Lisa Jackson's Bentz & Montoya Bundle: Hot Blooded, Cold Blooded, Shiver, Absolute Fear, Lost Souls, Malice, & an Exclusive Extended Excerpt From Devious (167 page)

Montoya sauntered into the room. “You need to go home and get laid,” he said, observing Bentz’s utter frustration.

Bentz shot him a look. “Like that’s gonna help.”

“It always helps me.”

“Fine.”

“Look, you don’t smoke, you don’t drink, but you’ve got one helluva good-lookin’ woman waiting for you at home.”

Bentz stole a look at the picture of Olivia on his desk. Montoya was right. Petite, with gold curls falling down her shoulders, clear eyes, and a tight little butt…“I’m meeting her for dinner in half an hour,” Bentz admitted then decided the less Montoya knew about his love life the better. “You heard the information officer made a statement about the recent killings? He’s asking for the public’s help.”

“Not much they can do. We don’t even have a composite of the guy.”

“Yeah, well, maybe someone saw something at Our Lady of Virtues or All Saints. Maybe we’ll catch a break.”

“Maybe,” Montoya said, sounding unconvinced. Not that Bentz blamed him.

“What else is happening?”

“No DNA yet, but soon, I’m told.”

“I’ll believe that when I see it.”

“Zaroster has a few leads with the tattoo ink and equipment, but nothing concrete yet. The plaster casts at the crime scene of footprints and tire marks haven’t been analyzed completely, but the guess is we’re looking for a guy who wears size twelve or twelve and a half.”

“Big guy,” Bentz said.

“So it would seem.”

“What about Abby’s picture?”

“Nothing yet, and again no one at either convent or the college noticed anything out of the ordinary.”

“Two nuns killed and it’s business as usual?” Bentz scowled and twisted a pencil in his fingers.

“We’re not done yet,” Montoya said, but he was irritated and anxious as well. “I’m still trying to put together a roster of the people who worked at the hospital when Faith was there, but the records, hell, they’re obsolete.”

“The state must know, or the Feds. Tax records.”

“FBI’s supposed to be on it. So, did you meet with Eve Renner’s brothers?”

“Both of ’em.”

“And?”

Bentz leaned back in his chair. “I think Eve’s lucky she only has two. They were here to try and get the body released, so they can, let’s see”—he found his notes—“‘get on with our lives,’ which I take as Renner-speak for they can’t wait to get their hands on whatever Daddy left them.”

“You think they could have killed him?” Montoya asked.

“Anything’s possible. I’m waiting to see who inherits. There’s got to be a will, and we’re already checking into life insurance benefits. Neither brother has an alibi. Seems as if they were both out driving around about the time dead old dad had his throat slit. Kyle claims he was on his way here from Atlanta, and Van says he was driving from Arizona. I figure we might get credit-card receipts to bear their stories out.”

“Or prove them wrong.”

“Kyle, he’s big. I’d guess the size twelve shoes would be about right, but the other guy is smaller in stature.”

“So what reason would either of them have to kill the nuns?”

“What reason would anyone?” Bentz pushed himself closer to the desk again, studying his notes.

“What you got there?” Montoya asked, nodding at Bentz’s desk.

“Just me trying to sort things out. Those are their tattoos.”

Montoya spun the paper around and read Bentz’s block letters.

“So, what do you make of it?” Montoya said.

“First off, I’m not certain whoever tattooed Faith Chastain is our killer. Her tattoo was a word, not a number. And we can’t really count the doll. We’re not even certain it exists. But there’s something weird about the numbers.

“Which is?”

“They read the same way backward as forward.”

“So?” Montoya said, his forehead wrinkling.

“Well, it doesn’t mean too much, but when you read the tattoo on Faith Chastain’s head backward, what do you get?”

Montoya looked at the letters, and his cocky smile faded. “Evil.”

Bentz dropped his notes on the desk as he stood.

“Jesus.” Montoya’s eyes narrowed. “Okay…but so what? Maybe it’s just a coincidence. I mean, Faith was tattooed over two decades ago.”

“Thought you didn’t believe in coincidence.”

“I don’t, but…”

“It’s just a thought. Means nothing.”

“It means enough for you to bring it up.” Montoya rested a hip against Bentz’s desk, apparently waiting for an explanation.

