Lisa Jackson's Bentz And Montoya Bundle Part 199

In his mind's eye he saw the bloodless bodies of the girls in the morgue and sent up a prayer that she hadn't become a victim of the psycho who was behind the killings. Why hadn't he insisted she go to the police when they found the d.a.m.ned vial of blood? What kind of an idiot was he to allow her to stay in Baton Rouge, alone, when they both suspected that a serial killer was stalking coeds. And that someone was videotaping her apartment!

Like you could have stopped her! No way. Not that bull-headed woman.

But he couldn't shake the guilt. He should have stayed with her. Now...oh, G.o.d, now...

"Son of a b.i.t.c.h," he bit out, driving like a madman, ignoring the speed limit, hitting the gas whenever a light turned amber. Bruno, unperturbed, stared out the window as Jay's headlights cut through the night.

He'd left three messages for Rick Bentz, too, none of which had been returned, but then Bentz himself was up to his eyeb.a.l.l.s in this case, the press, and the resulting chaos. As Jay understood it, the New Orleans Police Department, as well as the Baton Rouge PD, had issued statements to the press and general public that there was a serial killer on the loose. The university had been contacted, so hopefully a warning had already been issued to the students to stay indoors or in groups, and a curfew had been imposed.

Jay had finally connected again to Portia Laurent, who had given him all the information she had over the phone. The upshot was that Dominic Grotto had access to a navy blue van, one he borrowed from his brother-in-law upon occasion. Jay was convinced the vampire-loving professor was their man; Portia Laurent was reserving judgment. She was still doing background checks and Grotto, so far, was clean. She had another couple of leads she was following up, something that was bothering her, but before she could explain, another call had interrupted her and she cut him off, saying she'd phone him later.

So far, she hadn't.

Jay was nearing Baton Rouge when his cell phone rang. He picked up before the second beep, his hand gripping the d.a.m.ned thing as if it were a lifeline. He hoped to G.o.d that Kristi was on the other end of the wireless call, that she was safe, that his worst fears were unfounded.

"McKnight," he answered.

"Bentz. You called." Rick Bentz's voice. Tight. Hard. Seething with fury-and maybe repressed fear.

"Yeah. I'm on my way to Baton Rouge, but I haven't been able to reach Kristi. I was hoping you had."

"No." The single, d.a.m.ning word echoed through Jay's head and until that moment he hadn't realized how much he'd hoped that Kristi had been in contact with her father. "I thought she might be with you," Bentz went on. "She's not picking up her G.o.dd.a.m.ned phone and I'm on my way up there right now."

"Me, too. I should be there in about forty minutes."

"Good. I know the Baton Rouge PD is stretched to the limit, FBI's been called in. The public's being made aware, police working with the press to get the word out. I'm surprised you got out of the lab."

"I worked it out. I'm officially in the field." Jay had put in over forty hours in the crime lab this week and Inez Santiago had taken over for him. Inez had been insistent that he leave when she'd arrived and had a.s.sured him that she, Bonita Washington, and the other criminologists on staff could handle anything that came up.

Jay hadn't needed any more encouragement. Not after finding bodies drained of blood, their necks showing evidence of bite marks measuring the size of an adult male human, the puncture wounds consistent with razor-sharp cuspids. Bruising on the necks of all four victims was identical and the hope was that the police could match the mark on the victims' skin with the killer's teeth.

The work of someone trying desperately to make them believe that there were blood-sucking creatures of the night attacking girls at All Saints.

Jay's hand clenched over the wheel and he braked to avoid rear-ending a motorcycle that had cut into his lane. He said to Bentz, "You know that Kristi was in a cla.s.s on vampires in society or some such c.r.a.p." Checking his side view and switching lanes, he tromped on the gas and sped around a sedan driven by an old guy in a hat.

"Yeah?"

"I think someone's taken this vampire thing to another level." Quickly, he explained to Bentz about Lucretia tipping Kristi off about a campus cult, and how he and Kristi had found a vial of blood in Kristi's apartment-Tara At.w.a.ter's previous home. While Bentz listened silently, Jay explained about discovering the video camera and setting a trap. He added that Kristi was convinced Father Mathias, the priest who staged the morality plays, was somehow involved in the coeds' disappearances. Jay finished with, "Kristi believes that Wagner House is at the heart of the cult."

"Someone might have told me," Bentz stated grimly.

