See Me in Your Dreams by Patricia Rosemoor Read Free Book Online

recognize the area or was she trying to make
him think she did? Cynic that he was, Tyler knew it would take more than her
word to make him believe her.
    "This is
it," she finally murmured. "I recognize everything. The position of
the buildings. The lit signs. The bridge she took to get to the bandshell ."
    Tyler focused
on Monroe Street, on the other side of the Art Institute. A homeless man had
stationed himself on one side of the bridge. A couple of punks were play- streetfighting on the other. The kind of people his
daughter had been forced to deal with? He didn't know that, Tyler reminded
himself, trying to remain calm. He still wasn't convinced that Cheryl had been
on her own. If he believed she was, then he would have to believe she ran away
from him. He would have to believe her being missing was his fault.
    The suggestion
made him gruff. "Getting any good vibes?"
    Keelin's eyes
narrowed as they met his. "Let's walk around the bandshell .
Maybe I'll pick some up."
    Tyler didn't
miss the sarcasm in her tone. He took her arm and escorted her onto the lawn.
She was silent but for the small breaths and sighs she occasionally released as
she gazed around the area this way and that, seeming able to see through the
thickening dark. Suddenly she stopped dead and faced the bandshell ,
her flesh trembling under his hand. Instinctively, he released her.
    She glanced to
her right, her gaze narrowing as if she were measuring. She stepped several
yards back and to her left. Adjusting. Checked herself and corrected her
position again.
    Finally
satisfied, she nodded. "Here."
    "Here,
what?"
    "Where
Cheryl waited. Afraid. Trying to concentrate on the music. Liszt. A piece you listen to." Forehead pulled
into a frown, she faced him. "She was upset because it reminded her of
you."
    Hair prickled
at the back of his neck. "Why didn't you tell me this before?"
    As if she
didn't hear, she sank to the lawn, concentrating. The prickle spread when she
cocked her head and glanced over her shoulder, pointing. "The voice came
from over there somewhere."
    He stared in
the direction she indicated, hoping to see something, feel something. Of course
he didn't.
    "The
voice startled her," Keelin went on, as if in a trance, "and she
jerked around..."
    She sat very
still for a moment, obviously concentrating. Her expression changing slightly
as if she remembered something. Then she swept her hands through the grass.
    "What?"
    "Something
flew out of her fingers onto the ground."
    Right . "And the clean-up crew would have found whatever that
was."
    Keelin would
know that, he told himself. She was merely play-acting for effect. Still, he
tensely watched her as she continued to examine the ground around her, getting
to her knees and widening her search. He fought the urge to drop to his knees
and help. Fought making a damn fool of himself.
    Still his gut
tightened when she murmured, "Wait...I think I felt something."
    Her fingers
scrabbled, digging through the green blades to the earth below. When her hand
whipped up, something small was clasped tightly between two fingers. Quickly
she rose to her feet and came to his side.
    Tyler held out
his hand and Keelin placed the object in the center of his palm. A chill shot
down his spine. Even in the near dark he recognized it. A fairy charm from the
bracelet his daughter always wore.
    He remembered
Cheryl complaining that he hadn't been spending enough time with her last
summer, that he was too busy with his work. He'd tried making up for his
negligence. They'd spent an entire weekend together, Sunday at the Renaissance
fair. They'd had a great time. An unforgettable day, just the two of them. The
bracelet had been outrageously priced for scraps of leather and small bits of
metal, but he'd seen how his daughter's eyes shone when she'd looked at it, and
he hadn't been able to resist buying it for her. The bracelet was her prized
possession and she rarely removed it.
    Keelin's eyes
were shining when she asked, "Now do