Read Online Cold Cold Heart by Tami Hoag - Free Book Online Page A

having to deal with her mother’s emotions as well as her own.
    â€œHow long before we get home?” she asked.
    Her mother sighed. “About an hour . . .”
    *   *   *
    S HE COULD SEE THE sunlight hitting the surface of the water far above her, diluting instantly as it tried to penetrate the depths. She swam toward it. Up. Up. Kicking. Reaching. But something held her back like an unseen arm across her chest. It pulled on her from behind, slowing her down, drawing her backward away from the light and the air and freedom.
    Her composure burst like a balloon within her, like her lungs exploding, flooding her with ice-cold panic. In the next instant she broke the surface of consciousness, literally throwing herself into the present. She cried out as she struggled against the hold of the seat belt and shoulder strap. Her arms flung out before her, hands clawing at the dashboard of a car.
    â€œ
No! No!
”
    â€œDana! Dana!” Her mother’s voice shouted her name frantically as the car swerved to the shoulder and stopped hard. “Dana, it’s all right! It’s all right, sweetheart!”
    Still not fully in the present, Dana batted away the hand that reached toward her. She sucked in air in great choking gulps. Her pulse roared in her ears.
    â€œCalm down. Calm down,” her mother said over and over, her voice trembling. “You’re all right. It’s all right. You’re safe.”
    Dana thought her heart would gallop out of her chest like a runaway horse. She could smell her own fear in the cold sweat that drenched her clothing. Her mind scrambled for the list of things to do to calm herself.
    Slow your breathing.
    Be conscious of your pulse.
    Take stock of your surroundings.
    Slowly the world began to come into focus. She was in a car. It was daylight. The radio was playing softly. They sat on the side of a road that bordered a neighborhood on one side and a wooded field on the other.
    â€œYou’re all right, sweetheart,” her mother said again, reaching over to touch Dana’s shoulder and stroke a hand down her arm. “You just had a bad dream. You’re safe. We’re almost home. You’re all right.”
    She sounded as if she was trying to calm a panicked animal.
    She is
, Dana thought.
    She shrugged off her mother’s touch, irritated by it, irritated and embarrassed by the situation. She pulled her hood up, wanting to close herself off.
    â€œYou had a bad dream.”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œIt’s over now. You’re all right. We’re almost home, sweetheart,” her mother said, reaching out again to touch her.
    Dana shied away, crowding herself against the car door, scowling. “Just go. Let’s go. Don’t make such a big deal.”
    Lynda sat back behind the wheel and sighed, then put the car in gear and eased back onto the road.
    â€œAre things starting to look familiar?” she asked.
    â€œI guess,” Dana murmured, looking at the houses as they turned into a neighborhood.
    Lovely brick houses of complementary styles sat on large landscaped lots. Pumpkins and mums and happy scarecrows decorated front steps and front yards. Ghosts of memories slipped through Dana’s mind. She had been the little girl in pigtails riding her pinkbike down the street. She had been the girl walking the dog, the teenager sitting with her friends on the park bench, talking fashion and boys. All that seemed like something from a movie, from someone else’s life.
    They turned onto a cul-de-sac lined with vehicles—three of them news vans wrapped in advertising for their stations, satellite dishes perched on the roofs.
    â€œOh no,” Lynda muttered under her breath.
    Dana felt her mother tense. It didn’t occur to her why. It didn’t occur to her that she would be considered news. She knew she had been a headline in Minneapolis in January, but she had spent the last nine