by Jan Coffey
~~~~
“But it doesn’t make any sense to go that way,” Victor said, standing his ground.
“We’re heading for the state road,” Brian said again, continuing to push him away from the truck.
When they were a good distance from the vehicle, Victor dug in. “We’re far enough away, Brian. We’re not going to get blown to pieces if those explosives decide to do their thing.”
Brian said nothing but looked down the road.
“Now look,” Victor started. “Let’s consider our options.”
“We’re going to get out of here.”
“I agree, but walking God knows how far through God knows what may not be the best way to do it.”
“We can’t be far from the state road.”
“But we are! They drove a while before leaving us here.” He looked around him. “In fact, I know exactly where we are.”
“You do, huh?”
“See that boulder sticking out of the ground by the road there? The one that looks like Benjamin Franklin’s head?”
“Come on, Vic.”
“Seriously. I saw that each time we drove in and out of the inn. There’s a side road right up…there.” He pointed up the road to a spot that was just visible. “That dirt road is near the inn. I’m telling you. The inn is right there. It’ll take us five minutes to walk to it.”
“Vic, if we are close to the inn, why did they drive us here, booby trap the door and leave us where, if the truck blew up, anyone within a hundred yards would be obliterated?” Brian paused, staring at him. “Don’t you think there’s something nasty going on? I think we should get the hell away from here.”
Victor shook his head impatiently. “Do you even remember how far away the closest gas station or convenience store was? Or anywhere we could find a phone?” He didn’t wait for Brian to answer. “Five miles, at least. Be logical. Hobart is not so stupid that he’d leave us in our truck in the middle of the road here and then go back to that inn and pretend nothing happened. We’ll walk toward the inn—just for a little ways—and take a look.”
Brian nodded grudgingly. “Okay, but just to take a look…and I don’t like it, Vic.”
To Victor’s relief, they were exactly where he thought they were, within a half mile of the inn. After walking for just a few minutes, they spotted the building through the trees.
“Look at it,” he pointed toward the parking area. “Hobart’s car is not even there.”
“There’s something weird going on here,” Brian warned. He was still holding onto the power screwdriver, and he tucked the tool under one arm. “This might be more dangerous than what Nate and Ellie went through with that Betsy Ross flag last year.”
“Hey, we helped with that, didn’t we?”
“We followed directions,” Brian said reasonably. “We had the FBI, the Philly police, and Nate watching out for us. Everyone was looking over our shoulder, and they gave us one little job to do and we did it. This is different.”
“We’re not going to do anything stupid, Brian.”
“Hobart and his goons were armed, Vic.” Brian shook his head. “Do you remember all that shooting in Ellie’s apartment? People get killed when there are guns involved. You and I were lucky enough to save our own asses this time. The next time Hobart runs into us, I wouldn’t count on that happening again. I’d just as soon have the police handle this.”
“I agree. We’re saying the same thing.” Victor took a couple of steps toward the inn and then stopped. Brian wasn’t following. “Come on.”
Brian shot a look of frustration at him. “Where are you going?”
“Ian Campbell is a cop.” Vic paused and pointed at the sedan parked in the lot. “That’s his car. We go very quietly to the inn. If you want, one of us can go in and the second one can watch the other one’s back.”
“With what?”
“You’re getting too technical on me.”
“Vic, this isn’t a TV movie.”
Vic waved him off. “Look, we know there’s a phone in there. We sneak in, use the phone or talk to Ian, whichever comes first. Then we let the professionals take charge.”
“I still don’t feel good about it,” he grumbled. Together, they moved toward the inn.
Everything was too quiet. There was no activity. There were only three cars in the parking lot, and that was strange, too, considering every room in the place was booked.
“So, do you want to wait here while I go in and use the phone?” Brian asked when they reached the line of trees beyond the parking area.
Vic looked at the inn again. “I’ll be no good to you here. But let’s not go in the front door,” he said, summoning his courage.
“If they start shooting, don’t stand there and argue,” Brian warned in a low voice. “Just duck.”
“Argue? Of course, I wouldn’t argue.” Ten steps across and nobody had shot them, yet. Vic felt his confidence building and started around the inn toward the kitchen door. “I don’t know why you’d say something like that.”
“I don’t know, either, except that yesterday you made sure to let Hobart have it both barrels for the way he was treating us.”
“He’s a creep. I have a few cousins in South Philly I’d like to introduce him to.”
“He was armed, Vic. I’m going to have Nate give you a lecture about respecting guns.”
As they drew near the kitchen door, Victor started to respond, then stopped. Looking down by the beach, he could see a canoe floating near the shore. There was no one in it. He looked around him. There was no smell of food coming from the kitchen.
Suddenly, Victor felt very uncomfortable about everything. Maybe Brian was right. Maybe they should have gone in the other direction…away from the inn. Then he saw Ian come out of the cottage by the edge of the lake.
He was wet. He was heavily armed. And he was wounded.
~~~~
Arriving at the camp, Kelly told herself she would do nothing to look as if she were betraying Somers’s trust. Jade was with her, and Kelly intended to keep her daughter right by her side.
