Mindwarp Read online

  MINDWARP

  Tara Nina

  Please be advised this book was previously published in 2010.

  It has been revised prior to current release.

  All rights reserved

  Copyright© 2019 by Tara Nina

  Cover Art by Syneca of OriginalSyn

  Published by T.N.Books

  ISBN ebook: 978-1-7342057-0-1

  This book is licensed for individual readership only. No portion of this book may be resold or redistributed in any format by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without expressed written consent of the author. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person.

  Thank you for respecting the author’s work.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters and events are creations of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to any persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental and unintentional by the author.

  To obtain permission to excerpt portions of the text, please contact the author at

  http://taranina.com

  T.N.Books

  New Jersey

  2018

  Published in the USA

  Dedication

  This work of fiction is dedicated to the fine men and woman who diligently strive to maintain this country’s security. The Office of Terrorism and Financial Intelligence (TFI) is a branch of the United State’s Treasury Department. It is their job to protect our financial system from outside threat.

  Trademarks:

  Jeopardy is a trademark owned by Sony Digital Pictures Inc.

  Chapter One

  Lightheadedness.

  The sensation captivated every ounce of her brain when she woke on the chaise lounger. At the sight of an unfamiliar male hovering over her, Amelia gasped and scrambled upright. Wrong move. Her head spun, and a wave of nausea cramped her stomach. His heavily accented tone reached into her whirlpool of confused thoughts, calming and relaxing her within seconds. Her pulse slowed and her breathing shifted from erratic to normal as recognition returned. Doctor Riyad’s office; she sighed as the memory surfaced.

  Potted plants, a shaded window, a wooden Old World crafted desk, and a high-back leather chair came into view as her gaze darted around the room. In the corner stood a large privacy screen made of teak and etched with delicate flowers, vines, and birds. Plush carpet, pale blue walls, and soft lighting, along with ocean sounds piped in through hidden speakers, provided a peaceful setting meant to soothe skeptical patients. Which Amelia had been before her first visit—a true non-believer. Today was session two in a series of four hypnotic treatments to help her with weight loss. The scale standing in the corner reminded her of the reason she was here.

  “How do you feel, Amelia?” Doctor Riyad’s thick Middle Eastern accent made her think his words through before replying. At times, she had difficulty understanding him and had to listen carefully.

  “I’m fine.” She shifted in the seat. “Just a little thirsty.”

  Doctor Riyad nodded to his assistant, Mina, who disappeared, then returned in seconds with a small cup of water from the cooler outside his office door.

  Mina handed her the cup. “Here, drink this. It should help.”

  Cool coated her throat, relieving the strange, desert-dry sensation. Odd, that itchy, burning sting in the back of her throat happened when she woke last time as well. Was it her body’s reaction to being hypnotized? Amelia set the cup on the side table, moistened her lips, and then focused on the doctor’s face. With all her specialized training, she’d never thought she could be hypnotized, but somehow he’d managed to accomplish the feat.

  “When I see you next time,”—Doctor Riyad jotted a few notes on his pad—“I expect you to weigh four pounds less for a total loss of nine pounds.”

  “Not sure how this works,” Amelia replied, swinging her legs over the edge of the dark-brown, leather chaise lounger, “but it has so far. We’ll see if it helps with the total twenty-five I want to lose.” She stood.

  “Oh, it will.” Mina bobbed her head in affirmation.

  “I can only hope.” Amelia smiled as she offered her hand to the doctor. “See you next week.”

  After her first session she’d had her doubts, until the scale dropped one pound, then two in a week’s time. She’d managed minute changes before, but never three pounds in a week. By the end of two weeks, she’d lost a total of five and made her second appointment with the doctor. Curiosity was the main reason she’d returned.

  Was it coincidence or actual results of his techniques?

  When he accepted her hand in a firm shake, she noted his well-manicured nails. His expensive, tailored silk suit and expensive leather shoes made her think he had a successful business. How else could he afford such fine things? So far, his techniques had worked.

