*

18

S he did not know how long she had been lying on the uncovered mattress in this immense room, nothing to cover herself but the soiled damp sheet that clung to her naked flesh. She had no sense of time or space, perhaps because of the drugs, perhaps because the extended separation from the outside world, from the normal diurnal cycles of day and night, had so thoroughly eliminated her sense of time and place.

She knew she was no longer in the chapel. This room had no rose window, no windows at all, no source of light but the glaring fluorescent bulbs that hung directly overhead. Her face and hair were sticky with blood. The pattern had repeated itself over and over again-the bright lights, the sharp pain, the electric current rippling through her body, the physical punishment, the moments of calm interrupted by more agonizing pain. The draining. And the questions, the never-ending questions. She had told them everything she knew but they acted as if they did not believe her, as if she might actually lie to them. For what? For Colleen? She was beyond help. For Veronica? She, too, was long gone. And she had no idea where Amber was, or even if she was still alive. There was nothing she could tell them. And yet, the needle remained in her arm and the relentless questioning went on and on and on…

Her vision was a turbid fog, just like her brain, and since they all wore identical robes, she couldn’t be sure who it was when the door opened. The sound of his voice told her-it was the Sire. He stood beside the bed upon which she lay. She gazed at his long hair, his thin blood-red lips and the phlegmatic expression she had come to interpret as a smile of pleasure.

“I must know everything,” he said simply.

“I’ve told you everything.”

“What you have told me is useless.”

“I don’t know anything about Amber.”

“Never mind that. I found Amber on my own.”

“Is she here?”

“No. I couldn’t get her away. There were too many people around. I had to simply… eliminate the threat.”

“What does that mean?”

“What I need to know now is who else you have spoken to. Friends? Family? Your sister? My minions tell me she’s in town. Looking for you. What did you tell her, Beatrice?”

“Nothing. I promise you. Nothing!”

He leaned closer, letting her feel his heat, his breath, his intoxicating scent. Despite herself, she was aroused beyond anything she had ever imagined in her life; her need was so intense she would do anything.

“I can give you so much,” he said, whispering into her ear. “Make you feel like you’ve never felt before.”

“Oh please. Oh please yes please.” She squirmed on the table, her legs thrashing, her hips grinding. “Please. Give it to me. Give it to me!”

“Only when there are no more secrets. When there is nothing between us.”

“There is nothing!” she screamed, and even though her arm was hooked to the IV, she jerked forward, teeth gnashing, biting at him. “Please! I burn, master. I burn!”

“And if I give you what you want, what will you give me, my darling?”

She jerked back and forth on the table, growling like a feral beast. “Punish me, master.”

“Do you deserve to be punished?”

“I want to feel the hurt,” she gasped. “I need the hurt.”

“You must control yourself, my child.”

“Hurt me!” she screamed, an earsplitting cry that reverberated through the room. All at once he reared back his hand and hit her, his knuckles smashing against her face. A trickle of blood flowed from the corner of her lips. She thrust her tongue out and licked it up, rubbing it across her lips, savoring the taste. “I need more, master.” Her voice was low and guttural. “You know what I need.”

“Very well.” He leaned back, walking a finger across her barely covered chest, pinning her to the table not with his finger but with the intensity of his eyes. “I believe you are sincere. I will give you what you crave. Because you can still be of use to us. Soon we will perform the final rite of purification. And then, my dear-” He brushed the matted hair from her face. “-then we will have all of eternity before us.”

19

“I still can’t believe it,” Glancy said, pounding his fist on the conference table. “As long as I’ve been in politics, I’ve never been played like that. I might have believed it from anyone else, but not Shandy. Not in a million years.”

Ben tried to be sympathetic. “Just shows to go you. You can never really know a person.”

“But I did know her, Ben. I did. I just didn’t see this coming.”

“Well, it’s over now. We have to move on.” They were seated around a conference table in Ben’s borrowed law offices. After hours of being grilled by the police about the death of Amber Daily, Loving had dropped by to deliver an update, then left again to resume his investigation. Christina and Jones were present, though, as well as all the members-all the remaining members-of Glancy’s staff. Amanda Burton was fielding phone calls from the press, Marshall Bressler was on his cell trying to minimize the political damage, and Hazel was keyboarding a flurry of documents, some legal, some political. “What was in that letter Shandy gave you, anyway? Before court was in session.”

“The height of objurgation.” Glancy flung it across the table. “Her letter of resignation.”

“How decent of her,” Christina said. “Saved you the trouble of firing her.”

“And gave her an out in the event that she might be held in contempt of Congress for testifying against me,” Glancy said. “Not that any charges are likely to be brought now. The press are treating her like some heroic whistle-blower, not like the b-” He glanced up and caught Christina’s eye. “Okay, the unsavory person that she is. Amanda tells me that 60 Minutes and 20/20 are engaged in a bidding war to get her on as a guest.”

“I thought they weren’t allowed to pay for interviews,” Ben said.

“Oh, they won’t pay her anything directly. They’ll just… make a contribution to her elderly father’s pension fund or something. Maybe they’ll give her a free hour of prime-time TV to promote her new CD. That’s how they got Michael Jackson.” He snorted. “Next they’ll be offering to pay for the film rights to her life. Erin Brockovich, Part Two. Except without the cleavage.”

“Do you have anything we might use to impeach her testimony?” Ben inquired. He’d asked before, of course, but it never hurt to try again. “Judge Herndon knows Shandy took us by surprise. I think he’d let me call her back as part of the defense case, if we had a decent reason.”

“I hardly know anything about the girl. Contrary to the picture painted by Mr. Padolino, I am not a serial sex addict. And it isn’t because I’m such a pure soul-it’s because I know you cannot keep a secret in this town. I strayed once-only once-and of course the whole damn world knows about that now.”

“So Shandy-”

“I hired her in a rush the day this mess began. I never had a chance to socialize with her.”

“You’ve said some very complimentary things about her since. Talked about how she was taking care of you. You’re still saying you thought you knew her,” Christina pointed out.

“After the murder. When she was spying on us. I thought she was trustworthy.”

“And there was never anything… untoward?”

“When would I have had a chance? Yes, I do tend to hire attractive interns. It’s not because I want to sleep with them; it’s because it’s good politics. Even interns have a role, and a good intern can sometimes make the difference between a bill that passes and a bill that fails. We all are more persuaded by attractive people; it’s just human nature. Hiring young pretties isn’t sexist-it’s smart.”

“Glad you hadn’t figured that out yet when I came on board,” Marshall said, his hand covering his cell phone.