“It’s just something to explore,” Bentz said, but he felt that he was on the edge of something. Something that might be important. He just hadn’t sorted it out, wasn’t sure what it was quite yet. Throwing his pencil on the desk, he said, “I’ve got to run.”

“I’m thinking you’re gonna get lucky tonight.” Montoya’s grin was absolutely wicked.

“I’m always lucky.”

“An old fat guy like you? Huh.”

Bentz laughed despite himself. With Montoya in tow, he snapped out the lights and tried to shake off the feeling that he was missing something major about Faith Chastain. There was a reason she’d been tattooed twenty-odd years ago. He just had to figure out what it was.

CHAPTER 25

“T
his is where you live?” Eve looked around the small camelback house wedged tightly onto a poorly lit street. To say it needed work would be the understatement of the year, and when compared to the roomy Italianate home Cole had once owned, it was a dump. Pure and simple. Barely more than a roof over his head.

“I’ve really come up in the world,” Cole said with a quick smile. He’d stopped by his place, grabbed a quick shower, a bag of clothes and personal items on the way to the restaurant. It was odd, really; in all the time that they’d talked about marriage, they’d never lived together, just stayed overnight at each other’s places. But now, it seemed, Cole was moving in, at least for the time being, and it seemed like the right course of action.

Quite a turnaround from just a few days ago when you still thought him capable of murder.

“All set?” Cole walked out of the bedroom dressed in a pair of khakis and an open-collared dress shirt with the sleeves rolled up. “My wardrobe’s pretty limited,” he admitted when he noticed her eyeing him. “I think I have a ton of suits somewhere, but I’m not sure. Deeds could have sold them too. He certainly didn’t leave me with a key to any storage unit, so…” He spread his arms wide and shrugged. “What you see is what you get.”

“And I like,” she admitted, walking into his open arms and kissing him soundly.

“Careful, darlin’, you keep this up and we’ll never get to those mudbugs.”

“Can’t miss that.” She kissed him again, took his hand, and led him outside to the narrow little driveway where his Jeep was parked. There were kids hanging out, plugged into iPods and practicing jumps on their skateboards, an older man smoking on the stoop of an apartment building, and a couple of men in their twenties working on a car in a garage a couple of doors down the street.

On the corner of the next block, a sizzling sign for the local bar glowed neon green in the night. Farther south, past cross streets and old buildings, was the waterfront, where the Mississippi slowly moved toward the Gulf of Mexico. The night was clear, and somewhere above the streetlights there were stars, but Eve couldn’t catch a glimpse of many as she climbed into Cole’s Jeep and he drove her into the French Quarter. He located a parking spot three blocks from Chez Michelle then walked her inside, where the cozy wood-paneled interior was packed with patrons. The scents of tomato sauce, cayenne pepper, and sassafras made her mouth water the minute she walked through the door.

A thin, friendly waitress led them past an open kitchen where chefs in white coats worked their craft, braising meat, broiling fish and sausage, and creating sauces.

At a private table tucked in a back corner, Cole ordered the special mudbug appetizer and a pitcher of beer. “You’ll love them, I promise,” he said over the buzz of conversation and strains of jazz piped in from hidden speakers.

“You don’t scare me, Counselor. I grew up on crawdads.”

“Did you, now?” he said, a bit of the devil in his eyes. Oh, it was so easy to fall back into this routine with him, and despite the holes in her memory, she remembered clearly how much she’d loved him.

Frosty mugs of beer and a bucket of bright red, spicy mudbugs were served, and they both dug in, cracking the shells of the crayfish and dipping the tails into a succulent hot-pepper sauce. Eve ordered a spicy gumbo filled with seafood, sausage, and okra, while Cole chose the signature jambalaya.

For the first time all day, Eve relaxed, and the headache she’d been fighting for weeks retreated. She and Cole talked about inconsequential things, neither wanting to tread too close to the brutal murders, his life in prison, or the complicated layers of their relationship.

For now, they were able to push the rest of the world and the nightmare surrounding them into the darkest corners of the night. She wondered where they’d be now. What twists and turns would their love affair have taken if that one night had been different?

What if Roy hadn’t called her?

What if she hadn’t gone?

What if she hadn’t been so certain that Cole had been there, pistol in hand?

Roy’s throat had been slit, no bullet in his body, and yet she’d been shot from a handgun as yet unlocated.

