Jenn continued to lull him, stopping him from coming out of the trance until they reached the hotel. After paying the driver, she brought him back to her suite.

"Wow," was the first thing Ray said when they entered the suite.

He settled down on the couch in the living area, glancing around her place. Jenn closed the door behind her and locked it while she watched him closely.

"You actually live here?" he asked, turning around to look at her.

She simply moved towards the couch, sat down beside him whilst setting her backpack at the side of the couch, and subtly placed her hand on his. Then Jenn squeezed his hand lightly, breaking his trance. "Wake."

Ray's eyes went blank for a moment. Then he blinked at her and took in his surroundings once again.

"What is this place?" Confusion coloured his face and he touched a hand to his forehead. "And how did I get here?"

Ray was frowning to himself, plainly trying to recall what had happened. "The last thing I remembered was ..." His eyes widened in disbelief as he raised his eyes to meet hers. "We were ... kissing?"

"You remember?" she asked warily, observing his face.

"Barely – just bits of it." He scratched the back of his head.

"Huh," Jenn merely uttered. Staring at the pink tinge on his cheeks, she realised that Ray wasn't actually a flirt. If he were, he would have looked anything but shy. This flirtatious side that he had been displaying the past few days must be a side effect of being hypnotised by the real killer. It was a mask to hide his guilt and probably to carry out his commands from the hypnotist – whatever they were.

Jenn knew that Ray remembered much more than he was letting on. Well, it did make sense. After all, to put someone in a trance was nearly impossible after a kiss, much less to suppress his memory. She did quite well for herself, Jenn thought.

Ray avoided her gaze, pushing away the images in his head. "Where am I?" he asked in a clear attempt to fill the awkward silence.

"My suite." She got up from the couch and went to the kitchen. It was a good thing that she'd prepared some hot water with the electric water boiler this morning before she left to visit Ray. "We'll be staying here for the time being." She explained as she made a cup of tea.

"Oh," Ray muttered, glancing around again. When her words finally registered, he stood up immediately. "Wait – what?"

Jenn came back into the room and set the cup of tea that she had made for him on the coffee table.

He stared at her, incredulous. "We? As in you and me?"

"There's no one else here, right?" She pretended to look around. "So yes, you and me."

There was a sudden look of remembrance on his face. Then Jenn saw his eyes flashing around, looking for a way to escape, and she knew that Ray must have recalled the confrontation that took place this morning.

"Sit down," she commanded, eyeing him with such intensity that it made him obey her. Then she sighed. "You're confused," she stated.

He regarded her with wary eyes. "Well, let's see. You came over to my house and confronted me about the girls. And I also gave you my confession. You could have handed me over to the police and closed the case. Then suddenly, despite my confession, you decided that I'm not the killer. Instead, you kidnapped me. How can I not be confused?"

She exhaled deeply through her nose. He should know the truth. "You might want to have some tea first before I start explaining," she said with a stoic expression on her face.

As Ray hesitantly took a sip of tea, she slid her hand into her pocket. She took out her badge and showed it to him. "The truth is, I'm not Jennifer Cole anymore. My new identity is Catherine Nelson, special agent of the National Security Secret Service. I'm assigned here to investigate the murders of the six girls in this town." She paused, letting her words sink.

Ray's eyes widened at the sight of her badge, and an expression of shock was frozen on his face. Ray opened his mouth to say something, only to close it again when no words came out.

Jenn continued. "The day you first saw me back in town was the day I arrived. I have been investigating the case since then. At the moment, you were not on my suspect list. It was only when I went back to the crime scenes to look for evidence that I started to think that the culprit was you. Your name was carved into a wooden chair to which the first victim was tied.

"After that, I went to see a few witnesses who claimed that they saw one of the victims leaving a party with you the night before she died. That was how I confirmed you as the killer. But then when I went to your house this morning, I observed you while I confronted you about it. You were too eager to confess your crime, and you had no idea at all about your motive for committing the murders. You displayed no signs of psychopathy or mental disorder, which could have explained your lack of motives. You also made it obvious that you are not a thrill killer, so you made it quite hard for me to actually pin you down as a serial killer.

"Also, your pupils were dilated the whole time we talked. Your pulse was considerably steady for someone who had just admitted to committing a murder. So it led only to one explanation: hypnosis."

At this point, Ray looked totally flabbergasted. He started shaking his head, denying her words. "It couldn't be. It's not true. I am not hypnotised, okay? You've got it all wrong. I feel perfectly normal."

"So you feel normal too, being a serial killer?"

"I ..." He frowned, biting his lip, looking as if his thoughts were in a jumble.

She kept her voice firm. "Have you ever thought about stopping after killing so many innocent young ladies?"

"They deserved it. They deserved to die." He repeated the words to himself like a mantra. "They deserved it."

"What did they ever do to deserve such punishment?" she pushed on, finding a crack in the barrier in his mind. "Why did they deserve to die?"

Once again, he was stuck at this question. His hands were tightly clenched into fist while his eyes went wild, searching for answers.

She started over. "So tell me again: did you really kill them?"

"Yes," Ray answered automatically.

"Then tell me how you killed the girls," she challenged.

That shut him up quickly.

"As you can see, you have no idea why or how you killed those girls. How can you expect me to believe that you're the culprit? It was obvious that the hypnotist – whoever that is – put that idea into your head. Believe it or not, the flaw to this ingenious plan of the real killer is you."

