"Dennis Palumbo takes you into the sizzling side of the Steel City."
Reviewed by Sherri Morris
Posted October 7, 2011
Thriller Police Procedural | Suspense
There's a sweltering heat wave hitting Pittsburgh. Nearly
a year after psychologist and trauma expert Dr. Daniel
Rinaldi helped unravel a baffling murder, he finds himself
drawn into another case. When a bank robbery goes horribly wrong, Dr. Rinaldi is
called in by the police to question Treva Williams, the sole
survivor. Though she is clearly traumatized, there is
something about Treva Williams' actions that are just not
adding up for Dr Rinaldi. As several unrelated events unfold tainting district
attorney and gubernatorial candidate Leland Sinclair.....the
pieces start falling into place and Treva Williams seems to
be at the center of them all: from her connection to the
death of the assistant manager at the bank, to the attempted
assassination on Leland Sinclair, and even the attempt made
on his life. And what about the mysterious attraction
between him and Detective Eleanor Lowrey? Former Hollywood screenwriter and author Dennis Palumbo
takes you into the sizzling side of the Steel City in this
book complete with government corruption, crime, love, and
broken hearts.
SUMMARY
A blistering summer heat wave is the backdrop for Fever
Dream. Nearly a year after psychologist Daniel Rinaldi,
a trauma expert who consults with the Pittsburgh Police,
helped unravel a baffling murder, he finds himself drawn
into another case. When a daring bank robbery goes horribly wrong, resulting
in the deaths of all the hostages except one, Rinaldi is
called in to treat Treva Williams, the traumatized young
woman who survived. However, what seemed a simple robbery
soon explodes into a series of events that plunge the
investigating officers, Sgt.Harry Polk and Det. Eleanor
Lowrey - as well as Rinaldi himself - into a vortex of
mistaken identity, kidnapping and, ultimately, a fiery
climax at an abandoned steel mill. Meanwhile, thrown together by the demands of the case,
Rinaldi and Eleanor deal with the growing attraction
between them, even as the recently-divorced Harry Polk
spirals into an alcohol-driven, self-destructive free-
fall. All of which is played out against the gubernatorial
campaign of Rinaldi's former romantic rival, District
Attorney Leland Sinclair. Until, as sudden death threats
against Sinclair fuel a mounting frenzy of accusations and
political maneuvering, Rinaldi finds himself facing the
reality that the two cases might somehow be connected. And
that now, what he knows - or thinks he knows - makes him a
target as well... Fever Dream is the second book in the Daniel Rinaldi
series, following Mirror Image.
ExcerptFinally, night. Crowding out the last faint rays of a
stubborn summer sun. Though a stale heat still lingered,
fringed the air. Made the darkness heavy, oppressive.
I pulled into the parking lot at Pittsburgh Memorial,
under the glowing UPMC sign. Only a few cars dotted the line
of spaces, their roofs shining like new coins off the glare
of the parking lot lightposts.
I went into the hospital through a side entrance,
by-passing the main reception area, and took the elevator up
to the ICU-- Where, to my surprise, the doors opened onto a
deserted corridor. Silent. Empty. I paused a moment, then
stepped out of the elevator. Heard the doors close with a
whispered rumble behind me.
The corridor wasn't just deserted. It was dark. Long
shadows painted the dull walls, making gray the familiar
hospital white. I looked up, saw that the overhead
flourescents were out. Tubes of flat black that ran the
length of the high ceiling, disappearing at the end of the
hall.
I took another step and glanced toward the nurse's
station. It was empty. The wheeled chair behind the
semi-circular desk was pushed back against the corner, as
though shoved there.
As though somebody had bolted out of it in a hurry.
I swallowed, mouth suddenly dry as dust. Felt my heart
revving up in my chest.
Something was definitely wrong.
Steeling myself, I started down the corridor toward the
last room. Treva's room.
