He had parked his car several blocks away, walked to the center, and then checked out the visitors’ lounge directly inside the entrance to make sure the night watchman was nowhere to be seen. Once inside, he moved quickly down the corridor toward the west wing, luckily not encountering a single solitary soul.
So far, so good.
Pausing at the point where the hallways crisscrossed, he peered around the corner and scanned the nurses’ station. A heavyset, dark-haired aide came up the hall toward the station, apparently having just left a patient’s room. She bypassed the station and went straight into the lounge.
He took in a deep breath, waited a couple of minutes, and watched as the guard rose from his comfy seat, stretched, and headed for the lounge where the employees’ lockers were located. Once the coast was clear, he ventured around the corner and rushed past the guard’s empty chair. The sound of voices and laughter from the lounge followed him down the hall as he hurried to room 107.
He opened the door and gazed into the dark room. Coming from the well-lit hall, he had to wait a couple of minutes for his vision to adjust to the darkness. She lay on the bed, her body turned away from the doorway, the covers pulled up to her neck. A combination of excitement and dread shot a dose of adrenaline through his veins.
I can do this. I will do this. She doesn’t deserve to live any more than the others.
His attention focused on Terri’s still form as he closed the door behind him and moved toward her. Feeling around in the bedside chair, he found the extra pillow that the aides placed behind her back during the day. Smothering her would take only a few minutes. She wouldn’t suffer, not as the others had. In a way he was glad. But somehow it didn’t seem fair that she, the one who was the most responsible for all of his pain and misery, would be allowed such a gentle death.
Suddenly, his peripheral vision caught a flash of movement on the other side of the bed. Holding the pillow over Terri’s head, he stopped dead still when he saw a dark silhouette standing in the corner, only a few feet away.
Even in the darkness, he recognized the man.
“Hello, son,” Ransom Owens said.
“What are you doing here?” Tyler Owens stared in total disbelief at his father.
“I could ask you the same question,” Ransom replied as he reached out and pulled the lever that turned on the light over Terri’s bed.
Tyler gripped the pillow tightly. “I came to check on Mother.”
Ransom glanced at the pillow. “What were you going to do with that?”
Tyler swallowed hard. “I thought she might need another pillow.”
“Over her face perhaps?”
“Don’t be ridiculous.” Perspiration peppered Tyler’s forehead and upper lip.
Ransom hadn’t wanted to believe that his son was capable of murder, let alone that he had come here tonight to kill his own mother. But somehow the possibility didn’t surprise him. He had spent years denying his concerns about Tyler, who had been a sullen, moody little boy whom he had suspected of killing numerous birds and several neighborhood pets.
Thank God, he had taken his ex-wife seriously tonight when she had managed to say those few damning words—
Tu kull. Me. I nuw.
He had translated. “Tyler is going to kill you? You know. You know what?”
Terri had pointed to the number twelve on her bedside clock. “Kull. Kull awl.”
Cold fear had permeated Ransom’s body at that moment, hours ago, after Lila Newton had lied to the guard and convinced him that Ransom’s name had been added to the visitors’ list. Lila had been the one who had called him to warn him that she believed Terri had asked her son to protect her from his father. Ransom had instantly realized something was wrong, that either Lila had misunderstood or that Terri’s mind was playing tricks on her. He had never done anything that would make Terri believe he might harm her. God, he loved her. Always had. Always would. Yes, there had been a time, years ago when she had broken his heart, a time when he had wished her dead. But he hadn’t meant it.
But how many times had he watched that damn movie—
Midnight Masquerade
—and drank himself into a stupor, often with Tyler at his side. Tyler, who had been just a little boy. God in heaven, what had he done to his son by forcing him to watch that movie with him, over and over and over again? He could barely remember the things he’d said, horrible things, about Terri and the other actors.
Late this afternoon when Ransom had finally been able to understand that his ex-wife was trying to tell him that their son was the Midnight Killer, he had wanted to deny his own gut instincts. And he had, at least at first. But then Lila had shown him the newspaper articles about each murder that Tyler had brought Terri and stored in her beside table.
“How do you know for sure that Tyler killed all these people?” Ransom had asked Terri.
“Tul mu.”
“He told you?”
Terri had nodded.
“When? Last night or before then?” Realizing that was two questions, he had rephrased. “Before last night.” She’d nodded. “And last night, did he threaten you?” She had nodded again.
“Why would he tell you?”
Tears had pooled in Terri’s eyes and he had known she couldn’t answer, that whatever reason their son had confided in her, no one would know unless Tyler chose to tell them.
“I know what you’ve done,” Ransom said to his son. “Your mother told me.”
Tyler’s flushed face dripped with perspiration. “Her words are just a jumbled mess. How could she have possibly told you anything?”
“We understood enough to figure out what she was trying to say.”
“We?”
“Lila Newton and I.”
Tyler dropped the pillow on the floor, then reached out, grabbed the form lying in the bed, and shook it. “Mother! Mother, tell them it’s not true. Tell them that they misunderstood.”
The figure in the bed turned slowly and a pair of dark brown eyes stared up at Tyler.
The door flew open and armed FBI agents quickly surrounded Tyler as the agent who had been lying in Terri’s bed rose to her feet.
“Mother!” Tyler screamed.
“Your mother isn’t here,” Ransom said. “She was moved into a different wing of the center a few hours ago, shortly after I got in touch with Special Agent Wainwright.”
