Already Trapped (Laura Frost FBI)

“Hi, Agents,” he said, stuffing his hands into his pockets. “I just spoke to the other guys who were out talking to the dating app people. We’ve managed to cover them all. No one suspicious without any alibi, eh.”

“Anyone without an alibi at all?” Nate asked, squinting his eyes slightly.

“Only a couple.” Frome shrugged helplessly. “I can give you their names, but they’re not at all suspicious according to the guys who talked to them. We’ll have full written reports for you by the end of the day.”

For a moment Laura thought Nate was going to insist, to ask to speak to the two without alibis immediately. But he seemed to deflate. “I’m at a dead end with this myself,” he said. “Doesn’t look like we’re getting anywhere right now.”

“Sorry we couldn’t be more help, eh,” Frome said. He seemed dejected, like a kid having to let down a parent.

“We’ll get there,” Laura said, trying to sound brighter. “I think we should go down this twin route.”

“Twin route?” Frome said, raising his eyebrows hopefully.

Nate only sighed.

This was her chance, Laura could see. Nate was on the ropes, having used up all of their resources so far and got nowhere. Short of waiting for the coroner’s report and some kind of miracle, like a fiber from a one of a kind glove left in one of the wounds, there wasn’t likely to be any advancement then. They might find out what kind of knife was used to kill the girls, but what help would that be without an actual weapon to pick up and analyze for prints?

Not only that, but with Frome here, she had a more captive audience. And Frome was clearly impressionable, a young detective who wanted to be better at his job. He might listen to something an FBI agent said just because they were an agent. He might believe her, back her up.

“I think we’re striking out on finding a personal connection to the killer because there is none,” she said. “I think, whoever this is, he isn’t connected to Ruby and Jade. He’s killing them for another reason.”

“What reason?” Frome asked, practically rushing forward to hear more. She had to suppress a smile. He was the perfect audience, just like she’d thought.

“I don’t know that yet,” Laura said. “And besides, just because he has a reason, doesn’t mean it will make sense to us. But any profiler worth their salt would look at this case and immediately pick out the fact that they were twins as being an obviously defining characteristic.”

“I don’t see any basis for suspecting that anyone else is going to die,” Nate said, although this time it was a lot more half-hearted than his previous objection.

“I hope they won’t,” Laura countered. “But if they do, I’d rather be ready for it. And from what I’ve seen in my research this afternoon, if this is a killer going after twins, I have a pretty good idea of where they might strike next.”

That was more than enough to pique Frome’s attention. Nate shifted in his seat, looking at her openly now. “Where?” Frome asked, his eyes gleaming, like he was watching the masters at work and couldn’t get enough of it.

Laura leaned forward, playing into it. Addressing both of them as if she’d spent the whole afternoon coming up with some theory and narrowing it down, instead of finding the twins she knew all along were next in line. “I searched for twins in the Milwaukee area, right? And I came up with this charity, which works with families who have twins to make sure they have the support they need. That gave me some names to start with.” She paused, tucking her blonde hair behind her ears. “I checked some of them out—the ones who were adults, but not too old. And I came up with something really interesting. A pair of twins who match Ruby and Jade’s situation pretty closely.”

“Two girls?” Nate asked. At least he was beginning to sound slightly interested, even if he was still frowning.

“Boys,” Laura said, shrugging. “That’s the only thing that doesn’t match up closely. But they’re identical twins, twenty-four years old—less than a year younger than Ruby and Jade. They both still live in Milwaukee, but, crucially, they live separately. That means the killer could strike and take them both out in different locations, the same way he did with Ruby and Jade.”

“You think he might attack them tonight?” Frome asked.

Laura hesitated. She hadn’t seen deadly intent in her vision. She hadn’t seen him actually follow them inside or take out a knife. But she’d felt it. You didn’t stalk someone just because you wanted to know what they were getting up to. You stalked them because you were planning to take them out, and soon. At least, you did if you were the kind of killer who needed to get access to people’s homes.

“Yes,” she said. “I think that’s a very real possibility.”

“Then we should do something!” Frome said fiercely. “We could get there ahead of him, stop it from happening.”

“I agree,” Laura said. “Speak to your captain about getting us some men. We need to cover two different locations at once tonight. The quicker we can get down there, the better.”

Frome turned smartly and rushed away, clearly excited to be taking part in what was now a bona fide FBI investigation.

“Laura,” Nate began, his tone warning. “This is a long shot.”

“I know it looks like a long shot,” Laura said. She sighed, took a breath. Why not? He was already not talking to her properly anyway. “Nate, you know how you think I’m not telling you something because I always seem to know what’s going to happen?”

“Yes,” he said, his gaze snapping to her in the same way a guard dog zeroed in on a noise. He thought she was about to tell him something. She tried not to let her heart sink at that.

“Well, that means you know, at least on some level, that my hunches usually turn out to be right,” Laura said. “Doesn’t it?”

Nate frowned. “We disagree on calling them hunches. But, yes, fundamentally speaking.”