Laura let him go, reeling.
Frost.
She had a terrible, terrible feeling that she finally understood what was happening here.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Laura turned and strode forward, marching right off the property and out into the road. Behind her, she heard Nate call her name and then run to catch up.
“Hey, where are you going?” he asked, getting level with her again just as she reached the car.
“Back to the precinct,” she said. “Come on. Get in.”
Nate made a confused noise. “Why? We haven’t had a good look at the rest of the house yet.”
“We don’t need to. Get in, Nate!” These last words were shouted as she ducked her head, already climbing into the driver’s seat.
“Wh…” Nate gave up arguing and opened the passenger’s side door, to her relief, taking a seat beside her. He hadn’t even closed his door yet when she started the engine, prompting him to throw up his hands in alarm. “Whoa, whoa, whoa. Just where is the fire right now?”
“For god’s sake, Nate,” Laura said, turning to him. “The first victim’s name was Laura. Now Frost? You don’t see that?”
“Well, what about Caroline?” Nate said. “I mean, Laura’s a common enough name, and so is Frost. This can’t be your first time dealing with someone with either of those.”
“It’s not,” Laura said, gesturing impatiently for him to put his seatbelt on. One moment longer, and she was going to reach over and do it for him. “But Caroline’s nickname was Carrie.”
The second his seatbelt clicked into place, Laura nudged the car forward, heading out into the road again. She checked her mirrors and then peeled out, putting her foot down as much as she dared in this urban setting.
“I’m not getting it,” Nate said. “What? Is that your middle name or something?”
“It’s my mother’s name,” Laura said grimly. “Laura, Carrie, and now Frost. There’s no way that’s just a coincidence. Which is why we need to get back to the precinct—right now.”
***
“We have to find out who the next victim is,” Laura said, half-running through the precinct to their office. She almost knocked over a hapless deputy who was going back to his desk with a cup of coffee, obviously left behind to man the phones. “We have to figure out the name.”
Nate trailed behind her, only just managing to keep up. “Laura, I don’t know…”
“Please,” Laura said, throwing the word over her shoulder along with a desperate glance. “We need to think about this.” She reached their makeshift office and threw the door open, heading right for the board. She grabbed a pen and circled two things: Laura, for Laura Carlisle, and Caroline, for Carrie Birchtree. Underneath, she added Nadia Frost, circling Frost.
“Do you even have any more women in your family?” Nate asked, closing the door behind him with a sigh and folding his arms across his wide chest. “I didn’t think you had a sister.”
“I don’t, except for Lacey. But I don’t know if she counts. She’s a child, and the other names have been adults. She doesn’t live with me. Everyone else has been older. I don’t think it fits the pattern.” Laura tapped the end of the pen against her chin for a moment, thinking. “It has to be my father. Me, then my mother, then our family name—my dad has to be next.”
“What was his name?” Nate asked, sounding as though he was only playing along because he knew what she was like. That she was too far down this rabbit hole to listen to reason—and that sometimes she came out the other side of the hole with an answer that made sense. It was far from the first time she’d worked a whole case on what she told him was just gut instinct—but they always got an arrest.
“Alex,” she said, writing it on the board in block capitals. “Alexander, but he went by Alex.”
“There are probably hundreds of men called Alex in Albany,” Nate said, unfolding his arms and throwing them wide in an exasperated gesture. “That doesn’t help us at all, Laura. We don’t have any way to use this information.”
Laura felt her heart quickening its already rapid pace in her chest. Nate was right. How were they ever going to narrow it down?
They had to figure this out fast. If they didn’t…
“Someone’s going to die,” she said, out loud. She heard her own voice shaking. “We only have twenty-four hours, maybe less. We have to figure this out, or we’re not going to be able to save them!”
“All right, whoa,” Nate said, holding up his hands and stepping forward. He stopped just shy of touching her as she flinched away. “Laura, I need you to take a breath and slow down a minute.”
She dropped her shoulders, closing her eyes for a brief moment. He was right. She was on the verge of some kind of panic attack, and—