  Strange, at both visits she hadn’t seen another client in the waiting room, not when she arrived nor when she left. Surely there had to be others. Maybe his schedule allowed plenty of time between patients to maintain their privacy. Lord knows, she wouldn’t want anyone knowing she’d resorted to hypnosis for weight loss.

  Meeting his steady, dark-eyed gaze, he gifted her with a bright, white smile. “Don’t forget, four pounds.”

  “I won’t.”

  Amelia nodded to the assistant as she walked from the exam room and into the reception area. Five pounds lost in a matter of two weeks might not seem like a lot, but it surpassed the two-week totals in her history of fad diets.

  Bright sunlight made her squint as she stepped out of the doctor’s office onto the sidewalk. What a glorious day. She sighed, pulled sunglasses from her purse, and slipped them on. What a glorious day indeed.

  * * * *

  “It doesn’t make sense,” Nolan O’Connell stated under his breath.

  Four files lay spread open on his desk. The faces of each woman stared back at him. Nothing particular stood out about any of them with the exception of their crimes. Individually, they’d burglarized the banks in which they were employed. In each incident, the stolen money hadn’t been found. None of the women deposited it in any traceable account, nor did they hide it anywhere in their homes or known locations associated with them.

  The money had to be somewhere. Combined, these women stole over half a million dollars. Money like that didn’t just disappear. Nolan lifted the photo of the most recent female involved. Her history gave no hint of criminal tendencies. He flipped through the other three photos. Neither did any of those women’s histories. Nothing about these cases made sense. Common, everyday employees stealing without any memory of having committed the crimes.

  Worst of all, they couldn’t remember what happened to the money. Nolan sighed heavily as he placed the pictures back into the proper files. As lead Treasury Agent on the case, the responsibility of tracing the money trail had landed in his lap. There had to be an explanation. He relaxed into the high-backed, leather chair and stared out the window as he ran through the information he’d gathered.

  In six months, four different women had embezzled large sums of money with no recollection of having done so. As if the memory of the events somehow magically disappeared from their brains. Nolan straightened. What if they’d been brainwashed into committing these acts?

  Excitement coursed through him as possible scenarios fired at a rapid rate, piecing together a slim but semi-credible theory. Who would do such a thing to these women? Throughout TFI—the Treasury Bureau of Terrorism and Financial Intelligence—whispers of a possible new terrorist threat had circulated for months. The financial accounts of several known terrorist sympathizers were being monitored, but nothing actionable had surfaced. That didn’t mean the research int
o the matter stopped. No, on the contrary, it increased the effort to prove the United States Treasury and financial markets were safe. Nolan took a deep breath. Had he stumbled onto the possible rumored new threat? If so, how had they managed such a feat? Who were they? Most important, where would they strike next?

  Nolan gathered four colored tacks and walked to the wall map of Kentucky. If a terrorist sect was behind the thefts, why choose his state as their place of business? Why not New York City, the financial capital of the world? One by one, he located the venues and inserted tacks in the order the crimes occurred: white at Brandenburg, green at Shepardsville, blue at Elizabethtown, and red at Radcliff. Each location fell within a fifty mile radius of . . . No way! He snorted. No one had ever broken into that vault.

  It didn’t mean someone hadn’t thought about it. He returned to his desk, sat in his chair, and simply stared at the colorful conglomeration of tacks on his map. As a TFI Treasury Agent, he had to evaluate every aspect of the United States’ financial system. His training entailed reviewing detailed terrorism plots and dissecting them to follow the money stolen to finance crusades against America. He’d never failed an assignment and had no intention of starting now. The missing bank money had to be somewhere and he planned to locate it.

