Double Blind

by Brandilyn Collins

Hilderbrand ground to a halt and raised his foot to kick the knife from my hand.

  Inside me a switch ignited, and my icy veins blazed into fire. In one frantic motion I sat up, bent forward and plunged the knife deep in his thigh.

  Patti screamed. Hilderbrand bellowed and shuffled backward. Blood spurted onto his pants. His hands flew to the knife. Stiff-fingered, he grasped it. Pulled it out. It dropped to the floor, spattering crimson. He flailed for footing. The wound pulsed, pulsed, his slacks staining wet.

  I scooted forward, toward the knife. Couldn’t let him get it . . .

  “Bill!” Patti scurried to his side.

  Curses sprayed from his mouth. “Help me!” He pressed both hands against his leg. Red oozed through his fingers. “Get something. For . . . tourniquet.”

  Patti ran toward the kitchen.

  I scrambled to the knife. Picked it up. The handle was sticky.

  Hilderbrand listed sideways and slammed to the floor. The blood came hard and fast. On his pants. The hardwood.

  Patti appeared with a dishtowel. She fell to her knees in the puddling red beside him, furiously tying it above the wound.

  I tried to get up. My legs wouldn’t work. Tried again. Nothing. The third time I made it. I shuffled toward the kitchen, still clutching the knife, seeking a phone. It took me forever to get there. Behind me, Hilderbrand grunted and cursed in the same breaths.

  There—on the counter. A phone. I dropped the knife into the stainless steel sink. It clattered like the end of the world. My coated hand yanked up the receiver and punched in three digits.

  “911, what is your emergency?”

  “He’s . . . bleeding . . . to death. Hurry.”

  “Who?”

  No time for stupid questions. They could see the address. “He’ll die, do you hear? Come now!”

  I threw down the phone. My legs felt like water, and my heart quivered. On borrowed time I listed into the hallway. Patti had tied the tourniquet and was pressing both hands against Hilderbrand’s leg. His eyes were closed, his face pale.

  “Has the bleeding slowed down?” The words barely came out. I leaned against the wall.

  Patti threw me a look of rancid hatred. “If he dies, I’m coming after you. I swear it.”

  Great. Now two people wanted me dead.

  I pushed off the wall. Dragged myself in an unending journey to the front door. When I finally arrived I opened it wide—and found myself face to face with two policemen, preparing to knock.

  I gasped. They stared at me. I could guess how I looked: disheveled and head-bandaged, like walking death.

  “We’re looking for Lisa Newberry.” One officer stepped forward. “We got a call there might be some kind of disturbance.”

  My mind wavered. Sherry. She’d called the police to protect me from myself.

  I raised my bloody palms. The officer’s hands reflexed toward their guns.

  “Need . . . ambulance.” I staggered backward. “In there.”

  My legs gave out. One of the policemen caught me on the way down. The other one shoved past us into the hallway.

  Darkness and nausea swept through me. The policeman lowered me to the floor.

  “Call Officer . . . Bremer. Redwood City.” My pleading fingers plucked at the man’s wrist. “Tell him . . . I’m not. Crazy.”

  The room crumbled to black.

  Chapter 39

  FOR THE SECOND TIME I AWOKE IN HILDERBRAND’S HOUSE.

  Sound and movement curled as a policeman helped me up and into the TV room. He was tall and muscular, and practically had to carry me. My body felt like lead. I sagged onto the couch and stared at the blank TV. Hilderbrand must have switched off the murder DVD when I fainted the first time. Was it still in the player?

  Officers’ voices mixed with Patti’s, then Hilderbrand’s. Police radios squawked.

  “She stabbed him.” Patti’s voice pulsed with panic. “You have to arrest her!”

  The chip.

  I eased myself to lie down on the couch, eyes fixed on nothing. Vaguely I registered Patti’s accusations. Realized I may be going to jail. If Hilderbrand died . . . I couldn’t even grasp the concept. My brain would barely function.

  An ambulance shrilled up the street, the shattering noise dying to a strangled wail. More footsteps and voices, the clank of equipment.

