The Rose Ransom (Girls Wearing Black: Book Three) (9 page)

“Oh good lord,” Jill muttered.
She pulled the keys from her pocket and used the remote to unlock the car.
Exasperated, her mother crawled inside.

Jill turned back to the front
door.

“Hello?” she said, rapping on it
with her knuckles. “Hello. I need to speak with Gordon!”

Nothing happened. They weren’t
here. In her rush to get out of the house, with Code Orange called and her
cover blown and the mission in disarray, Jill hadn’t bothered with the simple
step of calling before she came.

She looked back to the car. Her
mother was inside now, with the doors locked. The window was up. The laptop was
open and her face was illuminated with the dull glare of its screen.

Confident there was no way her
mother could hear her, Jill rang the bell again. This time she followed it up
with the words, “Gordon? It’s Jill Wentworth. From the Network.”

Footsteps on the other side. The
door opened. Gordon Krause, the master hypnotist who had once looked in Jill’s
mind to ensure she was suitable Network material, stood on the other side.

“Jill! I’m so sorry you’ve been
waiting,” Gordon said. “We’ve got this encyclopedia salesman working the
neighborhood.”

“Encyclo-what?” said Jill.

“Never mind. Just something they
try to sell to old people,” said Gordon. “Please, come in.”

“Hang on,” Jill said. “I need to
get my mother.”

“Are you the hypnotist?” Carolyn
asked.

“I am,” said Gordon.

“Where do I sit?” Carolyn said,
shuffling about the living room like a crazy person. “I want to get this over
with.”

“Get this over with?” said
Gordon. The poor man had no idea what was going on.

“Yes, get this….does he even
know what we’re doing here?” Carolyn demanded. “Jill, I’ve indulged this for
long enough. I will speak to your father about it. He thinks this is what he
wants for me, but he’s wrong. What he really desires is for me to do my best
work, and my best work happens when I am in my room working, not when I am
playing silly mind games.”

“Mom, why don’t we get the
laptop and put you someplace quiet while I speak with the hypnotist?”

Jill looked to Gordon for help.
“Do you have a bedroom where she could work? She really needs a place where she
can sit down at a desk and close the door.”

Now Gordon was completely lost.
To his credit, he played along. “Yes, there is a guest room upstairs.”

“I’ll be right back with the
laptop, Mom. We’ll set you up and you can type away until it’s time for your
session to start.”

A minute later Jill was closing
the door on a small bedroom upstairs, shutting Carolyn inside with her laptop.

“Sorry about all this,” she said
to Gordon. “My mom…”

“Your mother has been programmed,”
Gordon said.

He said it in such a plain voice
Jill didn’t know how to react. “How did you know?”

“She displays all the
hallmarks,” said Gordon. “Over the years the Network has brought hundreds of
subjects to my door for deprogramming. Every time their response is similar to
hers. Their program doesn’t want them to be here. The internal conflict tears
them apart. They become irritable to the point of irrational. We’re lucky that
you knew how to calm her. How long will she be content to stay in the bedroom?”

“She’s working now,” Jill said.
“She’ll forget about the rest of the world. She’d stay there all day if we let
her.”

“So her program is to work,”
said Gordon.

“Something like that,” said
Jill. “I’m hoping you can tell me.”

“Let’s sit down and talk.”

They sat in the den, Jill on a
couch, Gordon in a chair. Gordon made a pot of tea and brought out a bag of
stale cookies.

“I’ve been on assignment in
Potomac,” Jill said.

“I recall,” said Gordon. “And I
encourage you to tell me as little about your mission as you can.”

“I don’t need to tell you
anything, except that it’s over,” said Jill. “Code Orange has been called. I
need to get out of town. I want to take my mother with me.”

“She’s in no condition to
travel,” said Gordon. “If you try to take her now, she will struggle and fight,
and eventually find her way back.”

“I can’t leave her here. The
minute I disappear my parents become suspects. I don’t know what the vampires
will do to them. My father will be fine. He doesn’t know anything about me and
he’s too good of an ass-kisser to get in real trouble. But my mother…she
deserves better than this.”

