The Rose Ransom (Girls Wearing Black: Book Three) (35 page)

“What? What does that mean?”

Walter leaned forward, held out
his hand, and then stabbed himself in the chest with his thumb.

“It’s me,” he hissed.
“Meeeeee…..”

“What are you talking about
Dad?”

“It’s about my happiness,” he
said. His body was slouching in his chair. A horrible look of sadness came over
his face. “It’s always been about my happiness.”

He was in another world now.
He’d have no memory of this part tomorrow, and even if he did, he’d assume he’d
dreamt it.

“You bought Mom from Melissa
Mayhew, didn’t you?” Jill said.

Walter looked up at Jill with
eyes so far gone she wondered if he could even see her.

But then he nodded his head.

“Tell me the command she used,”
Jill said. “What were the words Melissa used to enslave Mom?”

Walter put his hands to his face
and began to sob so violently his whole body shook.

“Dad?”

“I always knew you’d find out,”
he whispered. “You’re going to kill her aren’t you? Kill her and take her place
in the company.”

“What? No! Dad, I want you to
tell me the command Melissa used to enslave Mom. It’s very important.”

“Oh God! My own daughter a
murderer, and it’s all my fault!”

“Dad, I’m not going to kill
anyone. I’m trying to help Mom. You can help too. Tell me the command. You know
it, don’t you?”

“Of course I know the command!”
he shrieked. He tried to lean forward in his chair, but it was too much for him
and he nearly fell over the armrest. Jill wrapped her arms around him and
pulled him upright.

“Stay with me, Dad,” she said.
“You wrote down the command. Where did you put it?”

Walter shook his head. “No, no,
no, no, no,” he muttered.

“Dad, a vampire enslaved my
mother and I want you to tell me the words she used!”

“A vampire did not enslave your
mother!” Walter shouted. He was staring at Jill, breathing hard and shaking
violently. “I did.”

“What do you mean?”

“Melissa programmed your mother
so she would be a slave to her wedding vows. I wrote the vows, and on the day
we got married, your mother looked in my eyes, and said the words that made her
belong to me. When we kissed, the promise was sealed forever.”

The basement was just as Jill
had left it. Shards of broken DVD’s were everywhere, remains of a stomping fit
Jill allowed herself when she found her father’s old porn collection.

Jill snatched up the DVD she
wanted from the bottom step.

Holy Matrimony of Mr. and
Mrs. Walter Wentworth
.

A minute later, her father
snoring loudly in his chair, Jill was in her bedroom with the door closed,
watching a video recording of her parents’ wedding.

An outdoor garden at night. A
glimmering pool with a waterfall coming down behind it. Tropical foliage all
around, ferns and orchids and bright flowers hanging on a trellis that
surrounded them both.

They were so pretty. Jill never
knew. Her parents were good-looking people when they were young.

Carolyn, in a long wedding gown
of satin and silk, very traditional, with a veil and long gloves. Jill could
imagine Walter’s sisters putting together this look—everything about it was
proper Virginia attire.

And Walter, in a tightly-fitted
tux. The man in this video was a younger, prettier version of the one Jill left
sleeping in his chair downstairs, but he was undeniably Walter. His body was
slender beneath his tux, but the softness that was to come was already visible
somehow. The way he carried himself, arms and legs swinging about without any
semblance of grace. A small chamber orchestra played the wedding march, and
Walter’s movements were entirely out of rhythm with the music. He had a stunned
look on his face. The moment was too big for him.

He looked guilty.

Oh Dad, did you have any idea
how monstrous this was? Have you ever had a conscience?

The wedding party was small.
Walter’s two sisters on the bride’s side; two familiar faces on the groom’s.

“Would you look at that?” Jill
whispered, wishing desperately that Nicky was here to see this. Walter’s
groomsmen were Merv Tremblay and Galen Renwick.

It was Galen who lined up right
next to Walter under the trellis. Galen Renwick, whom Jill had made into a
sworn enemy of the family, was the best man at her father’s wedding.

