Page 10 of Let Her Live

Then, she moved on to the other ear, where she found two more maggots. She continued the process, checking every inch of the man's body for any signs of insect activity.

As she worked, she couldn't help but think about the man's life before his untimely death.What had he been like? Had he been a good person? Had he been loved?Fiona tried not to let her emotions get in the way of her work, but sometimes it was difficult. She had seen too much death and destruction to not feel something when examining the bodies of victims. Still, as the daughter of two parents who ran a funeral home, she was more than accustomed to seeing death.

She reached deep into the body and was plucking out larvae and pupae, when she heard a noise from behind her.

Fiona turned to see Darla with a look of shock on her face. "Oh my god," Darla said. "What the hell is that?"

Fiona looked down to where Darla was pointing and saw that the man's chest was moving. Something was inside him!

Fiona's first instinct was to jump back, but she knew she had to stay focused. She grabbed a pair of forceps and carefully began to extract the object. It was a small, wriggling worm, about three inches long. Fiona recognized it immediately: a botfly larva.

She couldn't help but feel a shiver run down her spine. Bot flies were a particularly gruesome insect, laying their eggs in living flesh.But this told her something significant—the man had potentially been in the area for some time before he'd died.

"Ms. Red?" Darla said, her voice sounding panicked. "What's going on? You look like you've seen a ghost."

"This man has a bot fly larva in him," Fiona said, pulling the worm out of the man's chest and dropping it into a jar. She snapped the lid on, then turned to Darla, who was pale. "He's been in that swamp for some time, and likely had been even before he was dead. This larva can only grow if it's living in a living host. It's gorging itself on the man's body."

Darla opened her mouth to respond, but Fiona was already turning back to the man.The man hadn't just been killed—he'd been used.

Fiona suddenly became aware of Darla's eyes on her. The coroner stood with her arms crossed, looking slightly off-put by Fiona's reaction to the worm.

"I'm sorry, Darla," Fiona said. "I'm just used to this kind of thing." She knew that Darla was watching her—she didn't want to give the wrong impression. "We'll need to examine his skin much more thoroughly, and we can look for larvae. It's too early to know anything yet. I'm just surprised, that's all."

"It's fine," Darla said, shaking her head. "I've never seen anything quite like that. I always knew forensic entomology was an important part of this job, but this is just…"

Fiona nodded, putting the forceps back down on the table. "I know, I know. It's a lot to take in."

"You're telling me," Darla said. She turned back to Fiona, and the two shared a look of understanding and acceptance. "Well, since you're here, do you want to do the autopsy now so we can figure out the actual cause of death?"

"Absolutely," Fiona said. "Let's get the body prepped."

CHAPTER SIX

The local police station was small, hot, and muggy—Jake wiped the sweat off his brow as a fan blew air at him while he sat in the briefing room, reading over the case files. He wouldn't expect much more from this part of the Everglades; it was mostly a touristy area with many campgrounds and not a lot of crime, so the force there wasn't used to getting this level of national attention. But Jake was making due, even in the heat.

First, he needed to understand who the victims were. So far, there had been three: Alec Johnson, Jonas Smith, and now, the third, unknown victim whom Fiona was currently working to identify. She'd gotten a ride to the country coroner's while Jake waited here for her to return with news.

Alec Johnson was the first to be found. He was a thirty-five-year-old tourist who had come down on a camping trip with his family. According to his file and the interview the police had conducted with his wife, there had been some friction in their relationship, and Alec had been going off alone a lot, leaving the wife and kids behind at the campsite.

Jonas Smith was a somewhat similar story; not with his wife and family, but the fact that he was a tourist coming down to the Everglades to spend time with his girlfriend. He had been a twenty-five-year-old travel blogger, and according to his file, was known for traveling and documenting the process.

There were only two identified victims, but already, Jake could see a pattern: they were both tourists, and they were all men.

They weren't solo traveling, though, which told Jake that the killer—whomever he was—must have been watching them. He or she could have been stalking them, waiting for the right time for them to separate from the people they were with.

Since their bodies had been discovered in the past week, and they had been reported missing for just under two weeks, the families had been asked to stay here to help with the investigations if need be. Jake quickly checked the contact info for Alec's wife—she and her children had been relocated to a motel until further notice. Maybe there wasn't much else they could say that they hadn't already told the police, but Jake needed to get an idea of what had happened. If she had noticed anyone strange following them, or if Alec had said anything else about the time he'd been spending away from the family. The team had placed Jonas's girlfriend at the same motel, too, so it would be easy for Jake to conduct interviews. He checked his watch—it was getting late, and Fiona could be tied up at the county coroner's for hours. Sitting around here reading was making him antsy, so he headed out of the room and left the police station into the hot, damp night.

Even in the town, the insects were buzzing wildly, and the smell of the swamp radiated through the air. Jake looked up at the pale moon bleeding down through the clear sky. He could understand why people would want to visit the Everglades; aside from the bugs, it felt very campy, like he was truly disconnected from society and a part of nature. He headed toward the rental car he'd been given.

Inside the car, he turned on the air conditioner and checked his messages while he waited for the car to cool off.No messages from Fiona, so he started the car and began the drive through the touristy town toward the motel.

As he drove, Jake couldn't help but feel uneasy. The fact that the killer was targeting tourists was unsettling, but what made it worse was that it appeared he was stalking them, waiting for the right moment to strike. This meant that the killer was patient and methodical, which made him even more dangerous.

Jake could feel his stomach tighten as he thought of the faceless killer. It was someone with local knowledge and experience—someone who knew precisely where to find victims and how to dispose of their bodies without raising a single red flag.

When he finally arrived at the motel, Jake's mind was racing with possibilities. Could this just be the beginning of a serial killer’s rampage? And who was he? A disgruntled former employee? A resident of the town that had something against tourists? He frowned, feeling overwhelmed by the task ahead. If only they had an idea of who this person was, then Fiona and he would have a fighting chance at finding out what happened to Alec and Jonas.

Finally, he pulled up to the motel and parked the car.The motel was brightly lit, and neon signs advertised its many amenities. The walls were a garish yellow, and the windows were painted in bold reds and blues. Chipped paint peeled from the cracked walls, and the parking lot was filled with beater cars. The motel screamed of cheapness and disrepair, and the building had an overall unsavory feel to it, but it was one of the only motels in town. Most tourists camped out when they came here, so Jake figured there wasn't a high demand for other hotels. According to the file, Alec's family was staying in unit 4, while Jonas's girlfriend was in unit 10. He got out of his car and made his way toward unit 4 first.

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