Page 24 of Girl, Sought

HISTORIC CHESAPEAKE MEDICAL MUSEUM OWNER CONVICTED OF INSURANCE FRAUD.

The Chesapeake Herald - December 15, 2023.

Former owner of the St. Andrews Museum of Medical History, Dr. Karl Barker, was sentenced to six years in prison yesterday for insurance fraud related to the suspicious fire that destroyed the historic institution last December.

The museum, which housed one of the East Coast's largest collections of anatomical specimens and medical artifacts, had closed its doors in late 2020 due to financial difficulties. The collection, valued at over $3 million, remained in storage on-site while Barker sought new funding.

However, on December 12, 2022, a fire ravaged the building, destroying approximately 60% of the collection. Initial investigations suggested arson, leading prosecutors to uncover evidence that Barker had orchestrated the fire to claim a $5 million insurance payout.

‘It's a tragic end to a vital piece of medical history,’ said Miss Blackburn, owner of the Curated Value Group. ‘Many of these specimens were one-of-a-kind. Their loss represents an incalculable blow to medical education and research.’

Something about the information pinged the base of Ella’s skull, but before she could entertain it, Luca burst through the door.

‘Ell! You want the good news or bad news?’

She glanced up, startled. ‘Bad.’

‘Well, CSIs arestill processing Alfred Finch’s house. Our guy's a real neat freak. Not a hair or fiber out of place.’

‘Why am I not surprised? And the good news?’

‘Hang on, I wasn’t done with the bad yet. We’ve also got the CCTV from Chesapeake Library and there’s no sign of Eleanor leaving with a mystery man. Tech guy went back two, three months. The cameras don’t even point to the parking lot. So, no luck there.’

‘Ugh,’ Ella grunted. ‘Please say the good news makes up for that.’

Luca held up a USB stick. ‘Let’s find out, because we’ve got 48 hours of footage from Alfred Finch’s creepy crawly room.’

CHAPTER TWELVE

Ella stood back while Luca held court in their office. Detective Reeves joined and shut the door behind them. Her nerves sang like plucked piano wire as Luca loaded the memory stick into his laptop’s USB port.

After two dead collectors and zero solid leads, Ella was overdue a break. She prayed that somewhere in that 48 hours of footage, their doll-making, bug-loving psycho had made a mistake and shown himself on camera.

But experience told her that serial killers were human cockroaches. They were resilient little bastards who scuttled away the moment you flipped the lights on. Given how familiar her killer was with his victims, he certainly knew about Alfred Finch’s camera if he’d been to his house before.But did his ego override his survival instinct?

God, she hoped so. Some criminals were smart enough to give themselves Shakespearean death scenes but too stupid to check for security cameras. Those were her favorite kind.

ANew Device Detectedmessage popped up on Luca’s screen. One click later they were staring at a new folder with a single file inside. An MP4 with the filename Breeding_Room_CamSD.

‘Breeding room,’ Luca said. ‘Explains what Finch was doing in there.’

‘Play it, Hawkins.’

Luca obliged. He double clicked and his media player whirred to life.

The breeding room materialized in standard definition monochrome. Glass tanks marched along the walls like transparent coffins. Heat lamps cast alien shadows across a maze of tubes and wires that wouldn't look out of place in a mad scientist's lab. Ella guessed Finch needed eyes on this place 24/7.

The time stamp blinked in the corner: 09:03 AM, two days ago.

‘Fast forward,’ she said.

Luca hit the arrow key, and Alfred Finch's last two days became a silent movie. The breeding room strobed past in jerky stop-motion. The old entomologist appeared periodically, puttering between tanks like a fussy librarian. Check the gauges. Adjust the dials. Monitor the humidity. The audio picked up nothing but climate control white noise and the occasional scratch of something skittering behind glass.

‘Take it to this afternoon,’ Ella said.

Luca dragged the progress bar forward and suddenly they were watching the last normal moments of Alfred Finch's life unfold in real time. The empty breeding room sat as patient as a spider in its web.

Then, timestamped at 6:00 PM earlier that day, voices leaked through the speakers, muffled but clear enough to raise every hair on Ella's arms.

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