Dead by Midnight - Beverly Barton [170]
He knocked on the door frame. “Lorie? Honey, wake up.”
She lifted her head and stared at him; then she sat up, sending the covers sliding to her hips. “Mike? What’s wrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong,” he told her as he entered the room and went straight to her. “They got him. Hicks Wainwright just called. They arrested the Midnight Killer a few hours ago.” He sat down beside her.
“Say that again.” She looked at Mike, happy tears in her eyes.
“It was Terri Owens’s son, Tyler,” Mike said. “The FBI set a trap for him, and when he tried to kill Terri, they arrested him. He’s confessed to everything.”
“Oh, thank you, God.” Lorie threw herself into Mike’s arms and hugged him fiercely. “I’ve got a million questions, but none of them seem to matter right now. Oh, Mike, Mike…Is it really over?”
“Yeah, honey, it’s over. It’s really over.”
He wished he could go right up to Lorie’s house and look in the windows the way he used to do before Mike Birkett had moved in with her. It was too risky now. He had to watch from afar. But the day would come when she’d be alone, all alone, and then he could make his move. He was tired of waiting, but as long as she was guarded so securely, he couldn’t risk getting caught.
For more than two years, he had hoped she would notice him the way a woman notices a man she’s interested in; but that hadn’t happened. He had been patient, waiting for her to see him as more than a mere acquaintance. But the only man Lorie could see was Mike Birkett.
If only she could see him in a different light, he would help her seek and find forgiveness for her many sins. But he had come to realize recently that she was beyond forgiveness now. She would never repent, never find redemption, and never plead with him to help her cleanse her soul of its wickedness. Not now that she had Mike back in her life—and in her bed.
I loved you so, Lorie.
I would have done anything for you.
But she had betrayed him with a man unworthy of her. A man who could never love her the way he did.
He understood now that there was only one way he could save Lorie from herself. And he loved her enough to do what had to be done.
Chapter 35
The Powell Agency wrapped up their investigation into the Midnight Killer case two weeks after Tyler Owens was arrested and signed a confession. Ransom Owens had hired Robert Barlow, a high-powered attorney from Richmond, but Tyler had refused any help from his father and gone instead with a court-appointed attorney. The news media was having a field day with the story.
Griff had called a final meeting of all the main agents involved in the case, giving each instructions to report to their respective clients for one last time in order to help them find some measure of closure. Griff had gone to see Jared Wilson to tell him about Tyler Owens’s arrest before the news leaked to the press. Michelle Allen and Ben Corbett would return to Knoxville for a follow-up visit with Jared. Holt had already left to catch a flight to Memphis to finalize the case with Tagg Chambless, Hilary Finch’s husband. Other agents had been assigned to speak with the families of all the victims, whether or not they had been Powell Agency clients.
Nic had told Maleah that Griff had arranged for Charles Wong’s wife to receive a sizable check that would give her and her daughters modest financial security for a number of years. Mrs. Wong would be told that the money came from a life insurance policy her husband had purchased a year before his death.
“If Casey Lloyd hadn’t been so secretive about what he was doing, we could have completely eliminated him as a suspect,” Maleah said.
“I suppose collaborating with a world-renowned author on a tell-all exposé about his years in the porno business wasn’t something he wanted to broadcast,” Derek said. “Besides, I think Casey enjoyed the cloak-and-dagger secrecy of visiting the reclusive author in Arizona without anyone being aware of what he was doing.”
“Information after the fact doesn’t help us, does it?” Griff told them. “If we or the Bureau had found out sooner that when he was