The Rose Ransom (Girls Wearing Black: Book Three)

by Baum, Spencer

  “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.

  Jill led Tarin up to her mother’s study and reached at the door with her fist, about to give the same gentle knock she had used to enter the study so many times over the years.

  But Tarin pushed the door open before Jill could knock.

  “Oh, Tarin. That’s gonna make her--”

  Too late. Carolyn had spun around in her chair to face them, her eyes wide, her face angry at the interruption to her thoughts.

  “What is this?” she said in an angry voice. “Who is this?”

  Tarin spoke immediately, charging into the room with speed and purpose.

  “Hello Carolyn,” he said. “I am a friend.”

  In that instant, two things struck Jill as strange. The first was that Tarin called Jill’s mother by her first name. Jill didn’t remember ever telling Tarin her mother’s name.

  The second was that the anger in Carolyn’s voice subsided immediately.

  “You are a friend?” she said.

  “I am a friend,” said Tarin. He held out his hand. Carolyn shook it. He introduced himself, said he was a friend of the family, and was here on her husband’s request.

  It all moved so fast Jill barely knew what was happening. Seventeen years of interactions with her mother had conditioned her not to expect anything like this. Tarin was breaking all the most sacred rules of the Wentworth family: do not interrupt Carolyn while she works; do not enter her study without knocking; do not approach her desk without being invited.

  Do not take up her precious time.

  He had such command over the room. The sheer force of his presence—it was astounding. Jill never would have believed it if she hadn’t seen it with her own eyes.

  Tarin was speaking to Jill’s mother, and she was listening.

  “Will that computer play a DVD?” Tarin asked, pointing at Carolyn’s desktop.

  Okay, now he was going too far. He was going to show her the movie, mere minutes after barging into her study? Jill needed to slow this down. She remembered how long it took Gordon to bring about a hypnotic state. Layers upon layers of relaxation were required before Carolyn was ready to talk. If Tarin showed her the movie now, she was sure to freak out on him.

  “Tarin, maybe we should all sit down and talk for a bit,” Jill said. “You know, before you show the movie.”

  Tarin turned to Jill and gave her a huge, knee-weakening smile.

  “Why don’t you go sit on the couch downstairs?” he said. “Keep an eye on your father. Make sure he doesn’t bother us.”

  For one long second, Jill was confused. On the one hand, there was her skepticism about the way Tarin had charged into her mother’s room and already had the movie out. On the other hand, well, checking on her father did sound like a good idea.

  Better than a good idea. It was a brilliant idea. Walter was down there on the couch asleep. Somebody needed to check on him. Who better to do it than Jill?

  “Okay,” she said. “I’ll be downstairs.”

  “Close the door behind you, will you?” Tarin said.

  Jill was already closing it. The suggestion to check on her father sounded so perfect to her, so spot-on, she could hardly wait to do it, and she sprinted down all three flights of stairs, leaping across half the final staircase like an acrobat. She bounded into the parlor to find her father still sitting in his chair, his head cocked back, his mouth wide open as he snored like a buzzsaw.

  Jill took a seat next to him on the couch. I’m checking on you, Dad, she thought. And I’ll keep checking on you until Tarin’s finished.

  Chapter 35

  As Jill sat in the parlor, watching her father snore, she thought about all the things that had been weighing on her these past two months.

  Three of her friends were dead, having been murdered by a vampire on the night of the Date Auction.

  Two more of her friends had been kidnapped, and were now the prize at the end of a brutally difficult treasure hunt. Her boyfriend was gone, brainwashed right out of her life. Her old contacts in the Network were out of touch, so far away now she might as well have never met them.

  Let it go, Jill. Let it slip out of your mind and float away on the breeze.

  It was amazing how powerful it was to have someone to talk to. After she watched that tragic video of her mother and father’s wedding she felt so alone in the world she didn’t know if she could continue. But then Tarin showed up. He listened. He understood.

  He was helping her. Right now, all Jill had to do was sit on the couch and make sure her dad stayed put. Tarin was doing the rest.

  Time passed slowly for her, but she wasn’t bored. She was at peace. She felt like the horrible, frightening world she had lived in for months would stay away from her so long as she sat on this couch, doing what Tarin told her to do.

  And then he came into the parlor.

  “We are finished,” Tarin said.

  “Finished? Do you mean--”

  Tarin held his hand up to his lips. “Let’s not wake your father,” he said. “Carolyn is waiting for you in your bedroom.”

