Malice

by Lisa Jackson

  Now, watching the back hoe extract soil from his wife’s grave was surreal, the low-laying fog making it more so. Bentz believed with all his heart that the decaying body inside the coffin belonged to his wife.

  Who else?

  And yet he was jittery. Tense. Expecting the worst. He began to sweat despite the cool temperature. The men with shovels were just getting to work when Hayes arrived in a tan suit that looked as pressed and crisp as if it had just come from the dry cleaners. Dark shirt and matching tie finished the outfit and complemented the polish on his shoes. Always a dandy.

  “No word from your wife?” Hayes asked.

  “I was hoping you knew something.”

  “Working on it.” Hayes touched the knot of his tie. “Tracked down the phone with the G.P.S.,” he said.

  “What?”

  “No, don’t get excited. Obviously the phone was dumped. We found it in the sand beneath the Santa Monica Pier.”

  “Shit!”

  “We’re checking with the webcam people again. So far nothing, but it’s still early.”

  Santa Monica. Again. Bentz’s guts twisted because he knew why the phone had been left there. Because of Jennifer. Because that pier and town were so much a part of her life, their life together. Whoever had kidnapped her was pointing that out, rubbing salt in the wounds, laughing at him.

  “Son of a bitch.” Bentz couldn’t stop the black fury that overtook him. “Jennifer,” he spat out. “She’s playing with me.”

  “It’s not Jennifer,” Hayes said, hitching his chin toward the coffin.

  “I know…you know what I mean. The woman I was with in the car. She looked a lot like Jennifer. A lot, but her voice was off and she was too young, and once I was that close, I knew she wasn’t my ex-wife. But damn it, she knew so much about Jennifer…about us.” His skin crawled at the memory of kissing her, of touching her. His stomach roiled at the thought of the taste of her and how he’d been duped. Furious with himself, he tried to focus, to move on, to think like a cop, not a husband. “Okay. So the phone’s a bust, what else are you doing?”

  “Backtracking mostly. Talking to people at the airport who might have seen Olivia connect with Petrocelli at baggage claim. We’re checking security cameras at the airport and piecing together Sherry’s schedule yesterday.”

  It’s not enough, Bentz thought. “Have you called the FBI?”

  “The captain’s taking it up with-”

  “It’s a kidnapping case, Hayes.”

  “It hasn’t been twenty-four hours. Not that our Missing Persons Department plays by that rule.”

  “I hope not. Jesus H. Christ! A police officer is dead. Along with a lot of other people. So, not only do we have kidnapping, we’ve got a serial killer on the loose. A cop-killer. I think the Feds should be involved.”

  “They’re already checking into the Springer twins’ murder. We’re just not sure that all these incidents are connected,” Hayes admitted. “Bledsoe’s working that angle.”

  “Great.” Bentz couldn’t stand to think that Olivia’s safety might hinge on Andrew Bledsoe’s investigative work. “What about Fernando Valdez? Have you talked to him?”

  “Still trying to find him. He didn’t go back to the Salazars’ house last night. We watched.” He glanced at Bentz. “I talked to Jerry Petrocelli. He was devastated.”

  “I bet,” he said, hoping to high heaven that he wouldn’t be the next husband to learn that his wife had been murdered by this whack job. Not if he could help it.

  Bentz watched as the casket was carried to the van by six strong guys…so reminiscent of the burial when Jennifer was originally laid to rest. The dusty box was slid into the back of the vehicle. “At least now we’ll know if it’s Jennifer inside,” he said as the back doors of the van were slammed shut.

  “It won’t take long,” Hayes said. “We’ve already received the records from her dentist. Got an expert who’s going to compare them to what we find in the skull.”

  And then what? Bentz wondered. No other body had washed onto the beach, so they still didn’t know what had happened to the woman who’d teased him, lured him to the cliffs, and jumped into the sea. God, why would anyone do that? Who was this woman who looked so much like Jennifer? Why was she tormenting him? And what the hell had she done with Olivia?

