Page 36 of Let Her Live

Jake's heart rate picked up. Could this be the guy they were looking for?

"Yeah, I think I know him too," another officer chimed in. "He's that guy who dumped red paint all over Mark Schumer's truck."

"He's lucky Schumer never pressed charges," the other officer said.

The room muttered around, sharing stories of this guy. None were violent, and none ended in criminal charges, but Jake wondered if there was more to Peter than met the eye—if maybe he could dig something up that could point toward his guilt.

"We'll look into him," Jake said. "Thanks, everyone, for your time."

As the officers started to file out of the room, Jake noticed Fiona lingering in the corner, looking at him with a worried expression. He knew what she was thinking—that they were grasping at straws, that this Peter guy was just another dead end. But Jake had a feeling. Something about the way the officers had talked about Peter made him believe that he could be the one they were looking for.

"Hey, Red," he said, pulling her aside as the last few officers left the room. "We need to look into this Peter guy."

"I don't know, Jake," Fiona said, biting her lip. "It seems like a long shot. We don't even know if he's still in the area. And it sounds as though he has no real criminal record."

"We have to try," Jake said, a sense of urgency creeping into his voice. "We're running out of time, Red. If this guy is out there hunting people, we need to stop him before he strikes again."

Fiona looked at him for a long moment, then nodded. "Okay," she said. "I trust your instincts. Let's start digging into his background and see what we can find."

"Good," Jake replied, relieved that Fiona was on board.

They sat down at the table and pulled out their laptops. He couldn't shake the feeling that they were on the cusp of a breakthrough. He could practically taste it.

But as he sat there in the empty conference room, he began to feel a sense of unease. If they were wrong, then it was more wasted time, so he got Fiona's hesitance. Plus, she was normally right about these things; Jake was the agent, and yet Fiona’s intuition had come through for them more times than once in the past. If anything, it made him want to sharpen his own mind and be a better agent, and that was one of the many things about Fiona Red that inspired him.

Jake knew that he couldn't afford to let his doubts get the best of him. He had to keep pushing forward, even if it meant following a lead that might lead them down a dead end.

Jake went online and pulled up Peter's file. They found out that he had worked at the local animal shelter for over ten years and had recently quit to start his own animal rescue organization. He had made a name for himself in the community, but not everyone agreed with his methods. Several people had tried to shut him down, calling him an extremist and a danger to the public.

On top of that, Peter—who was thirty-eight—wasn't even from Florida.

He had moved here when he was twenty-five to start a new life and had been working with animals since. But his extreme methods of getting his cause across had grown more intense in the past few years.

"He's from West Virginia," Jake said.

Fiona came over to his side and leaned over his laptop, reading over the file with him. He could smell her hair as she got closer to read, and Jake pulled away, his cheeks warming. Now wasn't the time to think about that.

"Who was he before he moved here?" Fiona asked.

Jake kept scrolling. "No criminal record, but his medical records show he spent time in rehab when he was twenty-one."

Fiona frowned. "A drug-addict?"

"Looks like it," Jake said. "Or an alcoholic. It doesn't specify."

"Maybe that's why he's so passionate about animals," Fiona suggested. "Maybe they helped him get clean."

Jake nodded, scrolling through Peter's social media accounts. Many of his posts were about animals and how they were the purest beings on the planet. He also posted about the dangers of humans and their destructive behavior.

Jake leaned back in his chair, lost in thought. The fact that Peter had a history of substance abuse was concerning. It could be indicative of deeper issues, perhaps even mental illness. He wondered if this could be the key to understanding why Peter might be targeting animal killers. It could be a twisted form of vigilante justice, a way for him to inflict punishment on those he felt were destroying the planet.

There was no concrete evidence that Peter was involved in the murders, but he was in the same area, and the motive could match. His physical stature, as well; according to his identification, he was five-foot-eight, which would match up with Fiona's theory.

"At the very least, we should go visit him," Jake said. "He could be working at his animal shelter right now."

Fiona looked at Jake, trying to read his expression. "Are you sure about this, Jake?" she asked. "We don't have much to go on, considering he has no record."

"I know," Jake said, standing up from his chair. "But it's worth a shot. We don't have any other leads, and we can't just sit around waiting for the killer to strike again."

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