  “My bedroom?” Jill said.

  “Come find me outside when you’re done talking to her,” Tarin said.

  Jill nodded her head once, then ran for the stairs. She entered her room to find a very familiar sight. Her mother, sitting at a computer, her back to the door.

  “One second please,” she said. “I’m onto something here.”

  Was this the new Carolyn Wentworth? It seemed just like the old one. The only difference was that Carolyn was typing on a laptop on Jill’s desk, rather than the computer in her study.

  “Mom? What are you doing?”

  Ca
rolyn held up one finger. It was the gesture she had always used when Jill wanted to talk to her and she wanted to work.

  Jill got a sinking feeling in her stomach. It looked like the deprogramming hadn’t worked at all.

  “Okay, that will do it,” Carolyn said. She took her hands off the computer and stood from the chair. What she did next was so unexpected and beautiful it took Jill’s breath away.

  Carolyn Wentworth walked across the bedroom with open arms, and embraced her daughter.

  It took Jill a second to hug her back. When she did, she let out a laugh. “Mom?” she said. “Mom, are you okay?”

  Carolyn took a step back and put her arms on Jill’s shoulders. “I’m okay,” she said. “And I need to get back to work. I think I’ve figured it out.”

  “Back to work? Mom, that laptop you’re working on--”

  “I know all about the laptop,” she said. “Your friend told me.”

  “My friend? You mean Tarin?”

  “Mmm-hmm,” Carolyn said, returning to the desk and putting her hands back on the keyboard. “Through this laptop you have full access to Renata Sullivan’s phone,” Carolyn said. “But Tarin tells me you haven’t seen anything you can use yet.”

  “No, we haven’t,” Jill said. “But Mom. Did Tarin tell you why we have access to the phone? Do you understand what you’re doing?”

  “You are part of the Network,” Carolyn said, her fingers clattering across the keys as she spoke. “I know all about the Network. I’ve written lots of software over the years to seek out members of the Network. I’ve always wondered why Daciana was unhappy with the software and wanted me to write more. Now I know. There was an equally talented programmer working for the Network all this time. You and I were playing cat and mouse all over the Internet.”

  It was startling to hear her mother speak of the Network, so much so that Jill had to sit down. A part of her wondered if this was really happening. For months, she had imagined what her mother would be like when she was free of the commands that held her hostage.

  She had never expected her to be like this.

  “I really don’t know if this is the best use of your time right now,” Jill said.

  “Nonsense. Renata is masking her important work somehow. When you hacked into her phone, you only got past the first layer of security. I think I know how to get past the second.”

  “Mom, please. Could you stop typing for a second and talk to me? I want to know how you feel. You’ve had these commands in your mind your whole life.”

  “And now they’re gone,” Carolyn said. “Believe me, Jill. It’s not something I can begin to describe. But for the first time in my life, I am doing what I truly want to do.”

  Carolyn was smacking away at the laptop with the same focus and vigor she brought to all her other computing.

  “This?” Jill said. “What you’re doing now is what you truly want to do?”

  “I am helping you, Jill. I am helping you and Tarin complete your mission. And when I’m done, I’m looking forward to helping you complete another task, whatever it may be.”

  “I appreciate the help,” Jill said. “I’m sure Tarin does too. Did he put you up to this? What did you guys talk about up there?”

  “Tarin helped me see the truth about my situation,” Carolyn said, absently. She typed for a time without speaking, then added, “I am glad to know the truth.”

  “Mom, could you please quit typing and look at me?”

  “Not now. I’m too close to figuring this out.”

  She was hunched over the computer, her fingertips flying across the keys. It was the same view of her mother that she’d always had.

  “How about when you’re done? Could we talk then?”

  “Mmm-hmm,” Carolyn said. Jill shook her head. The classic, Carolyn Wentworth mmmhmm. It was a sound she’d heard thousands of times. It meant I’m done listening to you now.

  “I’ll be outside with Tarin,” Jill said. “I’m excited to talk to you later.”

  Carolyn said nothing as Jill left the bedroom and closed the door behind her.

  Jill found Tarin downstairs.

  “I don’t understand,” she said.

  Tarin held his finger to his lips. “Not here,” he whispered, pointing at Walter. “Let’s go outside.”

  Tarin led her to the back porch. As soon as the door closed behind her, Jill said, “She seems a little different, but--”

  “I can see that you’re confused, Jill. Let me tell you how this works” Tarin said. “I found the commands in your mother’s mind. We watched the DVD together. I helped her recognize the commands that were holding her hostage. I taught her to reject them.”

