Lisa Jackson's Bentz & Montoya Bundle: Hot Blooded, Cold Blooded, Shiver, Absolute Fear, Lost Souls, Malice, & an Exclusive Extended Excerpt From Devious (63 page)

Chapter Twenty

The names of the saints ran through Bentz’s head.

St. Cecilia.

St. Joan of Arc.

St. Mary Magdalene.

Each one different. Each one immortalized on a medal that was purposely left at the scene of the crime.

Why? Bentz wondered as his computer spewed out pages of information on each of the martyred women. What was the significance? Pivoting in his desk chair, he picked up the first page on St. Cecilia, patron saint of musicians, poets, and sinners. He skimmed the account of her life as a Roman girl, then came to the part about her death. His nerves tightened. Cecilia or Cecily was sentenced to death for refusing to repudiate her Christianity. She was supposed to die from suffocation in her bathroom by furnace fumes, and when that didn’t work, she was to be beheaded by three blows to the neck, which again failed, and she survived for several days after the attack.

“Jesus,” he whispered as he thought of the similarities to the woman’s death in Bayou St. John—the smoky bathroom and then her head nearly severed from her body, in three blows according to the ME as well as Olivia Benchet. The sick bastard who did this was copying the punishment meted out against St. Cecilia—the name Olivia had heard him whisper in her vision.

An eerie sensation swept over Bentz’s skin.

He knew that Joan of Arc died from being burned at the stake and the Jane Doe had been horridly burned before her body had been dumped at the statue of Joan in the French Quarter.

But what about Mary Magdalene … that part didn’t quite fit. He didn’t have a record of Mary Magdalene’s death, but he did know that she was a sinner—presumably a prostitute—as was Cathy Adams, who was found dead in her Garden District apartment. Cathy’s head had been shaved, and the smell of patchouli oil had been present. He read the account of Mary Magdalene’s life and how it was recorded in the New Testament by St. Luke that she wiped Christ’s feet with her hair and anointed him with ointment.

Bentz felt that eerie sensation again.

Had the killer turned this story of Jesus into something grotesque?

The phone rang. It was the ME in the morgue. “The dental records of the victim from the fire in Bayou St. John match with Stephanie Jane Keller,” he said, though Bentz had already convinced himself that the girl who died in the fire was Dustin Townsend’s girlfriend.

“You’re certain?”

“A hundred percent. She had a lot of dental work done a few years back. I’ve checked the X-rays and talked to the dentist. She’s your girl.”

“Thanks.” Bentz hung up and tapped his pen on a legal pad situated near the phone. He felt sick inside. He’d seen grizzly deaths—more than he wanted to count—but these killings were so macabre and hideous, gruesomely executed by some kind of weird zealot. A
priest?
No way.

“So think, Bentz. Think.” Stop him before he strikes again.

What did the three women have in common aside from being murdered in a bizarre fashion?

They all appeared to be under thirty. Two of the three were white, though Cathy Adams was racially mixed. The killer had jumped racial lines, which was odd in and of itself. But not unheard of. He made a note.

Okay, what else?

Until he found out who the Jane Doe left at the statue of Joan of Arc was, he had only Cathy Adams and Stephanie Jane Keller to compare lifestyles and acquaintances and their pasts. They both had boyfriends, though Cathy’s hadn’t been heard from in months. Marc Duvall, Cathy’s pimp/boyfriend, had blown town around the time of the murder and was still a suspect.

Both of the identified victims had lived alone, Cathy in the Garden District of the city, Stephanie in an apartment in Covington, less than a mile from her boyfriend’s house. Cathy was a part-time student at Tulane and an exotic dancer. Stephanie was a secretary for an insurance company and took night classes at Loyola.

Which was next door to Tulane University.

A connection? Or a coincidence?

Bentz made it a personal code not to believe in coincidence. He made another note and wondered about the remaining Jane Doe. Another student at one of the universities in the Garden District?

Olivia Benchet’s a graduate student at Tulane.

His jaw tightened. He didn’t like where this was leading. The thought that Olivia might be in contact with the killer scared him. Big-time.

So what about the priest?

The priest only Olivia saw—and that was in her “vision.” Don’t go jumping off the deep end here, Bentz. You need more facts to believe that a priest would kill these women.

