Deep (Pagano Family #4)(65)

Alvin Church, would-be king of the Rhode Island underworld, was lashed to a steel support beam, his wrists bound around the beam, and his body chained at his throat, shoulders, waist, and ankles. He did not appear to have been touched, other than to be bound.

The Bosnians had been stripped bare. Church had been left dressed, according to Nick’s orders.

All three were gagged, with rags stuffed into their mouths. J.J. had heard that lesson, too—stuffing was a much more effective silencer than tying. And Nick had no need for any of these men to talk. Only to listen. And to see.

After taking a few brief seconds to see his subjects, he turned and walked to his worktable at the far end of the room. Matty followed. When he looked back to see that J.J. had not, he waved him over.

He took off his Armani suit coat. He always wore a suit to work, even work like this, even work like the ambush in Danbury. This was his job, and he was a businessman. Another lesson he’d learned from his uncle and father. Dress like a professional, not like the professional’s hired help. He had ruined a few suits over the years, but he did not revel in his work; he did not play—so, often, he was able to wash his hands, roll his sleeves back down, put his jacket back on, and go home.

Tonight, he saw no reason he wouldn’t be able to do just that. Tonight, he was passing the torch.

He hung his jacket over a wooden hanger and began rolling up his sleeves. “J.J., I want you to get your hands dirty tonight.” He gave him a long look. “Which one had a blade with a bone handle?” Beverly had woken from a nightmare and, sobbing, had gritted out that terrible detail.

“The big guy—why?”

Nick didn’t answer. That fat f*ck had cut on Beverly. He was going to pay extra. “Where is it?”

“Here.” J.J. walked over to a trash bag and rooted through it until he came up with the knife. He brought it to Nick.

Nick set it on the worktable with his tools. “He goes second. Make sure he watches what happens to his friend. J.J., you take the friend. Do your thing. I have one requirement: he eats his dick.”

J.J. paled a bit at that but nodded. And they got started.



oOo



J.J. did well, with little prodding from Nick. He wasn’t creative, and he did make a mess, but by the time the guy was dead, he had suffered horrors that were sure to have been beyond his own imagining, and he’d died screaming around his own dick. They left his naked body hanging from the hook, the bloody, meaty end of his dick still protruding from his mouth. Picker winched him out of the way, and he and Matty cleaned up the mess.

Not until then did Nick step up to his first subject. Fatso and Church had both spent most of the first man’s death ordeal shouting behind their gags and struggling with their bindings. Fatso was in obvious distress—as heavy as he was, hanging from the hook was probably an agony. He was lucky his shoulders had not dislocated. Yet.

He was probably a hundred pounds overweight, and his belly hung heavily over his genitals. As Nick stood before the goggle-eyed man, he pulled on a pair of heavy latex gloves.

He reached under the blubber and grabbed the man’s flaccid, average dick. The man’s muffled screams intensified, and he tried to kick his bound legs, but the jerking and rocking stressed his shoulders too much. Nick pulled a rubber band from his pocket and wound it tightly around the base of the man’s dick. A tourniquet. He didn’t want this bastard to bleed out and die too quickly. He had another means of death in mind.

Then he took the man’s knife out of his pocket and opened the blade. Again, the man renewed his horrified, terrified screams. Beyond him, Church rattled his chains. Nick knew Church figured that whatever he was witnessing was not as awful as his own end would be.

Dr. Kerr had said he thought the blade was probably too dull; that was why Beverly had been spared the horror of losing her breast. But Nick knew the pain of a dull blade, and she had not been spared that.

The blade was dull, in fact, and pitted, too—the man had not taken care of his weapon.

“Matty. Hold his belly out of my way.”

Matty did what he was told, and Nick, his way clear, pushed the knife in and through the skin just to the outside of the tourniquet. The man’s screams became an undulating, unending, sobbing wail, each wave more hysterical than the last. Nick drew the blade forward. The dull edge required that he use a sawing motion to get through the tissue. The tourniquet and Nick’s slow pace intensified the pain and controlled the blood loss so well that he barely had spatter even on his hands.

When the blade was clear, Nick had sliced the man’s dick in half, lengthwise, leaving two anatomy textbook cross-sections, albeit with rougher edges. When he stepped back, and Matty let go of his belly, the man’s bladder went, urine coming from the point at which the urethra was still intact, and the man shrieked and lost consciousness.

Nick turned his back and walked away, pulling the gloves off, turning them inside out as they came off his hands. “J.J., wake him. Use the ampules in my kit. You and Picker get him down from the hook. Matty, I want the Daughter.”

“Fuck. Really?”

Nobody but family, and Dr. Kerr, knew the details of what had been done to Beverly. Still, Nick would not countenance being questioned for his tactics here. He stopped and turned back to Matty.

He said nothing, but Matty stepped back. “Yeah. Of course. Sorry.” He turned and went toward a door in the corner, behind which was a smallish closet.