Killer Heat (27 page)

Because of that appalling lack of interest, Dean had created some missing persons flyers on his computer and had often considered printing them and posting them at the grocery store and post office. Julia deserved that much of a tribute, didn't she? A small shred of proof that
someone
had cared about her? She hadn't been a bad girl.
She'd been kinder to him than his own family, acted like the sister Paris never had.

Besides, he enjoyed the thought that seeing Julia's image in public would give Butch a good scare. At times, he'd even been tempted to locate Julia's family and divulge the whereabouts of her body. He wasn't sure they'd care. She'd told some pretty awful stories about them. But revealing what he knew would get rid of Butch. This past year, Dean had been able to tolerate his brother-in-law mostly because he felt he
could
get rid of him if he really needed to.

But now that he realized his mother was also at risk, he was glad he'd kept his mouth shut. He doubted she had any direct involvement in the murder. His mother had always liked Julia. She was the one who'd taken pity on her and given her a job and a place to live. It was far more likely that she was covering for Butch. She wouldn't want Paris and Champ to lose their husband and father just because she'd taken in a poor runaway.

Expecting Francesca to come out of the bathroom any minute, he wrapped the ends of the rope he'd brought in his backpack tightly around his hands and pressed himself against the wall. He hated that it had come to this, wished there was some other way. But he had no choice.

Think of Mom.
He'd do anything for Elaine, wouldn't he? Of course. Despite his many shortcomings, he'd always been a loyal son.

But the door to Francesca's bathroom didn't open. The tub went on instead. She was taking a bath.

Grateful he'd have a little more time to acclimate and do what he liked best—look around and imagine being romantically involved with a woman of Francesca's beauty—he moved into her bedroom and searched
through her drawers. If he could find Julia's panties, all would be well. Then he could slip out as quietly as he'd slipped in, and Francesca would never have to know he'd been in her house.

But life was never that easy. Especially
his
life. He turned her entire room upside down but found nothing. And by then he didn't dare look anywhere else. Francesca had just pulled the plug on the tub.

He could hear the water drain.

She was getting out.

 

The sleeping pill Francesca had swallowed before climbing in the bathwater was beginning to take effect. She could feel her body relax, her thoughts slow. Afraid she might slide under the water—which had reportedly happened to Butch's mother—she'd cut her bath short.

Secret decoder ring.
Finch had upset her. But that was nothing new. And why did his opinion matter? There wasn't any point in dwelling on him or Hunsacker. She'd do everything she felt was necessary on the Bonner case, do what her conscience dictated, regardless of what they had to say about it. If the sheriff's department felt strongly enough to act on their threats and tried to prosecute her, she'd get a lawyer, a damn good one. She wasn't without resources.

As for Jonah… She didn't know what to think about Jonah. Her resistance to acknowledging her feelings about him seemed to be ebbing away with her tension. Every time she closed her eyes he was there, taking her in his arms and making love to her like he used to. It was crazy, but she wanted him now more than ever.

Then there was Adriana, and all the issues of trust and distrust, love and loyalty, their last conversation had dredged up…

Refusing to go over that again, she toweled off. If she allowed herself to dwell on Adriana, the sleeping pill wouldn't work.

After blow-drying her hair, she pulled on her nightgown and walked into her bedroom. She was so eager to fall into bed, it didn't occur to her that the lights shouldn't be off. She was halfway across the room before she realized. Then she stopped.

She'd spoken to Finch in the dark, but she'd turned on the lights after she disconnected so she could grab fresh underwear to put on following her bath. How was it that they were off?

Had she hit the switch as she passed into the hall? That was what she wanted to believe. But she was almost positive she hadn't. And, as her eyes adjusted to the darkness, she spotted something that made her blood run cold. Someone had pulled out her dresser drawers. Clothes spilled onto the floor. Her room had been ransacked.

Adrenaline overcame the sedative as Francesca squinted to see if she could locate her iPhone on the nightstand. Should she tiptoe over and get it? Search the blankets for the pepper spray she'd taken to bed with her? Or run out of the house without wasting another second?

