brittle branches. Was it her imagination or was someone outside ... lurking in the darkness?

Fear pulsed through her blood. She moved close to the window, peered through the mist and darkness, but saw no one. The night was suddenly still, the rush of wind having died.

She slammed the window shut, locked it, and snapped the blinds closed.

This was no time to get spooked. But at the bookcase she felt it again, that icy sensation.

You're overreacting. Stop it, Liwie!

Her breath was shallow, the hairs lifting on the back of her arms, as if there were someone in the room with her.

She caught her reflection in the mirror mounted next to the bookcase and shivered. Her hair was wild and uncombed, her face pale beneath a few freckles, her lips bloodless. She looked as scared as she was.

But she had to go ... She dug into her purse and grabbed her key ring, held the longest and sharpest key in her fingers as if it were some kind of weapon, then headed for the front door. Hairy followed after her, his tail between his legs.

"You have to stay here," she insisted, but as she opened the door, the scrappy little mutt streaked through, tearing through the fallen leaves to her beat-up truck. Olivia locked the door behind her, checked over her shoulder, and jogged to the driveway, where the dog was whining and jumping against the cab of her pickup. "Fine, get in." She opened the driver's side and Hairy hurtled inside. He took his favorite spot on the passenger's side of the bench seat, propping his tiny feet on the dash, his tongue lolling as he panted. "This isn't a joyride," Olivia said as she backed into a turnout, the beams of her headlights splashing over the face of her little cabin. She saw no strangers lurking in the shadows, no dark figure hiding behind the wicker furniture on the porch. Maybe her vivid imagination had run wild again.

It had to be.

Still her heart pumped wildly.

She shoved her old Ford Ranger into gear. With a rumble, the pickup shot forward, turning up gravel in its wake. The lane was long and wound through stands of cypress and palmettos, across a small bridge and onto

the main road.

New Orleans was a good twenty-minute drive. She pushed the speed limit. But she didn't want to bother with any other police officer, no other detective. No. She wanted Bentz. It was too early for him to be on duty.

But she'd wait. As long as it took.
As the road turned south, she noticed a glimmer of light that grew into

a faint glow on the horizon, an orange haze that was visible through the
thick stands of cypress and live oak.
Her insides twisted.
The fire.
Dear God.
She knew before the firemen or the police that somewhere in that hellish

inferno was the body of a woman; the woman she'd seen in her vision.

Chapter Three.

"Uh-oh." Reuben Montoya's voice held the knell of doom.

Bentz looked up from his stack of paperwork as Montoya, carrying two paper cups of coffee, slipped through the open door of his office. He handed Bentz one of the cups, then leaned a hip against the file

cabinet of Rick Bentz's office. In his trademark black leather jacket
and black jeans, he let his gaze wander back through the half-open door,
past the maze of cubicles and desks in the outer office, to the
stairway.

"What?" Rick asked from behind the desk and a mountain of paperwork that
never seemed to diminish. Crime was big business in New Orleans.
"Trouble."
"There's always trouble."
"No, you don't understand, the resident nutcase is here again."
"Again?" Bentz repeated, looking out the door to see the object of

Montoya's interest, a petite woman with wild gold-colored curls, smooth white skin, and attitude written all over her. In faded jeans and a New Orleans Saints sweatshirt that had seen better days, she was charging straight toward Bentz's office.

"She's been calling Brinkman, claims she's a psychic and that she sees
murders before they take place," Montoya explained.
"And Brinkman says?"

"What he always says. '.' He doesn't believe in any of that crap."
At that moment, she barreled into the room. Her cheeks were flushed, her
pointed chin set in what Bentz took as angry determination. Her eyes,
the color of fine malt whiskey, bored straight through him.

"Detective Bentz?" she asked without so much as a glance in Montoya's

direction.

"Yeah. I'm Bentz."

"Good. I need to talk to you."

By this time Bentz was half standing. He flipped a hand at Montoya. "And this is Detective Reuben Montoya, my partner."

"Reuben D. Montoya. I go by Diego," Montoya added.

Bentz lifted a brow. Diego? Since when? Oh ... Since a beautiful female entered the room. Montoya might have referred to this woman as a nutcase but he was interested in her--of course he was--it was the younger man's MO whenever a good-looking woman was nearby. Regardless, apparently, o f her mental condition. And in spite of his talk the other night of being a one-woman man. Montoya's male radar was always on alert.

She barely gave Montoya a second glance as Bentz offered his hand. "I read about you in the Times," she said.

Great. Another citizen who thought he was a damned hero. To her credit, her gaze leveled straight at Bentz and she didn't give Montoya's flirtation a passing glance. Her grip was surprisingly strong as she gave his palm a hand shake then released her fingers. "You can't believe everything you read."

"Trust me, I don't."

He waved her into a chair. "So what's on your mind?"

"A murder."

At least she didn't beat around the bush. He pulled a legal pad from beneath a pile of half-finished reports. "Whose?"

"A woman." She fell into a chair and he noticed the smudges of exhaustion beneath her eyes, the little lines pinching the corners of her mouth. A faint scent of jasmine entered with her. "I don't know. He called her Cecilia but she said that wasn't her name and ... and she never told him what her name was."

"Told who?" "The killer," she said, staring at him as if he were as dense as granite.

"Wait a minute. Let's start over," he said. "You witnessed a woman being killed, right? You were there?" he asked.

She hesitated before answering. "No."

"No?"

"But I saw it."

Wonderful. Just what he needed to start the day right.

Bentz clicked his pen. "Where did the murder take place, Miss.--?"

"Benchet. I'm Olivia Benchet, and I don't know where it happened ... but I saw someone, a woman about twenty-five, I'd guess, being killed."

Olivia's face paled and she swallowed hard. "She ... she had shoulder-length blond hair, blue eyes, a few freckles, and ... and kind of a heart shaped face. She was thin, but not skinny ... in ... good shape as if she worked out or ... oh, God." Olivia closed her eyes, took in a deep, shuddering breath, then slowly let it out. A second later her lids opened and she seemed calmer, in control. Again the scent of jasmine teased his nostrils.

"Wait a minute. We'd better back up. You heard him say her name and you saw him kill a woman, but you weren't there?" Shit. Montoya had called this one, and the Cheshire cat smile beginning to stretch across his chin indicated he knew it.

"That's right."

"Was it on film?" ' '," she said, then rushed on,' ' think I should explain something."

That would be a good start. She leaned forward in her chair, and then, as if trying to grasp something, anything, she opened and closed her hands. Here it comes, Bentz thought. The part where it all falls apart but she tries to convince us that this outrageous story is true. She

was, no doubt as Montoya had explained, a bonafide nutcase.

"I'm able see some things right before or as they're happening. In my mind. Even though I'm not there. I know it sounds bizarre, even crazy, but it's true."

"You're a psychic." Or a psychotic.

"I don't know if you'd call me that. I think of myself as having a
little bit of ESP."
"A little bit?"
"It comes and goes. Last night, while I was sleeping, this was very