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“I’ll make another copy from one of these four. You didn’t hear it from me but when dealing with the CIA it’s always best to keep an ace up the sleeve. I’ll emphasize that we have no way of knowing if you made other copies. That should keep you both safe.”
The limo took them back to their apartment and they got out of the car. Sean turned back. “Look, I know we probably won’t be seeing you again, but if you ever need help, you’ve got a couple of friends in Virginia.”
Whitfield shook both their hands. “If I’ve learned anything in this business it’s that real friends are damn hard to come by.”
CHAPTER
94
IT WAS A CHILLY DAY in early November when Sean drove Michelle to Horatio’s office.
“I don’t want to do this, Sean. I really don’t.”
“Hey, you came back from Camp Peary alive. And if I know one thing about you, you never go back on a deal.”
“Thanks for your support,” Michelle said bitterly.
Horatio was waiting for them.
Sean started to leave but Michelle gripped his hand. “Please stay with me.”
Sean looked at Horatio. “That’s not a good idea,” the psychologist said.
“But I want him to.”
“You’re just going to have to trust me on that, Michelle. Sean can’t stay.”
After Sean left the room it didn’t take long to perform the hypnosis.
Horatio spent a few minutes getting Michelle back to the age of six. And he took another few minutes placing her in that night in Tennessee when her life had changed forever.
Michelle’s eyes were open, even though her conscious mind was no longer in charge. Horatio watched with great professional interest and also with growing pain as she recounted what had happened. Sometimes she talked as a child and other times with the reflection and vocabulary of an adult whose subconscious mind had grappled with that night and tried mightily to make sense of it.
The man in uniform had come that night. Michelle didn’t remember seeing him before. She must have always been asleep when he came. But that night her mom was very nervous and kept Michelle with her. Her mother told the man she didn’t want to see him; that he had to leave. He thought she was joking at first, and when it was apparent that she wasn’t he turned angry. He started taking off his clothes. When he reached for Michelle’s mother, she told Michelle to run. The man started pulling her mom’s clothes off. Her mom was trying to stop him but he was too strong. He was forcing her down on the floor.
It had taken Michelle only a second to reach it. She had sometimes held her father’s gun, when it was unloaded of course. She pulled the soldier’s gun from the holster he had thrown on the sofa with his other clothes. She had pointed it at his back and fired one time. A big red mark appeared on the man’s back, dead center. He had died quietly, slumping over on top of Michelle’s mother. The woman was so shocked she’d fainted.
“I killed him. I killed a man.” Tears came down Michelle’s face as she spoke about this long-buried event in her life.
She had been standing there with the pistol in her hand when the door had opened and her father came in. Michelle didn’t know why he had come home early but he had. He saw what had happened, took the gun from Michelle and pulled the man’s body off his wife. He tried to revive her, but she was still unconscious. He carried her up to bed, ran back down and took Michelle by the hand, whispering gently to her.
“He took my hand,” Michelle said in a small voice. “He said he had to go away for a while, but he would be back. I started screaming, screaming for him to not leave me. I grabbed his leg, I wouldn’t let go. I wouldn’t. Then he said he was going to take me with him. That we were going for a ride. He put me in the front seat of his car. Then he went back inside and carried the man out and put him on the floor in the back.”
“Why not the trunk?” Ho
ratio said.
“It was full of junk,” Michelle immediately answered. “So, Daddy put the man in the back. I saw his face. His eyes were still open. He was dead. I knew he was dead because I shot him. I know what happens when you get shot. You die. You always die.”
“What did your daddy do next?” Horatio asked quietly.
“He put newspaper over the man. And an old coat and some boxes, whatever he could find. But I could still see the man’s eyes looking at me. I started crying and told Daddy. Daddy, I can still see the man’s eyes, he’s looking at me. Make him stop looking at me.”
“And what did your daddy do?”
“He put more stuff on him. More stuff until I couldn’t see him anymore. No more eyes staring at me.”
“And your daddy drove somewhere?”
