Sam’s face paled and his fingernails dug into the cover.

“What is it?” Jenna asked.

He pressed his lips together. “Someone sent a message.”

Jenna rushed to his side and stared at the underside of the cover. YOU’RE NEXT HOLLIDAY. A large grease stain had bled through her name.

“Oh, shit.” Now she’d have to explain that she was Jenna Holliday.

He glanced at her. “You know who this Holliday person is?”

“It’s me. I’m Jenna Holliday.”

“I thought your last name was Richman?”

Tell the truth. No. Her heart was going too fast. “Holliday was my married name. Richman’s my maiden name.” She blew out a hard breath. “I was married for less than a year.” She waved a hand. “It didn’t work out.”

Sam starred hard at her for a long moment. “That means this guy knew you back then.”

“I guess so.” Dear God, how many lies could she tell before Sam shut her out completely. And she needed him. Heart pounding, Jenna grabbed onto Sam’s arm.

He enveloped her and held her tight, his scent seeping into her pores. “We’ll find the bastard, I promise.” Sam’s jaw clenched. “He’ll slip up, and we’ll get him.” He turned to Carla. “Could you call the pizza place back and ask for the name of the delivery person?”

“Sure. You think he saw this guy?”

“Maybe.”

With shaky fingers, she punched redial. “This is Carla Pendowski again. Could you tell me the person’s name who delivered my pizza?...I, ah, forgot to give him a tip...okay, got it, thanks.”

“Well?” Jenna asked.

“Just a sec.” Carla looked down at the number she’d written and dialed again. “Hi, my name is Carla Pendowski. You just delivered a pizza to the HOPEFAL lab... .Can you tell me who paid you?” She tapped the half-chewed pencil on the desk. “Would it be possible for you to come back to the lab? We’d like to ask you some questions. Thanks.” She disconnected. “Someone met him outside the lab. Medium build, sunglasses, and wearing a hoody.”

His jaw tightened. “That could be our man.”

“Oh, shit. If Seth wasn’t at his station, I wonder if our killer took him out like he did Harold.”

“Carla, stay here and lock your office door,” Sam said, as he grabbed Jenna’s hand and pulled her into the hallway.

“Be careful,” Carla called after them just as she closed the door.

Jenna pushed the elevator button ten times before the damn thing arrived. Sam was the first one out the door on the bottom floor. Thankfully, Seth was sitting in his chair reading a book, and relief weakened her knees.

“Seth,” Sam said.

The young guard sat up. “Yes, sir.”

“About ten minutes ago, someone came through here carrying a pizza. Did you see him?”

His face turned blank. “No, sir.”

Jenna stepped toward the guard. “When I came down a moment ago, the pizza was on the counter and you weren’t here.”

He glanced away and chewed on his bottom lip before facing her. “I heard a buzzing sound down the hall and went to investigate. That must have been right about when the pizza man came.” He reached below his desk and pulled out a device about the size of a desk of cards. “Some prankster left this in the hallway.” He pushed the button and a screeching sound emitted. He immediately shut it off.

Sam turned and tugged on her arm. “Thanks, Seth.” He wrapped an arm around her waist. “Let’s check out the video room. Hopefully, the guy didn’t disable the camera this time.”

Sam and Jenna rushed Edwardo Lopez’s video lab again. They knocked on his door and entered. When she saw Edwardo was seated in front of his computer and not dead with his throat slashed, she blew out a breath.

Sam clapped a hand on Edwardo’s shoulder. “Can you do us a favor and look through the video of the guard station?”

“Something wrong?”

Sam told him about the threat on the box and the absent guard.

“Sure, what time frame?”

“The last hour.”

“Give me a sec.” Edwardo brought up the digital image from his computer. “Here ya go.”

Jenna stood behind Edwardo, her gaze glued to the screen. “Here he comes.” She squeezed Sam’s hand for comfort.

“Damn,” Sam said. “He has his hood pulled too low for us to see his face.”

