Cold Blooded (30 page)

"What's up?" Olivia asked, though she knew that, of course, the call would be about Leo. She reached into a cupboard and found a package of sunflower seeds, which she used to fill one of Chia's dishes.

"Leo's in New Orleans."

"What?"

"That's right, he called me last night, wouldn't say where he was, but I had caller ID installed last week and saw the area code."

"What's he doing here?"

"I have no idea ... well, I have one, but I don't like it.

He was at a convention in Nashville last year and ever since then he's been distracted. Spends a lot of time on his e-mail. When I went to log on to check it, I couldn't get in.

He's changed his friggin' password. I've been trying to break into it, but so far no luck."

"Why'd he call?"

"I don't know. At first I thought he just wanted me to know that he was okay, to put my mind at ease, but now ... well, I found his strong box and broke the lock." "What did you find?" Olivia asked, not really wanting to know.

"Bank statements for an account I didn't know he had and ... a first draft of some legal papers. Divorce papers," she said and her voice wobbled. ' ' can't believe it, Olivia, after all these years and all his cheating now he thinks he can divorce me? No way ... no ... freakin' way."

"Oh, Sarah, I'm sorry," Olivia said and she was. She hated to hear the pain and despair in her friend's normally upbeat voice. But she hated Leo Restin for what he was doing to his wife. Olivia wanted to say that divorce might be the best thing, but held her tongue; Sarah was too raw, would argue it to the death.

"Yeah, me too." Sarah's voice cracked with emotion. "I was wondering, how would you feel about a house guest?

Oh, me ... not Leo." She laughed a little through her tears.

Sarah knew how Olivia felt about her husband; Olivia made her position clear often enough.' ' could have Thanksgiving together."

"While you track down Leo?"

"I'd take a break for dinner," Sarah kidded, with a hoarse chuckle.

"Unless you have other plans. I mean, oh, God, I didn't think that you might be going somewhere or be with someone else."

"Don't worry about that part of it. I don't have anything going."

Leaning her head against an upper cupboard, Olivia twisted the phone cord in her fingers and thought of Rick Bentz. She wondered, foolishly, how he would celebrate the holiday. Not that it mattered one little iota. Then she remembered the man in the cathedral. "You know, I think I may have seen Leo--oh, God, was it just yesterday?"

"Where?" Sarah's voice grew tight.

"St. Louis Cathedral."

"Are you kidding? Leo hasn't been to mass in years."

"Maybe I'm mistaken."

Sarah explained,' ' was so pissed when they threw him out of parochial school, he's never been back to church."

"He went to Catholic school?" Olivia asked, surprised as she glanced at the window to watch sunlight filter through the trees.

"For a couple of years. He played football and they loved that, but ... well, he got caught getting high on the school grounds and was expelled.

Even then he was getting into trouble, not playing by the rules. But I thought he was the greatest." She laughed but the sound was hollow.

"Stupid, huh?"

"We all do stupid things when we're in love." She thought fleetingly of Rick Bentz again and reminded herself she wasn't in love with him, would never be in love with him, and to forget any idea of the kind. "So he gave up on the Church?" Olivia asked, her mind beginning to wrap around an idea that was absolutely appalling. Leo, the ex- Catholic. Maybe he'd gotten all screwed up along the way.

He was an athlete--a football player and a bow hunter, about six foot three with blue eyes and, from what she'd seen in his dealings with his wife, a cruel streak. But a sadistic murderer? No, she couldn't imagine it.

"Almost completely. Had a real fit when I insisted we get married by a priest. I thought he was gonna call the whole thing off. It was a big scene, but eventually, he agreed.

I think there was something else that happened, something bad, but he never talked about it and I didn't pry."

"He's your husband," Olivia pointed out and thought about seeing Leo in

the cathedral. He was in New Orleans.

Could have been for a while. Had a grudge with the Catholic Church ... and he had a temper. But that was a long way from murder. A long way, she reminded herself as she found a mug in the cupboard and, cradling the receiver between her shoulder and ear, poured coffee.

"I know he's my husband. Even so, we all have secrets, don't we?" Sarah observed darkly, then added, "So how about it. Want company?"

