Page 14 of What's Left of Us

“Oh,” he says, looking at the drawers and checking his chart on the wall before opening one. “John Doe there died approximately thirty-ish years ago. Jane Doe? Closer to fifteen.”

“Fifteen?” I ask, surprise shooting through me. That means… “She was alive during the Citrus Grove Slayer killings?”

“I estimate she probably died towards the beginning of those,” Briggs says. “Fifteen, sixteen years perhaps. I don’t have an exact DOD yet, but the remains aren’t nearly as old.”

My mind spins. If the body is only fifteen or so years old, Porscha could have killed this person just to have someoneto put in her place if she planned on dying. This could be considered premeditation, but how far back?

And if there’s a fifteen to twenty year gap between the bodies, is it really Diana? Why would she disappear in the 90s if she wasn’t dead for another fifteen years?

Briggs opens one of the drawers, pulling the body out and flipping the sheet back. The face is nothing but a skull now, and in the initial reports from the CGS case the poor woman had her face bludgeoned beyond recognition.

“This is our Jane Doe,” Briggs says, shaking his head.

Briggs turns and straightens his glasses before I can clarify who this is. “Remember the body you had me exhume from Porscha’s gave?”

I do a double take before nodding. Now that I’m focusing on the face, I realize there’s only a few teeth in the skull. “This is her?”

“Yessir,” Briggs says with a sigh. “Hands were missing, but after we found those two, I took the liberty of seeing if they were a match since we had both a body without hands and hands with no body. Looks like they are a match.”

“And you’re working to figure out who this person was?”

“She,” Briggs clarifies. “She might be in the wrong grave, but Porscha was smart enough to use a female body in her place. Now if only Dr. Whitmore was better at documenting things. I’m beginning to think he left things out of his notes on purpose.”

I look towards him, frowning. “What makes you say that?”

He gestures to the head. “See the face? I’ve seen Porscha’s all over the news, her cheekbones are fairly pronounced. Here, even before the face was smashed, the cheekbones weren’t sharp. This person had soft, delicate facial features and a rounder face than Porscha has. Any medical student should be able to see that much, and Whitmore wassupposed to be renowned for his craft. He did plenty of cases with the FBI and his findings always held up in court. There’s no reason he should have missed things like this in his report.”

“So he would’ve known this wasn’t Porscha,” I repeat.

“Of course. He couldn’t lie about that. If he was still alive he would absolutely be questioned about this, and if he were still practicing his license would be called into question for falsifying facts like this. Whoever she was, she looked nothing like Porscha in life. Not only that, but this skeleton is only five-foot-six. She’s too short to have ever been Porscha Surwright.”

Nodding, I’m already digging for my phone. This complicates things. I’m not sure why Whitmore would have a reason to lie, but if he did, why would he cover for Porscha of all people?

“Let me know when you get the analysis back on the DNA,” I say, and Briggs nods as I turn. “Sounds like we’re going to be questioning Porscha about a whole lot of things, including these two, and maybe Dr. Whitmore.”

Chapter 4

“Sei in Florida da febbraio e non hai pensato di contattare tuo padre?”

I roll my eyes, debating throwing my phone into the wall. Thus far I’ve managed to avoid my father, and it’s been the only gift I’ve received from the state of Florida since arriving. Until now, Massimo was too distracted with family business to care about me. But with weird gossip columns out there portraying me and Jo as a power couple for surviving a serial killer it’s giving me flashbacks to senior year all over again. “You have the family to contend with, Papa. I didn’t see a point in telling you all about your disowned son’s life.”

Massimo swears on the other end of the phone, and I glance over at Jo. She’s picking at her nails, eyeing her phone as she waits on me to finish the call. I’d rather be sitting with her again, pulling her head down my cock, but Massimo called seven times in a row before I finally decided to answer the damn thing. This is the kind of mood killer that I don’t need right now.

I only answered because of what Xeno told me about someone in the family acting shady. Between Dante and Jonathan, I expected my brother to have a handle on this by now, but with both Alastair and Porscha in prison there’s no reason to still have a guard detail. They are blissfully absent andout of my hair once more, which gives Massimo even less of a reason to phone.

When he doesn’t say anything, I try again. “Hai chiamato per un motivo preciso?”

“Reason,” he says slowly, and I tighten my grip on the cell. “Do I need a reason to call you, Vincenzo?”

“For the first time in almost two decades?” I ask dryly. “Yes.”

“Xeno tells me you were having an issue with some guards filming you,” Massimo says, and I freeze. Xeno mentioned someone might be filming, but I didn’t expect the news to get back to Papa of all people. “Jonathan, I believe?”

I messaged Russell about the two guys in question and he was supposed to get back to me with what was going on. Last we talked there was nothing to report. Now there’s a rift between the two of us and everyone at the club. Jo told them that things are complicated and we can’t talk right now, which isn’t a lie, but it’s going to drum up even more questions when we chat with the club members again.

Emeric, Nate, Callie… all of them deserve honest answers at some point. They are all helping to cover us while we’re in Florida so the club stays open, but in the end we owe them something. They’re supporting us during some of the hardest moments of our lives, and we’re skirting away from them anytime someone wants answers. We haven’t spoken to anyone in almost a week.

I let Massimo’s words stir around in my head, deciding how I want to ask the next question before lowering my voice. “Te ne sei occupato tu, allora, papà?”

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