Page 18 of In Her Dreams
Jenna stopped walking entirely, focusing on Melissa’s words.“Go on.”
“His system showed extremely elevated levels of adrenaline, cortisol, and other stress hormones at time of death.These levels are consistent with someone experiencing acute terror or extreme shock.I’m talking off-the-charts fight-or-flight response.”
Jenna thought of Richard’s face, frozen in an expression of horror.“So you’re saying that he was literally scared to death.”
“In layman’s terms, yes.His heart couldn’t handle the surge.It’s like his body thought he was being chased by a bear.”
“But there was nothing in the room to indicate that anybody or anything else had been there.Nothing that could explain that level of fear.”
“Nothing physical, no,” Melissa agreed.“And no toxins, no hallucinogens, nothing in his system that would artificially induce such a state.Whatever scared Richard Winters was either something he thought he perceived or something that was removed from the scene before we got there.”
Or something that seemed unimportant, Jenna thought but didn’t say.Melissa had said yesterday that the dreamcatcher hadn’t made an impression on her.And why should it?
“I appreciate you rushing this, Melissa.”
“Of course.I’ll have the full report on your desk this afternoon, but I wanted you to have the headline findings now.”
After thanking Melissa and ending the call, Jenna resumed running, her mind churning with this new information.The pieces were starting to align in a pattern she didn’t like.Richard Winters had died of terror, with no apparent cause.Now Jenna had dreamed of a woman being consumed by a frightening swarm of birds.She had looked terrified too.
And there was something else that tied them together … dull brown colors… the barrier of knotted strings.Her dream had echoed that dreamcatcher in Richard Winters’ bedroom.Was her own mind just getting confused?Conflating two separate incidents?
She turned onto another neighborhood street, passing houses that were beginning to stir with morning activity.A newspaper carrier on a bicycle tossed the morning edition onto front porches.A man in a bathrobe collected his mail.Normal life continuing, oblivious to the darkness Jenna sensed gathering.
The cry came so unexpectedly that Jenna nearly stumbled.
“Help!Oh God, please, somebody help!”
For a heart-stopping moment, Jenna thought she was back in the dream.The voice carried the same desperate edge, but this was real—the sound coming from somewhere just ahead.
A woman burst from the porch of a small blue cottage.She wore pajama pants and a hastily-thrown-on coat, her hair a frantic tangle around her pale face.She spotted Jenna immediately and ran toward her, bare feet slapping against the cold sidewalk.
“Please!”the woman cried, grabbing Jenna’s arm with surprising strength.“You have to help!I think she’s dead—oh God, I think she’s dead!”
Jenna gripped the woman’s shoulders, steadying her.“Slow down.Who’s dead?What happened?”
“Anita—” The woman’s breath came in gasping sobs.“My roommate.You have to come.Please.”
“I’m Sheriff Graves,” Jenna said, already letting the woman pull her toward the house.“Show me.”
The blue cottage was neat and well-kept, with flower boxes beneath the windows and a small garden gnome standing by the front steps.The door hung open, revealing a glimpse of a tidy living room beyond.
“This way,” the woman said, leading Jenna inside.“In her bedroom.”
The interior of the house was just as orderly as the exterior—books neatly shelved, their spines all aligned.The furniture was carefully positioned, and not a speck of dust dared to linger on any surface.
“I didn’t move anything,” the woman said, her voice dropping to a terrified whisper as they approached a door at the end of the hallway.“I saw her and touched her but there was no … I panicked … ran out to get help.”
The bedroom door was partially open.Jenna pushed it wider, her police instincts taking over as she scanned the room for threats before focusing on the figure on the floor.
A woman lay sprawled beside the bed, one arm outstretched as if reaching for something.Her face was frozen in an expression Jenna recognized all too well—the same wide-eyed terror she’d seen on Richard Winters.And on the dream-woman’s face as the birds descended.
It was her.The woman from Jenna’s dream, her eyes wide open, her features contorted in a final moment of absolute horror.
Jenna’s gaze traveled slowly upward to the wall above the bed.Her breath caught in her throat at what she saw there.
CHAPTER SEVEN
An all-too-familiar object hung on the wall of the bedroom, a chaotic tangle of dull threads, its feathers ragged and lifeless.With a gasp Jenna turned her attention back to the young woman lying on the floor, her face frozen in an expression Jenna had seen all too recently—pure terror.