“You are unable to leave her
behind,” said Gordon. “I understand. She is your mother.”

Jill was surprised at the impact
of the words.

She is your mother.

As tears formed in her eyes she
wondered how long it had been since she heard those words and believed them.

My mother.

The word was so powerful. It was
one that Jill had practically removed from her vocabulary. Her mother should
have been a protector, a teacher, a benefactor, a friend. Carolyn had never
been any of those things, but maybe there was still time. Jill owed it to both
of them to try.

“Tell me everything you know
about her programming,” said Gordon. “In order to unlock her mind, I must
understand what sort of key to use.”

“It’s about my father,” said
Jill. “I was investigating something for the mission and I stumbled into
disturbing info about my own family. Years ago, my father went to Melissa
Mayhew in secret and bought a slave to have as a wife.”

“A wife, or an employee?” asked
Gordon. “It seems she is motivated by work.”

“I think she’s programmed to
serve her husband,” said Jill. “She works hard because that’s what my father
wants her to do.”

“I’m surprised you were able to
get her to come see me.”

“I told her my father wanted her
to see a hypnotist. As far as she knows, she’s here to get some sort of
performance enhancing hypnosis to help her write computer code.”

Gordon laughed. “Oh yes,
everyone wants to do more, don’t they? They want someone to train their brains
so they work harder and with more focus.”

“I told her that’s what dad
wanted for her.”

“I will have a look, Jill. We
will go as deep as we can in your mother’s mind. But without knowledge of the
specific commands used, we may not be able to undo the damage. You see, what
Melissa does at the Farm—she uses short, succinct commands, and places them
very deep in the subconscious. Those commands flow outward and, over time,
shape every thought in the subject’s mind. When I deprogram someone, I negate
those commands, using the exact words that Melissa used. I know the commands,
so I can cancel them out. But with your mother, I have no idea what Melissa
said. Clearly she isn’t a standard subject.”

“No, not at all,” said Jill.
“She’s nothing like the slaves I’ve seen. She’s a phenomenal problem solver.”

“And that in itself makes me
worried. I’ve undone the work of many vampires from across the globe, and can
tell you that Melissa Mayhew is the very best in the business. Only she could
create a slave and leave such high level cognitive functions intact. Without
knowledge of the exact words Melissa used, it will be very difficult.”

“Can’t you ask her to tell you
what the commands are?” said Jill.

“Oh, we will. We most definitely
will. And if it were a less skilled vampire who did the programming, that alone
might work. But Melissa is an artist.”

Was an artist
, Jill
thought.

“Melissa creates her commands in
a way that the subject won’t divulge them easily under human hypnosis,” Gordon
continued. “Imagine an octopus burrowed deep in the brain, whose tentacles
reach all throughout the organ. You can cut off a tentacle, but it will grow
back. To undo the programming, you must go deeper. You must find the heart.
Melissa hides the heart so deep it is nearly impossible to find. I must know
the words she used. The words are a roadmap that takes me exactly where I need
to go.”

“There has to be a way,” Jill
said.

“We’ll do our best.”

“We? Why are you saying we? Will
I be participating in this too?”

“Oh yes. You know your mother
much better than I do. When I begin the hypnosis, you will be in the room with
me. You will help me make sense of what we find in your mother’s mind.”

“Carolyn, we are going to do
some exercises to relax your mind,” said Gordon.

They were in Gordon’s basement.
A large, windowless room, illuminated with two floor lamps on a dim setting.
The walls were bare. The furniture was sparse. Carolyn sat in an old blue
recliner. Jill and Gordon sat across from her in folding chairs.

“As long as it’s quick,” said
Carolyn. “I want to get back to work.”

“The exercises won’t be quick,”
said Gordon. “And they will only work if you allow them to.”

“Mom, we have to do this. And
you have to be willing to do it. The process won’t work unless you give it a
chance, and dad will insist we do it again if it doesn’t work.”

“What if it never works?”
Carolyn said.

“Carolyn, we will be seeking out
the most basic motivations in your mind and modifying them to ensure maximum
productivity. If you give yourself fully to the task, it will work. I promise,”
said Gordon.