Jay didn't respond. Let Kristi's father make of it what he would.

"And you left her there?" Bentz charged quietly.

"My mistake."

"You bet it was."

Jay let it go. The exit sign for Baton Rouge caught in his headlights just as the first drops of rain pelted his windshield. He accelerated onto the ramp and decided he'd been the brunt of Bentz's rage long enough. "So where are you?"

"A half hour from Baton Rouge. With Montoya."

"Good. I'm already there. I'm going directly to Kristi's apartment. I'll call you when I get there."

Pushing the speed limit, Jay cut through town, past neighborhoods that had become familiar since the first of the year. But all the while he was driving by rote, spurred on by images of the drained, bloodless corpses dragged out of the Mississippi.

His hope was that the killer had kept them alive for a long time before taking their lives. The delayed decomposition suggested as much.

Unless they'd been frozen.

He couldn't forget Bonita Washington's a.s.sertion of freezer burn on the severed arm, which, as it had turned out, belonged to Rylee Ames, the last victim.

Unless Ariel was the last one to go missing.

Until Kristi...

He took a shortcut to the campus. The rain was heavy now, coming down in sheets. News vans and cop cars were parked around the gates of the All Saints grounds, where, it seemed, every officer on the campus security force was visible. Students were far and few between, but klieg lights had been a.s.sembled by the news teams, and reporters dressed in rain gear stood with microphones at the ready.

All in all it was a d.a.m.ned circus.

The campus of All Saints wasn't officially a crime scene, at least not yet, but the presence of the police and the news teams announced to the world that a killer was on the loose, one who considered the private school his personal hunting ground.

"Not for long, you p.r.i.c.k," Jay muttered as he drove to the old house where Kristi lived and felt a second's relief when he spied her Honda parked in its usual spot. Maybe she was home. Maybe she'd lost her cell phone. Maybe...Oh, G.o.d, please. He shoved open the door of his truck before it had even stopped rolling. "Stay," he ordered Bruno, then ran up the stairs, taking them two at a time, his key already in his hand. He was on the third floor in an instant, unlocking the door, throwing it open.

"Kris!" he yelled, stepping inside.

It was dark and quiet, the smell of old candles in the air, the window over the sink open wide, a stiff breeze stirring the curtains.

His stomach clenched and he reached for a gun.

"Drop it! Down on the floor!" a female voice ordered. Mai Kwan stepped out of the shadows, directly in his path, the pistol in her hands leveled straight at his heart.

"Vampires?" Montoya, in the pa.s.senger seat, stared at Bentz as if the older detective had lost his mind. Light flashing, siren screaming, their Crown Victoria with Bentz at the wheel was flying up the freeway toward Baton Rouge. "Are you serious? Vampires? As in blood-sucking creatures that morph into bats and sleep in coffins and can't be killed without silver bullets or a stake through the heart or some kind of c.r.a.p like that?"

"That's what he said." Bentz squinted into the night and drove as if Satan himself were on his a.s.s. The rain was thick, his wipers slapping it aside as the police band radio crackled and spat. In the distance streaks of lightning sizzled through the sky.

"You believe this?"

Bentz felt Montoya's gaze drilling into him. "What I believe is my kid is missing and some crazed son of a b.i.t.c.h has her."

"But vampires?"

Bentz muttered tautly, "Those bodies pulled from the river had only traces of blood in them. Traces. And the puncture wounds. No one's reported finding any b.l.o.o.d.y crime scene without a body."

"Except for our stripper, Karen Lee Williams aka Bodiluscious. There was blood there. And she went missing." Montoya scratched at his goatee. "You think they're connected?"

Bentz scowled. "Don't know. There was blood there, yeah, but not six quarts. Not a whole body's worth."

"So, this f.u.c.kin' vampire worshipper probably drank the rest. And then turned into a bat and flew off on bat wings to a vault somewhere and slept in a coffin while he digested his meal." He reached into an inside pocket of his leather jacket and found a pack of cigarettes, the ones he saved, Bentz knew, for nights like this. His sarcasm couldn't quite disguise the hint of uncertainty he felt. Neither of them knew what they were up against.

