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"When they squeal." He hit a button on the round object in his hand and brought the circular blade to the back of Buddy's ear, bending the upper flap forward.
To Buddy's credit, he withheld screaming for almost a solid three seconds. When he began, it was enough for me to flinch as the agonized screech assaulted my eardrums.
I had no choice but to thread my fingers through his sweaty curls and hold tight to keep him still, tensing my entire upper body. Blood spewed like a hydrant, hitting my fingers, arm, and my chin.
I kept my mouth clamped shut so as not to risk some finding its way in there as well.
You could hear the blade cutting through cartilage and spinning out flesh perfectly. Maliki stood and eased the tool, a pleased look on his face.
"All right!" Buddy wailed.
The saw immediately cut off, but there was no hope for the nearly severed ear. It seemed to be dangling by pieces of tissue that hadn't been cut yet, leaving extraneous amounts of blood to run down Buddy's face.
"You've got ten seconds."
"Wait, please. I need—"
"Five."
"Fuck you," Buddy rasped like a complete idiot. His jeer was followed by him spitting in Maliki's direction.
A slow, carnal grin spread across Maliki's face. His hand shot out and tore the ear completely away with the snapping of something and a wet plop as he tossed it down.
Buddy began screaming again, rocking his body in the rusted chains, in tur
n forcing me to have to use more strength to hold his ass upright.
"We should do something about that," Maliki intoned with fake concern. He snatched the jar from the ground and popped the lid, bringing it to the place Buddy's ear used to be, and slowly tipping it forward.
A clear liquid spilled out, splashing onto the bloodied wound. It took a millisecond for the smell of what it was to register as Buddy continued to thrash.
Alcohol.
Maliki stopped when the man began to twitch as if he were freezing, his head shaking non-stop.
Replacing the bottle on the floor, he moved around to the front of the chair with the saw back in his hand.
"Ten seconds," he repeated.
Buddy continued to groan pitifully, still refusing to talk.
Maliki nodded to himself and then looked to me. "You got em?"
"I got em," I reassured.
Taking the pliers, he flipped them around and slammed the solid handle into Buddy's mouth with such force I heard the crack just before two teeth flew out with a bloodied string of saliva detaching from them.
"All you have to do is tell him what you did with his friends, and this can all be over," I soothed, taking on the role of the good guy.
"I...saved them..." Buddy garbled, spitting out a mouthful of blood. He lifted his green eyes and stared up at me, a red tinged smile creeping across his face. "That lil sick bastard was there when I came upon the scene. He's kin of yours?"
Samael. He had to be talking about Sam. It took everything in me not to demand an update on his condition.
You never gave someone a weakness to use against you, no matter how badly you wanted to crumble.
I began to wonder if he was getting minimal treatment, or the Stags were slowly letting him wither into nothing before he was found. Buddy having just confirmed that Ace and Darrian had at least been with them meant this could lead to nothing, or it could give us a desperately needed answer as to where they could be heading.
I highly doubted the Stags remained in one place, at least not one someone could 'happen upon', as Buddy had put it. We had to find Ace and Darrian.
