The only thing she needed to ensure herself was that there would be enough. And so she’d suggested that she accompany him on the next killing. Because he was getting nervous. Jumpy. Concerned that the police would take notice. It was a problem, but the answer was obvious: take more than one. Kill several at once. Then start hunting somewhere else. Somewhere less obvious.

But always hunt for smart, supple, clever women who were young enough to still have vitality. And never a mother, like that last lesser Vlad had tried to palm off on her. Come on! Didn’t he know that childbirth robbed a woman of her vitality? That once a mother had given her lifeblood to another, a babe in the womb, and then bled for days or weeks afterward, she was never the same?

Elizabeth finally managed to force the wayward tendril of dark hair into place. Gazing raptly at her own reflection, she decided it was time to tell him. She reached for her cell phone to convey the happy news. Tonight she not only wanted to watch him kill. Tonight she would help and ensure that there would be more than one victim.

Several coeds’ images came to mind.

The clearest belonged to Kristi Bentz.

CHAPTER 23

J ay was just walking out the door for the meeting with Dr. Hollister and wondering how to cut it short when his cell phone chirped.

Sonny Crawley’s name appeared on the small screen.

“What’s up?” Jay asked, hauling his briefcase and laptop outside, where the rain was beating on the overhang of the porch and dripping over the edge of the sagging gutters.

“I thought you’d like a heads-up about those missing girls.”

Every nerve in Jay’s body tightened. “You found something?”

“Maybe, maybe not, but I thought you’d like to know.”

Bruno slipped through the door and Jay pulled it shut. Together they dashed across the wet yard. “Tell me.”

“Well, it all started with a poacher findin’ a damned woman’s arm in a gator’s belly, and we’re thinkin’ it might belong to one of those missing coeds, but we haven’t been able to find the rest of the body.”

Sonny recounted the whole story as Jay loaded his things and Bruno into the cab of his truck. He slid behind the wheel without turning on the ignition, staring out the windshield as he learned the poacher had called the Sheriff’s Department, which had taken the alligator with its stomach contents to the morgue, that tests were being run on the severed female arm, and the police were trying like hell to get fingerprints from the partially decomposed and consumed limb. Search teams were still looking for the body or bodies and the theory was that this arm could have belonged to one of the missing girls. So far, they’d had no luck.