Evil Never Dies (The Lizzy Gardner Series Book 6) (19 page)

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

Five o’clock the next day, Hayley heard a knock on the door. Since she was on her way to the kitchen for chips for her bean dip, she stepped to the door and looked out the peephole. “Who is it?”

“Joey Rich.”

“That’s the father of Salma’s baby,” Lizzy said from the kitchen table, where she was sitting with her laptop.

Hayley opened the door. “What do you want?”

“Is Salma here?”

“Maybe. What’s your business with her?”

The guy looked as if he’d come straight out of business school or maybe accounting. Total geek. His hair was gelled and combed a little too neatly to one side. He wore the standard long-sleeved button-up white shirt, khaki pants, and a belt that looked cinched one notch too tight.

“A girl named Kitally sought me out and told me where Salma was living. I need to talk to her. I would like to meet my daughter.”

Hayley looked over her shoulder.

“Let him in,” Kitally said.

No sooner had she shut the door than another knock sounded.

“Are you kidding me?” Hayley returned to the door and peeked out. “It’s another guy,” Hayley said, “only this guy looks a lot like Salma.” She opened the door.

“I was told that my sister, Salma, is living here. I would like to speak to her, please.”

“Do you have a name?”

“Badar.”

Kitally rushed to Hayley’s side. “Come in,” she said.

Hayley shook her head. What the hell was Kitally thinking by telling everyone where Salma was living?

Kitally ushered Badar into the living area across the room from the other guy, and then she let out a long sigh before disappearing down the hallway. They could all hear her arguing with someone. That someone was Salma, and it wasn’t long before Kitally returned with the girl at her side.

Lizzy stood off to the side, her arms crossed. She was not happy.

“Have the two of you met?” Hayley asked Joey.

“No.”

“Well, great. Joey, this is Badar, Salma’s brother.” Hayley then turned to face the brother. “Badar, this is Joey, Salma’s boyfriend, and the father of her baby girl who has yet to be named.”

Neither of them looked happy or showed any sign of being gentlemen and shaking hands.

Salma looked at Joey. “Why are you here?”

His face turned red. “You’re kidding, right?”

She crossed her arms to let him know otherwise.

“I thought we had something good going, and then one day you disappeared from my life, and I haven’t heard from you since. You weren’t going to ever tell me that we have a daughter?”

Badar puffed out his chest. “You need to shut up,” he said. “Look at her! She’s much too young to be having babies, much less one of
your
babies.”

“Leave him alone, Badar.”

“Come on,” her brother said, gesturing toward the door. “I’m taking you home. Mother is ready to take you back. She’s worried sick.”

“If she was so worried, why did she kick me out of the house?”

“Because she was angry. She’s been disgraced.” He looked at Joey with hatred in his eyes. “And as I told you before, if I ever found out who dishonored our family’s name, I would do something about it.”

The asshole, Hayley realized, was threatening to hurt Joey, just as Salma had feared.

Salma stiffened. “I would like you to leave.”

His nostrils flared. “It makes me sick to know you have given birth to this man’s baby. I do not know why Mother will allow you into her home, but it is because of her that I cannot leave without you.”

Hayley wanted to drag his ass right out the front door, but she decided to wait and see how this played out and hopefully discover what Salma really wanted. Ultimately, it was her decision to make as to whether she returned home. No matter what happened, Kitally was going to get an earful from both Lizzy and Hayley.

“Is this why you left?” Joey asked Salma. “Because you were afraid for my life? Or because you no longer loved me?”

Her eyes glistened. “I love you, Joey. But this,” she said, gesturing between him and her brother. “I cannot live with this.”

Badar marched toward his sister and grabbed hold of her arm. “Come on. Let’s get the baby and get out of here.”

“Let go of her,” Joey demanded.

Badar pivoted and took a swing at Joey.

Joey ducked, then threw a good right and an even better left into Badar’s gut, doubling him over.

Salma’s brother recovered quickly, though, and lunged for Joey, sending them both onto the coffee table and breaking it in half. Hayley’s bean dip went flying, splattering the television screen and the floor with brown goop.

Salma and Lizzy shouted for them to stop, but it was too late for that.

They could hear the baby crying in the other room.

The two men wrestled around the room, knocking into furniture and walls as they went. When one of Kitally’s favorite decorative vases went flying and crashed to the floor in a million pieces, Kitally put her fingers in her mouth and let out an ear-piercing whistle.

