Dead by Midnight - Beverly Barton [92]
The Powell Agency’s main headquarters was housed in downtown Knoxville, in a renovated building Griff had purchased a number of years ago. The structure had been renamed the Powell Building in honor of its billionaire owner. A small group of administrative assistants, including the office manager, ran the day-to-day operations of the agency and reported directly to Griff and/or Nic. Fifty people, counting the in-the-field agents, were employed by Powell’s. The computer experts worked in various capacities, but mainly doing research. The bookkeepers handled the finances, including taxes, accounts payable and receivable, and payroll. Griff kept former FBI profiler Derek Lawrence on retainer, as he did Camden Hendrix’s law firm and a local psychologist.
Then there was Dr. Yvette Meng and her students. Maleah had no concrete proof, but she suspected that Griff was on the verge of utilizing Dr. Meng’s special talents and those of her small conclave housed at Griffin’s Rest to help with certain seemingly unsolvable cases. Personally, Maleah wasn’t into all that woo-woo stuff, but she tried to keep an open mind. She knew one thing for sure—Dr. Meng was extraordinarily perceptive. Whether Griff’s old friend and her pupils were actually psychic, she couldn’t say. Maybe they were.
Griff worked from Griffin’s Rest most of the time and had rarely visited the Knoxville headquarters in the past year. The real heart of the agency was located in a huge, state-of-the-art home office inside Griff and Nic’s home. The space was divided into three areas, one of which was a meeting room equipped with two plasma televisions, DVD and CD players, and a wall lined with books and magazines. Plush leather chairs circled a large rectangular table.
Maleah and Nic had taken a few minutes, just the two of them, to catch up after breakfast. By the time they arrived at the office, Griff was seated at the head of the table and the other agents were milling around the room. Derek sat at the end of the table near Griff and the two were deep in conversation.
“Don’t worry, they aren’t discussing the Midnight Killer case,” Nic told Maleah. “Griff wanted to speak to Derek about Kristi’s murder. We’re waiting for a report concerning the details that the Knoxville PD are keeping top secret.”
Maleah nodded. She never questioned Griff’s methods of obtaining whatever information he wanted. Only on rare occasions did the agency come up against that rare human being—the man or woman who couldn’t be bought for the right price. She wondered, if push came to shove, exactly what her price would be, because she knew only too well that the price wasn’t always monetary.
Nic spoke to each agent present and then took her seat at the opposite end of the table from her husband. Maleah surveyed the group. Nic and Griff and Derek were already seated. Holt Keinan, who had been assigned to investigate Hilary Finch Chambless’s murder in Memphis, sat down beside Derek. Ben Corbett and Michelle Allen spoke to Maleah as they headed for the table, coffee cups in hand.
After everyone was in place, casually seated around the table and still quietly chatting, Sanders entered and took a seat in the corner of the room, away from the others. Griff’s right-hand man seldom participated in the meetings, but he often observed. Maleah didn’t know why and had never asked.
Shaughnessy Hood, this month’s head of security at Griffin’s Rest, closed the door and then stood guard. His actions weren’t actually necessary, but she understood the need for protocol. This was a private meeting where the agents would be discussing matters of grave importance and sharing confidential information.
Griffin Powell ended his conversation with Derek and turned in his chair to face the others. His gaze traveled around the table, silently acknowledging each Powell agent present. The room quieted. Everyone focused on Griff.
“Kristi Arians’s autopsy will be performed