  “All right, get back now, let us look at him.”

  An efficient exchange of medical findings followed. Blood pressure, heart rate.

  “Will he be okay?” Patti sounded like she was crying.

  “You may have saved his life, ma’am. But we’ve got to get him to a hospital right away.”

  I heard the metallic sound of a gurney.

  “Where is she? Lisa Newberry?” Patti’s voice rose. “You arrest her, you hear?”

  “We’ll look into it.”

  “Can you get my statement at the hospital? I’m going with him in the ambulance.”

  “We’ll catch up to you.”

  Lies. She’d feed them lies. There was only one thing that could prove my story. Even the murder DVD wouldn’t do that on its own. I needed the chip they’d taken out of me.

  Footsteps approached the back of the couch. I looked up to see the policeman who’d caught me when I fainted.

  He walked around the sofa and faced me, hands on his hips. “How are you feeling?”

  Marvelous. “D-did you call Officer Bremer?”

  “Not yet.”

  “He’ll tell you. At least the first half of the story.”

  The officer regarded me. “What’s the second half?”

  I pushed up the sleeves on my shirt. “Look.” Dark bruises covered my upper arms. You could almost see the outline of Hilderbrand’s fingers.

  “How did that happen?”

  “Hilderbrand. He was going to kill me. I grabbed the knife to defend myself.”

  “Miss Stolsinger said you broke into the house and had that knife in your hand.”

  “Didn’t break in.” How to explain all this? “Walked in.”

  “And the knife?”

  “He was going to kill her. Patti. I had to stop him.”

  “What made you think he was going to kill her?”

  I closed my eyes. What chance did I have here?

  The gurney clinked and rolled. The EMT’s voices faded through the door. The second policeman came and stood behind the couch.

  I swallowed. My throat was so dry. “See the TV?” I pointed. “Play the DVD.”

  The officer in front of the couch glanced over his shoulder. “What’s on it?”

  “Patti Stolsinger’s murder.”

  He exchanged a look with his partner. “Wasn’t that her here just a minute ago?”

  “Yeah.” My stitches throbbed. Gingerly, I touched my bandage. Amazing that it was still there.

  “Before you h-haul me away.” I shifted on the couch and winced. “Get a search warrant for this house. And Cognoscenti. Hilderbrand’s company. You need . . . to find the brain chip they took out of me before he destroys it.”

  “Brain chip?” The cop behind the couch spoke up.

  His partner pushed out his lower lip. Clearly his afternoon was getting weirder by the minute. “And what are we supposed to find on that?”

  “Everything on the DVD.” I raised a shaking arm and pointed to my brain. “And they put that chip in me.”

  Disbelief flicked across both their faces. “Why?” they asked in unison.

  I drew the longest sigh of my life. Would I ever know the full answer to that question?

  “Because they wanted me to see the murder. Believe it happened.”

  The first cop spread his hands. “Because . . . ?”

  They’d just have to ask Hilderbrand, wouldn’t they.

  Dizziness swooped over me. I was going to faint again. I managed one more answer before I went under.

  “Best I can figure . . . I was . . . the lab rat.”

  TUESDAY, MARCH 20—SATURDAY, APRIL 21


  Chapter 40

  TUESDAY MORNING I AWOKE IN THE HOSPITAL—AGAIN. The police had brought me in Monday after driving me away from Hilderbrand’s house, concerned about my throbbing head and weakness. A doctor examined me and suggested I stay overnight for observation. Nurses put in an I.V., which made me feel much better. I was badly dehydrated.

  But I didn’t exactly get to rest. That evening police questioned me for hours in my private room. The two Atherton cops were joined by Officer Bremer, who could verify at least what he knew of the events leading up to the stabbing at Hilderbrand’s house. Apparently Patti and Hilderbrand were still demanding my arrest, claiming I’d sneaked into the home with a knife, threatening to kill them both. Hilderbrand was also in the hospital. I heard he required more than a few stitches in his leg. I’d nicked the femoral artery, which could have killed him if Patti hadn’t acted so fast.