  As if reading his mind, Hayes said, “We’ll find her.” His cell phone chimed. “Later, Bentz.” He fished the phone out of his pocket and took the call as he walked back to his 4Runner and the vehicle carrying the casket took off. Bentz was left staring into the dry, empty hole where he’d thought he’d buried his first wife forever. Even in the hazy morning light, he felt a chill snake down his spine, as if someone were watching him, unseen eyes observing his every move. He looked up and turned, searching through the fog. A human form seemed to materialize, then fade, leaves and limbs of trees shivering. Was someone watching him from the shrubbery on the other side of the fence?

  He told himself that he was imagining things, that the exhumation had weirded him out, but he walked toward the area where he’d thought he’d seen the branches move. As he approached he was certain he caught a glimpse of eyes peering at him! Green eyes, so like Jennifer’s, studying him through the thick mist.

  His pulse skyrocketed.

  “No way,” he said between clenched teeth. But despite his denial, he had to check it out. Picking up speed, he broke into a jog, his gaze fastened on the area where he’d first caught sight of the voyeur. As he spurred himself forward, his knee and thigh protested, but he gutted it out. Upon reaching the fence, he vaulted over, landing with most of his weight on his good leg.

  No one was in the scrub brush of the vacant lot. No green eyes were staring at him. But he’d been certain someone had been here, watching…waiting, anticipating that he’d be at the exhumation; someone who knew where Olivia was.

  Hell.

  He pressed forward to a small copse of trees that stood still and quiet in the swirling fog. But he had seen her here, before she slipped through the sycamores and scrub brush.

  A ghost in the mist.

  “Where are you, you bitch?” Methodically, he searched the area, a strip of trees, grass, and brush between the cemetery and the subdivision abutting it.

  He strained to listen. No twig snapped, no footstep over the sound of his own heartbeat and breathing. He heard only the sounds of muted traffic and voices from the men working on the exhumation.

  Frustrated, he peered over the fence that edged the tree line and again saw nothing. No one.

  No one was here, he told himself. Just you and your paranoia. A mirage you conjured in your tired and willing brain.

  He took one last sweeping look, but found nothing.

  “Hell.” He climbed over the fence again, paid no attention to the pain in his leg, and decided he was going to take the law into his own hands. He knew that Hayes and the LAPD were doing their best to locate Olivia, but they were playing by the rules, doing everything by the book, and he didn’t give a damn about what protocol should be used, or whether he was compromising the damned case.

  Olivia was missing.

  Maybe already dead.

  Bentz wasn’t going to mess around any longer.

  He’d do whatever it took to find his wife.

  “Screw this.” Montoya hung up the phone. He wasn’t one to sit on the sidelines when the action was elsewhere. Bentz was in trouble, seeing ghosts, for God’s sake. Now Olivia was missing. Bentz was going even further around the bend, and there wasn’t a whole helluva lot he could do from here in New Orleans.

  So California, here I come.

  He had the next two days off anyway, and there was some leave he could use if he needed it. He didn’t even wait for the end of his shift, just told Jaskiel that he wanted to take a few hours comp time, and walked out the door.

  On the way home he called Abby at work and gave her the same word. Fortunately she was cool with it.

  “Do what ya have to do,” s
he told him. “But be careful, would you? Come back in one piece. I’m not great at playing Nancy Nurse.”

  “You got it.” He hung up smiling. At the house he packed a quick bag, then jumped into his Mustang again and headed to the airport.

  Hayes returned to the office to find Bledsoe on a rampage, trying to build a case to nail Bentz for any and all crimes committed in L.A. and the surrounding area for the last week.

  “I’m tellin’ ya,” Bledsoe reiterated when Hayes ran into him in the men’s room. “If Bentz hadn’t shown up, five people that we know of would be alive today.” He zipped up, then made a pass at the sink. “Ask the family members of McIntyre, Newell, Esperanzo, and the Springer twins what they think.”

