Melissa MacNeal - Beyond Redemption

"Now, get your ass outside and be sure they tie that noose right!" the magistrate rasped. "No more mistakes! And not a word about Billy being gone, for God's sake! Just FIND him!"

Out the door he strode, my buttonhook in his hand. A nervous Virgil Furmeister followed him like a puppy, yapping about tracing the Gypsies' trail in the snow and other such nonsense. The only trail that overblown oaf could follow was the aroma of fresh pie coming from Etta's oven. Never mind about the bereaved nanny still stuck in the other damn cell!

I was smiling, however. Just waiting for their voices to fade through the front entrance…waiting for the stuffy little jailhouse to ring with silence after a night that defied description for all of us. Then I slipped through the cell door I'd left unlocked, careful not to let its hinges squeal on me.

I could only hope I'd learned enough by staying behind, risking my own future credibility, to clear Billy's name. As I blended with the back alley's shadows to reach my office again, the sight of that noose was a bleak reminder that, like the card in Pandora's tarot deck, Lady Justice balanced her scales in one hand-but wielded a terrible, swift sword with the other.

I had to do the prudent thing, before Billy and I got slashed with that weapon.

For nearly three hours I worked on files in my office with the lights off-long enough to watch from behind my closed curtains as Judge Legg and Nathaniel Dammet left the cemetery, but not long enough for the magistrate to start after Billy Tripplehorn. Quietly, still dressed in Andrea's dress and heavy cloak, I drove the buggy down the back alleys to the other side of town. I coaxed Dory into a canter when we reached the road.

Bless the little mare, she understood the urgency of my mission. We followed the meandering road through a countryside still dusted with snow, beneath a leaden sky that promised more by day's end. I shivered beneath my cloak, but as the orphanage and ivy-covered mansion came into view, it was more than mere weather chilling me to the core.

Had Pandora, Pink, and Perfidia spared Billy-three playful pusses toying with a new mouse? Or had they converged on him without mercy, to enslave him with their deadly passions? They would remind him, of course, that his eternal devotion was the least he owed them, for saving him from Judge Legg's noose-or even from the stranglehold Lucy would've caught him with, had she lived. They were a special, splendid trio of queens, but they expected a man's all in return for their favors!

Over the centuries of their combined existence, the Three P's had seduced millions of dollars from suitors who were literally dying to meet them, so they no longer pursued moneyed men to insure their survival. No, in this present incarnation, they'd taken on a godlier mission in the orphanage-although that came down to vanity, really: they believed the blood of younger, untainted victims would prolong their youthful beauty. It assuaged their occasional twinges of social conscience, spending that old blood money to feed and clothe unwanted children. And it gave them a sense of purpose, however skewed, that convinced them they had every right to indulge their more hedonistic whims, as well.

Hence, their foray into town last night-the first I'd known of in years-was for the pleasure of duping Virgil Furmeister, and to bring Billy back as their prize. I couldn't dispute their taste, for Tripplehorn was a prime morsel indeed. And right now, at midday, he was safe from their clutches.

I wondered again, however, what they'd done with him when they got him home…just how far they planned to take him…how deeply they intended to sink their shimmering teeth to keep him in their thrall-and to ruin any chance I might have at a normal relationship. They knew, of course, that if Billy lured me away from their nether nest, they'd be hard pressed to replace their link to the natural, living world-the liaison who saved them from their ancient roles as predators constantly on the hunt.

It was no pretty business, being a vampire.

And it was no easy feat, juggling my duality to maintain the luxury they now enjoyed, in these wooded hills beyond Redemption. I sensed, as I parked the buggy and settled Dory into the stable, that the delicate balance keeping the living and the undead in their rightful spheres was being tested every second. Billy Tripplehorn could well be the nugget that tipped the scales-especially with the magistrate pinning Lucy's murder on him.

I stepped through the back service entrance, pausing to get a sense of any new secrets these old walls had witnessed. While I could not listen in on others' thoughts or coax them to go my way, as the three Sisters did, I had developed a knack for knowing when things had gone awry. Pink, Perfidia and Pandora weren't really such a bloodthirsty lot-they just had to eat, like the rest of us. And their need to feed was the axis upon which our entire world rotated. When I heard a giggle and the furtive slap of flesh upon flesh, I relaxed.

A peek into the parlor revealed Cerise-completely out of uniform-clearing away cups from bedtime refreshments. In reality, she was wagging her pretty ass at Justin and his brother as she leaned over the low table. Not ones to ignore such an invitation, the blond twins moved to either side of her to fondle a pert breast with one hand while smacking her backside with the other. The dishes in her hands rattled, and her face tightened with the effort it took not to drop them, but she seemed in no hurry to stand up straight again.

Smack! went the hand on one side, punctuated by the maid's laughter, and then smack! came the answering slap from the other. I hated to interrupt their fun, but they carried on this way for hours when the Sisters weren't supervising them.

I cleared my throat to alert them to my presence. "Where's Billy?"

Cerise cocked her head, looking my direction. "Upstairs asleep, cherie."

I let out the breath I hadn't realized I was holding. "And the Sisters have fed, and are resting peacefully?"

Justin and Jeremy nodded, fixing me with the glazed look of those held in that hypnotic limbo brought on by vampires who'd spared their lives but enslaved them. It was best for all of us that our maid-who was no more French than I, but had been convinced by Pandora to behave that way-and her two cohorts lived in a trance that enabled them to pick out the Sisters' living dinner and then dispatch the remains. This saved me the horrible heartache of sorting through the children, and kept Pandora, Perfidia, and Pink in a rosy state of satiation. And when those three ladies were happy, everyone was happy!

"You are exhausted, Mademoiselle," the maid continued with a concerned pucker of her brows. "And you look-how you say? Ravished? Or ravishing?"

I chuckled in spite of my weariness. Again, her feigning ignorance of the English language came from the total conviction that she'd been imported here to serve: Cerise, like myself, had been abandoned at the orphanage, and had somehow found favor enough to survive the Sisters' feedings.

"Ravished, my dear-and then held in jail with that idiot Furmeister, until I could slip away. Billy and his new playmates owe me one hell of an explanation!"

The three domestics exchanged a knowing glance. Their fixed, polite smiles told me they'd been instructed to keep the Sisters' recent activities secret…yet another hypnotic suggestion no amount of my prying would unlock. I suspected the blond twins, Justin and Jeremy, had also been spared years ago because Perfidia so easily made them her mental slaves: her mesmerizing gaze overrode the impulsive behavior common to most young men, and they obeyed her like loyal puppies.

"I'll run your bath, Andrea," said Jeremy with a slight bow. "Downstairs, in the deeper tub."