When she saw that he was still unconvinced, she explained further. "Ray, the killer simply used you as a bait to bring the victims to him. He used you to charm the victims so that they would follow willingly when you brought them to him. With your good looks and sweet words, it's not hard for you to get them to fall for you."

"But I'm not a player. I don't even flirt!" he blurted out, plainly incredulous. Then, as if he'd just realised what he had said, he blushed. "Well, it's not that I can't do it; I just never tried to flirt." He scratched the back of his head.

Jenn let out a chuckle. Only Ray could manage to feel embarrassed over something as trivial as this during such a crucial moment. Then she composed herself. "Then how did you convince them to leave the parties with you?"

"I just chatted with them ..." he answered, but he started to sound doubtful of himself.

"That's what you thought you were doing," Jenn stated calmly. "But what really happened was an entirely different thing."

When Ray didn't argue with her explanation, she carried on. "He was preparing you as his escape plan. You were meant to take the blame all along. Your name was carved by the victim on the chair because she knew that you were the one who abducted her.

"She was blindfolded when she woke up, tied to a chair. She couldn't see who the captor was, so she assumed that it was you too. Hence your name on the chair." She paused to see how well he was coping with all this. He seemed to be doing okay. "You know, it kind of surprised me that the killer managed to hypnotise you to believe that you are responsible for all this. After all, a subject cannot be hypnotised to do something against his morals or values. Though in your case, you were hypnotised to believe something and not actually do it all the same."

A strange look flickered across his face, disappearing as soon as it appeared. But Jenn caught it nevertheless. "Unless, of course, deep down you don't believe it," she said suggestively.

Ray looked torn. He squeezed his eyes shut, holding his head in his hands. "Look, I had no choice," he finally confessed, sounding desperate. "I have to believe it."

"You don't remember anything during the time when the murders took place, do you?" She spoke calmly, figuring it out all by herself.

His eyes snapped open. "How did you ...?"

"The first step to insert falsified information in one's mind is self-doubt. "How else would the killer have you convince yourself that you are guilty?"

Ray nodded in comprehension. Then he proceeded to explain his situation. "At first, all I knew was that I brought those girls away from the parties. I wasn't sure why I did so. I just had to, you know." He looked up as if to be sure she understood his meaning. Jenn gave him an encouraging nod, so he went on. "I assumed that I was drunk, considering the fact that I didn't know what I was actually doing or why I did any of the things I did. Well, I did bring them out of parties without any particular reason," he muttered. "Anyway, after I left with the girls, I kind of blacked out. And when I woke up, I was already back at my house.

"The day after each party, I woke up to the news of a girl's death. I had no idea what I had done to her. I thought that I was losing it, you know. I tried to stop myself from attending parties, but it didn't work. I didn't even realise what I was actually doing until after the parties, when I woke up to headaches. It kept happening again and again, but I didn't know how to stop it. It just happened, you know. I felt so bad to think that I'd killed them without even realising it. It was so disgusting." He pressed his fist to his mouth as if to stop himself from screaming aloud.

Jenn continued where he'd left off, speaking slowly, making sure he heard every word she said. "But after a while, you got used to it. You convinced yourself that the fault wasn't entirely on you because you were drunk every time it happened. Deep down, you felt bad for their deaths. But since you couldn't stop it from happening again and you were afraid to turn yourself in, you figured that accepting who you are would probably hurt less, so you turned off your conscience and kept quiet.

"That is, until just now. When I confronted you, you jumped at the chance to confess what you thought you had done. You had never had enough courage to go to the police, so when I came to you and gave you a chance to confess, you were more than happy to do it," she concluded. "So in a way, your conscience still exists inside you. You just need to believe it."

He nodded in resignation, finally accepting the truth. "You got it all correct this time," Ray muttered. Then he laughed dryly. "Hypnotised, huh? But I feel so normal."

"That's what every person under hypnosis thinks. It is a tough fact to accept." Jenn shrugged. "But now that I have clarified the situation to you, I suppose that you would rather believe that you're hypnotised rather than think that you're a serial killer." She gave him a pointed look.

He sighed. "Yeah, I guess so." Then he met her gaze. "You really have changed." He said suddenly, catching her off guard. "The Jenn I used to know could never be as sharp as you are right now."

She chuckled, but there was a hint of sadness in her voice. "Time changes a person."

"I suppose so," Ray said, mostly to himself. Then his eyes focused on her again. "For a moment, I almost thought that you're psychic."

His words made her laugh. "There's no such thing as psychic, though people do say I'm one. I don't really see myself as psychic; instead I think it's just a gift – or sometimes a curse. Sometimes it's annoying analysing idiotic or spiteful people. It makes me feel that I'm like them too, being able to understand their thoughts."

"You read minds?" he asked in awe.

"No." She frowned. "That would make it a whole lot worse." She shuddered at the thought. "I study people. I can analyse a person instantly and anticipate his thoughts and actions based on his behaviour. That's all."

"Cool." He raised his eyebrows with a hint of amazement.

"Not." She made a face. "It is useful during my missions and cases, but at other times, it's just plain irritating. Period. That's why I switch it off most of the time."

"You can ... switch it off?"

She paused to think of an understandable explanation. "Actually, it's more like reminding myself not to pay too much attention to body language and micro-expressions, or something like that. I focus on certain thoughts rather than my surroundings and ..." She trailed off and sighed. "It's complicated." She waved her hand, dismissing the topic. Right now, she needed to make sure that Ray had really accepted the fact that he was under hypnosis. "So—"

Her cell phone rang, interrupting her. Much to her chagrin, it was Ben.