  One particular vault amazed him during his internship as a trainee. Truth be told, that was the main reason he’d chosen the small, new Louisville office as his site. A smile upturned his lips as he sifted through the information in his head on the Fort Knox Bullion Depository. It would take more than one person to break into that place. If, it were even possible. He shook his head in an effort to dislodge the inconceivable notion.

  Again, he opened the folder and lifted the four photos. What did these women have in common? Something had to link them together. He’d spent hours pouring over the information. Their statements seemed vague and confused. Had they been brainwashed? Had his initial thought been right? He couldn’t stop revisiting that probability.

  Over time it had become apparent that terrorist organizations desperate to get a toe-hold in America brainwashed and instilled ideas into innocent victims as part of their regimen. If they couldn’t recruit new members, terrorists turned to alternative means to gather the hands they needed to accomplish their twisted missions. Over the years, several sleepers had been discovered and stopped before they completed the assignments. Could there be a terrorist cell in the area? What if they’d found a unique way to program people to steal for them?

  Determined the involved women were pawns in a much larger game, Nolan decided to investigate his theory and the women more thoroughly. If the missing money had landed in the terrorists’ hands, there was no telling what they were funding. A bomb, an attack on American soil . . . God, please not another 9/11. Well, it wasn’t going to happen. Not if he could help it. He’d taken an oath when he joined this department to protect the financial system from national security threats. In his book, this landed under that oath.

  Nolan gathered the files and stood. He needed to personally interview these women. Something must’ve been missed. Some question left unanswered. There had to be a common thread that bound them. If these women had been brainwashed, he wanted to know by whom and what they planned to hit next. He stopped in front of the Kentucky wall map, eyeing the tacks. Even though the theory was thin and lacked enough evidence, it refused to let loose of his instinct. He sighed. Man, he hoped he was wrong.

  Nolan tucked the files in his large, messenger-style briefcase, then set it beside the coat rack. He slipped his gray jacket over his starched, white, button-down, long-sleeved shirt. After straightening his gray and white striped tie, he grabbed the only accessory that didn’t fit the dull-suited, bureau criteria. After running a hand through his hair, he donned the Western Outback fedora. Nice. He smiled as he slid his thumb along the brim of his version of the cowboy hat. He loved the tan Akubra fur felt.

  As he grabbed his briefcase, he made a mental note to call his parents before the weekend. If he didn’t, they’d probably pop in for a visit and he didn’t have time to play host to his retired folks. Not this weekend; not if he planned to compile evidence to either support or disprove his theory. He hoped for the latter. Terrorists were the one thing he hated more than money launderers for drug lords. He shut his office door, locked it, and headed for the elevator.

  * * * *

  “Hey, Amelia, I’ve been looking all over for you.”

  The sound of Terrence’s voice grated on her nerves. Its nasal tenor and droll monotone practically induced sleep whenever he managed to corner her and force her to listen to his dry monologue about whatever subject he chose. Amelia rolled her eyes to the heavens and prayed the elevator doors closed before he reached them. Even though she repeatedly pressed the door close button, his foot slid between the stainless steel, preventing her escape. Unfazed, he lunged inside, waving a flyer in her face.

  “Great, I caught you. You mustn’t have heard me calling.” He adjusted his black, plastic-frame glasses. “When I left the grocery store last night, I found this on my windshield and thought of you.”

  Though she didn’t want to, she took the crumpled paper. One look and confusion bunched her brows. “What’s this announcement about an eco-friendly, health-food deli grand opening got to do with me?”

  Terrence reached around her and pressed the first floor button. The hair on his forearm brushed her elbow and she had to fight the urge to cringe from the unexpected touch. Since his arrival almost six months ago, his persistent pursuit had kept her on guard whenever he was around. She tried politely to maintain a distance from him. In the cramped elevator, he seemed oblivious to the sanctity of personal space.

  “Well,” he stated on a garlic-laden breath within a couple of inches from her face. “I understand you’ve made progress with your weight situation and thought we could go there and celebrate.”