  By the time the cops left my room, they’d pieced together enough evidence to know there was far more to the story. The DVD of Patti’s “murder” had told a tale of its own. Didn’t look like my arrest was going to happen. In fact they posted a guard outside my door Monday night. Patti was in the same hospital, watching over Hilderbrand. I was terrified she’d slip into my room while I slept.

  If I slept at all.

  Somehow in all the firestorm Monday evening, I managed to call Sherry. She was nearly hysterical with fear. Once she’d called the police, she hadn’t heard what happened. After our call, Sherry turned around and phoned my mother. By the time I was ready to check out of the hospital early Tuesday afternoon, Mom was back at my side.

  “What about your meetings at work?” I asked her.

  She waved her hand in the air. “They can manage without me.”

  “And I can’t?”

  My mother gave me a look to end all looks. “You nearly got yourself killed.”

  Yeah. There was that.

  By the time I arrived home Tuesday, the police, armed with warrants, had conducted searches of Hilderbrand’s home and Cognoscenti. At his house they found the dragon’s head ring and black suitcase. At the Cognoscenti lab they discovered the main prize—a small plastic container labeled “Memory EC.” Inside—a tiny brain chip.

  For the remainder of that week I rested when I could—between more interrogations with law enforcement. Police forces from three towns—Redwood City and Atherton, plus Palo Alto, where Cognoscenti was located—were involved in the major investigation. One of the craziest they’d ever encountered. Interviews with all involved parties would last for days. They took Mom’s and Sherry’s statements. Agnes Brighton’s—who finally learned the woman in her drawing wasn’t dead. The two salesmen at the jewelry store. The doctors who’d operated on me, and the nurses. Employees at Cognoscenti, including Jerry Sterne and Clair Saxton.

  And of course, they tried to interrogate Hilderbrand. Didn’t happen. By Monday night at the hospital he had an attorney and was refusing to talk. No surprise there.

  It didn’t take long for the story to break to the media. I found myself hounded by the press. National TV shows offered me large sums of money to talk to them. I wanted no part of it. Had refused to talk to any reporter. Besides, if I had, it could have hurt the investigation.

  I just wanted to get on with my life. Whatever that was.

  The police had to call in specialists to examine the so-called “Memory Chip.” The technology was so far advanced few experts could decipher its contents. In the end two technicians from Cognoscenti itself looked at the evidence. Their findings yielded my ultimate vindication. It was the first chip that had been implanted in my brain. The device was an actual Empowerment Chip, capable of sending out electrical impulses to cure depression. Of course Hilderbrand had needed to use a real EC for his cruel experiment. If I’d remained depressed, I wouldn’t have had the strength to do anything about the murder scenes in my head. I’d have just gone off the deep end.

  Which I almost did anyway.

  The chip also contained the brain’s encoded version of Patti’s murder scenes from the DVD. Hilderbrand had placed the filmed scenes in order on the chip, ensuring that each would, one by one, jump the synapses of my brain and into my memory. Apparently that technology was light-years ahead of any other researchers’. Some of the scenes Hilderbrand had placed repeatedly on the chip, so they’d play again and again. Others he’d purposely skewed—the dragon ring disappearing, day turning to night. The date on his watch. Apparently he wanted to see if every detail would come through.

  Even when confronted with the Memory EC, Hilderbrand still refused to talk. So the police went after Patti. And they had the tools to do it.

  California has a torture law, Penal Code 206. I heard about it so often in those days, I could practically quote it. Anyone who intended to cause another person “cruel or extreme pain and suffering for the purpose of revenge, extortion, or for any sadistic purpose” was guilty of torture. The “bodily injury” had to be physical. Therein would lie the arguments for future defense lawyers.

  Was my mental torture physical?

  But the prosecutor was gunning after Hilderbrand with everything he had. And his argument would be backed by science—the very information I’d learned online. The chip’s data had jumped the synapses in my brain. Had neurologically altered my memory forever. That was physical.

  The sentence for conviction under California’s torture law: life in prison. The police threatened to charge Patti with the crime as well.

  That’s when she started to talk.

