Ice Blue - Anne Stuart [70]
If she was going to be trapped, she’d be happy enough not to wake up, not until she stood some chance of escape. The woman sat and watched her, making notes in a leather-clad notebook, and every now and then some of the undead would wander in, ask questions and wander out again. Jilly was beginning to emerge from her safe cloud. The doctor was busy with her notes. She hadn’t realized her patient was beginning to come out of her drugged state, and Jilly wasn’t about to give her that advantage. The only thing that could possibly help her was the element of surprise. If the woman knew she was waking up she’d just come at her with another needle.
It took all her concentration not to react when the door to her cell opened. She willed her muscles to relax, her eyelids to keep from fluttering. Particularly when she recognized the soft voice of his holiness, the Shirosama.
“She still sleeps?”
Jilly remained motionless, listening to what was happening. The good doctor had risen, setting her notebook down, and Jilly thought there was tension in the room. Though it was probably only her own.
“She still sleeps,” the woman said in her accented English. “You need to trust me, your holiness. This particular girl is very hard to break, and I’m an expert at what I do. By the time I release her from her sedation she’ll be totally free of her past perceptions. She will be open and willing to embrace your guidance, and she will tell you everything you want to know. But the process takes time.”
“I’m not sure how much time we have,” the Shirosama said in the low, mellow voice that her mother likened to the voice of God and Jilly found creepy. “We haven’t been able to rescue her sister from the hands of the Yakuza, and countless members of the Fellowship have given their lives in the attempt. Blessings upon them.”
Unmoving, Jilly let his words sink in. Japanese gangsters had her sister, the revolting Shirosama had her, some B-movie Nazi femme fatale was drugging her into submission and even if Jilly was conscious she was being watched too closely to get the hell out of there.
“Blessings upon them,” the woman echoed. “I will speed the process as much as I can. One thing that would help would be total darkness, to increase her isolation.”
There was a long silence. “Would that not be difficult for you?”
“Not at all. I’m used to working in the dark. But it must be absolute. No lights from security cameras or coming from under the door. Give me twelve hours of complete darkness and she’ll be ready for your ministry.”
More silence. Jilly wanted to cry out, protest. She didn’t want to be trapped in the dark with this crazy woman, she’d rather take her chances with her mother’s guru. But she was still too drugged to say a word, trapped in a wall of silence.
“As you wish,” he said after a moment. “I have heard great praise for your methods. I put my trust, and this poor lost child, in your hands.”
“You do me honor.”
Jilly wanted to throw up. She couldn’t move, couldn’t open her eyes—it would serve the woman right if she choked to death on her own vomit. She’d try to do it quietly, just to spite the bitch.
She heard the heavy door close behind the departing Shirosama, heard the locks engage. The woman was rustling in her bag again, and Jilly knew another needle was coming, knew there was nothing she could do about it. Even if she weren’t already drugged, the German woman was stronger than she was. Jilly hadn’t been able to stop her the first time, when she’d had all her strength.
And then the lights went out. Odd how she knew it, since she couldn’t open her eyes. But as she felt the woman lean over her, the darkness intensified, becoming a thick, black cocoon, and she waited for the pinprick in her arm, the return of night.
Instead she felt the weight of the woman as she knelt on the