Never Die Alone

“What about Zoe?”

Selma shook her head. “Nothing serious since her sophomore year when Zach broke up with her. Zachary Armstrong. He was her high-school boyfriend. It was a big deal at the time. Zach and Zoe, the two Zs. But the breakup hit her pretty hard. Took her a while to come to terms with the fact that he’s a jerk. Lately she seemed to have gotten over him.”

“Maybe there was someone who wasn’t a serious boyfriend?” Bria

“I don’t know.” She shrugged. “The girls were shutting me out, growing up, so I wouldn’t be the first on their lists to tell about a new relationship.” Blinking against tears, she gripped her cup and finally took a swig. “I’m trying to reconstruct what happened, but it’s all a haze. Their two best friends say that Zoe and Chloe had di

“And when was the last time anyone heard from either girl?”

“Around eight forty-five, when Zoe texted her friend that she’d see her at the Hootin’ Owl.” She swiped at her tears. “That would indicate that they stopped partying before nine p.m. I don’t believe that. Do you?”

“It doesn’t seem likely,” Bria

“I know it sounds crazy, but it’s got all the ingredients for disaster, especially if the 21 Killer is out there, like you said.”

Bria

Biting back a sob, Selma shook her head. “The thing I don’t understand is why he would strike here? I mean, he committed all those murders in Southern California, right? Why would he come here? Why New Orleans?”

“That’s a good question,” Bria

Suddenly, the bad dreams and omens of the night melded into Selma’s frightening story of her missing girls to create a terrifying matrix. Twins, celebrating their twenty-first birthdays. Bria

She could barely look at her friend.

Why New Orleans? Selma had asked.

The answer was simple: Because of frickin’ Rick Bentz.

“You have to go to the police,” Bria

CHAPTER 6

“That wasn’t the deal.” Jase Bridges stared his older brother down, but Prescott only shrugged as he stood in the living room of the old house where they’d grown up.

“The deal changed.”

“How?”

“Lena doesn’t like livin’ here,” Prescott said with a shrug. “Says there’s too many ghosts.”

“Ghosts?”

“Ghosts. Memories. Spirits. Whatever.” Prescott, an inch taller than Jase, was a bigger man all around. Thicker in the middle, wider shoulders, heavier face. His hair was near black where Jase’s was a lighter brown. Prescott had been a defensive tackle on the high-school football team, all-state with offers of full rides to several small colleges, while Jase, a ru

Prescott placed a hand on Jase’s shoulder. “See, what’s happened is that Lena, she wants to live in town near the school so she can keep an eye on the kids and help out. And now that I’m selling insurance, I don’t have time to mess with this place. We need to move on. You understand about that, brother.” Then as if a sudden thought had struck him, he asked, “You run into Bria

The muscles in the back of Jase’s neck tightened, but he didn’t answer.

“She’s in town now, has a little place in the Garden District. Come home to roost, just like you.” He sent his brother a look only the two of them could understand. “From what I gather, she’s a psychologist now. Been back nearly a year. She has a practice and runs some kind of group for twins.”

“How do you know all this?”

“Come on, you’re the reporter. Figure it out.”

Jase waited.

Prescott shrugged. “Hell, I’m in insurance. Always pressured to get new clients, so I checked. Who knows, maybe she could use some term life?”

Jase let further conversation about Bria

“It’s gone a little further than that.”

In the kitchen, where the old linoleum curled and the counters were scarred by decades of use, Lena was pouring cereal into bowls. Pale hair had been scraped into a loose bun on the top of her head, and she was wearing a T-shirt that hugged her large belly, a white skirt, and flip-flops that snapped as she moved briskly around the kitchen.

A short woman who had once boasted an hourglass figure, Lena was in her eighth month of pregnancy and appeared squat. She glanced over her shoulder at her brother-in-law. “Pres told you we’re moving, right?” she asked, slipping the tab on the top of the Cheerios box into its slot.

Jase nodded.

As if needing to explain, she said, “I can’t stay here. I just can’t. I won’t bring another child into the world to be brought up out here in the middle of nowhere.” She walked to the pantry, stuck the box into the cupboard, and yelled up the back stairs. “Kids! Come on! We’re go

Hearing the shuffle of feet on the floor above, Lena walked to the refrigerator where she pulled out a carton of milk and placed it, along with two spoons, on the small table pushed against the wall opposite the sink, the same spot where Jase and Prescott had sat during all of their years growing up on this farm.

“Prescott said the place has too many ghosts for you,” Jase said.

Lena shot her husband a glance, then automatically rubbed the cross that hung from a chain at her neck. “Shhh!” she warned as her children thundered down the staircase and clambered into the room.

“Uncle Jase!” Trinity’s brown eyes lit up when she saw him. She raced across the room, blond hair flying, and flung herself into his arms. “I didn’t know you were here!”

“I snuck in,” he teased, juggling her onto a hip.

A moment later, her younger brother barreled into the room with a squeal of delight. “Hey!” Caleb cried, shooting across the floor to jump up.

Jase caught his nephew with his free arm. “Hey yourself, little man.” Jase had never considered himself much of a kid person, but when his niece was born seven years earlier, all that changed.