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“I don’t understand.”Lane shook his head.“What was the big end game?How did the guy think he was gonna get away with killing you?”
“I believe he forced Blain Montgomery to my house.Probably at gunpoint.”They’d found blood in the trunk of Jase’s car.Blood that matched to Blain.“He made the man enter my home.”He remembered how Blain’s hand had trembled when he started to raise his gun.“Jase killed him.I suspect Blain was another guy he was framing.With Nate in police custody, Jase had to move fast.Lucky for him, Blain happened to be in the wrong city at the wrong time.”
“And the videos I heard about?Were those really Blain’s?”
“The ones with the women being fake strangled during sex acts?No, our techs traced those back to Jase.But there was plenty of other twisted shit on Blain’s computer and phone.”Blain had still had a preferred type.Underage girls.
Blain was also in the ground.He hadn’t survived the bullet wound that had, indeed, shredded most of his heart.Every struggling beat had poured blood out of it.Oliver cleared his throat.“You were right about all of the attacks on you being targeted in here.Someone in a position of power was getting the guards to look away.That same person put a bounty on your head for the prisoners.”
Lane’s eyes glittered with fury.“Blain.”
“Yeah.He held a grudge.With you trapped behind bars, you were helpless.He saw the chance to get some revenge.”
“Not exactly gonna mourn for that bastard.”
No one was.The guards had been too happy to spill their secrets when Oliver had confronted them.They hadn’t exactly been Blain Montgomery fans.But he had power, and he used it against them.
“And that’s it?The story is over?”Lane demanded.“Seems to me that Jase was just constantly covering his ass.”
He had been.“When Nate went down, he picked another fall guy.Probably intended to make it look like Blain went after me.”
A confused shake of Lane’s head.“But you were alive.You would have said—”
“I don’t think I wassupposedto stay alive.”No more bruises lined his throat.They’d faded.As for the wound in his back?Just a new scar.“Jase waited for me to be distracted, and then he slipped down the hallway to attack me.Jase intended to strangle me with his rope.Kill me.Then make it look like he’d arrived and shot Blain as he tried to save the day.”After Blain had supposedly eliminated me.
Again, Lane shook his head.“My sister would have been there.She would have told everyone that he was lying.”
A cold wind seemed to slide over Oliver’s skin.“He kept saying he was going to make Lark his.”Oliver swallowed.“He made the women his when he killed them.Lark wasn’t going to survive.I think he always planned to kill her.”Maybe he would have acted like Blain had killed her.Maybe pinned that on him, too.With me and Blain both dead, he would have seemed like the FBI hero.
Lane’s hands fisted as they rested on top of the table.“You killed him before he could hurt my sister.”
Actually, Lark’s first shot might have been the one to end Jase’s life.“I’m sorry.”
Lane scrunched his face.“What?”
“I’m sorry.You were locked up because of me.”
“Uh, I was locked up because some freak framed me—”
“I should have seen what he was.He was on my team.I pride myself on being such a damn good profiler, but I didn’t see the killer right in front of me.”Midas had warned him—time and again—that people often didn’t see evil when it was up close and personal.
His friend had been right.
“I didn’t believe in your innocence.”
Lane snorted.“You don’t say?”
“But Lark did.She never gave up on you.”
The door to their interrogation room slowly opened.A big, burly guard stood in the entranceway.His narrowed eyes swept to Lane.Hardened even more.He entered the room with a lumbering stride.
“Time to go back already?”Lane sighed.“Great, well, see you next time, FBI Special Agent—”
“Time to go home,” Lark said.She stood in the entranceway now.A wide smile curled her lips.
Lane didn’t move.Fear flashed on his face.Fear and hope.
Oliver rose.“Paperwork is finally all done.Just thought you might want all the details before you walked out.”Those details mattered because… “Fair warning, there is going to be a media firestorm waiting for you.The reporters will be tossing questions at you left and right when you step outside.”
