Chapter 29 Sydney
Sydney
While Sydney had helped unload the truck earlier, she hadn’t paid attention to much of what they’d brought into the empty container.
That was a lie. Of course she saw the giant saw, the scalpels, and other such pain-inducing instruments, but she hadn’t witnessed Fink set up that giant wooden X in the back.
There were a few hinges in it, so obviously it was collapsible.
Maybe he erected the Saint Andrew’s Cross while she laid out the giant sheet of plastic that she used to cover their tool table.
Who knew? Right now, when he assembled the stand didn’t matter.
She was focused on lifting with her knees and not her back as the two of them lugged the unconscious Burke into the container.
“Careful,” she warned as the man’s head came dangerously close to the doors.
Fink peered at her questioningly.
She sniggered.
“Right.” What a silly thing to say.
Who cared if they banged him around a bit? Burke was about to endure quite an excruciating death. Pain was sort of the point.
Awkwardly, and only after nearly dropping him six times, they finally got him rigged onto the X.
There were steel cuffs around his wrists, his ankles, and his neck.
With him secured in place, Fink saw to closing the doors of the container while Sydney turned on the remaining battery-powered lanterns they’d use to see what the hell they were doing.
On the folding table to the right, she had meticulously laid out each tool over the plastic tarp. The setup reminded her of a surgical kit. Large knives, little ones, a big-ass saw. So many ways to cut someone. All of which were quite enticing.
“What do we do first?” she asked as she ran her fingers along each blade’s handle.
“Have you ever field-dressed a deer?” he asked from behind her.
What did that have to do with anything?
“No.” She’d never hunted a day in her life.
He rested his hands on her shoulders, and she leaned back against him. The heat from his body flowed through hers, and her core tingled with anticipation. He pressed an affectionate kiss to the crown of her head, and she grinned.
“My plan is to follow the same road map,” he said as he released her and approached the slumbering longshoreman.
Twisting, her gaze followed Fink while she stood in place.
“If we want this to be clean,” he began and crouched between the man’s spread legs. “We’re going to have to cut out his asshole and rip his guts out.”
She wrinkled her nose. “Ew. Why?”
Fink chuckled. “Do you want to walk around in shit?”
She scrunched her face as the undesirable image danced in her head. “Not really.”
“Once that is taken care of—” He rose to his feet and ran his fingers from Burke’s crotch, up his abdomen, and finished near his shoulders. “—we slice from top to bottom.”
“Oh, that sounds fun.” She rocked back onto her feet again.
Fink continued to explain how they’d saw his ribs and pull his chest cavity wide open. Sydney licked her lips and nodded along with him. With each description and direction of how they would proceed, her eagerness grew.
What tool would they use? Glancing at their choices, she tried to guess mentally.
Where would they put stuff? How would they keep him spread while they worked?
All these details were most likely explained beforehand, but that meant little then.
She was a learn-by-doing kind of person.
So, the abstract concepts he went over were lost on her. Until now. He had her full attention.
Staring at the man who slept and was blissfully unaware of the amateur surgery they were about to attempt, she couldn’t wait to get started.
“Will he be conscious for any of this?” she asked. The original plan had been for him to be begging for mercy the whole time.
“He should be,” Fink said as he spread the man’s right eyelid. “I only gave him enough to sleep during the transport. He should wake any minute now.”
She frowned.
Sydney didn’t want to wait. Besides, the longer they hung around, the more likely security would walk by and discover what they planned. Especially because emptying this guy of all his organs would take time.
“Why are there coolers?” She gestured to the small boxes filled with dry ice.
He grinned. “Part of the contract stipulated that we harvest his kidneys, liver, and eyeballs.”
“Not his lungs?” she queried. Seemed like almost everything was getting yanked, so why not those?
Fink shook his head. “Smoker. They’d be useless on the market.”
Oh! She hadn’t thought of that. “At least his parts aren’t going to waste. Wait! Do you work for the organ black market?”
A look of confusion crossed his painted features. “What?”
She shrugged. “Urban legends say it’s a lucrative business.” Then again, he had taken nothing from Mitchell. So, this assumption really wasn’t adding up.
He rolled his black eyes. “No.”
Fink shifted his focus to Burke and gave him a good slap in the face.
“So, taking his guts is just a happy coincidence?”
“I guess so,” he agreed as he shook the guy. “I don’t set the terms of the contracts. My job is to do what they ask me to do.”
“This seems like an over-the-top request,” she commented as she picked up the scalpel and examined the tiny but extremely sharp blade.
“Not the weirdest I’ve ever gotten,” he said as their victim groaned.
“Finally.” She tossed the tool onto the table before she skipped beside Fink. “I feel like we’ve been waiting for days.”
Fink shook his head with amusement. “You’re one in a million.”
Turning toward him, wearing a grin from ear to ear in pride, she preened. “Thanks. You’re not too bad yourself.”