  She crinkled her nose against the odor. If she had a mint, she’d give it to him. “My weight situation?” She stepped back, trying to capture a garlic-free breath. Oh my God, he didn’t just imply something about her weight. Out of the corner of her eye, she caught the reflection of her backside in the stainless steel. The battle of the bulge had been a continuous struggle her entire adult life, but her problems weren’t any business of his. Heat filtered up her spine, making her stand straighter. Chin tilted, she stared him directly in the eye as she shook the flyer at him. “Are you implying I’m fat and should try eating this stuff?”

  “For my taste,”—he wagged his eyebrows—“no. I like my women with a bit of meat on their bones. I heard you’d dropped five, and to show that I support your effort, I’d like to take you to lunch. That flyer simply suggested a healthier choice.”

  “I’m not your woman.” She kept her tone as calm as she could muster through the angry constriction in her throat. The extra twenty-five pounds she carried was none of his concern. Besides, her latest weight loss attempt seemed to be working. This morning, the scale verified another pound had disappeared. The hypnosis techniques had helped her with sugar cravings to the point she wasn’t eating ice cream and candy bars everyday.

  “Not from my lack of trying. You just seem to always be busy.”

  The fact she shot mental daggers at him somehow she doubted would faze him if he knew. He’d asked her out many times and she’d given him polite excuses, but he simply didn’t seem to comprehend she wasn’t interested.

  “I have noticed you’ve dropped a little. So the hypnotist is working?”

  The doors slid open and Amelia pushed past him into the lobby. As far as she was concerned, this conversation was over. Heat rolled off her as anger speared through her. How did he know about the hypnotist? That was supposed to be a secret between her and her best friend Louisa. His hand clamped around her elbow and nearly threw her off balance in mid-stride. Before falling, she righted herself, jerked her elbow from his grip, then whirled and faced him.

  Her gaze darted around and she kept her
voice low. “How do you know about that?”

  She certainly didn’t want any of the higher-ups overhearing she’d been hypnotized. It might not set well with their ideals of what was and wasn’t a security risk for her position at Fort Knox.

  “I gave Louisa the hypnotist’s business card a couple of months ago.” Terrance didn’t give her a chance to speak. Her jaw gapped open as he rambled on. “I got it from Hubert. You know, the new janitor for your floor, I ran into him at the one-hour dry cleaner on Rosemary Street. Started up a conversation with him, you know, welcome him to the neighborhood. Seems he’s not so nice. Doesn’t like being spoken to, said I talk too much, grabbed the card from the rack of local business cards on the wall and handed it to me. Said maybe it could help me learn to shut up. Can you believe that?” He shrugged with a laugh. “One look at the card and I thought you could use it. Instead Louisa tried it. How did you think she got over that nail-biting tendency of hers?”

  Staring at him, Amelia couldn’t believe he’d stated all that without so much as catching a breath. She closed her mouth, tightly. He had to be speaking utter nonsense. Louisa had told her she’d quit by keeping lemon juice on her nails and the taste turned her off. If what Terrence said was true—and she doubted it—Louisa had lied. She huffed as she faced Terrence.

  “Terrence, I’m sorry it’s come to this,” she gasped out between clenched teeth. She couldn’t wait to get hold of Louisa. Terrence had to have found out about her visits to the hypnotist through her. It didn’t make sense why Louisa would say anything to him. They both knew Terrence was a bit on the talkative side. Even if he did give her the hypnotist information, Louisa was her friend and this was supposed to be a secret.

  Taking a deep breath, Amelia reined in her anger. Terrence wasn’t at fault for Louisa’s loose lips. She just wished this hadn’t been shared with talkative Terrence. It wasn’t his looks that turned her off. It was his non-stop chitchat. The black plastic frames, small dark eyes, and slicked back, short hairstyle gave him a “Buddy Holly” appeal. She’d dated the nerdy type before and enjoyed intellectual conversations.