It didn’t make any sense. He scanned his notes again, the ones he’d taken during the interviews with Olivia. He stopped when he came to the sheet of paper with the weird letters and symbols. His eyes narrowed as he thought. Another saint? Or was that stretching it too far … grasping at straws? Why would a priest kill women and make them look like martyred saints? That didn’t make sense. And why would Olivia be able to see him killing the women?
How?
What was the connection? Bentz was missing something … something important.

He ran a hand over his face, heard the hum of computers and buzz of conversation in the outer office, and glanced back on his notes on St. Cecilia once again. The same stuff. Except … His gut clenched as he noticed the feast day. November twenty-second. He caught his breath. The day Stephanie Jane Keller was murdered.

The killer had done his work on November twenty-second not because it was the date of the JFK assassination, but because it was the feast day of St. Cecilia.

“Son of a …” He flipped through his pages on Joan of Arc. “Feast day… May thirtieth.” The Jane Doe was found at the foot of the statue of Joan of Arc on May thirty-first. But she could have been killed before midnight, May thirtieth, her feast day. Burned at a damned stake? Where? “Shit.” What kind of sick mind were they up against?

And when would he strike again? Jesus, if Bentz remembered correctly, from his days of Catechism, it seemed there was a feast day celebrating some saint’s life every time you turned around.

Sweat broke out on his forehead. That meant there wasn’t much time.

If you ‘re right, his mind warned. You could be connecting dots that don’t exist.

Like hell. He knew he was right. The demented bastard was using the holy days for his gruesome work.

Suddenly Bentz wanted a drink. And a smoke.

He opened his desk drawer and scrounged for a piece of tasteless nicotine gum. It wasn’t the same; didn’t give him the hit a Camel straight did, but it would have to suffice. For now. A drink was out of the question.

Grabbing his jacket, ID, and shoulder holster, he logged out and told a secretary if Montoya showed up he needed to talk to him. Then Bentz hit the rain-drenched streets, paging his partner himself from his cell phone as he unlocked his Jeep. He decided to drive to the one spot in the city that he’d managed to avoid for a long, long while.

Jaw clenched, mind racing with more questions than answers, he cut across town, impatient with the clog of traffic. Ironic that a place he’d shunned was now so damned important that he’d abuse the speed limit to get there. The wipers slapped a torrent of rain from the windshield and the police band crackled, though only if Satan himself was found in New Orleans would Bentz be deterred.

A final turn and he saw the church. A place of faith. His parish, if he had one. Since moving to New Orleans, he’d been here about five times. Always with Kristi. On Christmas, sometimes Easter. Never in between and sometimes he’d skipped a year. It all depended on how he felt about God at the time the holiday rolled around. He parked on the street and stared up at the tall spire of St. Luke’s Church. Illuminated by lights on the ground, the steeple rose into the night, seeming to knife into the clouds, unbent by the rain.

It was ironic, he thought, that James had ended up here.

What were the chances?

Unless James had requested the transfer.

Wouldn’t that beat all? He’d wondered half a dozen times why his half-brother had transferred to the Big Easy.

Bentz pocketed his keys, didn’t bother turning up his collar, and made a dash for the front doors. Someone had told him long ago that God was patient. He hoped to hell it was true.

The woman was a problem. A serious problem.

The Chosen One sensed her presence, knew that it was only a matter of time before she led the police closer to him. He knew her name. Olivia Benchet … a self-proclaimed psychic. As was her grandmother, a backwoods voodoo priestess. But then The Chosen One knew all about Virginia Dubois.

He’d done his research. It was necessary to understand one’s enemies. How else would one prevail?

Standing in the shower’s hot spray, he sneered when he thought of the police. Simpletons. Idiots. With all of their sophisticated equipment and computer links, and manpower, they were still running around in circles. He’d listened to the press conference that was meant to warn the constituents of the city about a homicidal maniac; he’d heard that there was a task force in place and that more details would be released when they were available.

Which was a joke. The police didn’t dare tip their hands and tell too much about what they’d found for fear of a copycat killer, or someone confessing to the crime who had no part of it.

So they were careful.

And stupid.

He held a razor and shaved himself carefully. First one thin blade, then another, and finally a third, so that there was no margin for error. The razors were sharp, honed with precision, and they gently caressed his skin, removed all trace of his hair. He worked his way downward from his hairline, slowly over his face, then his neck and chest and underarms, anywhere there was a hint of body hair. He was careful in that sensitive area surrounding his scrotum and took his time with his legs and feet, watching the dark stubble swirl down the drain in an eddy of lather.

