Lisa Jackson's Bentz & Montoya Bundle: Hot Blooded, Cold Blooded, Shiver, Absolute Fear, Lost Souls, Malice, & an Exclusive Extended Excerpt From Devious by Lisa Jackson Page B

to pay for your sins.” The voice she’d become so familiar with oozed through the room, filling the corners, sliding behind the curtains, scraping her mind.
    “What sins?” Bentz asked, and a glimmer of interest sparked in his eyes as he scanned the room, taking stock, she supposed, of her small library and equipment.
    “I don’t know.” Sam was honest. “I can’t figure it out.”
    “And the calls to the radio station, they were about the same topic—sin?” he asked, his gaze moving over the desk and bookcase as if he were studying her den to get a better picture of who she was.
    “Yes. He, um, he called himself John, told me that he knew me, that he was, and I quote, ‘my John.’ When I said I knew lots of them, he insinuated that I’d been with a lot of men and he, um, he called me a slut. I cut him off.”
    “Have you ever dated or been involved with a John?”
    “I’ve thought about that,” she said. “Sure. It’s a common enough name. I think I went out with John Petri in high school and a guy named John…oh, God, I don’t remember his last name in college but that’s about it. Neither one of them were more than a couple of dates and nothing happened. I was a kid, and so were they.”
    “Okay, so go on. He called again?”
    “Yes. The other night…it’s on tape, but it was after the show. He called in and Tiny, he’s the technician that was setting up for the next prerecorded show, took the call. The caller asked for me, said he was my ‘John’ and that he hadn’t called in earlier during the show because he’d been busy and that what had happened was my fault.”
    “What had happened?”
    “I don’t know.” She shook her head. “It was eerie and sounded sinister, but then I was jumpy. I thought I might come home and find my house burned down or ransacked or something, but…everything here was as I left it.”
    “You’re sure it was the same guy who called here?”
    “Positive. But my number’s unlisted.”
    Bentz scowled down at the photo as he leaned against a corner of her desk. “This is a publicity shot. Right? There were dozens of “em made. Handed out.”
    “Yeah.” She nodded.
    “And this is a copy from one of those.”
    She swallowed hard. “I…I assume that he must have an original.”
    “Why do you think he cut out your eyes?” he asked, his eyes thinning.
    “To scare the hell out of me,” she said, “and, for the record, it’s working.”
    “Did he ever mention your eyes or something you saw when he called?”
    “No…not that I remember.”
    “I’ll need a copy of the tapes from your program.”
    “I’ll get them to you.”
    “I’ll get the original letter, picture and message tape from Cambrai.”
    “Fine.”
    “But you don’t mind if I take these until I see the originals?”
    “No.”
    Carefully he placed the letter, envelope and picture in a plastic bag, then asked if he could look through the house. What he was looking for, she wasn’t certain, but she gave him the tour and they ended up in the living room as dusk was beginning to settle outside. She turned on the Tiffany lamp near the window and listened to the sound of crickets and mosquitoes as he sat on the couch and she took a chair on the other side of the coffee table. The paddle fan turned slowly overhead.
    “Just tell me what happened, from the beginning,” Bentz said as he placed a pocket recorder on the glass top of the table.
    “I already told the officer at the station.”
    “I know, but I’d like to hear it firsthand.”
    “Fine. Okay. Well.” She rubbed her hands over her knees. “It all started when I got back from Mexico…” She launched into her tale, told him about losing her ID in the boating accident in Mexico, again explained about the letter she received, the threatening call on her answering machine and the phone calls to the station. She mentioned that she’d thought someone had been watching her house, then dismissed it as a case of nerves. All