“Red, attack! Sic ’em!” He tried to call out to the dog, but his voice failed him, and all that came was a whistle of air from his lungs. Damn! He tried again. “Red! Attack!” But once more all that he was able to do was a whistle.

He hoped the dog would understand and detain her. Even if she managed to get away, Red would track her down. The dog had been trained that way. He found the ladder and started to right it when he heard the dog bark an alarm. Good. Probably had the bitch pinned down.

In the next moment a banging sound startled him as the trapdoor overhead dropped into place.

Wait! She couldn’t . . . wouldn’t . . .

Over Red’s now-muted but furious barking, he heard the trapdoor shut with a heavy thunk. Then, the distinctive click of a lock snapping shut.

Shit!

That fuckin’ little bitch, the girl he thought was a complete wimp, an absolute coward, had not only duped him. She’d locked him in his own damned dungeon.

Worse yet, she had his cell phone.

True to his word, Jonas Hayes had sent over the 21 Killer file via the Internet. For the second night in a row, Bentz sat at his computer, but instead of drinking beer, he was letting a cup of coffee go cold on a side table. Also, tonight he wasn’t staring at footage of Father John exiting the prison where he’d left his last victim, but was skimming the reports and notes on the Diana and Delta Caldwell murders. Trial testimony was included, as well as interviews with Donovan Caldwell, who repeatedly maintained his innocence.

Hayes had also sent information on Lucy and Laney Springer, twenty-one-year-old twins who had been killed more recently in the same ritualistic manner as the Caldwell sisters. Although the DA did not have a strong enough case to indict Donovan Caldwell for the Springer twins’ homicides, it had been generally assumed that Caldwell was the murderer. Evidence at the Springer crime scene and the circumstances of the killing followed the patterns of the Caldwell homicides.