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“You had to? Why would you have to?”
“Because I came down here to kill you. For Colleen.”
Bennett’s laugh rose sharply.
“And how’s that working out for you?”
“Pretty well, actually… except all of a sudden, I’ve changed my mind. I don’t want you dead, Bennett. I want you to rot in the living hell of prison. For Colleen and all the women you’ve killed and hurt.”
“Well, there’s one problem with that plan.”
He waggled the gun he held and smiled. Ballard saw the flat, dead eyes then. She thought about him calling himself the devil a few minutes before. If the devil was a psychopath who had no empathy or other emotions, then Bennett had nailed it.
“No, that’s your problem,” she said. “Because…”
As she spoke, she casually reached down to the left cuff of her pants, pulled the Ruger from her ankle holster, and straightened up with it pointed at Bennett’s chest.
“My gun has bullets,” she continued. “And yours does not.”
Bennett immediately pulled the trigger on the Glock. It snapped on an empty chamber. His eyes widened, and he pulled three moretimes, all with the same result. Ballard read his expression as he realized the mistake he had made leaving the briefcase unattended in the kitchen while he prepared the house for showing. He focused on the Ruger, and Ballard read him again.
“It’s small but it carries seven rounds and I’m good with it,” she said. “You make a move and I’ll put both your eyes out.”
Bennett made an odd sound as if giving voice to the fight-or-flight impulse taking over his brain. He then calmed himself and offered a half smile of surrender.
“I want you to put the gun down on the counter and slide it across to me,” Ballard said.
Bennett complied, shoving the gun hard enough that it would have flown off the counter if Ballard hadn’t reached with her free hand to catch it.
“Now get down on your knees, hands flat on the counter,” she ordered.
“This will never work,” Bennett said. “No one’s going to—”
“Do it, Bennett, or we go back to plan A. Is that what you want?”
“Okay, okay, I’m doing it.”
He started to sink down behind the counter, his hands holding the edge for balance. Ballard moved quickly past the island to his left, grabbing the bag of snap ties.
“Okay, hands behind your head,” she ordered. “Now.”
Bennett did as instructed. Ballard opened the baggie and grabbed a handful of ties, regretting her decision to leave her handcuffs in the Defender. She moved in behind Bennett and put the muzzle of the Ruger against the skin behind his right ear.
“Do not move or you’re going to have a lead slug bouncing around inside your skull. If it doesn’t kill you, it’ll scramble your brain. You’ll need somebody to wipe your ass for the rest of your life.”
“Not moving. Just do your thing.”
He said it in a tone that suggested he was bored. A few of theplastic ties had already been looped for quick use by Bennett. Ballard now used them the same way.
“Hold your left hand up. Slowly.”
Bennett complied, and Ballard looped a tie over it and pulled it tight at the wrist. She followed the same procedure with the right hand, then stepped back and ordered Bennett to get facedown on the floor with his hands behind his back. After he did, she quickly wove one of the open ties through the loops on his wrists and then pulled the free end through the snap-lock.
Bennett was now secure.
“Don’t move,” she said. “You move and I’ll use the rest of these to hog-tie you like you did to all the women you raped.”
Bennett turned his head on the floor so he could look up at her.
