Dead by Midnight - Beverly Barton [177]
And then her smile disappeared. Apparently she had sensed that something was wrong.
“What is it?” she asked as she got up and laid aside the book.
“I just got off the phone with Holt Keinan,” Griff said. “His brother was murdered sometime last night.”
“Oh, my God!”
“His throat was slit,” Griff told her.
“No, no, please don’t tell me that—”
“His body was mutilated postmortem. The killer carved triangular pieces of flesh from his arms and legs just as the person who killed Kristi and Shelley did to them.” Griff clenched his jaw, and then looking squarely at Nic, said, “Apparently, he’s not just targeting Powell agents. Now he’s killed a member of an agent’s family.”
Epilogue
Lorie had tried to convince Mike that they should have a small, private wedding, just family and closest friends.
“As much as I want to give you whatever your heart desires, I’m afraid we are outnumbered when it comes to decisions about the wedding,” Mike had told her. “My mother says that since this is your first marriage, you deserve a big, fancy wedding. And Hannah is already talking about being a junior bridesmaid and M.J. told me that if your father won’t walk you down the aisle, then he wants that honor.”
So in the end, with Cathy joining forces with Nell and the kids to insist on the wedding being a major event, Lorie and Mike had agreed, if somewhat reluctantly. A June wedding, with a guest list in the hundreds. A church wedding nonetheless, at Dunmore First Methodist, with Reverend Patsy Elliott officiating.
But Lorie had drawn the line at wearing white.
“I’m not that much of a hypocrite,” she’d told Cathy.
“Mike was your first lover and now he’ll be your husband. Wear white if you want to. You have as much right as three-fourths of the brides today.”
“I don’t want white. I want yellow. A pale, shimmering yellow. It’s what I’ve always wanted.”
Today, Lorie Hammonds had walked down the aisle on her father’s arm, the two now on speaking terms even if their relationship remained somewhat strained. For the first time in her married life, Sharon Hammonds had stood up to her domineering husband and told him what’s what.
“You are going to walk our daughter down the aisle on her wedding day. And if you refuse, then you’ll be sleeping on the couch the rest of your life!”
Lorie had indeed felt like a fairytale princess in her strapless, butter cream yellow wedding dress, the bodice heavily decorated with pearls and rhinestones and intricate bedding that culminated in a cluster at her waist. The only jewelry she wore were small diamond stud earrings and the half-carat yellow diamond that Mike had given her the first time they had been engaged, all those years ago. She had sent it back to him from Los Angeles seventeen years ago and Nell had kept it for him all this time.
The entire wedding had seemed like a dream to Lorie, every aspect of the event as perfect as perfect could be. From the warm and sunny June weather to the approval of a town that had once scorned her, Mike and she had exchanged their vows surrounded by family, friends, and well-wishers.
Jack and Cathy, as matron of honor and best man, had insisted on hosting the reception at the Dunmore Country Club.
With his hand over hers, she and Mike sliced into their seven-tier wedding cake as the photographer snapped shot after shot of the happy couple. But breaking with tradition of the bride and groom sharing the first bites of their cake, they had brought Hannah and M.J. with them and offered the children the first pieces.
They were a family now, she and Mike and his children. Their children. She would never try to take Molly’s place. What she wanted was to carve out her own place in their hearts and in their lives.
As the foursome posed for more photographs,