  “They’re not cops.”

  “Oh, and add Donovan Caldwell, Alan Gray, and even Bonita Unsel to the mix. I’ve talked to them all; they think Bentz is our doer.”

  Hayes shook his head. “Again, not cops.”

  “Unsel was.”

  “With a major grudge. She and Bentz had a thing.”

  “Big deal. Bentz was quite a swordsman in his day. Cut a pretty wide swath through the department.” Then with a smarmy grin Bledsoe added, “Even your girlfriend hooked up with him a few times.”

  Hayes had expected the zinger; it was just Bledsoe’s style. “You talked to Alan Gray?” Hayes asked.

  Bledsoe nodded. “He’s back in town. Well, back in Marina del Rey, where he’s got his yacht moored. Hates Bentz.”

  “Then maybe he’s setting him up,” Hayes suggested.

  “Gray has too much money and power to be bothered with a pissant nobody like Bentz.”

  “Didn’t he steal Jennifer from Gray?”

  “You think he cares?” Bledsoe scowled. “Alan Gray has enough girls to make Hugh Hefner jealous.”

  “Don’t tell Hef,” Hayes said. “And Gray’s a competitive guy. My guess is he doesn’t like to lose. Nobody does.”

  “But to wait so long? What is it…like twelve or thirteen years?”

  “Longer,” Hayes said. “Jennifer was with Gray before she and Bentz were married. More like twenty-five or thirty.”

  “Alan Gray has better things to do than harbor a thirty-year-old grudge. Christ, Hayes, get real.”

  Hayes couldn’t help the irritation that crawled into his voice. “You and I both know that Bentz is innocent. You’re just pissed at him.” Hayes took a position in front of another urinal. “Let it go, Bledsoe. You’re a better cop than that.”

  “And you’re not looking at this clearly. You’ve got blinders on, man. We’re searching the wrong direction; we should be looking at Bentz with a freakin’ electron microscope.” Bledsoe pushed open the door and stepped into the hallway as a toilet flushed.

  Trinidad, newspaper tucked under his arm, emerged from the stall and glanced at the doorway. “Bledsoe’s a prick,” he said, moving to the sink to wash his hands.

  “Old news, Russ.”

  “But he’s a good cop. His instincts are usually right on.”

  “He’s tryin’ to make a case against Bentz.”

  “No, he’s not.” Trinidad reached for a towel. “He’s sayin’ look at the man more closely.” He wiped his fingers and wadded the towel, tossing it into the wastebasket with the skill of a high-school jock. “Wouldn’t hurt.” He paused. “Bentz thought he was saving my life and killed a kid. An honest mistake, but it doesn’t make me think Bentz is a saint. He’s made his share of mistakes just like the rest of us. Personally, I think some sick son of a bitch is setting him up. That’s who we should be trying to find.”

  Hayes finished peeing and shook off as Trinidad left the room. Maybe Bledsoe and Trinidad were right. There was a chance that, in his efforts to defend Bentz, Hayes hadn’t really looked at him, seen his flaws, put together a complete history of the man. He believed that someone was setting him up, he believed that it had to do with his ex-wife, and therefore it was personal.

  Someone had a razor-sharp ax to grind.

  It was just a matter of finding out who.

  Bentz squeezed the steering wheel, trying to reaffirm the line between reality and delusion.

  Had he seen Jennifer?

  Was that crazy woman who dived into the ocean really still alive and taunting him, or had her vision been a figment of his tired but overactive imagination? He didn’t have an answer as he drove directly to Encino. All he knew for certain was that his last hope, that of locating Olivia through her cell phone’s G.P.S., had been destroyed.

  Crushed.

  He’d staked so much on the possibility of being able to locate her through her cell phone.

  But he’d been wrong.

  Again.

  So here he was back in Encino, chasing another ancillary lead. He was tired to his bones, lack of sleep and worry eating at his guts, but he couldn’t stop. Not until he found Olivia.

