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,” she 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.”