Nobody cared.

“That only works in the movies,” Hayley told her.

“Thanks,” she said. “I can see that.”

Joey finally managed to push Badar off him, sending him staggering backward across a good portion of the living area before he found his balance. If he had any decency at all, he would have stopped right then and left the premises, but, like he’d said earlier, his family had been dishonored and apparently he was ready to fight to the death.

Lizzy didn’t care if the two man-boys killed each other.

She’d followed the baby’s cry and found her wrapped up and left atop a makeshift bed of blankets. Her tiny legs were stiff, and her face was red from crying. Lizzy picked her up and held her close to her chest. “Everything’s going to be all right,” she said, although she had serious doubts that would prove true.

Through the bedroom window, she saw Detective Chase walking toward the house.

What the hell?
With the sounds of the living room battle still raging, she walked with the baby to the front entry and opened the door to find the detective just reaching the steps.

“What are you doing here?” Lizzy asked.

“Whose baby is that?”

“Nobody you know,” she said. “What do you want?”

“You’re not going to invite me in?”

Glass shattered in the other room.

He stiffened. “What’s going on in there?”

“Do you really want to know?”

“Shoot.”

“A young girl and her boyfriend had a baby.” She tipped her chin toward the baby in her arms. “Her family strongly disapproves of the boyfriend and have threatened to do him harm.” She tipped her head toward the sound of chaos. “Boyfriend and brother are inside duking it out.”

“How do you get yourself into these messes?” he asked her.

“Trouble follows me wherever I go. You know that.”

“Maybe I should put a stop to it.”

“It’s your call,” Lizzy said, “though you’re probably a lot safer right here. Why are you here?”

“Your neighbor called in to complain about the noise. When I heard the address, I decided to swing by and make sure you were OK.”

“I appreciate it.”

As the male shouting inside built to a crescendo, he took a closer look at the baby in her arms. “She’s a cute one.” He put his finger in her little hand, and she gripped it tightly.

Chase turned to her. “I also wanted to tell you that I’ve authorized two of my best men to check out the area in and around Bennett’s vacation home in Lake Tahoe.”

That bit of news surprised her. Chase was letting her know he’d listened to her concerns about Bennett . . . and that he had her back. “Thanks, Detective. That means a lot.”

“Don’t get too excited. I’m not doing it because I think you’re right about the man. I’m doing it for peace of mind.”

“Got it.”

With nothing better to do, they both headed into the living room to see what was going on.

Badar would not let up, and he finally had to be dragged out in cuffs by Chase. Once Badar was secure inside the back of Detective Chase’s sedan, the detective walked over to where Lizzy stood a few feet away.

“What about the girl?” Chase asked Lizzy.

“What about her?”

“I don’t think her brother is going to let it go, and I’m not sure how long I can detain him.”

“I don’t know what to do,” Lizzy said. “Can’t you threaten the boy with jail time or something?”

He shrugged. “I’ll see what I can do. The kid’s running pretty hot. I’ll let him cool down, then see if I can put the fear of God into him.”

Lizzy watched Chase walk back to his car and said, “You’ll keep me updated on the Bennett matter?”

“Do I have a choice?”

No, you don’t
, she thought as she watched him get in his car and take off down the street. Lizzy looked at the baby wrapped in her arms and brought her tiny face next to hers. She smelled like sweet innocence mingled with baby powder.

When Lizzy stepped inside the house, Salma and Joey were waiting for her.

Lizzy handed her the baby. Before she could talk to them about what had just transpired, she felt the vibration of her cell phone in her back pocket. The caller ID told her it was the prosecutor, Grady Orwell.

“I have bad news,” he told her when she answered.

Lizzy walked through the house, weaving around overturned furniture and broken pottery, making her way toward the office at the end of the hallway, away from everyone else. “What is it?”

“Olimpia Padula,” he said. “She was found dead in her apartment. Drowned in the bathtub.”

Lizzy stopped walking. “Jesus.”

“They’re calling it accidental.”

“That’s bullshit.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Me, too. Thanks for letting me know.” Lizzy disconnected the call and then swallowed hard. Her fingers gripped the phone until she thought it might break.

“What’s wrong?” Hayley asked. “Who was that?”

Lizzy walked into the office.

Hayley followed behind and shut the door.

