Blow Your Mind Pt 12

I hope you are all liking the series so far. Please be polite in the comments, even if it's negative. This one is a lot longer as Brandi and Kory work on how to co-exist and how their powers are changing.

PART XII

Brandi yawned as she got out of her Uber and started the complex system of undoing her numerous alarms to get into her condo. Brandi could tell Kory was feeling the sun and smelling the sea and taking it all in.

After several minutes they got inside and Kory let out a whistle. "Nice place Brandi. Really nice. Right on the ocean, lots of private security, top line systems, and I'm betting you have some other less obvious things in place?"

"Yes and thank you. I've modified some of the alarm systems and made some of my own personal items. If you happen to get control of my body, be careful what you touch without checking first."

Kory snickered. Brandi walked all through her place checking various things and items, noting that no one had been inside since she had left nearly two months back. She checked her office last and swept it for bugs. Then she sat down and pulled out her new burn phone. She dialed the number and got Mr. Case right away.

"Brandi, so good to hear from you. The client is VERY pleased with your work. He included a bonus for you and said that things are going smoothly. I have to add my own thanks as this one was a hard one. That being said, we need to talk. Very soon. I want to hear details and we need to be sure to properly document this for future possibilities."

"Of course, are you free at 3pm?"

"Yes, make it the office at 34

th

and White."

"Will do."

"One other thing. Your boyfriend Steve has been calling the office since you went out of town. We told him you had forgotten your phone and were on assignment, but I get the distinct feeling he is going to ask a lot of questions and not take wave offs this time."

"That is not good."

"Not it's not. I don't presume to tell you how to live your life Brandi, but you need to handle this. If he won't back off, you may need to cut him loose."

"I will handle it."

The phone went dead and Kory let out another low whistle. Brandi felt some alertness and alarm from Kory.

"That was Mr. Case I take it? Okay, yeah, I can see why you are nervous about him."

Brandi blinked. "You, wait, from just that?"

Brandi could feel Kory's link pulse wariness. "Something about his tone. Call it gut feelings, but I've dealt with guys who are dangerous and the really dangerous ones are the ones that have no tone. He was neutral, I mean dead neutral. It's hard to pick up, most people who don't deal with danger never notice. But for someone like me? Yeah, that is the tone of someone you do NOT want to fuck with. He could talk to you about baseball and killing a guy with a screwdriver in the same conversation and not even break stride. I think we made the right call NOT telling him."

Brandi nodded and looked at the clock. "About noon. We can get cleaned up and then I'll call my boyfriend and have him come over."

"We need to fix him fast."

Brandi paused at Kory's tone. "Meaning, shit, yeah, I get it. Mr. Case didn't exactly leave any room for doubt and I need to be sure Steve doesn't do something stupid."

"That him?"

Brandi looked at a picture on her desk of her and Steve on a large boat that they had taken at a party right as Steve had closed a big deal for some real estate. It had been a fun night and she had left the next day for her Chicago assignment.

"Yes, that's him. He's fun, and rich, and connected. And I'm pretty sure he's head over heels in love with me."

"You got that right. That look in his eyes? Oh yeah, he's smitten. Fuck, this could be a problem. But he's handsome and looks great, so maybe the solution will be fun. In fact, maybe we can try something out."

Brandi would have gotten mad at Kory but she felt the link. Kory was thinking hard about something. Then Brandi blinked.

"Donni."

"Yeah, Donni. Her mind was manipulatable when we were having sex. We might be able to modify his memories about this." Kory said.

Brandi tapped her lip and smiled. "That might work, but we need to do a test run first. There is something more to this. When I was scissoring at the club going after McLean, I changed some memories. With Donni though it felt like something more. We might be able to do something else, but we need to test it first. Steve isn't going to be a lab rat."

"Yeah, that makes sense. I get you like the guy, but if he's connected we need to be careful about how we work with his mind."

Brandi opened her backpack and pulled out Kory's laptop and the hard-drives she had found. Brandi felt Kory tense up a bit, but she was also relieved and excited.

"Glad to see this stuff?"

"Yes very. If I ever try to get back into Chicago, this stuff will get me in the door."

"I used your laptop back in St. Louis, I didn't see anything on it and the password was stupid simple."