"Are you kidding? Of course I do. You're welcome to stay here but I just don't know if I'd try to track down Leo if I were you."

"We're still married," Sarah reminded her. "Remember the vow about ' death do us part'?"

"Yeah."

"Well, I'm working real hard on it."

Olivia braced herself for another session about Sarah's marriage, the kind of conversation where Sarah complained about Leo yet swore she loved him. But instead of launching into that tired old song and dance, Sarah rattled off the time she'd fly in and told Olivia she'd rent a car and drive to the cottage on the bayou, didn't want directions, and promised to call Olivia from her cell when she touched down. "I'll be there tomorrow."

"You got a ticket?"

"That I do. And it only cost me two arms and one leg.

I still can hope," she joked.

"I guess I'd better see if I can find a turkey and some cranberries."

"And sweet potatoes. I make a killer sweet-potato pie," Sarah said before hanging up. Olivia's spirits lifted a bit.

She hadn't looked forward to spending Thanksgiving alone, and though she thought Sarah's hunt for her husband was a fool's mission, at least she'd be with her friend for a few days. Taking a sip from her mug,

Olivia felt the coffee warm a path to her stomach. Maybe Sarah and her
problems would make her forget about Rick Bentz.
Maybe.
Then again, maybe not.

Bentz wasn't a man easily forgotten.
And one thing was certain--nothing would put her completely at ease and
let her forget that there was a sadistic killer on the loose; a murderer
who knew her name. She looked at the picture of her and her grandmother.

Oh, Grannie, if only you were here now, she thought as she stared at the old photo where Grannie Guy was swinging her off her feet. The hot day. And the shadow. Dark, a somber reminder of the man who had taken the snapshot. Your father.

Her hand was beginning to throb and something niggled at the back of her mind, something that had been bothering her ever since Reggie had called ... what was it? What had he said that didn't ring true. What?

They had been talking about the fact that he wanted to see her. He'd been adamant. Determined. What had he said?

"You're the only child I've got left, you know. I've lost the others ..." That was it! Others. Plural. He wasn't just talking about Chandra. He'd fathered more kids, some she obviously had never heard of. When? With whom? Had he married again or were they the results of affairs? Who were they? Or had he just slipped up?

Maybe it didn't matter. He'd said they, too, were gone.
She shivered when she remembered his words.
I've lost the others.
How? Because they were estranged from him?
Cradling her cup, she walked closer to the picture, stared at the shadow

looming in the foreground. Was it possible his other children, too, were

dead?

Imbeciles!

Ignoramuses!

Absolute morons!

The Chosen One added the new lock of hair to his braid as he listened to the news on the radio, a smarmy air-wave personality who thought he had all the answers and even had the gall to make some inane jokes.

The Chosen One didn't know who was more pathetically stupid--the police or the press. To compare him to the Rosary Killer. How insulting. Father John had been nothing but an apprentice ... and a foolish one at that.

He'd gotten caught.

Deftly The Chosen One went about his task, sitting on a stool near the window, winding the strands, mixing a new lock of shiny black hair with the others. His fingers tangled and stroked in the hair. He closed his eyes, willed his temper to subside. A thrill swept through him as he thought of the last sacrifice and his blood heated. She'd been so willing and then, when she'd awakened to find herself strapped to the wheel, her terror had been complete. "Saint Catherine ... "

But her blood hadn't flowed white as he'd expected; as had been preordained.

He'd wanted her. So badly. His lust had been excruciating as he'd watched her scream and rotate slowly on the wheel, spinning closer to him and then away, her eyes bulging with terror, her face white from the pain ... he'd longed to lie down with her, to feel the spikes, to somehow thrust into her as the wheel turned and creaked. Yes ... that was what he'd wanted, the pain and the lust combined. To enter her body as she screamed and he felt the pressure of those sharp spikes.

He was drained. His head pounded. The aching was with him more each day , it seemed, a dull thud that increased as the hours passed. A sacrifice always hyped him up before, during, and immediately after the rite, but later, after reliving it for hours, he was exhausted.

The WSLJ announcer was still blither-blathering on about a serial killer stalking the city. Two victims had been identified as coeds from Loyola and Tulane. So the police were beginning to discover that there had been earlier sacrifices ... good, good ... it had frustrated him that they hadn't connected his earlier work.