“Olimpia Padula is dead.” Lizzy took a seat at the desk and let her head fall into the palms of her hands. A few seconds passed before she gathered herself and looked up at Hayley. “I should have parked my ass in front of Olimpia’s apartment 24-7. Fuck that man!” She took a breath. “Bennett might very well have gotten away with murder . . . again. That asshole has been captured on video drugging and assaulting a woman, and yet it’s inadmissible in court.” She stabbed a finger in the air. “Nobody will speak out against the amazing Mr. Bennett. But guess what? I don’t give a shit. I refuse to let that man continue on his merry little way. That man will not lay a finger on anyone else.”

“What do you propose?” Hayley asked.

“Bennett isn’t the only one with eyes in the back of his head,” Lizzy said flatly. “His wife is in Europe. Mr. Bennett sent her away to spend time with friends until the media circus died down. Tomorrow night, when he comes home from work, we’ll be waiting.”

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

They had parked the car blocks away and then made their way into Bennett’s backyard via an undeveloped greenbelt. Lizzy watched behind a thick shrub and signaled to Hayley and Kitally that Bennett had arrived.

As she had seen the man do many times before, he parked his car near the fountain in front of his mansion. As he busied himself with unlocking the front door, Lizzy moved swiftly and silently after him. When he’d stepped inside and disabled the alarm, she rushed up from behind, put the TASER to his neck, and hit the switch.

He collapsed to his knees; fell flat to the marble floor, his body twitching. His face, turned to one side, contorted as he grimaced in pain and shock.

Kitally, Hayley, and Lizzy all wore black. They also wore dark full-faced ski masks just like the one Hayley was now sliding over Bennett’s head as he writhed on the floor.

Lizzy shut the door and locked it while Kitally wrapped duct tape around Bennett’s neck, securing his mask in place. Lizzy and Hayley stripped his clothes off. Hayley injected him with Dilaudid to help keep him under control.

They dragged him through the house, to the side door leading into the garage. His head knocked into the door frame and then clunked against the doormat covering a small section of the cement floor.

“Watch his head,” Kitally said.

They ignored her.

There was only one other car, an expensive BMW, inside the five-car garage, leaving plenty of room for them to do their work.

As soon as he stopped twitching, Lizzy hit him with the TASER again, giving him a good jolt. “How does it feel to be naked and powerless, Mr. Bennett?”

He grunted, tried to say something, but had a difficult time getting any words out. “You . . . will . . . pay . . . for . . . this,” he finally managed.

Lizzy held out her hand toward Hayley. “Give me the baton.”

Hayley did as she said.

Lizzy extended the stick and cracked it hard across the pale flesh of his thigh.

His pride did not allow him to scream out in pain. Although most of his face was covered, she could see the agony in the clenching of hands and teeth.

“Get on all fours,” Lizzy told him. “I want to see you walk around on the cold cement floor like the pig you are. Do it now or I’ll zap you with the TASER.”

He didn’t move.

She swatted him again, swinging harder this time, hitting him across the chest and then the stomach.

His knees rolled up to his chest in pain, but then he did as she said. He rolled over and pushed himself to his hands and knees.

“Move around in circles and squeal like a pig. We’re getting this on tape, so make it good.”

“You will die,” he said between pathetic squeals, his voice muffled beneath the mask.

She swatted him on the buttocks, leaving a red welt against his skin. “Squeal louder. We can’t hear you.”

He shrieked more than squealed. Pathetic. After a few seconds, he stopped, came to his knees, and put his hands to his neck. His fingers pulled and clawed at the ski mask covering his face.

Lizzy whipped his right arm and then his left. She swung out wide and came back hard, lashing his chest and then his side. Blind with rage, she whipped him across the shoulder. Blood spurted. An intricate network of red welts appeared.

He fell to the ground.

He was on his side, his knees curled close to his chest.

She couldn’t see through her fury, couldn’t stop whipping him, gaining no pleasure from what she was doing, just intent on stopping him from ever hurting another human being. He had been molesting young women for years. He raped and murdered and paid people to turn the other way.

Her arm was sore, her palm blistered from holding so tight to the baton, but she refused to stop.

She would put an end to this now.

She continued lashing out until, out of the corner of her eye, she saw Kitally.

The horror she saw scrawled across her face prompted Lizzy to stop and take a step back. Her arm fell to her side, and the baton dropped from her hands, clanked, and rolled across the cement floor.

She turned her palms upward and saw a new blister forming. And then she looked at Bennett. He was a bloody mess. He was no longer moving. She had no idea if he was breathing.