Right before his eyes, Ransom watched his son—his only child—emotionally disintegrate. He blamed himself. He and Terri had done this to the boy. When he had looked into his ex-wife’s eyes as she had tried so desperately to tell him that Tyler was the Midnight Killer, he had seen not only terror, but regret. He realized that she accepted her share of the blame for the damage they had done to their son.
Tyler dropped to his knees, covered his face—that beautiful face so like his mother’s—and wept uncontrollably.
The FBI agents circling Tyler waited and watched. When Ransom moved toward his son, every instinct within him urging him to comfort and protect, the agent in charge grasped Ransom’s shoulder and shook his head. He looked the agent squarely in the eye and nodded.
Two agents holstered their weapons, reached down and grabbed hold of Tyler under either side of his arms. As quickly as he had burst into violent tears, he stopped crying, came to his feet wildly, and struggled against the agents’ tight hold.
“I had to do it,” he screamed. “It was the only way I could be free.”
Emotion welled up inside Ransom and it was all he could do not to weep.
Shoving Tyler facedown onto the bed, the agents used force to subdue him. He kicked and flailed and screamed.
“Please, don’t hurt him.” Ransom barely managed to get the words past the lump in his throat.
Turning his head sideways, Tyler laughed hysterically. “You don’t want them to hurt me. Such fatherly concern. Too little too late, you son of a bitch.”
Ransom sighed heavily as the agents handcuffed his son and yanked him off the bed and onto his feet.
Tyler glared at Ransom, pure hatred in his blue eyes. “Aren’t you happy that they’re all dead? You hated them, every last one of them, but you hated her the most, didn’t you? Candy Ruff. How many times did I hear you say you wished she were dead? If you hadn’t tried to play the hero tonight, she’d be dead. Dead before midnight.”
Tyler’s sinister smile unnerved Ransom. Had he created this monster, this sick, angry, dangerous monster?
As the agents dragged Tyler out of the room and down the hall, he kept talking. “He used to sit there in front of the TV screen playing that movie over and over again. Watch it, he’d say. See what evil truly is. That’s your mother up there screwing those men. She enjoys it, damn her. Hell, she loves it. That’s what he’d say.”
Long after the agents escorted Tyler out of Green Willows, Ransom stood alone in room 107, his son’s accusatory voice echoing inside his head. Choking on his unshed tears, he gasped for air and finally gave in to his emotions. He wept quietly, his shoulders shaking and his hands trembling.
“Mr. Ransom?”
He cleared his throat, wiped his face with his fingertips, and turned to face Lila Newton.
“Is there anything I can do for you?” she asked.
“Would you take me to Terri?”
“Yes, sir, of course I will.”
Lila led him from the west wing to the east wing of the center. As they approached room 118, he noticed that a nurse’s aide sat in a chair outside the closed door. Lila spoke to her as she opened the door and then went with Ransom into the semidark room, the only illumination coming from the night-light in the bathroom. He slowly walked over to the edge of the bed and only then did he see that Terri was wide awake and staring at him.
“Tu. Tu?” she asked, her voice quavering.
Ransom took her small, slender right hand in his and held it tenderly. “The FBI took him away. They didn’t hurt him. Tomorrow, I’ll hire him a lawyer. I’ll call my old fraternity brother, Robert Barlow. He’ll take Tyler’s case. I’m sure of it.”
Terri squeezed his hand.
“Robert can use an insanity plea,” Ransom told her. “Tyler’s sick. He’s very, very sick.”
Terri squeezed his hand again and slowly closed her eyes. Ransom reached down and wiped the tears from her cheeks.
Mike’s cell phone rang at 1:15
A.M
. Although he kept the volume on low at night, the distinct ring woke him immediately. He flopped over in bed, flung his arm out toward the nightstand, and grappled across his wallet, keys, and holstered S&W semiautomatic before finding his phone. He grabbed it, pressed the Unlock button, and stared bleary-eyed at the caller’s name and number.
Hicks Wainwright.
Mike shot straight up in bed and tossed back the covers. He took the call as he rose to his feet. “Mike Birkett here. What’s going on?”
“Mike, it’s Hicks Wainwright. We got him.”
“What!”
“The Midnight Killer. We arrested him tonight, just a few hours ago. And we have a full confession.”
“How? Who? My God!”
“Tyler Owens, Terri Owens’s son,” Hicks said. “For some reason, he confessed to his mother, and despite not being able to speak coherently since her stroke, she managed to make her ex-husband understand what she was trying to say. We set a trap, waited for Owens to try to kill his mother, which he did, and took him into custody. He’s been singing like a bird ever since.”
“I can’t believe it’s over,” Mike said. “You’re sure. A hundred percent sure.”
“As sure as we can be at this point,” Wainwright told him. “But my gut tells me that there’s not much doubt he’s our guy.”
“Thanks for letting me know so quickly.”
“I thought Ms. Hammonds should be one of the first to know. She and Terri Owens are the only two survivors. All the other actors from
Midnight Masquerade
are dead.”
“I’m sure she’ll have some questions.”
“Maybe I’ll be able to answer them in a few days.”
As soon as Mike said good-bye and placed his phone on the nightstand, he grabbed his jeans off the nearby chair where he’d hung them earlier, put them on, and ran up the hall to Lorie’s room. Per his instructions, she had left her door open.
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.