  “But it’s like she’s still not in control,” Jill said. “She couldn’t bring herself to stop working.”

  “You must lower your expectations,” Tarin said. “You desire that this poor woman transforms herself into the mother you’ve always wanted. But that’s not who she is. She has spent her life working as a computer programmer all day, every day. That is her identity.”

  “Her identity?” Jill said. “I thought the point of deprogramming her--”

  “Deprogramming is exactly that. Nothing more, nothing less. I removed the programming from her subconscious mind. She is no longer a slave to her wedding vows. And, over time, with those commands gone, she will rebuild her mind in whatever way she sees fit. But right now, she has decades of neural pathways built that tell her she likes to work. She has created the mind of someone who wants to program computers all day, every day.”

  “And that’s what I wanted to free her of.”

  “No, Jill. You wanted to free her of the commands to make your father happy. And that is done. There is a big difference between the woman working in her bedroom and the woman we found in her study.”

  “I didn’t see it.”

  “It was there. Right now, she is doing something she chose to do. She is doing what she wants, not what Walter wants.”

  Jill looked up at the sky. The glow from DC was so strong that the stars were mostly invisible. For weeks, she had imagined that someday soon, she and her mother would drive far away from here. They would get in a car and leave Washington in the rearview mirror, setting up a new life for them both in a place where they could see the stars at night.

  “I’m disappointed,” Jill said. “I thought that, given the choice to do what she wanted to do, she might choose to get out of here with me. Instead she’s chosen to work on the hack I started.”

  “I guided her in that direction,” Tarin said. “As soon as the commands were gone from her mind, it was clear that your mother was lost. She is a woman who must have a computing project to work on, and she’s never once chosen the project herself. She was desperate for someone to give her something to do. For a few seconds there, I thought she might have a nervous breakdown. So I told her about the Network. I told her it was important to you and she could join us if she wants. I told her she has a skillset that we value and she could get started right away, if that was what she wanted to do. There is the big difference Jill. Your mother knows the truth now and had the choice to do anything she wanted. She immediately chose to get to work.”

  “It’s a frustrating project to start on,” said Jill. “I don’t think there’s anything there for her to do. The hack is complete. We have access to Renata’s phone. It’s not our fault she’s so boring.”

  “No, Jill. On this one, you’re wrong. Renata is hiding something. I’m sure of it. Let’s give your mother a chance. A challenging problem like this is good for her.”

  “If you say so.”

  “You know, I didn’t come here tonight to reprogram your mother. I came here to talk about the second clue.”

  “What’s is there to talk about? It’s impossible, isn’t it?”

  Tarin had a grin on his face.

  “No. Don’t tell me you….no way! There’s no way you solved it.”

  “What have I told you? The key to these clues
is thinking like Renata Sullivan, and it just so happens that I know exactly how she thinks.”

  “What is it? What’s the answer?”

  “I’ll take you to it. Go get a jacket. And your most comfortable shoes.”

  Chapter 36

  Tributes to kings

  Both born and elected

  Join their inspirations in dust

  Despite 657 claims to the eternal

  Jill pondered the clue as they drove into DC. They crossed the river and approached the National Mall. When they were near the Washington Monument, Tarin parked the car and they got out.

  “The Monument?” Jill said. “No. We’ve already checked here.”

  “You have already come to the Monument?” Tarin said.

  “No, not me, but many others from school.”

  “How come you didn’t come?”

  “It’s too obvious,” Jill said.

  “Is it? Has anyone solved it yet?”

  “Well, no, but people have checked here.”

  “How thorough were they?”

  “Very thorough! Winthrop brought all his friends and spent the whole day scouring this place. Mary Torrance brought a group here too. She even took a helicopter ride to have a look at the top.”

  “And they found nothing,” said Tarin.

  “That’s right. They found nothing.”

  A guard in a Park Service uniform approached them.

  “Good evening, folks,” the guard said. He was a chubby man with a crew cut and a sidearm hanging from his belt.

  “We would like to go inside the Monument,” Tarin said.

  “Monument’s closed,” the guard said. “The doors open again tomorrow morning at nine.”

  “You don’t understand,” Tarin said. “This is Jill Wentworth from Thorndike Academy. She would like to go inside now.”

  The security guard stood in place for a moment, as if registering the words Tarin had just said to him, then a big smile came over his face and he extended his hand to Jill. “Pleasure to meet you,” he said.