Carolyn sighed. She closed her
eyes and slumped her shoulders.

“Fine. Let’s get this over
with,” she said.

“We begin with a deep breath,”
said Gordon. “In through the nose, out through the mouth.”

Carolyn did as Gordon
instructed. In fact, now that she had decided she had to “get this over with,”
she became an ideal subject.

Gordon had her look at a spot on
the ceiling as he counted down from ten. He made her close her eyes and imagine
waves of relaxation going through her body. His voice was so soothing Jill felt
her own body following his commands.

And when I get to zero, you
will be in an even deeper state of relaxation. 10…9…8…

It was like they were traveling
deep into a cavern and Gordon was their leader. With each breathing exercise,
each countdown, Jill felt like they all were going deeper into the cave. Layers
upon layers of relaxation. As he spoke, Jill saw the physical response in
Carolyn’s body. She became loose. The tension in her face was released. Her
legs and torso and chest sunk into the chair. Neither asleep nor awake, Carolyn
Wentworth was in a state of perfect relaxation.

“Open your eyes, Carolyn.”

Still very much in a trance,
Carolyn opened her eyes. Gordon grabbed a framed picture from under his chair
and held it up for Jill and Carolyn to see.

“Tell me what you see in this
picture.”

“It’s a castle,” said Carolyn.
Her voice was slow and steady, soothing even. Listening to it, Jill felt
herself grow more relaxed.

“More than a castle,” said
Gordon. “This is a fortress. Look how it is high on a hill. Look at the many
protections around this castle.”

“Yes, a fortress,” said Carolyn.

“I want you to think of your
mind as a fortress, like this one.”

Carolyn stared at the picture.
Her head was so loose on her shoulders she couldn’t hold it still, and it
swayed back and forth.

“The fortress of your mind has
many protections built into it,” Gordon said. He spoke slowly, with long pauses
between sentences. “There is a moat surrounding your fortress. Beyond the moat
is a tall wall and the only way through that wall is for someone inside to drop
the gate.”

The relaxing tones of Gordon’s
voice, combined with her own lack of sleep, were too much for Jill. Sitting
upright in her chair, she closed her eyes and imagined her own castle. Her own
fortress.

“Inside these walls is an army
who will protect the castle from all invaders,” Gordon said. “Are you thinking
of your mind as this fortress?”

“Yes,” said Carolyn.

“Good, now tell me, why are
there so many fortifications around your castle? What’s inside that you wish to
protect?”

Having drifted into her own
fantasy, with her own castle, Jill saw a massive computer in the fortress. A
computer full of secrets. The Network, the mission, Phillip, Helena, and Nicky,
a thousand fake identities and phony papers Jill had created, the truth about
her mother…

“I see a queen,” Carolyn said.
“The fortress is there to protect the queen.”

“Describe the queen to me,” said
Gordon.

“She’s a beautiful woman, with
long black hair. She is wearing blue jeans and a black leather jacket. She has
a rifle over her shoulder.”

Jill’s own fantasy was
interrupted with this strange vision from her mother. A queen with a black
leather jacket and a rifle? Her mom was full of surprises.

Now Jill saw this woman, this
queen in a leather jacket, sitting at the computer in Jill’s fortress.

“Does your queen have a crown?”
Gordon asked.

In Jill’s mind, there was a
crown, a silver tiara in fact. A queen in a black leather jacket with a silver tiara
on her head.

“No,” said Carolyn.

Jill’s vision of the crown
disappeared.

“Thank you for telling me what
you know about her,” said Gordon. “Now I’m going to tell you what I know. The
queen hides where her enemies can never find her. She has a room in the tallest
tower of the castle, in the very center of the grounds. All of the protections
of this fortress are for her, because she is a sacred woman. Her word is law in
this land, and she decreed the law many years ago. Do you believe me, Carolyn?”

“Yes, I believe you.”

“Carolyn, the fortress is your
mind. Do you understand?”

“Yes, the fortress is my mind.”

“I am here today to talk to the
queen.”

A pause.

“Okay,” Carolyn said.