Gatekeeper — Tom V. Whatley

A friendly town is caught by surprise when a relatively unknown woman is murdered in northwest Alabama. Nothing adds up as detective Lane Cole jumps on the case with bulldog tenacity only to find himself at repeated dead ends. The nonexistent trail to the killer is a puzzle. Good police work finds him quizzing the neighboring law enforcement agencies about their unsolved murders. He soon discovers five other killings over an eight-year period with the same M.O. Lane Cole discovers he has a multiple murderer on his hands. What follows is a twisting road leading all the way to Chicago. It travels through the land of deep mental illness, severely abused children, and police work dangerously close to the edge. The surprise ending becomes the beginning of serious soul searching for any reader.