“Dearly beloved, we are gathered
here today…”

Jill didn’t recognize the
minister. She didn’t recognize the flower girl, the ring bearer, or most of the
people in attendance. She didn’t know whose garden this was. Watching the
recording charge forward, she became aware for the first time in her life that
there were no wedding pictures hung in her house. How strange was that? A
married couple with a teenage daughter and not a single wedding picture in the
house?

Did Walter fear that any
reminder of the day might jeopardize Carolyn’s programming? Or was he so racked
with guilt he didn’t want to think about it.

Watching him recite his vows,
Jill suspected the latter.

“Carolyn, I promise to be worthy
of your love. I promise to be the man you saw when you fell in love with me,
and always strive to do what’s right for our marriage,” Walter said.

His voice was quiet and shaky.
He was looking Carolyn in the eye, but it was making him uncomfortable.

“I promise a commitment to us,
to be your partner in life, and to give fully of myself.”

His face was flush as he spoke,
and he was drenched in sweat.

Did you know, Walter? Was
there some part of you that knew what you were doing was unforgivable?

“I will be patient and
forgiving,” Walter went on, and Jill shook her head. How hard is it to be
patient with someone who does whatever you ask?

“I will be kind and
understanding.”

What you did to Mom was the
exact opposite of kind.

“Strong enough for both of us
when necessary but secure enough to lean on your strength when I need it most.”

The hatred Jill felt for this
man had dissipated. Her conversation with him tonight, followed by this
despicable look down memory lane, made her realize her father wasn’t worthy of
her hatred. Pity, maybe, but not hatred.

Hatred was an emotion she needed
to reserve for people like Kim, people who were a genuine threat to her.

Walter was no threat at all. He
was a pathetic loser who had made a horrible choice in life and he knew it.
This young version of Walter on the screen knew it as it was happening. Jill
could see it in his eyes. He was so full of shame at what he was doing he might
have stopped it then and there if he could. He looked like he wanted to run
away screaming.

But it was too late. Walter
Wentworth’s future had already been written by the time he got to the altar.
Galen Renwick was to his right; his sisters to his left. The wedding was a rite
of passage, required before Walter could become a member of the power elite,
and the fact that it was happening at night suggested that at least one
immortal was in attendance. Probably Melissa.

So Walter went through with it.
He squashed whatever reservations were running through his mind and kept his
cold feet locked in place.

“Til death do us part,” he said.

Now it was Carolyn’s turn. Jill
leaned closer to the screen, terrified at what she was about to hear.

“Walter, you are my light, my
love, my teacher, and my one true friend,” she began.

The words made Jill cry. They
were spoken in a different voice than the one she knew. This wasn’t the Carolyn
Wentworth who spent day and night in front of a computer. Not yet. This was a
little girl who had no idea what was happening to her.

“I promise to honor and cherish
you always,” Carolyn said. She was smiling. Smiling as she spoke the words that
imprisoned her mind! “I promise to see past your faults, and focus on your
virtues.”

She was so beautiful. A girl
from nowhere, born on the Farm, raised to be food but set aside because she was
special. She had a freakish mind capable of the most extraordinary creativity
and logic, a gift that was meant for all of humanity. At this moment, that
wondrous mind was being locked in a cage.

“I will respect you,” Carolyn
said. “I will stand by you. From this moment on, your happiness is my aim in
life. Serving you is my purpose.”

Jill was sobbing so hard she
could hardly see. It was tragic what was happening on the screen. The loss of
something so precious…so innocent.

“I promise to listen carefully
when you speak, to submit fully to our marriage, and to be yours for the rest
of my life. ‘Til death do us part.”

And then they kissed, and the
promise was sealed.

Jill was so lost in emotion she
didn’t realize the door had opened behind her. She turned around not because
she heard someone coming in, but because she sensed it. A chill came over the
room, deadening the intense emotion she was feeling at the moment.

She jumped up, a part of her
expecting to see a vampire in the room with her.

It was Tarin.

“What are you doing here?” she
cried. “And why the hell can’t you ring the doorbell like a normal person?”