“…so I’m hoping to move out of the dive as soon as I get back on my feet again,” he was saying, his blue eyes fixed on her in a way that made her shift in her chair.

“And move where?”

“Does it matter?”

“Maybe.” She smiled up at him and knew she was flirting.
Don’t do this, Eve. Don’t be suckered in…. It’s too soon. Too many horrible, unexplained things are still happening.

He winked at her, and she melted inside. “We’ll see.”

They lingered over coffee and split a dessert of espresso-flavored crème brûlée and pralines.

He paid for the meal with cash. Then they walked into the balmy night. Cole linked his fingers with hers as they crossed the street. “So, what do ya think?” he asked, heading toward his Jeep.

“About what?”

“Everything that’s going on.”

“Do we have to think about it?” she asked, hating the lighthearted spirit of the night to end.

“We don’t have much choice,” he said, and the words were barely out of his mouth when her cell phone rang. She looked at the caller-ID screen and didn’t bother answering it. “Television station,” she said, groaning. “I don’t want to talk to them.”

“Then don’t.”

He unlocked the door, and, just before she slid into the passenger side, she felt a little tremor in the air, as if someone were staring at her, sending her bad vibes. She paused and glanced down the street.

“What?” Cole twisted his head, picking up her unease. “You see something?”

Shaking her head, she said, “No. Just a weird day. Too many awful things going on.”

He slammed the door shut, and she kept her eyes on the sideview mirror, observing the sidewalk illuminated by streetlights.

She heard the clop-clop of hooves as a mule-drawn carriage creaked by.

A shadow appeared in the mirror.

Eve froze.

A tall, dark figure stepped out of the gloom for an instant.

She twisted in her seat, but as she stared at the circle of light from the streetlamp, a van rolled across the intersection, blocking her line of vision for second. In that heartbeat, the shadowy figure disappeared. She saw nothing.

“Something is wrong,” Cole said tensely as he slid into the Jeep.

“I thought I saw someone staring at me, but I could be wrong.”

“Let’s check it out.”

He pulled out of the parking lot, negotiated a U-turn, then drove through the narrow streets, where knots of people strolled amid slow-moving traffic. Eve’s eyes scanned each intersection, alley, and street, but no one seemed out of place.

“I guess I was imagining it.”

“I doubt it.” Cole turned down a side street. “You’re not prone to invention and paranoia.”

“Except at Roy’s cabin?” she asked.

He tensed as he nosed his Jeep around a corner. “You have to trust that I would never do anything to hurt you, Eve. Not that night. Not ever.”

“So I just imagined you there.” It was a statement of fact, not a question.

He slid her a glance and touched her leg as he shifted. “It was a strange night.”

“Can’t argue with that,” she said, still unsettled.

Her cell phone rang again, and she checked the display. This time caller ID indicated only that the call was restricted. “Maybe the reporter’s cell,” she said and turned the phone off. “Whatever it is, I’m not dealing with it now.”

But the damage was done.

Between the phone calls and Eve’s thinking someone was watching them, they were back where they’d started. The few hours of breaking away from the nightmare were over, and the real world had intruded once again.

In silence, Cole headed to the Garden District, a place Eve had always loved. Tall, ornate houses and gardens were tended and well kept, the history of each building as lush as the surrounding grounds.

But tonight she noticed the vaults and headstones of a cemetery as they passed. In the dark the tombs seemed ominous, a reminder of the death that was stalking the city. As they turned onto St. Charles Avenue, even the castlelike universities of Loyola and Tulane appeared sinister and dark, malevolent fortresses that could surely house evil.

Stop it,
she told herself. Hadn’t Cole just said she wasn’t prone to paranoia? Although she tried to tamp down the bad feeling that had crept over her, as Cole turned a final corner and Nana’s house came into view, even the familiar sight of the broad front porch, tall, shuttered windows, and curved turret couldn’t temper her unease.

Cole parked near the garage, and as Eve opened the Jeep’s door she spied a shadow dart across the yard. “Samson?” she called as the cat climbed up the back steps and paced on the mat by the door. “How’d you get out?” She picked the cat up with her good hand and held him to her as Cole unlocked the door. “You’re so much trouble, but I love you anyway.”

“Nice to know,” Cole said, opening the door and letting her step into the mudroom first.

“I was talking to the cat.”

“Uh-huh.”