“Looks like he has red hair,” she said.

“I’m betting it’s another wig.”

“Maybe he runs a wig store.”

The man bounded past the empty guard station and turned left. He disappeared down the hallway where Seth told them he’d found the noisy device.

Sam leaned closer. “He’s coming back. See how he’s tilting his head away from the camera and toward the floor? He knows where the security system is. Guy must have scoped out the place before.”

“Like when he killed Harold.”

“Perhaps, but we can’t be certain he’s the same person.”

The movie continued to roll. “Lookie there. Seth didn’t tell us the whole truth. He wasn’t at his station a number of times. It wasn’t just when the guy came to put the device in the hall or when he delivered the pizza.”

“Rather convenient if you ask me.”

“So you’re thinking he’s in cahoots with our mystery man?” Jenna asked.

“Hard to tell, but something’s not right. I’ll ask Carla to dig up any dirt on this new guard.”

Jenna’s shoulders turned heavy. “I think it’s sad we have to suspect everyone here.”

Edwardo looked up and held up a hand. “Hey, don’t look at me. I was here the whole time.”

For some reason his expression made both of them laugh.

Sam’s phone rang. “It’s Carla,” he said to her. “Kid who delivered the pizza is waiting outside for us.”

This time when they left the lobby Seth was standing at his station, and they hurried out.

Pimply faced and thin for his age, the delivery boy paced in front of his car. Sam flashed his HOPEFAL badge, but the kid barely glanced at it. He straightened his shoulders as if Sam were some kind of FBI agent. Sam asked him about the man who took possession of the pizza.

The delivery boy shoved his hands in his pocket and glanced toward the ground. “Like I told Ms. Pendowski, I drove up and some guy came out of those doors.” He nodded to the ones Jenna and Sam had exited. “He handed me a twenty and said to keep the change. I was so excited I forgot to tell him who the pizza was for.” The kid shrugged as if it was no biggie. “I figured Ms. Pendowski asked a coworker to pick it up.”

“Did you get a look at his face?” Sam asked.

“Nah, not when he was waving a twenty spot under my nose.”

“There was nothing remarkable about him? Any scars, tattoos, a limp maybe?” Sam practically attacked the kid, but Jenna was glad he was asking the questions and not her. Her occupation would have been evident to everyone if she had been.

The kid crossed his arms and bit down on his lower lip. “He had a tattoo, that much I do remember. I was thinking of getting one, so I’ve been watching for one I liked. His had a snake wrapped around a stick.”

It’s him. Oh, God, the killer was close. Real close. She couldn’t catch her breath.

He handed the kid a ten-dollar bill. “Thanks.”

The boy smiled, jumped in his truck and zoomed off. Sam lifted her chin. “You okay? You’re pale.”

“Death threats have that affect on me.” As a cop, she shouldn’t have weakened. Damn.

Bianca hid behind her bedroom door, her hand clutching the loaded gun. Every time her uncle came over, her father suffered from his wrath. She refused to stand by any more and watch the vicious man hurt her dad. It didn’t matter her uncle was blood. Nor did it matter he carried a gun or that the world thought he walked on water. To her, he was scum.

She pressed her ear to the door, listening to the heated exchange. For the last month, she’d told her father she was staying late after school to be in a play, when in fact she went to the Hillsborough gun range twice a week for lessons. If he knew, he’d be real pissed, but she was proud she could hit her target with relative accuracy.

Her uncle was an evil man, but her father would never stand up to his younger brother-in-law no matter how many times her uncle hit him. Well, she’d stand up to the bastard. Only maybe not today.

“I want something to cover my hands,” her uncle snarled, his voice softened by the closed door. “Make me look like a black man.”

“I’ve never made hands before.”

Bianca shook at his father’s weakness. He should tell her uncle he wouldn’t do any more work for him and to get the hell out of his house. She’d heard the threats her uncle had made against her and her mom if Dad didn’t do what he’d asked. The evil man would never get near her. Oh, he tried to act nice when he was around her, but she knew his sweet-talking was an act.