As the van stopped, she fought down her panic and got out smiling, just as she was instructed. She shook the hands of dozens of people who greeted her warmly, many kissing her hand. She waved to others who were walking back to the benches for the continuing devotions.
Not allowing herself to appear either surprised or distressed by the throng of red-robed children in the camp with their parents, she even forced herself not to turn away as Ken Burke showed up with his camera and began to snap pictures continuously of Kelly and Jade.
Some of the people looked very familiar to her. There were faces that she could have sworn she’d known at another time in her life. People like Ken Burke were from the past she’d been trying to forget. But forgetting wasn’t her priority right now.
She was still wet. They’d draped a blanket around her before she left the van, and they now offered her dry clothes and a robe to change into. Kelly noticed they’d given her a white robe very like the one Somers was wearing. Hers, however, had a hand stitched crescent moon logo on the breast.
Rita appeared at her side. She’d been assigned to escort Kelly to one of the cottages to change. Kelly’s inclination was to give the young woman the same treatment she’d given Janice, but she held her temper. As always, Rita was sharp-toned and curt in telling her where they were going and what they were doing. As they walked through the camp, Kelly noticed that the pair of armed guards—whom she’d learned in the van would serve as her “protective” escort—had left their rifles behind, carrying only handguns concealed beneath their robes.
Kelly’s main concern was Jade. She had been in her daughter’s place twenty-two years ago. In her research about what had happened at the Butler Divinity Mission, the first thing Kelly had done was to try to understand how mind control worked…and how to break a person free of it.
When they reached the cottage where she was supposed to change, Kelly put her h
and up to stop Rita from coming in, too. “I need privacy.”
“Then she stays with me.” Rita reached to take Jade from Kelly’s arms.
“No,” Kelly said with enough authority and lack of emotion to make herself sound convincing. “Father Ty said she stays with me…now and for the rest of the hours of devotion that are left.”
The younger woman’s eyes widened, as if she was seeing Kelly in a new way, and nodded.
Kelly knew now that Butler and his inner circle—including Ty Somers—had been consciously using established mind-control techniques on those at lower levels in the sect hierarchy. Their goal was to take control of the thinking and the actions of the cult members. Creating and using triggers aimed at all five senses, they were able to manipulate how a person received and processed information. Nothing they did was new. The techniques they used had been studied and documented thoroughly over the past fifty years.
Kelly was certain they’d used the same methods with Rita as they had with Jade. She doubted if the young woman realized that she was a puppet in all this. She wondered if, deep down, Rita even understood the significance of how empty her life had been up to now…the significance of how completely she had given up her will to make choices. That was what made the actions of Somers and the sect leaders a crime and not simply a tragedy.
“I’ll wait right here,” Rita said tersely, opening the door for her. Quickly, she laid Kelly’s robe and a change of clothes on a chair by the door before backing out.
Kelly saw the two men take up positions not far from the cottage. The smell of burning incense reached her before they even stepped through the door. It was a basic trigger meant to prompt programmed memories and behaviors. She recalled the same incense burning at all the dormitories at the Mission in New Mexico. They’d had it always burning in the chapel, too. It was no accident.
As the door closed, Kelly grabbed a pitcher of water and dumped it on the smoldering stick. The sharp hiss of it going out gave her a deep feeling of satisfaction.
She looked up and was immediately faced with a huge, white tapestry hanging on one wall. Numerous photographic images had been transferred onto cloth and hand stitched onto the tapestry. Michael Butler. Kelly herself. There was even a picture of her as a child, standing by the Father’s knee. Images of the crescent moon and zodiac signs had been arranged around them.
Jade tensed in Kelly’s arms. She immediately turned her daughter’s eyes away from the tapestry. Michael Butler’s face and crescent moon had always been triggers for Kelly, too. She remembered how, for years after leaving the Mission, she continued to be afraid of being outside at night during specific phases of the moon. Even now, she forced herself to think of the faces of her husband on their wedding day. Of Jade on the day she was born. Of Ian in the half-light of dawn.
There were no locks on the door. The windows were covered with plywood. Kelly went to the tapestry and ripped it down.
She held Jade tighter and tried to think what other tricks they might have used on her child. Somers’ voice was definitely a trigger for Jade, just as Butler’s voice had been for Kelly. But she didn’t know if there was anything else. She knew that the sense of taste or even the sense of touch were used, but perhaps they hadn’t had enough time for all of that with Jade. She prayed that was true.
Kelly’s clothes were damp, but Jade didn’t seem to mind. She had her head on Kelly’s shoulder. Her body was limp. Still though, Kelly knew her child could hear her. She tried to remember the articles she’d read years ago about mind control and deprograming. They all stressed the importance of bringing out of the subconscious memories of good times, of warm feelings and positive occurrences and safe situations the victim knew prior to being subjected to the abuses of mind control.
“We’re going to find our way out of here, my love,” she whispered to Jade. “And we’re going to get in a car and drive far away.”
Jade’s arms remained looped around her mother’s shoulders. She didn’t say anything in response.