"Feh, who keeps anything on a laptop anymore? The hard drives are the key. That one with the red dot is my blackmail stuff. Photos, videos, scanned papers and so on. I could put away the entire Chicago mob, half the police force and probably the entire city government with that. The FBI would pay me their yearly budget for that."

Brandi made a mental note to see about copying it sometime. "And this one?"

"That is my rainy day money. Account information for a couple of offshore accounts, and a bunch of bitcoin."

"Nice. And this?"

"Personal stuff and my "business plan" for running the city. I keep a lot of it in my head, easy when you are a genius, but my basic blueprint and my historic notes are on that. I can adjust on the fly, but I need to have it mapped out to really get the idea down and to make decisions."

"I get you, I use that white board and the whole wall there when making my plans. You have to be able to see it, and not just in your head."

"You got it girlfriend. Great minds think alike after all."

They both giggled at that.

"Okay Kory, here's the deal. I am going to lock up your stuff in a safe. I am not going to touch your money or your stuff. We will keep it here safe for you for when we get you out of me."

"Thank you. I appreciate that. Who knows, maybe I'll just retire after all this is done."

"I really doubt it, you don't seem like the person who retires."

"Well, neither do you."

Brandi finished emptying the backpack and opened one of her safes. She had several, and this was a spare one. She put everything in it and locked it up. She turned back to the backpack and then remembered one of the interior pockets. She reached in and pulled out several bags of that synthetic coke she had taken.

As soon as she saw it, she felt a craving. Not huge, not like she got when she didn't feed for several days, but a dull ache or craving. Brandi felt Kory's link pulse a bit and it seemed similar to her own feelings.

"So what do we do with this?" Kory asked.

Brandi licked her lips. "Um, I took it because I am curious as to how it might have affected me, well, us, when we had our incident. It's not normal coke, so I am wondering if maybe it can help us fix our problem."

Brandi felt Kory thinking, and she was thinking herself. "Hmm, I can get this to Mr. Case and have him run tests for me. Or..."

"Kory, I'm a brilliant chemist. And you were the one who was overseeing the development of this product. I can use my company's assets and have them test it for me. Or, with a little bit of shopping and setting up I can run some tests myself."

Kory seemed to focus a bit more. "Making this stuff wasn't that hard. I was surprised by how little equipment was needed. It's the chemical base materials that are the issue."

Brandi mentally shook her head. "Nope, not for our situation. You are thinking in terms of market, I'm thinking in terms of just personal. We are not making this for distribution, we are making it to test it and figure out if it can help us or not. That means the amount of chemicals we need we can likely get at a chemical supply store with no issues. It's not like we are cooking meth for sale, we are taking several ounces at most."

"Fuck, didn't think of that. Okay, but Miami is your boss's base, he likely keeps tabs on you. Starting up a lab is going to get noticed and he will ask questions."

"I am thinking we tell him some of the story. The coke boost was real, we can tell him that much. I've got an idea about the rest to tell him. And then I show him what I have and tell him I want to dig into it. He knows I'm a god-honest chemist and a really good one at that. Why wouldn't he let me work on it?"

Kory focused. Brandi could sense she was running it through her head, just like she did. After a moment Kory said "I think that will work. Your boss is a guy who catches lies and reads people for a living, so the story we tell needs to have as much truth to it as possible. In my experience, if you tell a story that is 90% true you can get away with bullshitting the last 10%."

Brandi mentally nodded. "I agree. For us, we can likely catch even that 10%. You see how sensitive we are, I'm practically a walking lie detector. But Mr. Case is an exception, he's hard to read and he is a guy who is exactly what you said earlier. We need to be careful."

Brandi picked up the bag and carefully tipped some out onto a piece of paper. She got another plastic bag from the kitchen and poured it into the other bag. She locked that in the safe with Kory's stuff.

"Just in case we need some at a later time. Mr. Case may want to take all of it and I don't want to cause any fuss."

Brandi could fell Kory was focused on the coke. And she was too. The craving was still minor, but it was like a little fly buzzing her head, just enough to annoy but you could ignore it if you focused.

"Kory, I think we need to do something, go for a walk or hit the pool."

"Yeah, I think some air is what we need."

Brandi went into her bedroom and changed into some workout clothes. Brandi could feel Kory looking over her closet. She could feel approval and some jealousy.

"Problem?"

