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“Their identity?” Nate suggested. “If he’s only seen their names written down, he won’t know what they look like in person. He might want to be sure.”
“Yes!” Laura clicked her fingers. “That’s it—it has to be. So where does he get their names? The first two—the first two, he called them on landlines. Home phone numbers.”
She looked down at the desks across the bullpen. Right now, each of them had a copy of the phone book, open to a new section. Surnames A through J were already in use.
A source that contained both names and phone numbers. A place where you could find anyone with the right name. Even easier if you were going for surnames, like Frost. A listing for everyone in the city, everyone who was registered.
This was it.
“He’s using the phone book, too,” Nate said, his voice echoing and confirming her own thoughts.
“The third victim, Nadia Frost, she was called on her cell,” Laura said, hastily grabbing her own and looking up a page she’d already visited earlier on. “But she had her own online store—yes, here it is! Her personal number is listed on the site, for potential customers to call. He must have found her in the phone book, then looked her up online and seen this.”
“That’s amazing,” Nate said, grinning. “We’re on his trail.” But his smile faltered as he looked out across the room, at the deputies who were only now starting their second calls. They were going to be at it all night. Even if they managed to call all of the women on the list before darkness fell—even if they got a press conference together in time—was it going to be enough?
Laura pushed her hair back from her face, grabbing a scrunchie out of her pocket and sweeping it back into place. “Let’s join them,” she said, decisively. The only thing they could do now was try.
CHAPTER TWENTY NINE
Laura bit the inside of her cheek as the phone rang and rang. Her fifth call, and just like the last two, it seemed like it was going to go unanswered.
“Hello?”
“Yes, hello!” Laura said, sitting up sharply. She’d all but given up hope of connecting, and for a moment she almost forgot what she had to say. “Is this Alex Vardy?”
“Who is this?”
“My name is Special Agent Laura Frost,” she said. “I’m calling to—”
“You can prove that?”
“Excuse me?” Laura stumbled, finding herself cut off in her mentally rehearsed speech.
“You got any way to prove you’re FBI?”
“I…” Laura paused. “Not right at this moment. But ma’am, no one is in trouble. I’m actually calling because we think that Alex Vardy could be in danger tonight. If that’s you, I just want to keep you safe.”
“There’s no Alex Vardy at this number,” the woman on the other end of the line said. “She moved out. Couple years back. No idea where she went.”
Laura opened her mouth for a follow-up question, but the line went dead.
She groaned with the horrifying realization that at least one of them was now out of reach. What if Alex Vardy was the Alex that Ed had chosen? Sure, he couldn’t call her at home, but what if he’d found her online like he did with Nadia Frost and discovered her new location?
She looked up to the windows that allowed light into the bullpen, and saw that they were now overpowered by the electric lights overhead. It was getting dark. He would be striking soon.
This Alex, whoever she was, was about to die. And even though several more bodies had joined them on the phones, it wasn’t enough. It was never going to be enough. There was no way they could get through all of them, not in time.
Laura thought about the grim reality setting in—the fact that she was probably about to find a fourth body, another woman who bore the name of one of her family members—and it took everything she had not to hurl the phone book at
the wall.
The book. That was a thought. Ed was using one of these. She knew him now, knew who she was looking for. She was getting so much closer—she had to be. If there was any time a vision would come, it had to be now. Right?
She glanced up surreptitiously, making sure that Nate was engrossed in a call. All across the bullpen, everyone was involved in their own journey through their section of the phone book, scanning pages or going over a hastily written script. At the far end of the room, the door to the sheriff’s private office was ajar, and through the window she could see him making his own calls. No one was paying any attention to her.
Now was her chance. She shut her eyes, flattening the palm of her hand against the phone book, hoping it would look as though she was just saving her place. She took a deep breath, tried to shut everything else out. Focused in on the feel of the book under her pages. The texture of the cheap, rough paper. The slight musty smell coming from it. The sharp tang of coffee in the air, and the generally stale aroma of a room that enclosed working law enforcement professionals for long shifts every day. She let it all filter through, the padding of the chair she was sitting on, the sharp edge of the desk drawers against the side of her leg.
Laura breathed deeply, letting all of her senses in one by one. If she couldn’t do this, Alex was going to die. Whoever Alex was. And then Nate. And—