He’d installed a full-length mirror next to the shower, and through the steamy glass doors, he saw his image—bare and clean, white skin red from the hot spray, nary a single hair visible, just rippling muscles beneath taut skin, compliments of a rowing machine, a cross-country ski machine, and weights that he used in his daily regimen. The hair on his head was wet and he considered removing it. He should shave it down to nothingness as one single strand left at a scene would undo him. But a significant change in his appearance would raise suspicion, and in truth, pride and vanity won out over caution. For now, the hair would stay. He combed the wet strands from his face, slicking them to his head. Someday, perhaps …

As he stepped out of the shower, he didn’t towel off but let the cold air evaporate the moisture on his skin. He’d found his next victim. Oh, there were many to choose from; so many sinners, but this one, the redhead, would do nicely. He’d been watching her for weeks, wondering if she was worthy of the sacrifice, and when he’d spoken to her, he’d known then. If she only knew how he was going to transform her soul. Barefooted, he crossed the smooth wood floor to his closet and reached inside for the medal, a very special medal suspended from a fine chain.

St. Catherine of Alexandria.

He felt his blood begin to heat at the thought of his mission. Tonight … before midnight. He imagined her pleading for her life, praying and supplicating, crying and repenting, offering herself to him … No matter what she bartered with, no matter how desperately she begged, her blood would flow,

He looped the chain over his wrist and glanced in the mirror again. Tonight would be good. Yes. Another sacrifice.

But then he would have to reassess. Because the granddaughter of Virginia Dubois, daughter to the slut Bernadette, could ruin things for him.

Unless she became one of the martyred.

He smiled at the thought. She had to die. She was a threat and he had personal reasons to end her life, reasons she couldn’t yet fathom. There were others slated to be sacrificed first, of course, but… his schedule could be rearranged to allow for this special rite.

Saint Olivia. It had a nice ring to it.

A very nice ring.

Chapter Twenty-one

“There’s someone to see you … a police officer,” Wanda, the church secretary, said as she tapped on the door to the office while simultaneously pushing it open.

Father James McClaren looked over the tops of his reading glasses and read the curiosity in the uplift of Wanda’s white eyebrows. Thin and wrinkled with eyes that appeared owlish behind her glasses, she licked her lips nervously.

“His name is … what?” She turned and James heard a deep voice that he recognized instantly. “Oh yes … Detective Richard Bentz,” she said, looking at Father McClaren again.

James’s chest tightened. The soft classical music he’d been listening to seemed to fade. What would bring his half-brother here? Only the direst of circumstances.
Kristi.
James’s mouth went dry. “Send him in,” he said, turning away from his computer screen. Next week’s sermon would have to wait.

As Wanda stepped aside to let Bentz enter, James steeled himself. Any conversation with Bentz turned into a confrontation.

“Father,” Bentz said with a nod and James, standing, forced a smile.

“Thank you, Wanda,” James said, slanting a glance at the woman still hovering in the doorway. She got the hint and slipped outside. The door shut with a soft thud. James extended his hand across the desk. He relaxed a little. If something was seriously wrong with Kristi, it would have been evident in the lines on Bentz’s face. As it was his half-brother looked worried, but not filled with despair or grief. “Long time, no see. How’re ya, Rick?”

Bentz took his hand in a bear-like clasp that was as brief as it was strong. “Okay.” He settled into one of the visitor’s chairs and James remembered how much, as a boy, he’d looked up to his older brother. How close they’d been. As children, Rick had always been there for him. While growing up, Bentz had shown him how to throw a baseball, shoot a twenty-two and sneak booze from the old man’s liquor cabinet. Rick had scoffed at James’s piety, and once taken on Freddy Mason when Freddy and some friends had picked a fight with James in the school yard, calling him a sissy and a “Mama’s boy.” Rick had knocked Freddy flat, then, when the older boys had left with their tails tucked between their collective legs, Rick had turned on his half brother and kicked James’s butt from one side of Orange County to the other. He’d told James that Freddy had been right. James
was
a “Mama’s boy” and all that candy-assed stuff about God and Church had to be hidden away or he’d get into big trouble. It was time for James to fight his own battles.

The next week James had asked Rick to show him how to box and in the next year, after growing six inches and putting on thirty pounds, James had been able to stand up for himself. They’d been tight way back when and James had always felt awe for his stronger half brother; a kid who’d grown up not knowing his own father, a policeman shot in the line of duty.

Even so, eventually James and Rick had taken far different paths and eventually James had betrayed his older brother. And he’d been paying for it ever since.

Now, he dropped into his worn desk chair.

“How ‘bout you?” Rick asked without so much as a smile, as if he didn’t really give a damn. “You okay these days?”

“Can’t complain.” Drawing in a tight breath James asked a question that had been on his mind for months. “How’s Kristi?”

“Fine.”

“In school?”

“Yeah.” Bentz’s eyes dared him to go further.

He took the challenge. “Up at All Saints?”

“That’s right.”

“She doin’ okay?”

“As I said, ‘fine'.”

“Coming home for Thanksgiving?” James asked, eager for any little tidbit of information about the daughter who had believed he was her uncle until a few months ago.

“Yeah.” A muscle worked in the side of Bentz’s face as if he, too, were remembering the scene after he’d handed Kristi the condemning letter, then left a message on James’s answering machine explaining that he’d finally told her the truth. James had hoped for some kind of bonding, a healing, and he’d been sorely disappointed. Kristi had summarily rejected him, and told him to “Fuck off” when he’d called. The short, furious, one-sided conversation still rang in his ears.

“Don’t you ever call me, okay? You’re a goddamned hypocrite and I don’t want you praying for me, either, just leave me the hell alone!” she’d cried and slammed down the phone. He had prayed for her. Hours. Hoping she would see him. Speak with him, let him explain … If she only knew how much he loved her, had loved her mother.. maybe more than God. When Jennifer had admitted that she was pregnant with his child, he’d offered to quit the priesthood, had been willing to take the heat of his brother’s wrath, God’s fury, even to accept the specter of being ex-communicated, but she’d refused … She couldn’t accept the scandal, so they’d covered up the truth for a while. Now, he tapped his desk, feeling shame. Feeling that same familiar guilt.

Rick was still glaring at him. “I didn’t come here to talk about her,” he said tersely.

James nodded, trying to ignore that particular pang of emptiness whenever he thought about Kristi. “I know. And I guess I’m glad. I was afraid something was wrong with her when you showed up.”

“This isn’t about her.”

“All right, but…” He opened his hands and wondered how to ever bridge the gap between them.
Through God,
he’d told himself over and over, but for some reason the Father hadn’t seen fit to mend their small family. And that, too, was James’s fault. For he’d never forgotten Jennifer and years after Kristi was born, he and the mother of his child had sinned again. He cleared his throat. “I was worried … You know, she won’t respond to my letters or my e-mail.”

“Then leave it be, James,” Bentz said, his lips compressed.

“But—”

“I said ‘leave it'; if she wants to contact you, she will. Until then you just leave it alone.”

“I’ve prayed and—”

Bentz snorted, the way of nonbelievers but even so, James felt no sense of superiority in his faith. It was prideful, of course, to feel that smugness. And a sin. Even those who desperately needed God’s love sometimes rejected James’s attempts to lead them to the Father. For those who couldn’t find that faith, he felt despair, and, in some cases, unfortunately a sense of superiority. However not today. Not when it came to Kristi. James couldn’t rely on his faith for he’d transgressed so badly, wounded his brother so bitterly, that God seemed to have shunned helping him. Rick Bentz had, at one time, been his role model, the older brother James had looked up to and emulated.

But that was before James had met Jennifer. And the weekend that had changed their lives forever.

God help him.

“I’m here on business,” Bentz said, getting down to it as he leaned over the desk. “Here’s the deal. We’ve got another sicko loose, a serial killer.”

“I saw it on the news.”

“Yeah, well, there are certain things I can’t talk about, of course, things that we’re keeping from the public, so I guess I’m here as a … penitent or confessor or whatever it is the Church calls it these days.” He made a brushing motion with his hand, as if it was of no consequence. “I just want to make sure that if I talk to you, it’ll go no further, right? This is between you, me and God.”

“If that’s what you want.”

“It is.” Rick was dead-serious and James recognized the look. He’d seen it in the past. The grim, focused expression had always been a part of Bentz whether he donned it before a boxing match in high school or right before his fist had crashed into James’s face and broken his nose. James hadn’t seen it coming. But he hadn’t known that Jennifer had confessed to Rick that she was carrying his half-brother’s child. That one blow had been symbolic of the rift that was to come. James had tried to reconnect with his half brother, to play the role of uncle to his own child, but Rick had only grudgingly allowed it, probably for the sole purpose of hiding the painful truth and to protect Kristi.

“Then, yes. You can trust that this will go no further.”

Again the corners of Bentz’s mouth tightened, but he didn’t comment on trusting his half brother. “The killer has struck three women that we know about, potentially more. The women have a couple of things that link them, but one of the strongest is that I think they were all murdered on a Saint’s feast day.”

“What?” James didn’t think he’d heard correctly.

“It seems they were killed on the feast day purposely. There are clues to back this up.”

“Dear God,” James whispered, sketching a quick sign of the cross over himself. “But if that were the case then there could be dozens … or hundreds of victims.” He pointed to the calendar hung over his desk. “Look at today. It’s the feast day of St. Catherine of Alexandria, the patron saint of maidens and philosophers and students and preachers.”

“Damn.” Bentz glared at the calendar, then asked, “How did she die?”

“Horribly. Well, all the martyrs did … Here …” He swivelled in his chair and searched the bookcase behind him before he found the heavy book he wanted; one devoted entirely to the saints. What Bentz was speculating was heinous; crimes not only against the victims but the Church itself. To think someone would misconstrue the veneration of those canonized and twist it into murder was unthinkable. Twisted and evil.

As he slid a pair of reading glasses onto his nose, James flipped open the book, scanned the chapters and, thumbing quickly through the pages, found what he was looking for. “Here we go.” He pushed the open book across the desk.

The color drained from his half-brother’s face. “Tortured by being strapped to a spiked wheel.”

“That was the idea, yes.”

“Jesus,” Bentz whispered, his eyes scanning the page. “Her bonds were miraculously loosened and the spikes flew off to kill the onlookers.”

“And when that didn’t work she was beheaded.”

Bentz nodded slowly, his gaze glued to the text.

“It’s said that her blood flowed white. Like milk.” James scratched his neck beneath his clerical collar. “And all because she committed the sin of converting people to Christianity.” Folding his hands, James leaned over his desk. “If you have a killer who is copying the murders of the saints, you’re going to be very busy, I’m afraid. And he won’t be satisfied killing only women. Men and children as well will be at risk. There are hundreds of saints … thousands.” Inwardly James shivered. He skewered his half-brother’s gaze with his own. “This is unthinkable.”

“A lot of unthinkable acts have been performed in the name of God.”

“I know.”

Bentz flipped through the tome, the lines of his face deepening as he scanned the thin pages. “Do you mind if I take this? I’ll return it.”

“If it will help. Of course.”

“Thanks. Now, I’ve got something else I hope you can interpret.”

“I’ll try.”

Reaching into his pocket, Bentz withdrew copies of the notes Olivia had taken after her nightmares or “visions” surrounding the woman chained within a crypt. “Does this mean anything to you?” he asked. “Could those notations have anything to do with one of these saints?” He tapped the book with two fingers.

James adjusted his reading glasses. At first the letters and symbols meant nothing. “Is there anything else you can tell me about it?” he asked, studying the symbols.

“Yeah … if it’s connected with a saint, the feast day would have been in summer, I think. Probably August. Maybe July.”

“Philomena,” James said as the letters began to connect. He picked up the book again, but he knew before he thumbed through the pages what he would find. “LUMENA, PAXTE, CUMFI. It’s Latin, but mixed up. Supposedly these words were found inscribed in red on the tomb of Saint Philomena. When the tiled letters were changed around a little bit, the message read, ‘Pax tecum, Filumena,’ or ‘Peace be with you, Philomena.’ ”

“What about the symbols?” Bentz asked.

“On the tiles of the tomb.” James glanced down at the text. “I suppose they’re open to interpretation, but the tomb of this Roman girl was found in 1802. It’s thought that aside from the letters, the inscriptions on the tiles were of a lily, a palm, the arrows, anchor and a scourge, see here—” he pointed to the crude drawings. “That’s the lily and it means she was a virgin. The palm is symbolic of being a martyr and the weapons depict the tortures she went through.” He pointed to the arrows. “Even these squiggly lines over the arrow are supposed to represent fire, but of course, that’s speculation as nothing is recorded about her. She was also found with a vial of dried blood, presumably hers, within the tomb.”

“Her own blood? Why?”

James shrugged. “That’s the mystery of Philomena. Not much is known about her or who she was. Though she’s got a loyal following, the Church has wavered, even suppressing her feast day in the early sixties, I think. She’s gained favor again, at least with some of her supplicants, those who invoke her name in every sort of need.”

“She performs miracles?” Bentz asked, obviously skeptical.