Have I become one of them?

Her stomach turned. Was she now a clone of the monsters she’d been trying so hard to get off the streets? When had this happened? What had she done?
“We’re finished here,” she said, trying to catch her breath. “Let’s go.”

Hayley grabbed hold of her shoulder. “You two get out of here. I’ll take care of the rest.”

“No, you won’t. Leave him be.”

Hayley frowned. “You know he’ll just do it again. How many young lives is he going to ruin before you regret this decision?”

Silence. It took all she had to keep the bile from coming forth.

“He’s the devil,” Hayley said. “We need to finish this . . . right now.”

Lizzy couldn’t bring herself to look into Hayley’s eyes. She was responsible for these girls, and look what she’d done. She’d brought it to this.

She thought of Jared then. He’d seen evil in all forms, and yet he never would have bent down to the criminal’s level. Never. There was no excuse. “I said let him go, and I mean it.”

She went to the side door that led out of the garage, held it open, and waited for both Kitally and Hayley to come.

Kitally didn’t waste any time getting out of there.

Hayley took a little longer. She looked from Bennett to Lizzy. “This isn’t right.”

“We never should have come,” Lizzy told her. “I made a mistake.”

“Your hormones are all fucked up.”

“Let’s go,” Lizzy said again, refusing to leave without her.

Once they were outside, Lizzy shut the door and looked at Hayley.

She’d never seen Hayley direct her anger at her before, but she was seething and there was no doubt who she was pissed off at. Hayley got right up in her face, their noses an inch apart. “I know why you can’t do this. But you don’t have a clue, because you’re too wrapped up in all those distorted thoughts of yours to see the sky through the clouds.”

Lizzy opened her mouth to respond, but Hayley shut her down. “I shouldn’t have to tell you this, Lizzy, but you need to get your ass to the doctor. You’re fucking pregnant.”

Jessica greeted all three of them when they returned to Kitally’s house in Carmichael. She had Salma’s baby positioned atop her shoulder. Awkwardly, she tried to create a rocking motion and pat the baby on the back at the same time. “Where have you all been?” she asked. “I’ve been calling you for the last hour. I left messages on all of your phones.”

Kitally swept right by without saying a word.

Hayley grunted and disappeared.

“What’s wrong with everyone? What’s with the black outfits?”

Lizzy headed inside.

“I really need to talk to you, Lizzy.”

“I need some water first,” Lizzy said. “When did you get in?” She grabbed a glass from the cupboard, filled it with tap water and gulped it down.

“I arrived this morning,” Jessica told her, “but I’ve been at the office all day. Jimmy dropped me here at the house a couple hours ago.” She stepped closer. “What’s wrong with everyone?”

“Don’t ask. What do you need to talk to me about?”

Jessica asked Lizzy to follow her to the dining room table where pictures were spread out from one end of the table to the other. Lizzy had seen most of the pictures when they met with Jimmy Martin and Kenneth Mitchell downtown. There were new pictures as well.

“You’re a genius,” Jessica told her.

“Why is that?”

She poked a finger at a picture at the far left of the table. “This is one of many cold cases now linked to the Sacramento Strangler. See the pearl earring on the woman’s ear?”

Lizzy nodded.

“The killer used the earring to pierce his victim’s ear. Her other ear was not pierced. One pearl earring.”

Salma entered the room and took the baby from Jessica. She was wearing a robe and had a towel wrapped around her head. “Thanks for letting me take a shower.”

“No problem,” Jessica said, not missing a beat as she continued with her line of thought. She turned the photo around. There was a smaller picture taped to the back of it. “Look at this. I did an Internet search and printed off some famous paintings. The copies I made are black and white so you can’t see that the band around the woman’s head in the painting is blue, which is very close to the blue-colored band that was wrapped around the victim’s neck. Guess what the picture is called?”

“I have no idea.”

“
Girl with a Pearl Earring
, by Johannes Vermeer.”

Lizzy listened, waited.

“Here’s another one.” Jessica handed her one of the pictures she’d seen when they met with Jimmy and Kenneth Mitchell. It was the male victim—the one with the wreath of red roses around his head. “Although you won’t see it in the picture, crime scene technicians found a smoking pipe buried close by. That picture is in the files at the bureau.” Again, Jessica turned the picture around and showed her another copy of a painting taped to the back. “This painting is called
Boy with a Pipe
, by Pablo Picasso.”