  Later I would hear bits and pieces of her interrogation from the police and prosecutor. Since I was the victim they were doing their best to keep me informed. I wouldn’t learn the entire picture until the case went to court.

  The Empowerment Chip was Hilderbrand’s invention, Patti told police. It stood to make him millions of dollars, but he wanted more. He wanted to make the ultimate brain chip, the kind that existed only in books and movies. The kind that could be used in the most top secret of missions, that certain agencies and organizations would pay brilliantly for.

  “I do love a good spy novel,” Hilderbrand had told me. To this day I can see his chilling smile as he spoke those words.

  The Memory Chip could alter a person’s brain. Drive that person to do things he would never do. Or perhaps create a whole new life for that person through altered memories. The possibilities were wild and endless. And absolutely captivating to a man who lived for power.

  Hilderbrand chose me out of all the EC trial candidates to receive his first Memory Chip. He’d been working on the technology for years. Had done all the experiments he could on animals. Now he needed a human.

  So why Lisa Newberry? Patti shrugged as she gave the answer: I was widowed and alone. No family nearby to help. Most important, I’d been attacked and nearly choked to death. If the murder scenes of strangling and stabbing a female would terrify anyone, it would be me.

  However, things didn’t happen quite as planned. Hilderbrand expected me to believe I was going crazy. And he expected the Memory Chip’s final scene with the date of March 19 to “play” sooner than it did. He’d convinced himself once I saw an actual date—one that was soon approaching—I would contact Cognoscenti in a panic, if I hadn’t done so sooner. If Cognoscenti never heard from me, Hilderbrand would have cooked up a reason to call me and rope me in. He needed to know how well the chip had worked. And he planned to offer me his deal—a sum of money and removal of the chip. He’d have the results of his experiment, and he’d have my silence. No one would have believed me anyway. And I’d have never known the identity of the people in my “memories.” In time those memories would have faded. I would have forgotten Patti’s face.

  But Hilderbrand hadn’t counted on my mother coming along to help. Or the way we’d found his house, his identity, and Patti. How I’d found the dragon’s head ring.

  Ironic, isn’t it. In my brain, Hilderbrand’s Empowerment Chip had overpowered his own memory experiment.


  After Patti gave her statement and with all the evidence collected, the D.A. charged Hilderbrand with a long list of crimes, including torture. Patti had even told the police he’d broken into my apartment himself, and threatened me through the phone call and note. The burglary charge might stick after all, even without “foreign fingerprints.” Police had found Agnes’s composite drawing and the handwritten note in Hilderbrand’s house.

  Hilderbrand was currently out on bail. A good reason for me to leave town. I had other reasons as well. I’d return to testify when they needed me.

  “I don’t know about the case,” I told Mom. Three weeks had passed, and I was visiting her in Denver. “He’ll have the best lawyers money can buy.”

  “Wait till a jury hears what he did to you.” She firmed her mouth. “He’s going down.”

  I spent a lot of time praying during that visit. About what God wanted me to do, where I should go. I wasn’t about to make a decision this time around without His guidance. He’d gotten me through this far.

  I also looked up old friends. And got to know my mother more. As the days passed God helped me realize she’d been right all along about my returning to my hometown. Now I no longer felt I had to fight the idea. I no longer had something to prove.

  Saturday, April 21 was my moving day. I was more than set to leave town. Mom flew down the day before to help me pack. By Saturday morning boxes were stacked everywhere. Nothing was left unboxed except the furniture. And the coffeemaker. It was 8:00 in the morning. Mom and I had been at it since 5:00. The moving truck was scheduled to arrive any minute.

  A knock sounded on the door, already ajar. Sherry poked her head in. “Hi!”

  “Come on in.” I smiled at her over the counter. “You have Jay set to babysit?”

  “Yup.” She closed the door and threaded her way between boxes. “I’m all yours.”

  Her voice sounded chipper, but I knew she was sad to see me go.

  “Want some coffee?” Mom pointed to my brewer. “It’s the last thing to get packed.”

  “Sure, thanks.” Sherry sidled up to the other side of the counter and set down her purse. I poured some coffee into a Styrofoam cup.