“It’s easy. Aim. Pull the trigger.”

“After I load it and flip off the safety.”

“You lied; you do know how.”

“But—”

“Humor me. Just until I get home, okay?”

“And when will that be?”

“Soon,” he vowed, conviction ringing in his voice.

“Okay. Good. We have a lot to talk about.”

“I know.” He hesitated a second. “Be safe, Livvie. I love you.”

A pang of emotion tightened in her chest. Stupid tears again stung her eyes. “Love you, too. You be careful.”

She hung up and stared at the ceiling. Maybe she should have begged him to give up his damned quest and come home. Not that he could now, with those women he’d talked to now murder victims. Unfortunately, he needed to stay there. She wanted him to finish whatever it was that had drawn him to L.A. Then he could come home for good and she’d tell him about the baby. Not before. She knew that if she had mentioned her pregnancy he would have been on the next plane home. If that were the case, he would always regret that he hadn’t been able to find out what the hell had happened to Jennifer.

She switched off the light.

Olivia wanted this murderous, heart-wrenching rampage over. Forever. Never did she want Bentz to have regrets, to think he’d abandoned someone who needed him, to wonder if he’d left a part of him, his heart and dreams, in sunny California.

She needed all of him, or none of him. She wasn’t willing to settle for second best to his ex-wife.

Jennifer.

“Damn you,” Olivia whispered to the empty, dark room. How the hell did Bentz’s ex-wife figure into all of this?

She rolled over and stared through the window to the inky Louisiana night.

Bentz needed to finish this. Put Jennifer’s damned ghost to rest.

Before anyone else died.

Before Olivia lost him forever.

CHAPTER 25

“I already told all this to the Torrance police,” Bentz said as he drove Hayes back to Parker Center, where Hayes had left his SUV.

It was pushing 3 A.M. Bentz, tired as hell, drove along Sepulveda, then eased onto the 110 heading north. Despite the late hour the freeway was still busy, red taillights glowing on the gently sloping lanes ahead.

Hayes had come with Riva Martinez, who had joked that Hayes picked the absolute worst time to turn his cell phone off. “Better late than never,” Bentz had told the LAPD detectives, grateful that they’d responded at all. If they hadn’t shown up, Bentz would probably still be at the Torrance Police Station, shifting uncomfortably on the wooden chair in that damned interrogation room.