“You’re crying,” Tarin said.
“Why?”

Jill reached for the TV, her
fingers fumbling to find the power switch.

“No, no,” Tarin said, taking her
hand. “I want to see this.”

“It’s none of your business,”
Jill said. “You should have had the decency to knock before you came in my
room.”

Tarin was holding both of her
wrists now. She didn’t even try to struggle. He was so strong, and she didn’t
care. A part of her was thankful to be restrained.

“Your father is asleep downstairs,”
Tarin said. “The garage door was unlocked. You understand why I need to sneak
in like this.”

It wasn’t a question, but a
statement of fact.
You understand
. And she did.

“It’s not that I don’t want you
here,” Jill said, sniffling. “I’m just, having a moment.”

“Yes, I can see that,” Tarin
said. What he did next was a complete surprise, but entirely welcome. He pulled
her to his chest and put both arms around her back.

She couldn’t help herself. His
arms were so strong, so comforting, and she buried her face in his chest and
began to bawl.

Onscreen, the orchestra was
playing. Walter and Carolyn were walking down the aisle together.

“These are your parents,” Tarin
said. “You are watching a video of their wedding?”

“It’s personal,” Jill said. “I’m
working through some stuff. That’s all.”

“Tell me,” Tarin said.

“I don’t want to talk about it
right now,” she murmured, her face pressed against him, her voice muted. Tarin
put his hands on both sides of her face. They were so warm. She could
practically feel the energy flowing through them, going from one hand to the
other, passing through her mind on the way.

It was the most soothing,
comforting experience she had ever felt.

Looking right in her eyes, Tarin
spoke softly. “Tell me.”

And she did. The whole truth
about her parents, about the emails and documents and paper trail she found in
the TPM database, about Melissa Mayhew’s backdoor business of selling slaves to
wealthy humans, about the way her mom behaved, the failed attempt to deprogram
her at Gordon’s, the need to find the exact wording of the command that
enslaved her.

“It’s here,” she said. She was
speaking so quickly she could hardly catch her breath, but it felt good. It was
freeing, like a huge burden left her body with every word she spoke. “The commands
that hold my mother hostage are on this DVD. It’s her wedding vows. If I get
these vows to Gordon, he can deprogram her, and we can leave. I should have
been writing them down. I got so emotional I forgot to write them down. I have
to watch it again.”

She was pulling away, making for
the DVD player, but Tarin held her tight.

“Sit,” he said.

She sat on the bed. Why was it
such a relief at this moment to have someone telling her what to do? Every time
Tarin spoke, it was like the world became simpler. His words pushed aside
everything that was blurry and chaotic about life. She was so glad to have him
here, to seek his guidance.

It’s guidance I need
, she
thought.
I’ve been so lost.

Or had she? It seemed to Jill
that she had a guidepost at one time. Yes, not long ago she was confused about
how to proceed after everything blew up in her life and she had a rule to help
her. It was like a single sentence. Something powerful. Funny that she couldn’t
remember what it was.

Tarin walked over to the DVD
player, opened it up, and took out the wedding video.

“Your mother is here tonight?”
he said.

Jill nodded. “She’s working in
her room,” Jill said. Her eyes darted to the clock behind Tarin’s head.
Eleven-twenty. “Yes, she’s still up. Why?”

“Jill, I’m going to help you and
your mother,” Tarin said.

The words were like candy to her
ears.

“You…you mean?”

“I’m sure this Gordon fellow is
a fine hypnotist,” Tarin said. “But I’ve trained with the best in the world.”

Of course! Suddenly all the many
mysteries about Tarin—the way he just dropped himself into a vampire’s mansion
and immediately earned the trust of the entire staff, the presence he had about
him, the strength and reassurance she felt every time he spoke--Jill had heard
about people like him. Operatives so fluent in the art of hypnosis they could
move among the vampires. He was an expert.

“You know how to speak to her,”
Jill whispered. “You can deprogram my mother.”

Tarin smiled. It was a confident
smile that told Jill all she needed to know.

“Take me to her,” he said.