“The dark man’s,” Ridley said simply.
“Who is the dark man?”
“I don’t know. How would I know?” He was getting edgy again, and his fingers were in motion, tapping on his legs like a nervous piano student fumbling through a bad recital.
“Did the dark man come into the cave with you?”
“Of course not.”
“Then when did he join you?”
“He was always in the cave.”
“That can’t be true, can it?”
“Yes. Trapdoor sends him. He is the cave. He is the cave.”
“Think about this. How can it be true?”
“It’s true. It is true.”
Julianne was pushing too hard now, and Ridley was resisting. For the first time, a clear break had appeared, and even in his trance state, Ridley was beginning to view her as an interrogator and not a guide. She seemed to realize it because she changed tacks, but it was too late.
“Focus on the things around you,” she said. “Don’t worry about how it all came to be. Return to your senses now. Only the senses. Just tell me what you see, what you feel, what you hear, what you smell.”
“I don’t want to be here anymore,” Ridley said. “I can’t be here anymore.”
“That’s all right. You’re fine, you’re safe.”
“No. Not here. In this place, no one is ever safe. Not ever.” The words had gone frantic.
“You’re safe,” Julianne said. “Can you say that? Say the words and know that they are true. Say the words.”
“I’m safe.” He sounded like a blubbering child being talked out of a crying fit, promised that his injury didn’t hurt as bad as he thought it did. His breathing had gotten so rapid that he was hyperventilating. It was as if Ridley’s mind had blown a fuse, and whatever protection the hypnotized state had once offered him was now gone.
“I want to leave. Please. I want out of the dark. Please.” Each word left him with a gasp.
“Then we’ll leave it behind. We’re going to count our way back now, all right? We’re going to start at one, and when we reach ten, you’ll be back where you are safe. You will feel better, because you’ve asked yourself the right questions, and you know that you need to ask those questions. When we reach ten, you will feel safe, and you will feel peaceful. You will feel these things because you deserve them, don’t you? Yes. You deserve to feel safe and peaceful. You deserve that. One... You know that you deserve peace. Two... And when you return you will feel good, you will feel alert and strong and clean, you will feel so much better than before. Three... You know that you deserve safety. Four... five... six.” As she counted up, her voice rose in volume just a touch, a slow but steady increase, and even from just the recording Mark could feel a shift in his own energy. “You have done all of the right things, and you have asked the right questions, and you will feel better now than before, you will be a new and better version of yourself, because you have sought these things. You will feel the peace that comes with doing the right things... seven... eight... Let yourself feel warmth again. Feel warmth and see light. Everything will be brighter now. Everything will be safe. Nine... feeling the warmth... feeling so good and so peaceful... and ten.”
Ridley’s eyes opened on ten with an unseeing stare that focused quickly. His chest rose and fell in long, deep breaths. His hands were motionless against his legs; his body was still. For a moment, the screen held on his eyes, which were looking directly into the camera, and then the picture went black.
38
Mark let out a breath he hadn’t been aware of holding. Julianne was still standing just as she had been, a few steps behind him, her eyes locked on the now blank computer screen, her arms folded.
“That was in December,” she said. “I’ve continued working with him, but we’ve never gotten back to that place. Never so far. He’s very guarded now. As I said, I have had to prove myself as an ally. I couldn’t go to the police. You might disagree, but I know what would have happened. They would have dismissed me, then they would have been too aggressive with him, and the bond of trust I was forming with Ridley would have shattered.”
“But there’s been no gain to it,” Mark said. He was still shaken by what he’d seen. He’d never watched anyone speaking under hypnosis before, let alone confessing to a murder. “Your trust hasn’t led to anything good.”
She turned from the screen to face him. “It’s led to you.”
He didn’t answer right away. The clock ticked somewhere down the hall, and the wind drove rain against the windows, and Julianne Grossman stared at him as if she were waiting for an answer to a question that hadn’t been voiced.
“What am I supposed to do?” Mark said finally. “What do you think I can do that the police can’t?”
“Engage him in the way he wants to be engaged,” she said. “That’s the secret. He chooses who gets to play the game, don’t you see that? He gave the police nothing. Ever. He gave me something, and once he realized that he had, he came back around. I had no idea how to handle it, nor did I have the skills. It’s why I convinced him that we needed help to get his truth. When we found you... well, it was easier then. Because of your wife, you fit the role quite nicely.”
Mark ran a hand over his face and it came back damp with sweat. He was dizzy and wanted to sit.
“Was Ridley playing with you, or was that legit?”
“Do you mean was he really in trance? Yes. I’m certain of that. I’ve been a practicing hypnotist for twenty-two years. I know when someone is faking, and I know when it is real. Ridley was in trance.”
“And you’ve put him back in trance.”
“Yes. But he no longer shows interest in recall or trapped memories. He speaks of the dark man, he speaks of the cave as if it is a person. He speaks of what the cave wants him to do.”
“What do you make of the dark man?”
“He’s a part of Ridley. A part he wants to deny.”
“But that portion in which he talks about Sarah being someone else’s responsibility suggests that she wasn’t alone, doesn’t it?”
“Not necessarily. I suppose he could be blaming Evan Borders for losing her, but I think he’s blaming himself throughout. You just watched a chess match, and Ridley Barnes lost. To his own subconscious. I don’t think it happens often, though. I think he usually wins.”
“Even if I agree with everything you said, I don’t see how I can help. This” — he pointed at the computer monitor — “is not what I do. A forensic psychiatrist might have a shot with him. I wouldn’t.”
“I disagree. He has a vision for your role. If you play it, I think we can have some success.”
“What’s his vision for me?”
“You’re supposed to get him access to the cave. He’s certain of this. The fact that you already went into the cave—”
“I was forced into the cave!”
“Fine. Either way, it has validated his vision of you. That the cave wants you. He’s convinced that you can get him access to the cave. That the reach and clout of your firm can do that.”
“My firm wants nothing to do with me.”
“Access is controlled by Danielle MacAlister. She’s more likely to listen to someone of your background than someone of mine. If you could gain her cooperation, Ridley would view it as progress.”
“I’m not going back in that cave.”
“Why not?”
“If you’d spent the quality time down there that I did, you wouldn’t need to ask. But there’s also simply no gain to it. Let’s imagine it’s possible for me to get access, which I doubt, but let’s imagine it. What good comes of having Ridley in the cave?”