She decided to lock her door, reclaim her pepper spray and her phone and hide under the bed to place a distress call. But a quick movement caught her eye, and it dawned on her that whoever had broken in wasn't just in her house.

He was in her bedroom.

F
rancesca didn't bother trying to run. She had nowhere to go. Dean had already closed the door and locked it. Because it locked on the inside, she could undo it if she had the opportunity, but that would take a second or two more than dashing through an open doorway.

And she had a feeling every second was going to count.

“What are you doing here, Dean?” she breathed.

He looked frustrated. Unhappy. “I didn't want to come. I had to.”

She wondered if she could get out through the slider, which was on the opposite side of the room, but thanks to the scare she'd been given by her last visitor, she'd secured it with a broom handle so it couldn't be lifted off its track. By the time she removed the handle, unfastened the latch and slid the door open, it'd be too late. “No one made you come here.”

“You don't understand. It was my fault.”

Envisioning poor, frightened, mother-of-three Sherrilyn, who might've been down this road before her, Francesca backed slowly toward the bed. She'd left her pepper spray under the blankets and needed to find it. But it was only a two-ounce can, not large enough to see
easily. Would she be able to lay her hands on it—and spray Dean before he overtook her?

There was a small chance she could. If she moved fast and the can wasn't tangled in the bedding…

“What was your fault?” she asked.

“The panties. I'm the one who hid them in Butch's truck.”

Trying to put the bed between them, she veered to the left as she stepped away from him. “What panties?”

If he knew she was stalling, he didn't let on. “You know the ones. You took them. I need them back. If you cooperate, this night will end a lot better than if you don't.”

She managed to clear the bed while there was still ten feet or so between them. “What if I don't have the panties?”

“You
have
to have them. They're not at the salvage yard.”

“What if I do have them? Why would you care about some underwear I picked up in the yard, Dean?”

He had an object in his hands—not a bat, not that large. She couldn't make out any details in the dark, but she was almost positive it was a piece of rope.

“Don't play stupid,” he said. “It insults my intelligence.”

She might be battling the effects of a sleeping pill, but he sounded chillingly lucid. Struggling with the dull-witted feeling the medication gave her, she changed tactics. “So you're the one?”

“The one who what?”

“Who's been beating women to death.”

He grimaced. “No. Of course not. It's Butch. You know that.”

She was no longer so sure. Dean could've followed
him the night he met April at the Pour House, could have murdered her in an attempt to set up his brother-in-law. If Dean was indeed a sociopath, the sociopath who'd murdered seven women over a span of five years, what was one more? And there was certainly no love lost between the two men. Seeing that Butch went to prison would be a decisive way to remove him from the salvage yard without a body and without being blamed by Paris or their parents. It might even have been Dean who placed that business card from the bar near the bodies in Dead Mule Canyon.

The only problem with this reasoning was the fact that Dean had admitted to putting the panties in Butch's jockey box. If he wanted them to be found, why was he here, hoping to retrieve them? Had he changed his mind? Had he realized that his plan could backfire and bring
him
under police scrutiny? “How do
you
know it's Butch?” she asked.

“Who else could it be? Besides, there are certain signs.”

“Like…”

He started coming around the bed, so she jumped on top of it, planning to hop off the other side if he ever abandoned that spot between her and the door.

But he stopped, choosing to guard against the possibility that she could dart past him and beat him out of the house. “His eyes,” he said. “His eyes are empty. And his heart is cold.”

Attempting to locate her pepper spray with her feet, Francesca inched to one side. How had she been positioned while holding it? Had she been on the right or the left? And where might it have gone during her conversation with Investigator Finch, when the desire for a sleeping pill and a hot bath had superseded her fear?

She'd been too preoccupied, couldn't remember letting it go. Or was her fuzzy memory because of the sedative? “Paris doesn't seem to think he's so bad.”

“Paris loves him. She's blind to his faults. Besides, she hasn't witnessed his handiwork. I have.”

