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He was going to kill in her name again.
CHAPTER TWENTY SIX
Laura looked up as Nate walked in, almost jumping out of her skin. Just for a single moment, she was so scared she almost reached for her gun. Her nerves were going haywire, so many terrible thoughts about the revelation she’d just had going around and around in her head.
“I’m not getting anything out of him… whoa, are you okay?” He paused halfway to the board, frowning at her. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
“You’re not going to get anything,” Laura said grimly. “He’s innocent.”
Nate turned fully to face her, his arms crossing over his chest. “I take it this means you’ve come across some new evidence?”
“Better than that,” Laura told him. “I’ve worked out who the killer is.”
Nate blinked. “Are you going to let me in on it?”
Laura scrubbed a hand across her face. “Sorry. I only just worked it out. I remembered the case. This was years ago, back in Brooklyn. He was put away directly because of my expert testimony about his mental state. I stopped him from getting away with a cushy psychiatric sentence. It’s got to be him.”
Nate was already moving to the computer. Perhaps seeing she was still reeling and in no state to navigate the complex and outdated database system, he leaned over the keyboard, nudging her wheeled chair out of the way. “Name?”
“Ed Bronston,” Laura told him. “Edward, maybe. I know he went by Ed during the trial.”
Nate’s fingers sped across the keys, clacking out the name. “Here we go. Wait, you said he didn’t go to a psych ward?”
“No,” Laura said, looking up and frowning. “He went to jail. Why?”
“Well, his last release is recorded as being from Albany State Hospital.” Nate shook his head, scanning quickly through the re
sults on the screen. “Ah, here: he was jailed for a year first. That’s why he didn’t come up when I was scanning for recent prison releases.”
“What does it say?” Laura asked, bending her neck to see the screen while he stood in front of it. “Why wasn’t he kept in jail?”
“Uh…” Nate clicked to open up the record, waiting for what seemed like an age for the page to load. “Looks like he started exhibiting abnormal behavior which was referred to the prison’s psychiatrist. Then he was referred on to a psych ward for evaluation, where he bit a fellow inmate.”
“Bit?” Laura wrinkled her nose. “He should have been restrained, surely?”
“Hmm,” Nate agreed, scrolling through another page of a scanned-in handwritten report. “I don’t know. Sounds like the other prisoner was doing work in the wards, maybe. Earning some good behavior points by serving food. Then he got too close to Bronston, who bit the inside of his wrist so deeply the guy nearly bled out.”
For just a brief second, Laura had a vivid image of a vein spurting blood into an open mouth, and she swallowed down nausea. Had she seen that before? Or was it just her imagination working overtime at the gruesome story? “And that didn’t get him thrown into solitary?”
“Apparently, it was deemed that he was suffering from a severe mental break and delusions, and hearing voices.” Nate clicked onto another report before continuing. “His release record shows that he was given a clean bill of health after several years of ongoing treatment which showed gradual improvements. He was then released back to live with relatives—here, in Albany.”
“He’s from here?” Laura asked, searching for the information on the screen.
“You didn’t know that?” Nate’s voice held a note of surprise.
“No,” Laura said, sighing and shaking her head. “I thought he was from Brooklyn. But it makes sense. That’s why he’s killing here. Because this is where he lives, not because it has any particular significance to me.”
“Well, then how did you figure out it could be him?” Nate asked, frowning. “I mean, it does make sense. It looks like this is our guy. I just don’t get how you made the leap.”
“Call it divine inspiration,” Laura said, getting up from her chair and gesturing to the screen. “Whatever it was, we’ve got to go. Do you have his current details?”
Nate nodded, grabbing a piece of loose paper from beside the monitor and scrawling down the address he had on the screen. “I have his parole address. Nothing else is registered to him—no car, no cell phone number, no employment record. I guess we better hope he’s at home.”
“If he’s not there, we’ll have the sheriff track him down,” Laura said, already rushing for the door. “Come on. We haven’t got any time to waste. There’s only a few hours left until evening starts to draw in—and we need to find him before he kills again.”
Nate followed her as she marched as quickly as she could through the halls of the precinct, out to their waiting car. This was it. Laura knew they were on the right track, knew it in her bones—and they weren’t going to miss him this time.
CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN
