Fear For Me: A Novel of the Bayou Butcher(35)

His eyes widened.

Anthony’s footsteps had come closer.

“Who was the victim?” Greg asked.

The case had happened long before Greg started working as the coroner. The disappearance had happened years ago, when Lauren was just thirteen. “My sister, Jenny.”

“What?” The shock was Anthony’s. His footsteps headed toward her. His fingers wrapped around her arm. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

He hadn’t exactly stuck around long enough.

She turned her head toward Greg. “Let me know when you finish the autopsy on Stacy Crawford’s body. If you do find another note…” She exhaled, trying to focus back on him. “Call me right away.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Greg murmured as he started to secure the body once more.

Lauren’s gaze dipped back to the black bag. Life could just end like that. In a big, black bag. Zipped up.

Anthony’s hands tightened around her. “Lauren…” A tight, hard edge was in his voice.

She couldn’t handle talking anymore about Jenny, not then. Not in the room made for death. Lauren pulled away from Anthony. Greg would have noted that they’d been too close—hard to miss a grab like that, but at least Greg wasn’t the type to gossip.

And why do I care? At this point—why?

Lauren cleared her throat. “Walker left a note with Karen’s body. It said, ‘It’s beginning.’”

Anthony’s jaw hardened. “No, it’s ending.”

She wanted to believe him. But the dead around her wouldn’t let her give in to that fantasy. It wasn’t ending, and it wouldn’t end, not until Walker was dead.

“He didn’t leave notes before.” It bothered her. The FBI profiler was still out in the swamp, but she wanted to talk to Cadence again.

Walker had never taunted the cops or the media. He’d just killed. Brutally. Again and again.

“He’s been locked up for five years,” Anthony said quietly, but his gaze was guarded. “A lot can change in five years.”

Her eyes held his. “And a lot can stay the same.” Before she could say anything else, there was a commotion in the hall. She heard the grind of wheels and the rumble of voices as her whole body tensed.

The swinging doors opened, and a body was wheeled in—a body covered in a zipped black bag. Another lost life. Stacy Crawford’s start in a new town was just a cold dream now.

A cold, dead dream.

When the transport team saw Anthony and her with Greg, they straightened up quickly and pulled out their paperwork for the ME to sign. Lauren barely glanced at them. Her eyes were on the bag.

She’d talked to Stacy last night. And now…

Greg had wanted to know why she was a DA—it was about justice. She wanted to bring justice to the victims. To their families.

She’d never been able to get justice for her own sister.

She wanted to stop killers and not just watch the bodies of their victims pile up.

The transport team left. Greg watched as she closed in on the body. There was one thing she had to know right away.

“Check her throat,” Lauren ordered.

Anthony had closed in on the body, too.

The hiss of the zipper filled the air. Lauren’s shoulders locked as Stacy’s body was revealed. Stacy wasn’t as stark white as Karen had been. Her skin had a more ashen color, and she smelled far more heavily of death.

A fresh kill.

Lauren’s spine was stretched so taut that it ached.

Very carefully, Greg’s gloved fingers went toward Stacy’s throat. There was a slice there, a gaping hole that looked like a twisted grin. Lauren could feel the frantic thudding beat of her heart. It felt like it was trying to leap right out of her chest.

Greg’s gloved fingers pressed lightly against the wound on Stacy’s throat. He had a pair of tweezers in his left hand.

Lauren leaned forward. Then she lost her breath.

She could see the folded paper that his tweezers had just caught. Rolled up, nestled just inside of Stacy’s throat. “He didn’t do this before,” she said again. It just felt so wrong. “Not when he hunted years ago in Baton Rouge.”

“Well, he’s doing it now,” was Greg’s response as he finished using his tweezers to extract the folded paper.

They all moved toward the counter where Greg slowly unfolded the bloody paper. It would be checked for fingerprints later. She knew that. The paper would be thoroughly scanned, the handwriting analyzed, but for now…

“‘Steve Lynch.’” Greg read the name on the paper, then he glanced at Lauren. “Does that name mean anything to you?”

It did. “He was the jury foreman at the trial.” The same man who’d written to Judge Hamilton, saying he’d changed his mind about Walker’s guilt.

Anthony grabbed her arm. “We need to find Lynch. Now.”

He pulled her out of the room, but the heavy stench of death followed. They rushed into the hall and nearly slammed into Paul. The detective staggered to a stop.

“What’s going on?” Paul demanded as his gaze jumped between Anthony and Lauren.

“The killer left a note in Stacy Crawford’s throat. The bastard—”

“Whoa, hold up!” He lifted his hand. “Her throat? What the hell is that shit?”