Chapter 12

Had Vincent arrived a moment earlier, he might have shot Torne on the spot, while the huge black still mounted his unwilling, but becoming willing, victim. As it was, Vincent looked at the ravished body of his young and beautiful mistress, the cum running down her thighs as she cowered before him, and he wanted to prolong the hurt for both her and the big servant.

"You, Karen," he rasped, his face livid, "are an ungrateful whore. And you, Torne, have made yourself a bed in hell for a single piece of ass."

Torne backed away. His size and strength meant nothing against the vicious little weapon in Vincent's right hand. The weapon appeared to be but a toy, but it spat death at every squeeze of the trigger. It was part of Vincent's collection--a two-shot derringer from the days of the riverboat gamblers.

"Well, Torne?" Vincent grated.

Torne was once again the dedicated servant, except that his master no longer wanted him. "Mr. Kingston," he blurted. "She taunted me. She invited me in. She begged me to fuck her."

Karen did not deny the accusation, but she gave Torne a scathing look for being so quick to condemn her.

"Karen?" Vincent said. "Why don't you say he broke in here and raped you?"

"He didn't," Karen said weakly.

"No force at all?"

"Well, maybe just a little," Karen said.

"But did you encourage him?"

"Yes!" she shouted. "I couldn't stand this fucking pink room any longer. I had to have my freedom!"

"And you were willing to give your body in order to obtain it?"

"Yes!" she spat. "And I loved giving it, Vincent. Every moment of it!"

Vincent slapped her. Torne started toward him, but Vincent forced him back with the gun.

"You in a hurry to die, faithful servant?"

Torne eased off.

Vincent turned his wrath on Karen again. "You cock-hungry little bitch! You just kissed all freedom good-bye. I'll see to it that you never leave this room. You'll be seeing pink when you die. And to increase your agony, neither I, nor any other man will ever fuck you again.

You'll die unloved, your hands tearing at your moth-eaten pussy, wishing you could have just one more good fuck before you go!"

"Vincent, please." Karen was near tears. Her anger was gone, her body was drained of lust. She just wanted to be normal and free again.

"Let her go, Mr. Kingston." Torne's dark face was grim. "Ill stay. I'll be your damned slave forever. Your ball-licking black boy."

"No, Torne," Vincent said. "I don't want you around to violate the next pretty thing I bring here." He pointed the derringer at Torne. Two shots sounded.

Two holes appeared in Torne's chest, very near the heart. He covered them with his big hand, a stunned expression on his face as blood began to ooze between his fingers. And then he pitched forward on his face.

Karen leaped toward the fallen servant, but Vincent grabbed her and pulled her toward the other side of the room.

"Stay away from him," he ordered. "I want him to die without a friend in the world."

"But he didn't hurt you, Vincent," she cried.

"He took something that was mine," Vincent said. "I treated him as I would any thief who breaks in to carry away a part of my precious collection."

Karen heard a groan and she looked toward Torne. The big Negro was rising, pushing himself to his knees. Slowly, he managed to stagger to his feet. He moved toward Vincent like a zombie, his hands outstretched. His expression was frozen, and the glazed look in his eyes showed that he was dying, but he continued to move.

"Stay back!" Vincent flung the empty gun at Torne's head. It cracked against his skull, but the dying man felt no pain. His huge hands snaked toward Vincent's throat. The fingers began to tighten.

"My God, Karen!" Vincent gurgled. "Help me!" In less than a minute, Vincent Kingston was dead.

Torne turned toward Karen. His lips were blood-flecked, his face contorted as the final throes of death struck him, but he managed a final smile. "Your freedom, Missy," he said, then fell and rolled over, his eyes staring unseeingly at the pink ceiling.

Karen screamed, condemning one dead lover and mourning the other.

When she had calmed herself, she went upstairs to her bedroom. She stood before the tall mirror, surveying what had become a sex-crazed body. Her breasts and her thighs were cum-streaked evidence of her misdeeds, but the insatiable lust in her belly had faded away during those few moments of bloody violence.

She bathed and dressed, then picked up her small suitcase and went into Vincent's bedroom. She looked at the painting by Correggio. It looked different. Almost as if the dark-clouded beast had ravished his nude victim and left her all alone in the exquisite frame.

Downstairs, in Vincent's study, she carefully emptied his private files onto the floor and calmly struck a match to them. When the fire had crept to the desk and drapes, she left the mansion and walked across the garden. By the time she reached the gate, the big house was engulfed in flames.

She looked toward the cottage, wishing that Billy Denim was there. She hated to leave without seeing him. Excluding her father, she had only had three men in her life, and somehow Billy had held her close in a way that none of the others had. With him it had been pleasure without remorse, sex with love instead of lust.

Headlights flashed. A car came through the gate and Billy Denim got out. He spotted Karen and ran toward her. "What happened?"

"I'll tell you later," she said.

"Are Torne and Vincent in there?"

"Yes," she said calmly. "Both dead."

"Look, Karen," he said. "I didn't run out on you. They yanked me up like a criminal and I couldn't get back."

"The trial's over?"

"Yes."

"Good." She picked up her suitcase.

"Where are you going?"

"I don't know."

"North again?"

"Perhaps."

He grinned. "Would you seriously consider going deeper South?"

"I might."

"With an ex-cop and an ex-gardener?"

"Uh-huh. Especially with an ex-gardener."

Denim pulled the car up the drive and turned around near the burning mansion. Karen could hear the sounds of sirens in the distance. The mansion would be burned to the ground by the time they arrived.

She looked around as Denim drove back through the gate. The white columns were fiery and the big house was crumbling. Suddenly, an extra-bright flame shot up from its ravaged guts.

The pink room was going. She could almost hear the wailing of the lost virgins mingling with the sound of the approaching sirens.

And she could hear Torne saying, "Your freedom, Missy."