Two Little Girls in Blue Read Free

said, her voice shaking with fear. “We live at 10 Old Woods Road. We can’t reach our babysitter. She doesn’t answer the house phone or her cell phone. She’s minding our three-year-old twins. Something may be wrong. We’re on our way home from the city.”
    â€œWe’ll get right over there and check,” Marty had promised. Because the parents were on the highway and no doubt already upset, he’d seen little use in telling them that he already knew something was terribly wrong. The babysitter’s father had just phoned from 10 Old Woods Road: “My daughter is tied up and gagged. The twins she was minding are gone. There’s a ransom note in their bedroom.”
    Now, an hour later, the property around the house and the driveway had already been taped off, awaiting the arrival of the forensic team. Marty would have liked to keep the media from getting wind of the kidnapping,but he knew that was hopeless. He had already learned that the babysitter’s parents had told everyone in the hospital emergency room where Trish Logan was being treated that the twins were missing. Reporters would be showing up anytime. The FBI had been notified, and agents were on the way.
    Marty braced himself as the kitchen door opened and the parents rushed in. Beginning with his first day as a twenty-one-year-old rookie cop, he had trained himself to retain his first impression of people connected with a crime, whether they were victims, perpetrators, or witnesses. Later he would jot those impressions down. In police circles he was known as “The Observer.”
    In their early thirties, he thought as Margaret and Steve Frawley moved hurriedly toward him. A handsome couple, both in evening clothes. The mother’s brown hair hung loose around her shoulders. She was slender, but her clenched hands looked strong. Her fingernails were short, the polish colorless. Probably a good athlete, Marty thought. Her intense eyes were a shade of dark blue that seemed almost black as they stared at him.
    Steve Frawley, the father, was tall, about six foot three, with dark blond hair and light blue eyes. His broad shoulders and powerful arms caused his too-small tuxedo jacket to strain at the seams. He could use a new one, Marty thought.
    â€œHas anything happened to our daughters?” Frawley demanded.
    Marty watched as Frawley put his hands on his wife’s arms as though to brace her against possibly devastating news.
    There was no gentle way to tell parents that their children had been kidnapped and a ransom note demanding eight million dollars left on their bed. The absolute incredulity on the faces of the young couple looked to be genuine, Marty thought, a reaction he would note in his case book, but appended with a question mark.
    â€œEight million dollars! Eight million dollars! Why not eighty million?” Steve Frawley demanded, his face ashen. “We brought every dime we had to the closing on this house. We’ve got about fifteen hundred dollars in the checking account right now, and that’s it.”
    â€œAre there any wealthy relatives in either of your families?” Marty asked.
    The Frawleys began to laugh, the high-pitched laugh of hysteria. Then as Marty watched, Steve spun his wife around. They hugged each other as the laughter broke and the harsh sound of his dry sobs mingled with her wail. “I want my babies. I want my babies.”

3

    A t eleven o’clock the special cell phone rang. Clint picked it up. “Hello, sir,” he said.
    â€œThe Pied Piper here.”
    This guy, whoever he is, is trying to disguise his voice, Clint thought as he moved across the small living room to get as far away as possible from the sound of Angie crooning songs to the twins. For God’s sake, the kids are asleep, he thought irritably. Shut up.
    â€œWhat’s the noise in the background?” the Pied Piper asked sharply.
    â€œMy girlfriend’s singing to the