  The junior college that Yolanda Salazar and her brother Fernando Valdez attended was only five miles from their house in Encino. And the Blue Burro where Fernando worked stood smack-dab in the middle between home and school. It wasn’t too much of a leap to think that Fernando could walk, bike, or run to the JC, work, and home. He could also take the bus that stopped four blocks from the Salazar home, passed directly by the restaurant, and stopped at the main entrance to the college. Or, if everyone at the Salazar house was lying or hiding information, he could have easily borrowed one of the other vehicles or caught a ride with Sebastian or Yolanda.

  The question was, as it had been from the moment Bentz had awakened from the coma at the hospital: who was the woman he’d seen driving Fernando’s car? Today, come hell or high water, he meant to find out. He figured he didn’t have a whole lot to lose. He was already persona non grata at the LAPD, and back in New Orleans, his job was still in question.

  Besides, he didn’t give a flying fig about either; all that mattered was his wife’s safety.

  He parked in the visitor lot, found the registrar’s office, and by flashing his badge and wearing his dead-serious cop face, convinced a frightened-looking girl of about twenty to give up Fernando and Yolanda’s class schedules.

  With the help of the free campus maps on the counter, he was able to determine where and when both of Mario Valdez’s siblings were scheduled to be during the day. As luck would have it, he had missed the early class in Fernando’s schedule but the kid was supposed to be in Sydney Hall for an evening lecture.

  Good.

  Bentz planned to return before that class started.

  He couldn’t wait to have a chat with the kid.

  I don’t have a lot of time. It’s broad daylight, the damned fog is lifting, but I have to take the risk.

  So I leave work and drive straight home, download my picture of Olivia, and print it out. I’m wearing thin gloves…no reason to get sloppy now. The result is superb. I captured the horrified expression on Olivia’s face perfectly and cropped out anything that would give a hint of where she is being held captive. All you can see are the bars of a cage and a pathetic, broken, frightened woman looking desperately at the camera.

  “Phase one,” I say, pleased with myself. Then, before too much time slips by, I erase the image from my hard drive and slip the photo into a manila envelope. Rather than using up a day by mailing the picture to him, I decide it’s time to ramp things up. Push him hard. Let him know what it’s like to feel the hollowness, the despair, of losing someone he loves.

  Oh, yes. Rick Bentz will soon learn what it’s like to be truly and horridly alone.

  I put on my sweat pants and jacket, tuck my hair into a baseball cap, then find my running shoes and a pair of oversized sunglasses. Not the best disguise, but it will have to do. Even though the sweats will look out of place on this warm day, they help alter my shape, along with a sports bra that’s two sizes too tight. Satisfied, I scribble Rick Bentz’s name across the envelope, then drive quickly to that horrible dive of a motel where he stays in Culver City.

  One sweep past the
So-Cal Inn assures me he’s not in; his new rental car is not in the lot.

  I park several blocks away, then, with the envelope tucked into my jacket, take off at an easy lope. Hiding my face from any traffic camera, I time the lights just right so that I barely have to slow to cross a street. When I reach the corner near the motel, I cut across the parking lot and drop the envelope at the door of the office. From the corner of my eye I see a kid at the desk, but he’s not paying any attention to what goes on beyond the television screen mounted in the corner.

  I feel a rush of anticipation as I jog back to the car. From there, I find a place to fill up with gas. I duck into their restroom to change into work clothes. Looking in the cracked, dull mirror, I fluff my hair and pat on some powder to hide the fact that my cheeks are flushed.

  Then I pay for the gas with cash, climb into my car, and head back to work. For the first time in years, I long for a cigarette, just to calm my nerves, but I ignore the craving.

  How I would love to make a swing by the motel to make certain that stupid kid sees the package. But I restrain myself. No reason to take any unnecessary chances.

  I only wish I could be a fly on the wall when Bentz opens the envelope. Oh, dear God, his expression will be priceless!