"Fuck. I can't get over the fact we feel each other like this. You have an awesome wardrobe, and I'm jealous as fuck. This number? Sexy as hell, I bet you cause men to hyperventilate when you wear it. But classy. This is top shelf high dollar."

"Thank you. And right now it's more correct to say "Ours". Like it or not, you just got a new wardrobe."

Brandi could feel Kory looking over the dresses and shoes and feeling happy. Almost giddy. And then some disappointment.

"What's the matter?"

"I could have never worn any of this."

"Why not? You were a molten hot hottie, your body would have killed this one." Brandi said pulling out a short black dress.

"Yeah, my body would have. But I would have stood out like a sore thumb. You wear a dress like that and you have to act the part."

Brandi realized what she was getting at. "Wow. Kory is talking about not fitting into high society. She's sad because she felt that even with the power she had she wouldn't have fit in."

"Damn girl! There may be some more benefits to this for you than you or I realize."

"What do you mean?"

"I know how to fit in. I copied high class social skills from a couple of high dollar escorts and a couple of trophy wives I worked over. If you are going to be a shape-shifter you need to not only look the part, but act it. I'll give you the best tutorial you've ever had."

Brandi could feel Kory was excited about that. And also touched. "Thank you. That is nice for you to do, but I guess I'd get it anyway since you would put on the airs regardless."

"That is true, but it's one thing to just watch. It's another to be tutored while you watch."

Kory seemed to agree with that based on the feeling, but she didn't reply as Brandi pulled on her workout clothes.

Brandi put up her hair in a ponytail and put on her sneakers. "How about a job along the beach?"

"Sounds nice. Funny, strippers and high society both wear the same workout clothing."

Brandi checked herself out in the mirror. Her body was in great shape and her figure was killing the skin-tight leggings and athletic bra. She blew a kiss at the figure. "That's because both of them are trying to look the same type of hot in this getup."

"Well, you checked that block."

Brandi laughed and headed towards the door. Just as she neared it the door buzzer buzzed.

"Huh. I wonder who that is?" Brandi clicked on her camera. A young woman with blonde hair was standing in front of her door, dressed in a fashionable business blouse and skirt holding two cup of coffee. Brandi didn't recognize her.

Brandi clicked on the speaker. "Yes?"

"Excuse me, is Ms. Mimms home? I'm her new neighbor, Cynthia Banners. I just moved in two months ago, and I saw someone entering the apartment earlier and wanted to check to see if my mystery neighbor was back from her job."

"Oh wonderful, looks like we have a new friend." Kory said with some annoyance and humor.

"This girl, seems a bit familiar now that I hear her voice...Oh, she was at one of the after-hours events. I met her at the last one before Chicago. Peppy. Very peppy." Brandi replied internally.

"Oh sure, I remember you. We met at the after-hours cocktail party right before I had to leave for my consulting job in Denver. Hang on."

"Shit, you are going to let this dork in? She sounds like another one of those busy-bodies who likes to get into everyone's business."

"Can't wait for her to leave, and she'll be back anyway. Kinda curious why she moved in here though."

"Why's that?"

"She doesn't have that high paying a job, one of those society gigs, curator or something, and this place is expensive."

"Maybe she lives on her parent's dime."

"Maybe, but I'm getting the feeling that ain't it."

Brandi opened the door and Cynthia pushed right in and took her hand.

"Oh, so glad to meet you again! I was so excited to hear that we were neighbors, but then I never saw you. I was wondering what happened. All our friends at the cocktail hour were wondering if you would ever come back." She gushed.

Brandi smiled and shook her hand. But she was looking her in the eyes and immediately got an off feeling.

"This bitch is up to something." Kory said.

"Yes, I'm getting that feeling too. Those eyes have no smile to them."

"Fuck the smile in the eyes, although that is a good one. That smile is forced, see the way her lips turn?"

"Good catch. I was going off her breathing and her facial twitching, it's not someone who is calm."

"Oooo, got it. Damn, you are not kidding, you are a walking sensor! Yeah, I can see her facial twitches, I can hear her rapid breathing, shit I can feel her heartrate. She's hiding something."

Brandi nodded and smiled as Cynthia babbled on about various people at the cocktail party and how they all missed her.

"Well, I'm back and I will be trying to attend the next one, but I was heading out for a jog and..."