Bentz saw the exit for Baton Rouge and angled the Crown Vic toward the ramp. "All I know is my kid's missing and there's a whole lotta weird s.h.i.t going on." He thought of Kristi. Her smile. Her green eyes, so much like her mother's. The way she loved to bait him, or play up to him and call him "Daddy" when she was trying to wheedle something from him. Inside he felt empty. How many times would he have to go through this? She was the light of his life, and he suddenly felt a jab of guilt for the happiness he'd found with Olivia. Had he ignored Kristi, his only child? s.h.i.t, he'd even blamed Jay McKnight for abandoning her when he'd really been p.i.s.sed at himself.

"Don't beat yourself up over this," Montoya said, lighting up, the smell of smoke drifting through the car. "And don't say you're not. I see it in your face. I've been through this with you before. We'll find her."

Dead or alive.

The phrase cut through Bentz's brain, but he didn't repeat it. Couldn't think that he'd never see his daughter alive again.

"What the h.e.l.l are you doing here?" Mai demanded, her gun trained on Jay, who'd immediately dropped to the floor.

"I'm the boyfriend, remember? I think I should be asking you that question. I'm with the crime lab, for Christ's sake."

"FBI."

"What?"

"You heard me. I'm a field agent with the FBI. I've been working undercover on the missing coed case ever since the second vic went missing."

He looked up at her and saw the hardness in her small face. She was dead serious as she pulled out a badge. "Get up." She motioned with the gun, then crossed to the door and pulled it shut.

As she slid her sidearm into her shoulder holster he got to his feet and examined her badge. He'd seen enough in his life to recognize its authenticity. "What's going on?"

"I'm not at liberty to say-"

"Kristi's missing," he snapped. "I don't know where the h.e.l.l she is so don't give me any federal c.r.a.p. What the h.e.l.l do you know?"

"I can't tell you."

He pulled his cell phone from his pocket. "Then you can explain yourself to Rick Bentz."

"Stop it! You can't intimidate me."

"We don't have any time."

That seemed to get to her. She pushed a hank of black hair from her eyes, glanced at him, and mumbled something about a loss of protocol, but sat on the edge of the couch and said, "t.i.t for tat, McKnight. You spill everything you know, and we'll work this together." She held up a finger. "Just for now. I need clearance."

"Deal." He didn't hesitate.

"I've been working this case for months, undercover, and then your girlfriend comes along and starts s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g everything up, jeopardizes and threatens everything I've been doing for half a year!"

"You had the camera in here?"

"It was already in place. Hiram, the so-called manager, used to watch it for fun. His own private girlie show." She couldn't hide the sneer in her voice. "Should've run him in, but once again, I was working things out. We discovered the camera after the At.w.a.ter girl went missing and left it up, just in case the killer returned."

"You used Kristi as bait?"

"We did not put her in harm's way," Mai insisted.

"Nor did you warn her off." Jay was furious, ready to throttle the little woman.

"Couldn't blow our cover. You obviously discovered it, so I came back to adjust the books you put over the lens."

"You came in through the window," he guessed, and she nodded, a hint of a cold smile twisting her lips. "So where's Kristi?"

"Don't know. I thought she might be with you."

"You didn't have anyone following her?"

Mai met his gaze. "You don't know where she went?"

He shook his head. "She mentioned going back to see Everyman, Everyman, Father Mathias's production-" Father Mathias's production-"

"I work on the crew," she cut him off. "We know something is up with Mathias, but nothing we can prove, and no, Kristi, wasn't at the performance tonight. We tape them."

"You tape them?"

"With the administration's approval." She was stone-cold serious. "We don't know everything about this guy, but we're pretty sure he's a whack job of the highest order."

"But you don't know who he is?"

"We're working on it."

"And you haven't arrested Dominic Grotto?"

"He's not our guy."

"He's the one who's into all the vampire c.r.a.p!" The cat hopped through the open window, took one look at the strangers, and shot under the couch. Jay pulled the window shut and rain slid down the panes.

"I'm telling you we don't have a case against him."

"You mean you didn't," Jay pointed out. "That's changed. Now we have bodies," Jay said. "Bloodless bodies with evidence of homicide. Bite marks on the victims' necks. I'll bet my right arm those bruises match Dr. Grotto's bite impression."

Mai stared at him. Weighing her options, as if she might renege on her previous agreement. Finally, glancing at her watch, she said, "Okay, let's do this thing. We'll go talk to Grotto and see what the Vampire King has to say. On the way, you tell me everything you know and don't leave out a word."

"Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned," Father Mathias whispered as he knelt at his bedside. How had he been so tempted, so easily led astray? He'd thought it was all for the greater good.