Page 89 of Be Very Quiet

“You bitch!”

Theo lifted his arm, forcing Luca’s hand. He burst inside. “Drop the knife, Harvey.”

Theo’s head snapped up. “The hell? Why are you here?” He released a strap securing Liliana to the table and jerked her off, holding her in his grip with the knife at her throat. “No, don’t come any closer, or I will kill her. Who’s with you?”

Luca’s jaw clenched. A bruise was forming on one side of Liliana’s face. Theo Harvey would pay for hitting her. “I’m all alone. It’s just you and me, Theo.” Luca stopped his advance. “You’re taking over for your older brother, Ted, aren’t you, Theo?”

Liliana’s head whipped toward Luca. “Ted Rader didn’t have siblings.”

“Oh, yes, he did,” Theo corrected. “Half-brother. We had the same daddy. But he refused to acknowledge me, his bastard son, his secret mistake. He even tried to get my mom to abort me. Can you believe it? He was this holier-than-thou wanna-be preacher who was banging the church secretary, and he gets her pregnant. Then he had the gall to demand she clothes-hanger me.”

Too bad she didn’t listen. How many lives would’ve been saved?

“Others might not have known about you, but Ted did,” Luca guessed.

“He did. He was fifteen years older than me, and I idolized him. His bitch of a mother refused to let us have a relationship. Guess who he came to when he needed help?”

“After he was shot,” Luca stated.

“Yep. I was only fourteen, but I took care of him. I had to hide him in the shed in the backyard, so my mom wouldn’t find out. She was such a goody-two-shoes. Surprising that she had the chutzpah to carry on an affair with a married man. Anyway, the entire world was looking for him. I couldn’t call a doctor, so I did my best. I sat with him for hours a day as he talked about his women, as he called them, describing what he did to them. It sounded so wonderful.”

Good lord, the man was talking about murdering women, and he thought it was appealing. Luca was disgusted.

“He hung on for almost two weeks, but I came home from school one day and couldn’t wake him.”

“What did you do with him?”

“Buried him behind the shed.”

Luca made a note to have the police dig up Rader’s body. “So, you took over where he left off?”

“It sounded so glamourous,” Theo enthused. “He told me where he left his brag box. I found it, and it held souvenirs from all his kills. He took something unique from each one, a talisman, if you will.”

Sick bastard.

“Killing someone isn’t easy, Theo. How did you get started?”

“I practiced on wild animals or ones I caught from the neighborhood. Once I got the rhythm down, I took my first woman.” He laughed maniacally. “As soon as I strangled her, I threw up. I knew Ted would be so disappointed in me, so I steeled myself and finished the job.” He shook his head, clearly back in time to that kill. “I was sloppy. I knew I had to get better to do justice to Ted’s name.”

“Where did you find the victims?”

Theo’s lip creased into a sneer. “Hookers. Homeless shelters. Promise a junkie a hit, and they’ll follow you anywhere.”

That explained why they couldn’t find a pattern around the country. He practiced on women who wouldn’t be missed. “How many before you came to Miami Beach?” Damn it, why wouldn’t he move the knife from Liliana’s throat? An infinitesimal amount of pressure, and he’d break the skin.

“Eight, no ten.” He nodded. “It took a while to get it down properly, plus I had to wait for dear old Mom to croak.”

“Did you kill her too?”

Theo snorted. “No. As much as I wanted to, cancer beat me to it.”

Luca focused on Theo to keep him talking but glanced at Liliana. She didn’t look the least bit scared. She looked pissed.

“You’ve told me all about you, Theo. Now let me tell you a little about me. You see, I work for a security company, the best in the country. That’s how we tracked you down.”

“We?”

“Oh, when I told you I was alone, I lied. In about five seconds, you will see your brother again.”

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