As if he didn’t like being in the middle of their discussion, Samson wriggled out of her arms, hopped to the floor, and shot through the open door to the kitchen.

“There was a time you said something like that to me,” Cole reminded her.

Her heart clutched, and she had a fleeting memory of riding horses across a flat expanse of field at her father’s house. It was after her father’s trial, after he’d been acquitted of any wrongdoing. It was a glorious spring day, just before sunset. She and Cole had bet on whose horse was faster then raced back toward the barn. She’d been on the swifter little mare, but Cole had convinced his horse to jump a downed tree and somehow ended up at the barn a stride ahead of her. Still breathless, he’d claimed victory. She’d accused him of cheating, and he’d climbed off his horse, pulled her from the mare and, before her booted feet had hit the ground, kissed her so hard she’d scarcely been able to stand.

“It’s time you paid up, Eve, or I might just have to take the winnings out of your hide.”

“Promises, promises,” she laughed, goading him.

“Is that a dare?” Eyes as blue as a west Texas sky had sparked, and beneath a day’s worth of stubble, one side of his mouth had lifted a bit.

“Take it whatever way you want!”

“Dangerous talk, lady.”

“Oh yeah, like you scare me.”

“I should.”

She’d laughed as he’d kissed her again. Hard. And when he’d finally lifted his head, she’d held his face in her hands. “You are
so
much trouble, Cole Dennis, but, damn it, I love you anyway….”

Now he was staring at her with those same blue eyes, the same laser-sharp intensity that caused her stupid heart to pound. She tried to talk, but for a second her voice refused to work, and she had to clear her throat. “Let’s just not go there, not tonight.”

“When?”

“I don’t know.”

“I love you, Eve.”

There it was. Hanging in the air between them, and all flirtatiousness, all signs of playfulness that had been with them through the night, were suddenly dispelled. Here, in this dimly lit room off the porch, Cole Dennis had bared his soul, and as she looked into his face, she saw that he was raw. Naked. His feelings exposed.

She swallowed back an impulse to blurt out her own feelings.

Cole’s jaw was working, his hands at his sides. He was waiting for her to respond. To say what was lodged so deeply in her heart.

Tell him. Tell him you love him, that you’ve always loved him, that you’ve known all along that he couldn’t have raised a gun at you. That you were wrong. That you are sorry for all the pain you caused him. Tell him, Eve.

The words stuck in her throat. How long had she ached to hear that he still loved her?

“We should be careful,” she said, her own words rushing through her head.
You love him. You do. Tell him. For God’s sake, Eve, don’t blow this!

She had loved him. There was no use denying what was so patently obvious. There was a chance she still loved him, had never really stopped.

He touched her on the side of the face. “Take your time, Eve,” he said, and she had to fight not to fall against him. “I’m not going anywhere.”

His finger slid along the side of her throat then lower, hooking on the neckline of her blouse, his skin warm against hers. Leaning forward, his lips a hair’s breadth over hers, he whispered, “I’ll wait.”

Oh dear God.

Tears, unbidden, touched the back of her eyes, but she refused to cry in front of him. Would not break down. Her skin tingled where he touched her, and she had thoughts of wrapping her arms around his neck and then stripping off his clothes. In her mind’s eye, she saw them together, kissing, touching, sweat-soaked, naked bodies entangled in the sheets of her bed. Would it be so wrong? Would it?

Grabbing his hand, she wrapped her fingers around his. “I think we should take this slow,” she said carefully.

“I’m not sure there’s any ‘slow’ with you.”

“Cole…”

“Stop fighting me,” he said urgently.

Eve gazed at him. She wanted him. She tried hard to remember that she shouldn’t have him, but all she could see was Cole, the man she loved. “Okay,” she said on a shaky laugh.

Her sudden capitulation surprised and delighted him. He kissed her hard then grinned. “I’ll go get my things. Meet you upstairs.”

She turned and nearly ran through the kitchen, along the hall, and up the stairs, the cat following close behind. Was she crazy? Out of her mind? All she could think about was making love to him. Should she strip and lie naked in the bed?

Or put on a sexy piece of lingerie? Dear God, did she even own a teddy or flimsy nightgown? Surely she had something…. Not that he would care.

Samson shot ahead of her, bounding up the final flight to her turret room. Downstairs, she heard Cole reenter the house. She’d have to work fast if she wanted to surprise him with a sexy piece of lingerie.