A growing fear rose inside Laura as she watched. This was not just any daytime stroll. She was following that man—and she could feel how wrong it was, how carefully her host was avoiding being caught. This was something he was doing for a reason. He was stalking him.
The way that a killer might stalk his intended victim, in order to get him on his own.
Laura surfaced with her eyes still on the list of messages, and only paused a moment before continuing to scroll through them. She was no longer really reading them. She was thinking about what she had seen, about what it meant.
And what she was afraid of was that it meant there was going to be another murder.
“We’d better start contacting everyone they knew,” she said, looking up at Gausse. “Including the men on this list. One of them has to know something.”
One of them, she hoped, would be the man in her vision—and even though all she had to go on right now was a hand, it would have to be a start.
CHAPTER TWELVE
“We should start going through everything we can find on social media.”
Laura looked up at Nate’s words, only to find he wasn’t even looking at her. He was moving the mouse to wake up a computer they’d been assigned, out in the bullpen. Not exactly as nice as having their own office, but it would have to do. Gausse had led them to a pair of adjacent desks and told them to make themselves at home.
Laura’s jaw tensed slightly, hearing the formality in Nate’s voice. He was talking to her the same way that he would talk to any other member of the investigation. Like she was no one. Around them, she noticed a few of the other cops watching them curiously. They were no doubt interested in the FBI agents who had turned up in their midst. Laura wished they wouldn’t look, wouldn’t see how stiff Nate was with her.
“Right,” she agreed, because the investigation needed to continue. “We ca
n use the list of names that Gausse’s team has already whipped up. Start looking for people with known records, anyone behaving suspiciously. Messages in their accounts that flag up any arguments or grudges.”
Nate was already sitting, adjusting the keyboard to the right position for his long arms. “I’ll take social media and dating apps. You go through the records.”
Laura sat down silently, doing as she was told. There didn’t seem much point in arguing with him, or even voicing her agreement. He had decided who was doing what so that they didn’t have to talk about it any further.
Laura blinked a few times to try and clear her bleary eyes, looking at the computer screen and clicking around to bring up the national database where she would find any necessary records. It was useful, having a whole team of detectives working around you. They’d already combed social media for the names, and Gausse now had them out there working their way through interviews. There were far too many for Nate and Laura to handle themselves, but until one of them found something that was worth looking into or the coroner’s report came back with something interesting, they didn’t have a lot to do. This kind of admin could have been handed off to another detective as well, but Laura preferred sitting here to being out there.
Out there, there was more chance that someone would touch her, whether by accident or deliberately. That would mean the possibility of more visions. Laura wanted to save those for the important moments—the moments that might affect the outcome of the case. If she had too many unnecessary encounters, the headache would build into a migraine until she couldn’t handle it anymore. And then the case would go unsolved for another day while she recovered, and it would be one more day of sitting next to her partner and feeling like she was a stranger. And thinking about two little girls who needed her help back home, who were waiting for her to return.
Laura typed the first name into the database and waited a moment for the results to load up. There was no match. She deleted her query and concentrated on the next name on the list, waiting for a hit.
This time there was one, but it was for a man who was now deceased, as of several years ago. She doubted it was the same one that the twins had been in contact with. Even if it was, it was irrelevant. He couldn’t have been the one to kill them now.
She moved steadily down the list. When there was a need to cross-check, to be sure she had the right person, she used her phone to look up the person on social media, going through friends lists the same way that the cops had when putting the list together. Almost every person she looked up was friends with both Ruby and Jade. They had remained close, it seemed, through the whole of their lives. So many shared connections. Their pages were already flooded with memoriam messages, people posting about how much they would miss each of the women.
Going by this, what the Patricksons had said was correct. Both of the twins were popular, well-liked. They knew a lot of people, and those people thought highly of them. But, of course, that was how it was when someone died. People would post good memories, good thoughts and wishes—not bad ones.
Laura sighed, finding herself looking up the last name on the list. When that returned no hits either, she was at a dead end. She’d gone through what looked like the full branch of the Patrickson family, given how many there were in the list with the same surname, as well as dozens of friends, colleagues, and acquaintances. It wasn’t that none of them had a record—that would have been unrealistic. No, it was that the records they had were unrelated: parking fines, possession of minor recreational drugs, drunk driving. Nothing related in any way to violence or theft, nothing that suggested a reason to break into a house and stab someone.
She was getting nowhere. Laura glanced across the aisle at Nate. He was sitting parallel to her, engrossed in his screen. He didn’t glance back at her or show any signs of stopping. The task he’d chosen was the larger one—he’d probably be doing it for a long time.
Laura hesitated. She didn’t want to interrupt him or try to get his attention. The atmosphere was so frosty, she was almost afraid of what his reaction would be. She turned back to her own screen, trying to think of what else she could do with the information they had. Her thoughts strayed back home, to Amy.
It had been a long night for Laura, and now that the morning was in full swing she couldn’t help but think it must have been long for Amy, too. Where had the little girl slept? Not in her own bed, that was certain. Had she been able to get any rest? Had she been huddled up under unfamiliar covers, scared and alone? It sent a lump into Laura’s throat, and before she even realized it, she was dialing Rondelle’s number to check in.
“Division Chief Rondelle,” he said, giving his customary greeting—but he must have checked the caller display before answering. “Is there a problem in Milwaukee, Agent Frost?”
“No,” she said, wondering again at the fact that he was still on duty at his desk this early—even after last night. The man didn’t seem to sleep. Not that they had, either. “I was just wanting to check in, see if you’d heard anything…”
“About Amy Fallow.” Rondelle sighed. “No, Laura, I’m afraid we don’t have any updates yet. Like I told you, we have to wait for Child Protective Services to find her next of kin and discuss things with them. It could be days, or even weeks, before we hear any update.”
“Right,” Laura said. She knew that, of course. It was just hard to hear. She wanted to be there, making sure that Amy was all right. The last time she’d trusted in the state to get it done, Amy had ended up right back in the lion’s den.
“Please focus on your investigation,” Rondelle said, a hint of harshness coming into his voice. “You’ve got a job to do, Agent. Don’t mess it up because you’re too distracted.”
The call ended, leaving Laura listening to the hiss of nothing with the phone pressed against her ear. She sighed and put it down on the desk, rubbing her eyes. No news was good news. That was what she had to tell herself.