“Handiwork” likely meant the kind of brutal murder suffered by April Bonner—and the others, as well. His words raised the hair on the back of Francesca's neck. But she wasn't convinced he was telling the truth, not after learning about Sherrilyn. Was Dean projecting his own actions on to someone else? Someone who seemed capable of killing? Someone he'd hoped to frame? “You've
seen
him kill?”

“I've seen the body.”

“What body, Dean? Sherrilyn's? Or Julia's?”

Dean jerked as if she'd shot him. Had he taken one more step, Francesca would've had no choice but to dive for the pepper spray, even though she hadn't located it yet in the bedding.

“How do you know about them?” he asked.

“I've been doing my research. They're dead, right? You killed them.”

“No.” Seeming stricken, he shook his head. “Sherrilyn's not dead. She's just…missing. I've been looking for her for years. Almost every night. All over. I'll find her eventually.”

His voice sounded so childlike. Had he slipped into a psychotic episode? And, if so, would that help or hurt her chances of getting out of this alive? “What about the others?”

“Don't confuse me. This—this isn't about anyone else.”

“Who's Julia, Dean? Where did she come from?”

“Why should I tell you? I can't trust you. You're not
my friend. I tried to be nice. But you—you weren't interested.” He moved forward again. “I need to think of my mother. What did you do with the panties?”

What did this have to do with Elaine Wheeler?

Francesca came up against the headboard. She still hadn't found the pepper spray, but making a run for it seemed just as big a gamble as a search. “They're on their way to a police lab. So this is pointless, Dean. You might as well go home and not get yourself into any more trouble. If there's DNA on those panties, the police will build a case against you, and they'll put you in prison.”

“Why me? I haven't killed anyone! And I'm not going to kill you. Whether you die is up to Butch.
He's
the murderer.”

She wanted to believe him, but Butch wasn't the one standing in her bedroom. And she couldn't see why Dean would be holding a rope if he meant her no harm. “Then why are you helping him? Why are you doing this?”

“I told you. I have no choice.”

“You always have a choice.”

“Not this time.” When he lunged forward, she dropped onto the bed and shoved her hands under the blankets. Terrified that she wouldn't come up with her pepper spray, she almost couldn't believe it when her hand closed around the canister and she withdrew it so easily from the sheets.

Dean was already on her, forcing her onto her back, using his body weight to subdue her. But he didn't realize she had a weapon.

Knowing that some of the spray would fall on her, Francesca squeezed her eyes shut and turned her face away as she aimed and pressed the button.

It hadn't been a direct shot. They'd been moving, fighting. But her action had taken him by surprise, and
he gulped in some of the spray when he gasped. Coughing and screaming, he seemed to forget that he had the rope in his hands. He dropped it and swung at her wildly, hitting her in the head, the jaw.

Francesca lost her grasp on the can as she coughed, too. The pepper spray burned her eyes, temporarily blinding her, but she knew her bedroom better than Dean did. Ignoring the flash of pain in her forearm from the recent dog bite and using every ounce of strength she possessed, she slammed him into the headboard.

A second later, she broke free.

He cursed at her, telling her she was dead, as he flailed around, trying to find her. And then he started to cry for his mother.

Stumbling toward the hall, guiding herself with her hands, she managed to make her way out of the house. But by the time Josephine let her in to call the police, and a patrol car arrived, Dean was gone.

 

Pounding on the door woke Jonah from a restless sleep. He'd been dreaming. Of Summer, who'd been drowning in a crystal-clear lake; try as he might, he couldn't grab her. Of Adriana, who'd refused to help him, then screamed when she saw their daughter floating facedown, just out of reach. Of Francesca, who kept weaving in and out of the other sequences, while trying to escape an ax murderer. Beyond the woman-in-jeopardy theme, the dream made little sense. Except to magnify his fears. And fill him with a sense of foreboding.

Hearing someone at his door before dawn only intensified that feeling.