Kelly walked around the sparsely furnished room. The only way out was the way they’d come in.
“What do you say we stop for breakfast along the way? Somewhere we can order toast and lots of jelly.”
Again, there was no answer. Kelly thought about sitting Jade in the chair and braiding her hair. She wanted to do something that was part of their daily ritual. The child’s arm tightened around Kelly’s shoulders as soon as she tried to put her down.
“I like this,” Kelly whispered, rubbing her daughter’s back, pressing a kiss against her forehead. She started pacing the room and continued to talk about all the things they liked to do together. About the good books they read and the walks they’d taken. She could feel Jade starting to relax a little, but she didn’t dare hope.
“What do you say we forget about toast and go for a serious waffle with ice cream for breakfast instead? We can even make it sugarcoated.”
“And M&Ms?”
Her voice was so small that at first Kelly wasn’t sure if it was her imagination. “What did you say, honey?”
“And a billion M&Ms on top?” Jade slowly lifted her head off Kelly’s shoulder and looked into her face. “Can Ian come, too?”
Kelly pressed Jade’s head back on her shoulder, so she wouldn’t see the tears springing into her eyes. “Yes, my love. We’ll take Ian, too.”
She was responding, Kelly told herself. Her own Jade was with her again. But tears wouldn’t help solve the trouble that lay before them.
“I want a Band-Aid, Mommy,” Jade whispered tearfully.
Kelly searched the back pocket of her pants. Deep down, she found a soggy Band-Aid and pulled it out. Sitting Jade in front of her, she handed her daughter the Band-Aid. “Where should we put it?”
The little girl looked around on her fingers and arms in search of the right spot.
“How about here?” she said, pointing to her ankle.
Kelly recognized the spot as the same place where her own scar was located. She helped Jade put on the bandage.
The door of the cottage opened without warning. Rita stepped in. “You’re taking too long. Everyone is waiting for you,” she said brusquely.
Furious, Kelly leaped off the chair and charged the woman. “Don’t you dare interrupt us again.”
Rita quickly backed out of the cottage and stood just outside the door.
“We will come out when we’re ready,” Kelly told her imperiously. “Do you understand?”
Rita nodded her head a couple of times, and Kelly slammed the door in her face.
“I’m scared, Mommy.”
Jade’s voice brought Kelly’s attention back to her daughter. She took Jade in her arms again. “Don’t be, my love. I’m right here.”
“They’re mean here.”
“Only if we let them,” she said soothingly.
“They say things I…I don’t understand.”
“I know.”
Kelly considered that for a moment. She’d witnessed more than a few of Michael Butler’s lengthy sermons. She wondered if she could muster up the courage to stand before the crowd outside and come up with some rendition of her own. They had given her a white robe. She was supposedly their spiritual guide into the divine world. She wondered what she could say that might steer these people away from the abyss they had been programmed to desire.
Still, it was worth a try. At the very least, she could attempt to put things off until tomorrow. That was when Ian had told her the authorities thought the final ritual was to take place. She had to buy everyone some time. Of course, that was if Somers would allow her to break into his realm of power.
She looked down into Jade’s face. It was definitely worth a try.
Chapter 22
Ian didn’t pull any punches. Time was at a premium, so he explained the situation to Victor and Brian as clearly and as succinctly as he could, telling them who was dead and who was missing and what was happening at the camp. He thought the two men dealt wi
th it pretty well, listening to everything without saying a word.
They’d moved inside the house. Ian didn’t want them to be spotted by anyone from the camp.
He told them exactly what he wanted them to do. Their response—or rather, their lack of response—was what made him nervous now. Neither had asked any questions or had shown any objection to his plans. They were reacting like a pair of veteran law enforcement officers rather than a Philadelphia antique dealer and a carpenter.
Ian nodded to Brian. “Okay, let’s just go over it one more time.”
“No problem,” he replied, glancing at Victor. “We raid the kitchen long enough for you to get near the camp. Then we play the part of demolitions experts and blow up some cars and buildings.”
“You can be the demolitions expert,” Victor interjected. “I’ll be Rambo. I’m getting that gun down from over the fireplace.”
“You’re going to shoot yourself for sure if you take down that gun,” Brian responded. “I’ll put you in charge of matches.”
“Brian!” Vic snapped. “You can be such a chauvinist sometimes. Nobody said you were in charge.”
“I’m only looking after your—”
“Guys! Guys!” Ian interrupted. “Let’s focus on what we have to do here. You’re not going to engage in hand-to-hand combat, or get into a firefight. All I’m asking you to do is blow up one of the cars, or maybe the boathouse, or even the rental truck you just—”
“Not the rental truck,” Vic protested. “There are too many valuable antiques in there. Ellie would never forgive me. And then there’s my cousin Vinny.”
“You’ve got the gist of what I’m saying. There’s a gasoline can in the boathouse. All I want is a little fireworks on this side of the lake. Bill’s truck might be the best choice because if you can detonate that gas can under the truck’s tank without blowing yourselves up in the process, we should have a pretty good explosion. Plus, it’s far enough from the house that you should be able to avoid burning down the entire east coast.”