"Oh of course, here let me put this down in your kitchen and I'll be on my way!" Cynthia said and moved right past Brandi and into her apartment.

"Hey! I didn't..."

"Not a problem at all, oh lovely place you have! And this must be your kitchen. And...what is this?"

Brandi came behind her and saw that she was bending down. Brandi sensed some excitement off of Cynthia.

"Uh oh." Kory said.

"I am seeing it." Brandi replied.

"What may I ask is this?" Cynthia said as she straightened up and turned to face Brandi. Brandi noted a look of triumph in her eyes even though she put on a puzzled face. In her hand she held a small baggie of white powder.

"Oh shit! That must have fallen out of the backpack when we came in and were digging around! I took several sample bags from your safe house!" Brandi thought.

Brandi looked at the bag with a puzzled look. "Where did that come from?"

Cynthia held up the bag and gave a sympathetic smile. "Not yours? Well, that is odd. Don't worry though Brandi, I won't tell anyone. As far as I am concerned this never happened."

Brandi snarled internally. "What the fuck is this idiot on about?" Brandi kept her face straight and smiled back as she easily noted Cynthia's face. Her eyes had a slight look of triumph, her smile was obviously NOT about being concerned, and her breathing was definitely excited.

Kory started laughing. "Cripes Brandi, she thinks she had the goods on you! Oldest trick in the book, be the best friend of your most hated enemy. Get them to trust you and then stab them in the back. She is going to try and be your best friend and use this against you when she needs to."

Brandi nearly gaped openly but was able to control her face. "For the love of God! Seriously? I come back after all of this crap in Chicago and THIS is what I have to deal with first thing? Some dumb blonde wanting to play social queen bee drama games?"

"Well Brandi dear, no one needs to know about this "mystery". After all, you are such a popular figure with the young set here in Miami, it would be terrible for this to come out." Cynthia said with a mock tone of sympathy that Brandi could hear through a mile away.

"Oh fuck this. Brandi, let's fuck this cunt's head up!"

"Agreed!" Brandi said out loud.

"I be......"

Brandi moved forward and grabbed Cynthia. She kissed her full on the lips and Brandi dove into her head like she was an eggbeater going after batter. Brandi felt a full connection and she could sense Cynthia's mind turning into puree under her power.

She broke the kiss and let Cynthia simply slump to the floor in a heap. Cynthia's eyes were rolled up in her head and she was drooling. Brandi laughed and Kory matched her.

"God, what a moron! Of all the dumb shit to happen, having some bimbo trying to play high school drama games was NOT one I was expecting. Damn, she was planning on taking up my whole day to integrate herself as my new bestie." Brandi thought.

"Yeah. This chick's a gold digger, and not a very good one at that. She tried to move way to fast and force things. I'm betting she was making passes at your boyfriend right and left while you were gone while playing the sympathy card. "Oh Steve, I don't know why Brandi would jut up and leave you, I'm sure it's not you. Being such a career-woman she has to focus on her work, you understand." And so on and so on."

"Feh, that's a sure thing. Hmmm, we have about 4 hours until we have to meet my boss. We can dump this moron outside, go for a run, and forget about it."

"Or...maybe we can do an experiment."

"What do you mean Kory?"

"Remember about not wanting to hurt Steve? Well, it seems like we have an ideal test subject that is literally at our feet."

Brandi looked down and tapped her lip while she thought about it.

"Hmmmm, that's not a bad idea. No rush, and she still pretty new in town. Not connected, probably, but we can verify that easy enough. And I want to be sure about this. She may be a stupid gold-digger, but then again, she might be something else. Having some jealous bitch decide she wants to be the queen and then going after the one they think is in the way is pretty typical in the crowd I'm in, but given my real job we can't afford to assume shit."

"Great minds think alike." Kory replied with a feeling that made Brandi think she was grinning.

Brandi grabbed Cynthia by her feet and dragged her to her guest room. She heaved her up on the bed and then went back to make sure the door was secured. Brandi dumped the coffees in the sink and looked around to make sure the bimbo hadn't dropped anything. Aside from her keys which Brandi tossed on a small stand by the door, there was only the bag of coke.

Brandi pursed her lips. "Hmmmm, let's keep this handy. We might think of a use for it." She thought as she tucked it into her bra.