Identification of the venerated dead had been bound to happen. The police knowing his method and the dates he would kill might make hunting more difficult ... but he'd prepared for this. He'd already chosen his next victims ... women who needed to be released from their earthly bonds.

Twining his fingers in his braid, he walked to the altar, genuflected, and then gazed at the wall where he'd made his offering. It was a beautiful collage of pictures of those saints he'd chosen to be a part of his work. Each image of the saints, a picture of an old portrait of a beautiful young woman with a shimmering halo, would be covered with a newer picture, a photograph he'd taken ... Several were already covered with a new image. St. Joan of Arc, beautiful little Philomena, St. Mary Magdalene, St. Cecilia, and now St. Catherine of Alexandria.

But there were so many more. Kristi Bentz would be a perfect St. Lucy, but what of St. Olivia? The feast day was too far away ... certainly he could redeem Olivia Benchet by renaming her ... that was it. He glanced at his large book, sitting upon a table with the pair of pinking shears he used to clip the pictures from the pages. Yes, that was it, he'd find another worthy daughter of God ... ' ' Rick Bentz of the New Orleans Police Department ... "

The Chosen One's head snapped up at the mention of Bentz's name. He glared at his tiny radio and his lips curled.

Bentz had robbed him of his pupil; the only person The Chosen One had trusted with his secret. Father John. Now presumed dead. At Bentz's hand.

But Bentz would suffer and suffer well.

The Chosen One stood and let his robe slip to the floor.

Slowly and delicately he slid the braid over his nakedness.

Staring at his collage, he saw the faces of his victims as the plait slithered silently over his muscles.

They were all beautiful, all bright, all worthy of sainthood.

His breath was coming in uneven gasps. He was rock-hard, his cock throbbing. He tied the braid around it, imagined a dozen sets of hands and luscious lips upon his skin, teasing, taunting ... promising sinful delights.

He grew light-headed, swallowing hard as he remembered their terror, how they'd begged. He conjured up Kristi Bentz's face ... oh, yes ... she would be heaven, but no longer would she be enough. No ... he had others to redeem.

With a grim smile, he thought of Olivia Benchet.

She should thank him for her redemption.

Because she was a daughter of the whore.

Chapter Twenty-five.

' ', so what have we got?" Melinda Jaskiel demanded of Bentz and Montoya.

"The press is clamoring for more information, the chief is all over me, wondering what the hell we've got going with another serial killer, and I'm speaking with the head of the task force and the FBI in"-

she checked her watch--"twenty-three minutes."

"I've talked to the head of the task force and Tortorici with the FBI," Bentz said. It was about two in the afternoon, he and Montoya were sitting in Jaskiel's office, and he'd spent all morning working on the case, shutting his mind down whenever his thoughts strayed to last night with Olivia Benchet.

"Do we think there's any chance this is the Rosary Killer?" Melinda asked. She stood in her crisp navy blue suit, hips and hands resting against the edge of her neat-as a-pin goverment-issue desk. Bentz and Montoya were seated in front of her in the two visitors' chairs. There were a couple of photos of her parents and two daughters displayed upon her credenza and a crystal vase of ever-changing fresh flowers sat on one corner of the desk. Aside from those little touches, her nameplate, and a few awards displayed on the wall behind her chair, the office could have belonged to anyone. Well, anyone who was a neat freak.

"I've talked to the FBI and Norm Stowell ... who's an ex-profiler."

"Outside the department?" Behind her lenses, her eyes narrowed.

"Yeah, and--"

"Hold on, Rambo. We're playing this one by the book." "Of course we are," Bentz said, giving her the acknowledgment she needed should there be a problem. "It doesn't look like this is the Rosary Killer. His signature, the way he displays the bodies, is too different.

He's more brutal.

Violent Not the same guy."

"But you think this has to do with saints being killed?" "Martyred female saints," Bentz said and shifted in his chair. The more he considered the fact that women were being butchered in the manner in which saints had been killed, the more nervous he felt. Some of the women had gone to college and his own daughter attended All Saints-with a name like that it was bound to attract the attention of the killer, even if it was in Baton Rouge.