Page 39 of Sleeping with the Dark (The Righteous 3)
Arek shrugged and resumed his whistling. The man’s eyes tracked Arek, and yet he was doing his best to act nonchalant. It was an interesting dance between the men from where Trev sat. Arek laid out the extension cord and then plugged in the vicious blender with more than enough power to do what his brother had threatened. Grabbing a few other tools off the table, Arek smiled wide as he wandered back over to the man.
Where had the little boy who rolled around in pig shit with girls gone? Arek may be worried about him, but Trev was more worried about Arek.
The loud whirr of the blender fired up, and the guy flinched but refused to look behind him. Trev had to give the guy credit. He’d figured the man would have shat himself by now.
“Don’t fucking touch me,” The man yanked hard on the restraints, his hands curling into fists.
“This is your very last warning,” Arek yelled above the noise of the music and whipping blades.
“Do your worst.”
Arek leaned around so the man could see his face. “Fuck don’t say things like that to me. You’ll get my cock hard.”
Giving the man a wink, Arek sat the blender aside and picked up the hammer. With a few hard and quick strikes, the man’s fists loosened. Using the pliers next, the man hollered as, one by one, Arek twisted and mercilessly broke the fingers with a resounding snap.
Trev refused to look away. He didn’t care for torture and certainly didn’t get off on it like the demons that lived in Arek’s mind, but he’d chosen this path willingly, and that meant he wasn’t allowed to not be okay or hide from the brutal truth of their tasks.
The tools were cast aside for the still revving blender with its small yet undeniably sharp blades. The man’s angry shouts of pain turned to howls of true panic as his now useless hand was shoved into the blender. Higher and higher-pitched wails, his voice reached, his large body once more straining to try and escape as he thrashed against the heavy bindings.
The maniacal laugh that came from Arek could be heard above everything else. Trev shivered at the sound. There was a good chance he was going to have to talk Arek down off the ledge of insanity after this. He’d worked hard to leash the dark demons that haunted Arek, but this man had come into their home and threatened their family. There was no coming back from that for Lorena—no matter what he said or how much he begged, Arek was going to kill him, and Trev could only play the safety net on the other side.
No preparation readies one for the sound of flesh and bone being crushed and ripped apart. It was a noise you never wanted to hear. The man’s wails turned to ear piercing howls that made him wince as he was sure even the walls would have run away if they could have. The man became violent as he jerked back and forth in the bindings. His neck and arms were bulging as his back arched off the chair like he was possessed. His face was twisted and contorted with the extreme pain, his eyes attempting to roll back into his head. The little motor tried to stall out and then revved louder as it cut into more of the man’s flesh, the screaming reaching a whole new crescendo.
Blood flowed into the blender at a steady pace, giving it the look of something more in line with a summer punch than blood, with bits of flesh floating around in the spinning liquid. The blender clicked off, and Arek stood. Rolling his shoulders, he closed his eyes, and Trev knew he was letting the sound of the man’s screams bathe him with their terror. He casually stepped around the banshee-ing man who was attempting to scream the house down. A red line dripped onto the grey concrete of the unfinished space and ran in a thin river toward the drain under the precisely placed chair.
Arek held up the glass container in front of Lorena’s face, and surprisingly the yells grew impossibly louder as his bulging eyes tracked a finger slowly swirling around the red liquid substance with flecks of pinkish flesh.
“Would you like to tell me what you know now? Or would you prefer I find something else to blend off?”
Snot ran in long bubbling streams down Lorena’s chin as tears poured from his eyes. He gasped for air, his mouth opening and closing as he tried to push words out that didn’t want to form properly.
“This is a limited-time offer. If you are wise, you will speak up now. There are a great many things that can be cut off of the human body before you die.” Arek leaned in close to the man, the disgusting red concoction sloshing a little onto its original owner. The man whimpered and pulled as far away as he was able. His eyes avoiding the slushy liquid that fell in his lap. The stench of ammonia was strong as a yellow stream slid down the pant leg and joined the blood. “And I know them all,” he said close to the man’s ear.
“Give him a moment, brother. He’s still in shock. It’s not every day you have a body part blended off.”
Arek glanced his way and huffed loudly as he stood straight and crossed his arms like he was four and pouting over no dessert. The man gasped a little, a soft sob coming from his mouth. “I did warn him. What did he think I was going to do, give him the blender as a birthday gift?”
Trev lifted an eyebrow at his brother and received an eye roll for his efforts, but Arek sat the container on the floor and proceeded to sit down like he was getting ready for storytime. Trev had to stop himself from conveying any emotion, but the image of Arek sitting like that was way too reminiscent of their time as children. It was a time when Arek was carefree and wasn’t shrouded in a cloak of death. A time he wished he could go back and change so many things. Maybe more souls would have died, maybe more would have lived, that he couldn’t say for sure, but one thing was certain—Arek would not be this harbinger of death, and his own soul might have been salvageable. Now…
“This is the part where you start talking,” Arek prompted a little too happily. “Or I can continue, of course.”
“I-I came for revenge. For the money,” Lorena sucked in a deep breath before continuing. “And for the drugs he stole.” The man dared a peek at Trev before focusing on Arek once more.
“That’s all well and good, but why else were you here, and of course, how did you find out about Sally or where we live in the first place? We don’t exactly have a listed address.”
The man gulped as he stared into Arek’s passive face. “Alejandro got a tip that you weren’t who you said you were. I don’t know who from, but the guy said we would find the answers at your house. He gave me the address for Sally, and I followed her here.”
“Who is this guy?” Arek asked the million-dollar question. As far as Trev knew, no one outside of those that lived here knew where they lived or what they did, for that matter.
“I don’t know. I really don’t—Alejandro didn’t believe the guy at first because the man hung up before he could ask any questions.” His face was paling, and Trev knew he was on the verge of passing out.
Arek jumped up and grabbed some smelling salts from his little workbench of fun and brought it back for the man to sniff. His eyes shot open as if he’d just gotten a shot of adrenaline.
“So basically, what you are saying is that you can’t offer me any useful information? This is disappointing and yet is so much more entertaining news.” Arek bent and picked up the glass container and shrugged. “I guess that means I better get back to work.”
“No, no, please…I may—I may know one helpful thing.”
Arek paused, and Trev knew he was playing a cat and mouse game with this man’s desperation. He’d become something of a pro at mind-fucking a person just as thoroughly as he destroyed their body.
