Jenna examined the coffin, looking for latches or hinges, any mechanism that might open it.The gold frame was seamless, offering no obvious way to release the lid.She pressed her hands against the glass, feeling its cold resistance.
“What's your name?”Jenna asked, still searching for a way to open the coffin.
“Rebecca.Rebecca Hartley.”The woman's voice was muffled by the glass.“Please hurry.”
Jenna's hands stilled on the glass as she remembered—the very fact that this woman appeared in this liminal space meant her fate was already sealed.Rebecca Hartley—she couldn’t remember hearing the name before.But if Rebecca was here, in Jenna's dream, then Rebecca was dead.
“I'm trying,” Jenna said, even though she knew that there would be no saving Rebecca Hartley.
Rebecca pounded on the glass, her movements growing more frantic.“You have to get me out!”
Before Jenna could act further, a buzzing sound cut through the dreamscape, incongruous and insistent.The forest began to dissolve around her, the snow melting into nothingness, the glass coffin fading entirely.Rebecca's face, twisted in terror, was the last thing to disappear.
The buzzing dragged Jenna back to consciousness.She opened her eyes to the darkness of her bedroom, the red digits of her alarm clock reading 7:00 AM.Her phone vibrated on the nightstand.
Colonel Spelling.
Jenna reached for her phone.Calls at this hour never brought good news, and this time she knew that Spelling’s call had something to do with what she had dreamed just now.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Jenna snatched up her phone.Rebecca Hartley's face from her dream still lingered in her mind's eye—encased in glass, desperate to escape, not knowing that she was already dead.As she sat up in her bed and took the call, she acknowledged the caller, “Colonel Spelling.”
“Sheriff Graves.I've been monitoring cases that might connect to Claudia Kingsley's death, as promised.”
“You found something.”
“A woman named Rebecca Hartley from Pinecrest was reported missing two days ago.A work colleague called it in when she didn't show up for work and she got no answers on her phone.”Spelling paused.“Given what happened to Ms.Kingsley, I flagged it.”
The name hit Jenna hard.The woman in the glass coffin from her dream—she had called herself Rebecca Hartley.
“Jenna?Are you still there?”
She swallowed hard.“Yes.I'm here.”She steadied herself.“Colonel, Rebecca Hartley is dead.”
Silence stretched between them for three long seconds.
“You saw her,” Spelling said.Not a question.
“In a dream, just before you called.She was in a glass coffin, just like Snow White in that story.She told me her name.”
Since their conversation months ago when Spelling had confronted her about her abilities, these exchanges had become easier, but no less unsettling.Each admission still felt like stepping off a cliff, waiting to see if the ground would rush up to meet her.
“There's more,” Spelling continued.“About an hour ago, a woman walking her dog in Heritage Park came across something on a picnic table.A cake stand with—” he paused, choosing his words carefully, “—what appear to be a pair of lungs and a liver beneath it.”
Jenna's stomach clenched.“Human?”
“The forensics team is making that determination now.Could be animal, could be human.”
The blood in her veins turned to ice.“In the original Snow White story, the huntsman was ordered to bring back Snow White's lungs and liver as proof he'd killed her,” she said, the words tumbling out.“Instead, he killed a wild boar and brought its lungs and liver to the queen, who ate them thinking they belonged to Snow White.”
“So we're looking at another fairy tale murder.”
“Yes.”Jenna stood, unable to remain still, and moved to the window.Morning light was filtering through the blinds.“Same killer, different story, same twisted logic.”
Spelling's sigh was heavy through the phone.“I'd like you and Deputy Hawkins to meet me at the Pinecrest police station as soon as possible.”He hesitated.“I'm aware of your tense history with Chief Morgan.”
“Tense is putting it mildly,” Jenna said.Her previous encounters with Pinecrest Police Chief Rudy Morgan had been strained at best, openly hostile at worst.Pinecrest was in Cable County, outside of Jenna’s jurisdiction.Morgan guarded his turf like a dog with a bone, seeing any outside involvement as an indictment of his capabilities.“He won’t welcome my involvement.”