Dream within a Dream (Coffey & Hill Book #3)

Mike Nappa

Description

Trudi Coffey only realizes that she hasn't seen Samuel Hill in weeks when the FBI shows up asking questions about him. After a strange encounter with an armed man demanding her help and an attack by a member of the Boston mob looking for someone named Dream, Trudi manages to find Samuel--or rather, he finds her. He's made some pretty powerful enemies, but right now his full attention is on protecting Dream from the mob. Because Dream has something they want--the map to the location of artwork stolen from the Gardener Museum during the infamous 1990 heist.With danger closing in from all sides, Trudi and Samuel will have to call on all of their allies to keep Dream safe and discover the identity of the people who have been hunting down Samuel. The real questions are whom can they trust? And who will make it out of this thing alive?

Sujets

• Thriller

Informations

• Publié par: Baker Publishing Group
• Date de parution: 02 juin 2020
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781493423057
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 3 Mo

Extrait

Cover
Endorsements
Praise for The Raven
“I love Mike Nappa’s style! With intrigue, action, and a main character snarky enough to cheer for, The Raven is a thrill ride into the stark territory between grace and the letter of the law.”
Tosca Lee , New York Times bestselling author
“This is a superb series for those who love a great story filled with redemption and a gripping, quickly moving plot.”
RT Book Reviews
“As part of his regular street performance, a deception specialist who goes by the name The Raven picks his audience’s pockets while they watch. It’s harmless fun—until he decides to keep the spare wallet a city councilman doesn’t seem to miss, hoping for a few extra bucks. When he finds not money but compromising photos of the councilman and his ‘personal assistants,’ The Raven hatches a plan to blackmail the man. However, he quickly finds himself in over his head with the Ukrainian Mafia and mired in a life-threatening plot code-named, ‘Nevermore.’”
Goodreads
Praise for Annabel Lee
“Mike Nappa’s Annabel Lee is a fast-paced thriller, filled with unexpected twists and peopled by unique and memorable characters. From the first chapter on, I found it impossible to put down.”
Lois Duncan , New York Times bestselling author, I Know What You Did Last Summer and Killing Mr. Griffin
“ Annabel Lee is compelling, fast-paced, and filled with fascinating characters. One hopes that Mike Nappa’s eleven-year-old wunderkind from the title will reappear in future novels of this promising new suspense series!”
M. K. Preston , Mary Higgins Clark Award–winning novelist, Song of the Bones and Perhaps She’ll Die
“A relentless surge of suspense and mounting tension coupled with an engaging mix of characters. With Annabel Lee , Mike Nappa skillfully sets the stage for a compelling series of Coffey & Hill Investigation thrillers.”
Jack Cavanaugh , award-winning author of twenty-six novels
Half Title Page
Other Books in the Coffey & Hill Series
Annabel Lee
The Raven
Title Page
Copyright Page
© 2020 by Nappaland Communications Inc.
Published by Revell
a division of Baker Publishing Group
PO Box 6287, Grand Rapids, MI 49516-6287
www.revellbooks.com
Ebook edition created 2020
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—for example, electronic, photocopy, recording—without the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file at the Library of Congress, Washington, DC.
ISBN 978-1-4934-2305-7
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
This book is published in association with Nappaland Literary Agency, an independent agency dedicated to publishing works that are: Authentic. Relevant. Eternal. Visit us on the web at: NappalandLiterary.com.
Dedication
For Michele Misiak, Karen Steele, and Vicki Crumpton, friends indeed. M. N.
For my dad. M. K.
Epigraph
Is all that we see or seem But a dream within a dream?
E DGAR A LLAN P OE , “A D REAM WITHIN A D REAM ”

