All In (The Naturals, #3)(43)

For a second, I thought she was pointing at me. Then I realized she was pointing in front of me—at the girl sitting next to Aaron. Sloane’s brother went ramrod stiff. The girl next to him stood up. A couple of seats down from me, so did Michael. When Tory realized Michael was acting like she’d called on him, she rolled with the punches. “Looks like I got two for the price of one. Both of you, come on up!”

“Michael,” I said, reaching for him as he brushed past me.

“Come on, Colorado,” he told me. “Live a little.”

Up on stage, Michael gave a courtly bow to the audience and took his seat. Tory faced her volunteers and spoke to them for a moment. None of us could hear what she said. After two or three seconds, she turned back to the crowd and the volume came back up on her microphone.

“I’m going to count backward from one hundred,” she said, pacing the row in front of her volunteers. “One hundred, ninety-nine, ninety-eight. I want you to picture yourself lying on a raft, next to an island. Ninety-seven, ninety-six, ninety-five. You’re drifting. Ninety-four, ninety-three. The further I count, the farther you go. Ninety-two, ninety-one…”

As she counted, Tory went by each of the volunteers. She took their heads in her hands and rolled them back and forth.

The further I count, the farther you go. She kept saying those words.

“Your body is heavy. Your head, your neck, your legs, your arms…” Up and down the row she went. She tapped a couple of participants on the shoulder and sent them back to their seats, then began to describe a light, floating sensation. “Your body is heavy, but your right arm is weightless. It floats up…up…seven, six…The further I count, the farther you go. Five, four, three, two…”

By the time she hit one, the nine volunteers remaining on the stage were slumped in their chairs, their right arms creeping upward. I turned toward Lia.

Is Michael faking it? I raised an eyebrow at Lia, hoping to get an answer, but her concentration was fixed on the stage.

“You’re on the beach,” Tory told her hypnotized subjects. “You’re sunbathing. Feel the sun on your skin. Feel the warmth.”

Their faces instantly relaxed, smiles crossing their lips.

“Don’t forget to put on sunscreen.” Tory’s voice was light and silky now.

I couldn’t help snorting as Michael began rhythmically rubbing pretend sunscreen all over his biceps. He flexed for the crowd.

“Now,” Tory said, walking up and down the length of the stage. “Whenever you hear me say the word mango, you will come to believe that you have just passed gas. Loudly. In a crowded room.”

It was five minutes before Tory said the word mango. Immediately, all of the hypnotized subjects started looking distinctly uncomfortable, except for Michael, who gave an elaborate shrug, and the girl who’d been sitting with Aaron, who took a step forward. And then another. And another.

She walked straight to the edge of the stage, her head bowed. Just when I thought she might walk off the front, she came to a sudden halt.

“Miss, I’m going to need you to take a step back,” Tory called.

The girl lifted her head. Her light brown hair fell away from her face. She stared at the audience, her gaze piercing. “Tertium,” she said.

One of the stage lights shattered and popped.

“Tertium,” the girl repeated, her voice louder, more piercing.

Tory was trying to get her to back up, trying to wake her up, but she couldn’t.

“Tertium.” The girl was screaming now. Behind her, the rest of the hypnotized subjects stood perfectly still. Michael broke away from the others, his eyes cogent and clear.

The girl raised her hands to the side, palms out. Her voice lowered itself to a coarse but powerful whisper that hit me like spiders crawling down my spine. “I need nine.”





The girl’s eyes rolled back in her head. She collapsed. Tory leapt forward. In the row in front of us, Aaron pushed his way to the aisle.

The curtain came down. An uneasy murmur spread through the audience. The people around us had no idea what had just happened. They had no idea what it meant.

You.

Need.

Nine.

The thought came to me in pieces. I forced air into my lungs.

“Nine.” Sloane’s voice somehow managed to reach my ears through the dull roar of the crowd. “Tertium. Tertium. Tertium. Three. Three times three—”

“Please remain in your seats,” a deep voice commanded over the loudspeaker. “The show will resume momentarily.”

Judd took one look at the potential for chaos and jerked his head toward the nearest exit.

“What about Townsend?” Dean said as we pushed our way through the crowd. “He’s still onstage.”

Judd deposited us safely in the hallway. “I’ll go get Michael,” he told Dean. “You stay here and watch the girls.”

That got a substantial eyebrow raise out of Lia. “I do hope my dowry is large enough to attract a virile man,” she told me wistfully. “I’m so very helpless on my own.”

Dean was wise enough not to reply.

Once Judd was out of earshot, Lia lowered her voice. “So are we all thinking that either Aaron’s little girlfriend is our killer and she just had a psychotic break, or that our killer somehow hypnotized her into delivering that message?”