“You can make masks. You can make hands. Do it.”

“But—”

The sound of the flesh meeting flesh twisted her gut. Her hands grabbed the door handle, ready to charge out.

“I need to be able to walk around the lab without anyone taking notice. Every time that Jenna chick passes me in the hall, she looks at me, like she’s trying to remember where she’s seen me.”

“She the cop who used to work for Deidra?”

“Yeah.”

A surge of hope made Bianca lower her weapon. Jenna might be someone who could help.

The sounds of feet scuffling made her crack open the door. Her bedroom had a direct line of sight to the kitchen where her dad and uncle were talking, or rather arguing.

“Why do you need so many masks?” her father asked. “Are you hurting people again?”

By hurting, her father meant her uncle was killing people. She needed to stop this insanity before he came after her and her mom.

“You don’t need to know what I’m doing with the masks, you understand?” He grabbed her father by the throat.

She clutched the gun hard. Her fingers itched to pull the trigger and end his miserable life, but what would Mama do if Bianca landed in jail?

“Okay, okay.”

Her uncle’s face came within an inch of her dad’s. “If you ever breathe a word about who you gave these masks to, I’ll kill you. I don’t care that you married my sister. Got it?”

Her father dropped back against the kitchen counter and nodded. Her uncle lowered his hand and stalked out.

Bianca wanted to rush to her father, but she understood he’d be embarrassed that she’d witnessed the exchange. She slipped into her desk chair and booted up her computer. This Jenna woman shouldn’t be too hard to find. Bianca Googled the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Department. Dang it. No Jenna appeared on the roster. Then she searched Tampa Police Department. Bingo. That was too easy. Well, almost too easy. The problem was that there were two Jenna’s. One was Jenna Holliday, the other Jenna Salvadore. One looked young, the other old. She did a Zabasearch for both addresses, and then printed out the directions to both houses before shutting down her computer.

Bianca stuffed her gun into her backpack, pushed her hair from her eyes and stepped out of her room.

“Hi, Pops.” She smiled, pretending she hadn’t heard her uncle come and go.

“Where are you going? You haven’t eaten dinner. Mama will be home shortly.”

“Didn’t I tell you? I have a big economics project due tomorrow. My group and I are getting together at Tessa’s house. I’ll pick up something on the way.”

“Does your mother know?”

No. “I think I told her.”

“Don’t be late. And call if you’re going to be out past ten, okay?”

He must have sensed the blood on his lip for he ripped off a piece of paper towel and dabbed it. She said nothing about his slightly swollen eye or bruised cheek. She leaned over and kissed his face. “I won’t be too late. I have to get up for school tomorrow. Bye.”

She rushed out the door before he found an excuse to keep her home and jumped in her beat-to-shit Volvo. She couldn’t complain. Half her friends didn’t even have a car to call their own.

Bianca tried to decide what she wanted to say to the cop, unsure if she should say that her uncle killed people or just that he hurt them. Too bad she didn’t have any proof nor had she ever seen him kill anyone, but she knew he was evil. She’d seen the blood on his pants one time when her uncle had stopped by. She had to tell the lady cop that he’d threatened to kill Jenna. That should make her interested in helping.

Bianca motored down the two-lane country road, avoiding the main thoroughfares since the evening rush hour would slow her down too much. Lights blinked behind her. She looked up, but couldn’t see who was behind her. She glanced back at the speedometer. Since she wasn’t going over the limit, it wouldn’t be a cop.

She eased over to the side of the road to let the impatient jerk get by, and the right side tires edged off the road onto the dirt. The car behind her sped up and came along side.

She glanced over to see the age of the driver, but the person’s face was obscured by dark tinted windows. The sound of the gunshot registered first, then the pain in her head. Bianca’s hands slipped off the wheel as her legs went limp.