Read Dream of Danger (A Brown and De Luca Novella) for Free Online Page B

back,” Mason said without preamble as he opened the driver’s door and got in. “We need to head back there.” I saw the troopers run past, so I guessed they were coming, too.
    “I don’t think it’ll help,” I told him as he pulled onto the highway, sped up to the next turnaround and made U-turn to cross the median and head back the other way. “She obviously used the card before whatever happened, happened.”
    He drove a little farther, but I was getting more and more uncomfortable with every tenth-mile marker we passed. “This isn’t right,” I finally said. “Mason, this isn’t freakin’ right. ”
    Apparently, my tone got to him, because he frowned at me. And then I guess my expression got to him, because he slowed down. “Talk to me, Rachel. What’s going on? You having a...a vision or something?”
    “No, I’m not having a fucking vision. I don’t have visions. I have dreams. Or had. Past tense. I had dreams because I got your brother’s eyes, and the guy who got his heart was killing people. Period. It was a fluke, and it’s over. How many times do I have to tell you? I’m not psychic. I’m not one of those airy-fairy lunatics who tell the cops they’ll find the missing corpse near a body of water. Jesus, Mason.”
    He pulled the car over onto the shoulder, stopped and gripped the steering wheel, then seemed to choose his words with care. “Just tell me what you want me to do,” he said at length.
    “You don’t have to go back to the gas station?” I was feeling bad for snapping at him. He’d given up his Thanksgiving to help me find Amy. I shouldn’t take my gut-churning fear out on him.
    Ever.
    “I’m not officially on this, Rache. I’m off duty and out of my jurisdiction. The troopers will tell me what they find out as a professional courtesy, though. And just for the record, the reason for going back to the gas station is because that’s where she might have caught the wrong people’s attention. Someone who works there might have noticed that truck and whoever was in it. But we can do whatever you think is best. So just tell me. What do you want me to do?”
    I drew a deep breath, trying to figure out how to do it without looking completely batshit, and then decided it didn’t matter. Hell, he’d seen me sleepwalk straight to a crime scene. If he hadn’t run screaming by now, he wasn’t going to.
    “I want you to turn around and drive the other way. The way we were going to begin with.”
    He looked at me for about three seconds, then nodded and said, noddedÀsaid, “You got it.” He pulled the car out and hit the next turnaround, and the tight feeling in my chest immediately started to ease up.
    I sighed in reaction and relaxed in my seat a little, and he noticed because he noticed everything. Everything.
    “Better?” he asked.
    “Yeah. Thanks.” I moistened my lips and added, “And thanks for not asking.”
    “Oh, I’ll be asking. Just not right now.”
    * * *
     
    I don’t know what the hell was going on and I didn’t want to think about it just then. Hell, when I was having visions—no, not visions, dreams —of serial murders, the one thing I had figured out was that there was no figuring it out. I could drive myself crazy, and damn near had, trying to understand why it was happening or how the hell it could be happening at all. None of that had helped. What had helped, finally, was just shutting up and paying attention. Looking for details in the dreams and following where they led.
    This wasn’t the same thing. It wasn’t a dream. It was just a feeling. A lot like the feelings I get when I talk to people. The way I can tell when they’re lying and what kind of emotion is compelling them to: guilt or shame or pride or whatever. I can tell a lot about people. Some of it from the little telltale wavers and warbles and pitch of their voices. Some of it from something else. The energy they give off or whatever. It wasn’t ESP. There was no such thing as