Contents
Cover
Endorsements
Half Title Page
Other Books in the Coffey & Hill Series
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Epigraph
Seven years ago
1. Dream
Present Day
2. Trudi
3. Dream
4. Trudi
5. Dream
6. Trudi
7. Dream
Monday
8. Trudi
9. Trudi
10. Trudi
11. Trudi
12. Trudi
13. Trudi
14. Trudi
Tuesday
15. Dream
16. Trudi
17. Trudi
Wednesday
18. Samuel
19. Dream
20. Trudi
Thursday
21. Samuel
22. Dream
23. Samuel
24. Trudi
25. Dream
26. Samuel
27. Trudi
28. Dream
29. Samuel
30. Dream
31. Samuel
32. Trudi
33. Dream
34. Samuel
35. Trudi
36. Dream
37. Samuel
38. Trudi
39. Dream
40. Trudi
Friday
41. Trudi
42. Samuel
43. Trudi
44. Samuel
45. Trudi
46. Dream
47. Samuel
48. Trudi
49. Samuel
50. Dream
One month later
51. Trudi
52. Eula
About the Authors
Back Ads
Back Cover
Seven years ago
Somewhere in New England
1 Dream
“Get. Down.”
He’s driving too fast, looking too often at his rearview mirror. The world outside us is a strange, pale kind of twilight. There’s no sun in the sky that I can see, yet there’s still some kind of half-light, as if day is resisting night, refusing to go to bed like an ill-tempered child.
The gun resting on the console between us is still warm.
I could take it , I think. I could grab that pistol while he’s distracted . But the steel in his voice makes me think twice. He did just kill a man, after all. I can still smell the wet, hot copper spray that blew from the dead man’s body when the bullets hit.
The driver glances at me now, scowling.
It’s a tight fit, even for someone with my bit of pudge, but I slide off the passenger seat anyway and try to squeeze into the leg space below. Apparently, I’m not good at this.
“Farther,” he snaps. “All the way down. So no one can see you, even if we stop at a red light.”
If we stop at a red light?
The sedan lurches left, hard, but the tires don’t squeal. He guns the engine and, briefly, I feel dizzy, like I might have a concussion, like I might throw up if I’m given half a chance. Instead, I press myself deeper into the floorboards until he glances at me and nods. Then he does a double take.
“Don’t you spew in my car. You understand?”
I nod and close my eyes. Seems a lot to ask of me at this point, not to throw up. But I don’t want to argue.
“You spew, and I’ll put you in the trunk with everything else.”
His accent is strong, harsh, and hard to follow. I’m not from New England. Didn’t grow up here and never quite mastered the nuances of the brash northeastern accent. For instance, to me that last threat sounded like, “Yah s’puh an ahl pudya in tha trunk wid everthin’ else.” It takes me a second to process what he’s saying, and that seems to make him angry. He taps the brakes and leans down toward me while making another left turn. “Yah unnerstan?”
I nod again. I understand . There’s nothing to do about it now except pay attention and make sure my mind translates his words—fast.
“W-what do you want with me?” I ask. My voice sounds thin, like the pale light fading around us. I try to concentrate so I can translate his accent in my mind.
“You was in the wrong place at the right time,” he says. With my eyes closed, I can almost hear a grin in his voice. I have no idea what he’s talking about. I’m afraid to ask.
Afraid.
The car screeches to a sudden halt, and the back of my head smacks lightly against the glove box behind me. I risk opening my eyes, and I see him tapping the steering wheel impatiently. I can’t see the traffic, but I assume a car is stopped in front of us, maybe at a red light.
Now’s my chance , I think. Shove open the door and roll out into the street while the car is idling.
My legs feel deadened from this cramped space, but that doesn’t matter. I’ll just fall out of the car and crawl away on my hands and knees. Hopefully somebody out there will see me, someone will wonder what’s going on, and that’ll be enough for him just to let me go.
“What is that? Is that blood?”
His eyes flick in my direction, and I feel my chest tighten like thickening cement. Callused fingers flash toward me and grip my wrist. He yanks at my arm, and I suffer the slow agonies of opportunity pulling away. “Di’ya geh bluhd in mah cah?” Did you get blood in my car?
“No, no!” I say. “It’s cadmium red. Oil-based. It’s what I was using when you, when you . . .”
He throws my hand back at me and hits the gas again, swerving to pass something in the street. I reflexively wipe at the drying paint on my fingers and tell myself again and again, Don’t throw up, Javie, don’t throw up .
The man barely looks at me, intent on speeding through the twilight streets of what I’m guessing is East Middlebury or Ripton by now. He’s found a deserted route and is all business. I think we’re heading out to the forestlands, because I can see tall sugar maple and beech trees shadowing the sky above us.
I sneak a look in his direction while he’s occupied with the road. His cheeks are Pilgrim-pale, flecked with pockmarks that suggest he had a problem with teenage acne. His nose looks like a partially inflated balloon, bulbous and angry. He’s got thinning brown hair, a chin shaved clean, and clear blue eyes that seem out of place in that face. He’s wearing dark brown pants, a white button-up shirt, but no tie. And now his right hand is resting on that silver gun in the console between us.
“That’s how you do it where I come from,” he mutters to nobody. “That’s how we do it Southie style. Whitey B., you see that? Yeah, you saw that, wherever you are.”
“You’re from Boston?” I say, and even I’m surprised to hear my voice ask the obvious question.
His face relaxes into a proud grin. “Born and raised,” he says. Then he glances over at me and frowns. “Now stay down and shut up while I try and figure out these crazy-stupid roads out here in this crazy-stupid place.”
I nod. Outside, night has finally pushed aside the last complaints of daytime and taken its rightful place of supremacy. The Southie flicks on the car’s headlights, but the vehicle doesn’t slow.
“Head down,” he barks at me. “I got no time to deal with a skiddah like you right now.”
Skidder . Boston slang for a worthless bum. Is that what I am now? I fold my arms onto the seat and bury my face into them.
I’m going to die .
There’s silence as we continue into what I can only assume is more countryside.
But if he wanted to kill me, why didn’t he do it back at the workshop? Why come in with guns blazing at Henri and then stop when he sees me?
In my mind’s eye, I see a slow-motion explosion of bullets and flesh