When we got back to the suite, there were two packages waiting for us. The first contained footage of Sterling and Briggs’s most recent interview with Tory Howard. The second was from Aaron Shaw.
Sloane wordlessly opened the second package. Inside were six tickets to tonight’s performance of Tory Howard’s Imagine. The advertisement included with them promised a “bewitching evening of mind-warping entertainment.” On the bottom, Aaron had written, in a slanted, cursive scrawl, On the house. He’d signed his name.
“I have to go do something that isn’t cry now,” Sloane said. “And I’d like to do it alone.” She bolted before any of us could say anything.
Lia and I exchanged a look. When Michael and Dean joined us, we brought them up to speed. Lia flipped her hair over her shoulder and did her best impression of someone who wasn’t concerned about Sloane—or anyone other than herself.
“So,” she said, picking up the footage the FBI had sent, “who wants to watch Sterling and Briggs cross-examine Aaron Shaw’s girlfriend?”
On-screen, Agent Briggs, Agent Sterling, and Tory were in what appeared to be some kind of interrogation room, as was a man I assumed to be Tory’s lawyer.
“Thank you for agreeing to meet with us again.” Briggs sat across from Tory. Sterling was to his left. Tory’s lawyer sat beside her.
“My client was glad to come down and clear up any lack of clarity that may exist in her prior statements.” The lawyer’s voice was smooth and baritone. Even from a distance, his watch looked expensive.
Tory didn’t hire him. I didn’t second-guess the intuition. Tory was tough, she was a straight talker, and she was a survivor. At one point in time, she’d been in the foster system. She’d fought for everything she had. She would unquestionably hire the best lawyer she could afford to keep the FBI from strong-arming her—but her preference would lean toward someone more aggressive, with less of a fondness for designer suits.
“Ms. Howard, when we last spoke to you, you indicated that Camille Holt was the one who chose the Majesty’s restaurant as your destination that night.”
“Did I?” Tory didn’t bat an eye. “That’s not right. I was the one who suggested we go there.”
I flashed back to seeing Tory in the alleyway with Aaron. Had they been discussing this interview? Had he told her what to say?
“Were you aware that the location of Camille’s murder was set in advance?” Agent Briggs asked.
“No,” Michael answered on her behalf. “She wasn’t. Look at that.” He gestured in the direction of the screen, though I couldn’t tell what part of Tory’s expression had tipped him off. “She’s gut-punched.”
Agent Sterling took advantage of the moment. “What is your relationship with Aaron Shaw?”
Tory was still absorbed enough in the revelation about Camille’s murder that she might have actually answered, but her lawyer leaned forward. “My client will not be answering any questions about Aaron Shaw.”
“Check out the nostril flare on the lawyer on that one,” Michael said. “Closest thing to emotion the guy’s shown so far.”
In other words: “He’s more concerned with protecting Aaron than protecting Tory,” I said. She didn’t hire him, I thought again. The Shaws did.
On-screen, Sterling and Briggs exchanged a meaningful glance. Clearly, they’d picked up on that, too.
“Understood,” Agent Briggs told the lawyer. “Moving along, Ms.
Howard, we were hoping you could lend us your expertise on hypnosis.” Tory glanced at the lawyer. No objections.
“What do you want to know?”
“Can you describe the process through which you hypnotize someone?” Briggs asked. He was keeping the questions general.
Treat her like an expert, not a suspect, I thought. Smart.
“I generally start with having volunteers count backward from one hundred. If I want a bigger impact, I might use a technique that gets a quicker result.”
“Such as?”
“It’s possible to shock someone into a hypnotic state,” Tory said. “Or you can start some kind of automatic sequence—like a handshake—and then interrupt it.”
“And once someone is under,” Briggs said, “you can implant certain suggestions, cause them to act in certain ways?”
Tory was many things, but naïve wasn’t one of them. “If you have something specific in mind, Agent Briggs,” she said, “just ask.”
Sterling leaned forward. “Could you hypnotize someone into getting a tattoo?”
“That would depend,” Tory replied evenly, “on whether or not the person you were hypnotizing was open to getting a tattoo in the first place.” I thought she might leave it there, but she didn’t. “Hypnosis isn’t mind control, Agent Sterling. It’s suggestion. You can’t alter someone’s personality. You can’t make them do something they truly do not want to do. The hypnotized person isn’t a blank slate. They’re merely…open.”
“But if someone were open to getting a tattoo—”
“Then, yes,” Tory said. “I might be able to implant that suggestion. But seeing as how I value my job and not getting sued by angry audience members, I try to stick to things that are a little less permanent.”
Alexandra Ruiz’s tattoo was made of henna, I thought. Less common than a regular tattoo—and less permanent.
“Can anyone be hypnotized?” The questioning bounced back to Agent Briggs.
“You can’t force someone under who doesn’t want to go.” Tory leaned back in her seat. “And some people are more easily hypnotizable than others. Daydreamers. People who had imaginary friends as children.”
Beside Tory, the lawyer looked at his watch.
“How quickly could someone learn to do what you do?” Briggs asked Tory.
“To do it as well as I do it?” Tory asked. “Years. To be able to hypnotize someone, period? I know people who claim they can teach it in under ten minutes.”
I saw the next question coming. “Have you taught anyone?”
Tory’s eyes darted toward the lawyer. “I believe,” he said, standing up and gesturing for Tory to do the same, “that my client has indulged your interest long enough.”
Aaron, I thought. She taught Aaron.
The footage cut to static. After a moment’s silence, Lia spoke up. “Every single word out of her mouth was true.”
The real question, I thought, is what she wasn’t saying.
“I want to go.”
I looked up to see Sloane standing in the doorway. “Go where?” Michael asked her.
“To Tory Howard’s Imagine,” Sloane said. “Aaron sent us complimentary tickets. I want to go.”
I thought back to the way he’d rescued Sloane from the head of security, the way he’d ignored the shoplifting, the way he’d sworn that if he had known about her, things would have been different.
I thought of Sloane’s father telling her to stay away from his son.
A knock sounded at the door. “Delivery,” someone called. “For Ms.
Tavish.”
Dean was the one who opened the door. He accepted the box, his expression guarded. I wondered if he was thinking of the gifts I’d been sent once upon a time—boxes with human hair in them, boxes that marked me as the object of a killer’s fascination.
We waited for Judd to open the box. There, against a backdrop of sedately striped tissue paper, was the shirt Sloane had tried to steal.
There was a card inside. I recognized the handwriting as Aaron’s. The message said simply, I’m not like my father.
Sloane stroked her hand lightly over the silk shirt, an expression halfway between heartbreak and awe settling over her features.
“I don’t care what anyone says,” she said softly. “Not Briggs. Not Sterling. Not Grayson Shaw.” She gingerly lifted the shirt out of the box. “I’m going.”