Lizzy tried to pay attention, but her mind was still back in the garage with Wayne Bennett. She’d lost control. She could have killed the man. If she hadn’t seen him twitch before she left, she might have believed he really was dead. And where would that have gotten her or any of them? And yet maybe Hayley was right. Maybe it would have been better if she’d finished him off. If he knew who was responsible, they were all in danger. Her heart raced, and her mind whirled. What should she do? Talk to Detective Chase? No. Not yet.

Her hand went to her belly. A slight bump perhaps, but more likely she felt something because Hayley had put the idea in her head. It was true that she hadn’t been feeling well lately. She’d thrown up more than a few times in the past few months, but she’d put it all down to stress. The truth was she couldn’t recall the last time she’d felt so-called normal. She would make a doctor’s appointment first thing in the morning.

“What’s wrong?” Jessica asked.

“I’ve had a rough go of it today, but I’ll be fine. Go on.”

Jessica didn’t look so sure. “You look pale. Maybe you should lay down for a bit.”

“I’m OK. What about the victim found covered with irises? Did that mean anything?”

Jessica shuffled through the photographs, picked up the one showing the victim covered in flowers, and turned it over. “
Irises
, by Vincent van Gogh. It goes on and on, just like this. Mitchell is impressed, Lizzy. It looks like you might have found the missing link.”

Lizzy blindly sorted through the pictures, her mind still reeling.
A baby?
She couldn’t raise a baby amid this crazy life of hers. Was it possible she could be carrying Jared’s child? She grabbed hold of the edge of the table.

Another worried look from Jessica.

“I’m fine,” Lizzy said flatly. “Go on.”

Jessica had known her long enough to know it would do her no good to argue. “We have a suspect,” Jessica blurted. She reached over the table and retrieved another picture from the bottom of the pile. “His name is Jovan Massing. He’s an art dealer who did time for hiring master forgers and selling fake paintings for millions.”

The man was short and stocky. He looked like a bulldog, with pinched nostrils and baggy jowls. The only thing missing was a drool-slathered tongue hanging to one side.
This
was the man who’d killed so many? It just didn’t compute. Not just because of the way he looked, but . . . “A master forger suddenly becomes a serial killer?”

“He also did time for attempted murder.”

All right. That was something. But still, it didn’t fit. Something niggled at the back of Lizzy’s mind although she couldn’t pinpoint what it was. “What about Zachary Tucker?”

“Nothing has come up. It’s as if he never existed.”

“What about the house on Canyon Road where the Tuckers used to live? Did anyone visit the current home owners to see if they knew anything?”

“Yes, of course,” Jessica said. “Mitchell sent one of his agents to talk to the owners. They said they did, in fact, buy the house from the Tuckers, but they never met them face-to-face. They know nothing about Zachary Tucker.”

Lizzy thought about Kathryn Church and what she’d seen as a young girl. It might be time to pay her another visit.

“Lizzy, I’ve put Zachary Tucker’s name through every available database. There’s
nothing
. But Jovan Massing is promising as hell. The years he spent in prison fit the gap where no victims at all turned up in the Sacramento area. At the time, investigators figured the Sacramento Strangler might be dead or in prison, which could very well be exactly what happened.”

“Where is Massing now?”

“They have yet to find him, but they’re confident they’re closing in and will have him in custody soon.”

“What about Kathryn Church seeing Zachary kill his own sister?”

“Think about it, Lizzy. There’s really nothing to link Zach
ary Tucker to any of this. You said yourself that Kathryn was just operating on a hunch. A ‘feeling.’ ” Jessica shook her head. “The woman obviously has some issues. And maybe for good reason—if she really saw what she thinks she saw, that would be a hell of a thing to witness when you were a little kid, and a hell of thing to keep to yourself all these years. But what did she expect Jared to do for her? It all happened thirty years ago.”

Lizzy scratched the back of her neck as she tried to think clearly.

“Lizzy, I understand your frustration. Maybe, just maybe, Jovan Massing was Kathryn’s neighbor. Maybe he
is
Zachary Tucker.”

“You would have checked that out already. You have Massing’s whole history, his every address.”

Jessica lifted her hands in question. “What else would you have me do?”

Hayley had been waiting in a recliner in Donald Holmes’s living room for over an hour when she heard the rattle of a key in the front door and slipped out of sight into a hall closet.