I stood inside the patio door a moment, thinking about the blueprints of the place that Finn had procured for me and getting my bearings. In the woods, Elliot Slater had told his man to chain Finn up in the downstairs living room. I currently stood on the back side of the house, which meant the living room was several hundred feet in front of me. I knew that Slater had at least one more man with him right now-the one who had carried Finn out of the woods-but I didn't know how many other giants might be lurking around. Best to do a perimeter sweep and kill as many of them as I could before taking on the big kahuna himself.
Besides, some small part of me hoped that Roslyn Phillips might still be alive. I owed it to the vampire to get her out of here if she was still breathing. Jo-Jo Deveraux could fix anything short of death, no matter what horrible things Slater might have done to Roslyn. I'd promised the vampire that I was going to protect her from the giant. That he was never going to hurt her again. So far, I hadn't lived up to my word, but if Roslyn was still breathing, then I'd be damned if I was leaving here without her.
A long hallway stretched out north and south before me. I tiptoed up the north side, keeping to the shadows and pausing every few feet to look and listen.
Silence.
I didn't hear any movement. No rustle of clothing, no labored breathing, no scratch of shoes on the rugs or carpet. Just silence.
I kept going, eventually coming to a set of stairs that led up to the third floor. Once again, I visualized the blueprints that had been in Finn's folder. If I remembered correctly, the interior of the mansion was hollow. The downstairs living room on the second floor was the focal point of the structure, with the ceilings of the other floors cut out above it. Balconies on every floor led to other rooms while still overlooking the living room below, which featured floor-to-ceiling windows on one side. Since I wanted to see Elliot Slater's setup before I went after him, I headed up the stairs so I could get a bird's-eye view of things. Besides, the master bedroom was located on the third floor. Which is where Slater had probably taken Roslyn first when he'd brought her here.
Again, I heard no one and saw nothing except furniture-until I reached the door that led to the master bedroom. To my surprise, the door was cracked open, and soft murmurs slid out into the hallway where I stood. I cocked my head to one side. A man's voice doing most of the talking, but not Slater's. The pitch was too high. Didn't much matter. Other than Finn and Roslyn, whoever else was in this house was going to die right along with the giant, no matter what his voice sounded like.
I crept closer to the door, and the murmurs sharpened into real words.
"... know how beautiful you are? It doesn't have to be like this," the man said.
More silence, as if he was waiting for someone to respond.
"I'm talking to you, bitch. Answer me."
More silence.
Slap-slap-slap.
A series of violent blows rang out, and a low moan sounded. My eyes narrowed, even as my heart lifted. Because the moaner was a woman. And it sure sounded like Roslyn Phillips to me.
I eased closer to the door and put my eye up against the crack. The door was only slightly open, showing me a narrow strip of what lay inside.
A bed dominated the room-the biggest bed that I'd ever seen. The sucker had to be at least twenty-five feet square and was covered with an ivory comforter. Thick wooden posts rose up from the four corners of the bed, and I could see some sort of heavy, hemp rope tied to them. The rope creaked, as though someone was tied down by it. A man also stood before the bed, but it wasn't Elliot Slater. His hair was a bright red, instead of the blond wisps of the other pale, chalky giant.
This giant was also naked, with an ass that was so fat, dimpled, and hairy that I would happily have killed him just for inflicting the sight on me.
"Like I told you, Slater's busy right now. Besides, he doesn't know a good thing when he has it anyway. Smashing up that pretty face of yours, beating on that soft body of yours, what a f**king waste. If you were mine, I would have found something much better for us to do together. Something we're going to do right now," the man drawled in a soft voice, as though he wasn't casually talking about raping someone.
"He'll... kill you... for this."
The voice was low and weak and raspy, but I still recognized the person it belonged to-Roslyn Phillips. She was still alive-and she was damn well going to stay that way.
I couldn't see the man's face, but I got the impression that he smiled.
"No, he won't because you're not going to live long enough to tell him about it," he replied.
The man moved forward to the edge of the bed. He held a rag in his hand. The bits of rope I could see jerked and spasmed. Roslyn, trying desperately to get free before the bastard gagged and raped her. A cold, calm, familiar sort of determination filled me, and my hands tightened around my bloody knives.
While the naked giant wrestled with Roslyn, trying to get the gag into her mouth, I opened the door and stepped inside the room. The man was too busy with the vampire to hear my soft footsteps on the carpet. I came at him at an angle, so I could see what kind of shape Roslyn was in.
The sight on the bed sickened me.
I'd been right on one count. Elliot Slater had wanted to hurt Roslyn before he killed her. The vampire lay spread-eagled on the bed, her arms and legs tied to each of the four posts. Blood and cuts and bruises covered her body-every single inch I could see of it.
If I hadn't known it was Roslyn, I wouldn't have recognized her. That's how bad she looked, her features all mushed and mashed together, like she'd been run over by a car. Roslyn's skin looked like it had been rubbed raw with sandpaper. Her beautiful face was a mess of pulpy, purple, swollen flesh, and the vamp's blood had long ago turned the ivory comforter a dark crimson. There was so much blood on her that it took me a second to realize that Roslyn was still wearing clothes underneath all the gore. Her pants and shirt were torn in places, and blue-black bruises peeked out from the rips like dark eyes.
I didn't often feel rage, but cold fire burned in my veins at what had been done to the other woman-and what sort of torture Elliot Slater had in store for Finn if I didn't save him. For a moment, I felt almost crazed with this burning need to kill the giant and everyone else here, everyone who had hurt Roslyn and Finn.
The giant put one hairy knee on Roslyn's stomach. The vampire thrashed weakly against him, but he would have been much too heavy for her to dislodge, even if she'd been free of the ropes and at full strength. I gathered my own will and waited until the giant leaned over Roslyn, trying to force the gag into her bloody mouth before I spoke.