Dreamscape Read Online Free

thoughts ran to his own daughter, not much younger. He couldn’t imagine what he’d do if his child lay in the morgue. His anger built at the loss of a life with so much hope and promise—a waste of a life. For some sick bastard to have tortured and killed her filled him with a resolve, a determination to find this homicidal maniac.
    “Got a minute, Chief?” a voice interrupted his train of thought.
    Thorpe looked up. “Come on in, Warren. What do you have?”
    Warren walked in, Officer Carl Morris close behind. Morris’s eagerness shone in his eyes, a young recruit. Thorpe faintly remembered what it felt like to believe you could make a difference in the world, young and naïve, before reality crushed your dreams.
    “Chief, I downloaded the pictures from the scene on the computer. You should be able to pull them up now,” Warren said. He handed Thorpe a folder.
    Sitting behind his desk with pictures of his kids staring back at him, Thorpe accepted the folder. Piles of papers overflowed on the far side of his desk.
    “Thanks, Warren. Now go home. You’ve done your time today. We’ll have another long day tomorrow,” Thorpe said. The day had worn on everyone. “Is this the list of the renters and owners of the beach homes surrounding Sea Gull?”
    “Yeah, Chief Thorpe,” Officer Morris answered for Warren. “I’m just letting you know, I just got back from Chieftain’s. Talked to the manager, Troy Higgins. Didn’t get much, I don’t think. Could go interview the roommate again.”
    For the first time today, Thorpe was amused. The kid wouldn’t let go, a bulldog. “That’s okay, Morris. Need you to get things in order tonight and take any other calls we get.”
    “Hey, Chief,” Warren said. “I was thinking….”
    Thorpe looked up from the report. He pushed his chair back to listen. Warren didn’t waste any time. He leaned his hands against the desk. Morris stood behind.
    “Although we didn’t learn much from Troy Higgins...I know he said the girl, Annie Crandell, had left by herself and he thought he heard her say she was going out with her roommate, but he knew she definitely left alone.”
    Thorpe tilted his head. “This we know.”
    “Well, maybe it was a customer. Maybe someone who staked her out.”
    “Go on. Sounds interesting, Warren,” Thorpe encouraged.
    “When I talked with the roommate, she said they were planning on going out after her roommate got off work as a waitress down at Chieftain’s. The keys to her car were found by her door. Right?”
    Thorpe shrugged. “As far as I know.”
    “Wouldn’t it make sense that it might be someone who watched her from the restaurant? Abducting her without much of a struggle in a place where she wouldn’t have been surprised to see him.”
    “Yeah, Warren, but that could be an old boyfriend, anybody she knew.”
    Warren shook his head. “No, Chief. The roommate was very assertive that Annie didn’t have a boyfriend or mad ex. It’s not much, but might be an aspect to investigate.”
    Thorpe sat silently for a moment. He saw the logic behind Warren’s reasoning. “Tomorrow, go down and go through customer receipts, interview her coworkers. We’ll be working around the FBI, just so you know.”
    “Thanks, Chief. I’ll take Morris with me.” Warren straightened up. Leaving the office, he turned around. “Hope the pictures are what you were looking for. I took enough of them.”
    “I’m sure they’re fine,” Thorpe said, dismissing the two.
    Thorpe clicked on the computer to look over Warren’s pictures: the body, the beach chair, beach, houses, crowd. He flipped through them, paused, and went back. He stared at one in particular, the woman by the car. He closed in on her face. Where had he seen her? He knew he’d seen her before. Her name, it sounded familiar. It would bother him until he figured it out. He doubted he’d get much sleep tonight, not after viewing the body. Honestly, everything would bother him until he got