The first two rooms I passed were empty. Silent. Unlike
earlier today. No sounds of machinery pumping. No beeps,
blinking lights, pneumatic wheezes.And no patients. Again,
unlike earlier today. I remembered that there'd been one in
each of these rooms. Now the rooms were dim as caves, lit
only by a rising moon's faint glow through the windows
slats. The beds were stripped. Sheets gone.
I'd been around ICUs enough to know what that meant. Or
what it usually meant. The patients had died.
But where was the night nurse? More importantly, where
was Treva's guard, Detective Robertson?
That thought made me swivel where I stood. Nerves wound
tight, vibrating. Fight or flight. Nothing. And no one.
Then I looked again toward the end of the long, shadowed
corridor. Saw for the first time a soft, pale light that
bloomed faintly up ahead, coming from the last room. Somehow
more ominous for being the sole illumination in the darkness
of the silent ICU.
I squinted in concentration as I drew closer to that
light emanating from Treva's room. Gripped by a sudden,
visceral sense of forboding. Of dread.
The light grew brighter. A few feet more and-—
Something caught my foot. Big, soft, heavy. I stumbled,
clawing the air. Righting myself at last by grabbing the
doorframe at the threshold to the room.
I peered down in the darkness. A body lay on the floor at
my feet. A large-bellied man, jacket thrown open.
I got to my haunches, made out his features in the light
from Treva's room.
Robertson.
Quickly, I checked his vitals. He was unconscious, but
alive. A smear of blood tattooed the vinyl flooring beneath
his head. I spread his jacket, checked for more blood. Other
wounds. Nothing.
I knew I had to get him help, but not before checking on
Treva. I got to my feet again and bolted into her room.The
light I'd seen had come from two small table lamps, one on
each side of her bed. The overheads were out.
The shaded lamps made the room seem incongruously cozy.
Safe. The pillows were pushed up against the head- board, as
though perhaps she'd decided to read by lamp-light. Had in
fact asked that the overheads be turned off. Cozy. Safe. The
IV drip was unhooked and coiled. Hospital slippers
positioned side-by-side under the bed. Nothing seemed out of
the ordinary.
Except that Treva was gone.
A trail of blood, a series of irregularly-spaced
black-red droplets, shone wetly on the white floor.
Like a trail of scarlet bread crumbs in a nightmarish
fairy tale, they led me away from the bed. Out of the room.
Into the corridor behind me. Toward a service door at the
far end. Disappearing under that door...
Without a thought, I pulled it open and half-ran,
half-fell down the right-angled service stairs. The stairway
was as brightly-lit as the ICU corridor had been dark, and
the drops of blood glowed absurdly red against the worn
paint-flecked concrete steps.
Three floors down, and the blood trail went right, under
another door. I pushed it open.
Another, smaller hallway. Violently bright from the
overheads. But just as empty as the corridor above.
A series of double-doors lined the wall to my left. But
the only doors that got my attention were the ones that
stood open, a dozen feet or so down the hall.
I slowed my steps. Came up carefully to the opening.Took
a breath. Steadied myself. For some reason--perhaps in
answer to an old impulse--I clenched my fists.
And stepped inside.
It was an operating room. White-sheeted surgical bed in
the center. Trays of instruments on wheeled carts. A canopy
of goose-necked lamps positioned for maximum visibility,
beneath the familiar ceiling flourescents.
The room held two people, both staring at me, wide-eyed.
Faces drained of color. Pinched with fear.
Lloyd Holloway. The young doctor I'd met up in the ICU.
Standing at the surgical bed, hands at his sides.
Linebacker's body ramrod straight, strained from tension,
held upright by extreme force of will.
And Treva Williams. Sitting on the floor, knees up, her
back against a far corner. Shivering in her flimsy hospital
gown. Hands behind her back, obviously bound. Bare feet also
bound, at the ankle.
I registered them both in what seemed only a second.
Then I saw Treva's mouth open, forming an "O," and her
eyes widening, looking at me with sudden horror.
No, not at me. Past me...
I felt a searing pain at the back of my head, and looked
up at the blinding overhead lights as they began to whirl
like a vortex of spinning stars.And then I saw nothing at
all.
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