Dead By Midnight by Beverly Barton Read Free Book Online

Sanders asked.
    When Tagg looked him in the eye, his gaze questioning, Sanders clarified. “Did she ever catch you with another woman?”
    “From the day we married, there was never anyone else for either of us. It’s been that way for the past seven years.”
    “Who was this guy, the agent-cum-producer?”
    “Travis Dillard.”
    “Did your wife have any contact with him over the past seven years or perhaps only recently?”
    “No, none, not over the years or recently.”
    “We will check into it, find out if there is any reason to think he might be involved.” Sanders glanced at Barbara Jean. “See if Holt is free to join us and then have coffee prepared and served in approximately twenty minutes.”
    “Certainly.” Barbara Jean wheeled out of the room and headed straight for the kitchen. Holt would be there having a late breakfast. She had spoken to him less than fifteen minutes before Tagg Chambless’s arrival.
    The moment Cam Hendrix had contacted Sanders to tell him about Hilary Chambless’s murder, she had known Sanders would agree to take the case. He identified with any man who had lost his wife in such a brutal way. And each time he became involved in a case such as this, he relived his own wife’s death at the hands of a monster.
     
    Charles Wong placed the letter back in the envelope, tore the envelope into several pieces, and dumped the pieces into the kitchen wastebasket.
    “We’re off,” his wife Lily called to him from the living room. “Don’t forget that you’re picking the girls up from school today.”
    “I won’t forget,” he told her. “I’ll be there on time. Three o’clock sharp.”
    “Oh, and Charlie, call me after the interview, okay? Good luck, babe.”
    “Yeah, sure. Thanks.”
    When he heard the front door slam, he released a loud huff as he poured himself another cup of coffee and opened the caramel crunch breakfast bar he had laid out on the counter after he had cleared the kids’ cereal bowls from the table. Right now, Lily was supporting the four of them—herself, him, and her twin daughters, Jenny and Jessy. Since he’d been laid off shortly before Christmas, more than three months ago, he had signed up for unemployment and become a househusband. He had gone on numerous job interviews; today’s interview was number twelve. Unfortunately, he wasn’t qualified for much. His last job had been at a local plant where he’d been a janitor. Today’s interview was for a job as a bagger at the grocery store two blocks from their duplex apartment.
    When he’d met Lily three years ago, he had been on the verge of giving up, of taking an overdose or jumping off the nearest bridge. They had met at an AA meeting. He had never known anyone like her. For him, it had been love at first sight. She had survived a teenage pregnancy, a boyfriend who abused her, parents who abandoned her, and a drinking problem that had almost cost her custody of her girls. But she had turned her life around and had helped him do the same.
    They had been married for a year, had a decent apartment, managed to survive on one paycheck, and were doing their best to be good parents. He adored Jenny and Jessy. Who wouldn’t? They were seven-year-old replicas of their mom. And they were calling him Daddy now. Their own father never had been a part of their lives.
    Charlie sat down at the small kitchen table, ripped open the breakfast bar, took a bite, and then washed it down with coffee. When he had lost his job in December, he had believed that was the worst thing that could happen to him, but he’d been wrong. In early January, he had received the first letter. He had dismissed it as nothing more than a stupid prank and threw the letter away. Then the second letter, identical to the first, had arrived in February, right before Valentine’s Day. Even though that one had unnerved him, he had torn it up and tossed it in the garbage. As far as he knew, he didn’t have any enemies who hated him enough