The Night Killer

sleep, but several hours later she heard voices outside. That was when you and Deputy Conrad got there,” said Ben. “She went out on the porch to see what was going on and Tammy shooed her back inside.”
    “The next morning,” said Frank, “they loaded her into the truck and told her they had to take her back, that a family emergency had come up.”
    “Mrs. Fuller protested, especially because, earlier in the week, Tammy had taken her to the bank to change her account and have her Social Security check direct-deposited to a joint account in both her and Tammy’s names. Tammy had convinced her that what she was going to do was teach her how to budget her money so that she could afford an apartment and be independent. She told her that with the money she saved by living with them, she would have a nest egg before she knew it,” said Ben.
    “How did Tammy explain putting her own name on the account?” asked Diane.
    “Tammy said it would make it easier for her to put a little money in Mrs. Fuller’s savings account, help pay her bills, and get her medicine for her if Tammy’s name was on the account too,” said Ben. “And that’s where we can get her.”
    “The morning they took Mrs. Fuller back to the shelter, Tammy refused to go by the bank to change the account back to the way it had been. She said she would do it later,” said Frank. “Norma Fuller is worried about her money. She doesn’t remember which bank they went to and she doesn’t have the checkbook. And remember, she knew Tammy as Tracy Tanner. Mrs. Fuller doesn’t know how to get in touch with Tammy. She doesn’t really know where Tammy took her in the mountains. Tammy gave her the fictitious name of some town she made up. She’s afraid the shelter is going to put her on a ward in a nursing home. She is a very frightened woman.”
    “We spoke with a friend in the GBI and we think we have enough to classify this as an Atlanta crime and require Sheriff Conrad to cooperate.”
    “Leland Conrad is going to hate that,” said Diane.
    “He can hate it all he wants,” said Ben. “He is about to be forced to do his job.”
    They spent the remainder of the evening talking about a recent trip Frank and Ben had made to Nashville to find an embezzler who was stealing in order to fund his ambition to become a country music star. The two of them had Diane laughing so hard it hurt by the time Ben was ready to leave.
    Tammy had been right about one thing: Laughter was good medicine. Diane was back to her centered sense of peace by the time she got in bed and cuddled up against Frank.

    Diane spent all the next morning telling the police and Chief Garnett her harrowing tale of road rage. She didn’t expect there was much of anything they could do. She just needed the report on record.
    The patrolman who took her statement seemed to think it was probably a garden- variety maniac and that it wasn’t personal. He opined that it was a long stretch of road with not a lot of traffic, and so it was a good play-ground for dragsters, and he would put the area under regular patrol so that it wouldn’t happen again.
    Diane thanked him and the chief and drove to the museum, parking her battered vehicle in the impound lot at the west end of the museum.
    Earlier that morning she had collected paint samples where the truck had rear-ended and sideswiped her. She headed to the crime lab with the samples and checked them in. David and Izzy were busy, and she waved at them through the glass partitions and locked the evidence in the safe.
    Diane went to the restaurant to grab a quick lunch. She was standing near the front, near the bank of Internet computers, waiting for her takeout. Just as the waitress handed her boxed lunch to her, she heard a voice that drifted her way, and the sound went though her like an electric shock. A voice that was deep, smooth, with a slight nasal quality and not a hint of North Georgia twang to it. The voice of the mystery man in the woods the night of the storm. He was somewhere nearby in the restaurant.

Chapter 31
    Diane’s gaze swept the room in the same methodical manner she searched a crime scene. But it was another voice that led her to him, one she knew even better. It was the voice of Andie, her assistant. He was sitting with Andie, sans beard and rain gear. It was Andie’s new boyfriend, the one she was falling for, head over heels.
    The lighting in the restaurant, with its dark decor, was kept dim even at lunchtime.