“Coming!” After scrambling to get out of bed, he pulled on a pair of basketball shorts and jogged over to check the peephole. Then he threw the door open.

Nate Ferrentino stood in the hallway, wearing sweats that didn't match and a pair of slippers. He'd obviously just rolled out of bed, still had the imprint of a blanket on one cheek.

“What's the matter? Is it Rachel? Is she having the baby?” Jonah had never been part of their birth plan before. But perhaps Nate's mother was unavailable and they needed someone to watch Dylan….

“Where the hell's your cell phone?” Nate demanded.

“I turned it off so I could get some sleep. Why?”

“You need to get a home line.”

“I'm not here enough. What's up?”

He scratched his head, which did nothing to improve the state of his uncombed hair. “The answering service called me. They said someone from Arizona needs to get hold of you. That it's an emergency.”

Fear swept through Jonah with the force of a raging river. “Did they say what's wrong?”

“No.” Nate shoved a piece of paper at him. “Call this number,” he said, and shuffled off.

Jonah recognized the number. He'd called it earlier, just after he'd spoken to Dr. Price to let her know he was off the case and while he waited to board his plane. He hadn't felt one hundred percent comfortable leaving Francesca behind, so he'd purchased a little insurance.

As he closed the door, he turned to glance at the clock. Four.

Nothing good ever happened so early in the morning.

Powering up his cell, he stood at the window, gazing out at the headlights snaking along the streets of L.A. far below.

A male voice answered on the second ring. “Ray Leedy.”

“Ray, it's Jonah. What's going on?”

“Where have you been, man? I've been trying to reach you since midnight.”

Jonah hadn't really expected trouble. He'd hoped Finch and Hunsacker would keep a close eye on Butch, as promised. This security guard was basically an afterthought, a backup system, a way to put his mind at ease. “Forget it. You've got my attention now. What's happening?”

“Your man was busy last night, bro.”

Jonah's stomach muscles contracted. “What do you mean by that?”

“He's been up most the night. Wasn't easy to tell what he was doing. I couldn't see a whole hell of a lot, especially when he came home from wherever and went into the junkyard. Then I spotted him carrying something in a heavy-duty garbage bag to his truck.”

No…
“What'd he do with it?”

“He loaded it in the back and took off.”

Jonah sucked air between his teeth. “What time was this?”

“Around midnight. That's when I first tried to call you, to see what you wanted me to do.”

“I hope you followed him.” Jonah wished he'd given Ray more detailed instructions, but he hadn't expected him to have to do anything more than sit outside and watch. Besides protecting Francesca, Jonah had thought it might be handy to be able to confirm Butch's whereabouts should another murder take place. He hadn't anticipated
this
….

“I followed him, all right. You said I wasn't to let him
out of my sight. But he didn't go to Chandler, like you were worried about.”

“Where'd he go?”

“The mountains.”

Jonah gripped the phone tighter. “Which mountains?”

“The Juniper Mountains, to the west.”

“What for? What was he doing?”

“I'm not completely sure. I couldn't get too close. What with all the trees and having to stay back far enough that he wouldn't see me…”

“You lost him.”

“Yeah. I'm sorry.”

At least this guy was willing to accept responsibility. “Can you take me to the general area?”

“Sure.”

“That should help.”

“What do you think he was doing?” There was a note of insecurity in that question, because Ray already had an inkling or he wouldn't have asked.

“Who knows, but a suspected killer toting a black garbage bag into the mountains in the middle of the night always makes me uncomfortable.”

“Since I'm sitting about twenty yards from his front door, that shit makes me uncomfortable, too,” he said with a nervous laugh.

Jonah pressed his palm to his forehead. “Where is he now?”

“He got home not long ago. All the lights are off. I assume he went to bed.”

“Did he see you?”

“No. I kept my distance. That's why I don't know what he did with that black bag. I only know it's gone. I checked the truck.”

He'd tossed it out or buried it along the way. Jonah had no idea if they'd ever be able to recover it, but he planned to try. “Have you noticed anyone else who might be watching the place?”