He clamped his eyes shut, face contorted in pain until I took the lighter away.
“So tell me, why do you want to know what I’m made of?” I asked him.
He didn’t open his eyes. He breathed in and out harshly before he said, “You said you’re going to let me go. I’m going to make sure that I know who I’m dealing with in the future.”
I laughed. “I gave you my word and this is the thanks I get. Well, go ahead and tell your boss all about me, I’m sure he’ll be impressed. More by me than the fact you got this information.”
“Maybe it wouldn’t be for my boss,” Evaristo said. “And just for my own knowledge.”
I really didn’t know what this kid was getting at now, but I had a feeling he was just trying to waste my time. I nodded at Diego who came over and manhandled Evaristo, undoing the ties around his chest and pushing him down so that his head was between his knees. Evaristo struggled and Diego slammed his elbow into his cheekbone with a loud crack.
I winced at the brutality, knowing that it could make talking more difficult for the agent now, but didn’t say anything. When Diego was done tying him in this new position, his bare back exposed, Evaristo spit out a tooth.
“You’re merciless,” he said, his words a thick jumble as blood pooled out of his mouth. “That’s good. It would be even better if you didn’t let me walk at the end.”
I couldn’t help but chew my lip for a second as I raised my brows at Diego. Was it our luck that we had kidnapped some sort of masochist? God, wouldn’t that be just a fuck in the ass.
Diego wasted no time. He threw the wet shirt across Evaristo’s back and pressed it into his skin. I walked up and flicked on the lighter, holding it inches away.
“Tell us how to get Angel Hernandez and we won’t have to do this.”
“You will have to do this,” he answered.
And so I did. I held the lighter to the shirt until it caught fire, then stepped back and watched as the flames spread along his back. Evaristo screamed and screamed until the fire naturally went out.
“That wasn’t even the bad part,” I told him as he gasped for breath, sweat dripping off his face and mixing with the blood on the ground. “Do you want to talk before that?”
He groaned, panting, but managed to say, “You think I don’t know this game? You’ll have to do it anyway.”
He was right about that. Only a fool would think it was over at this point.
“Fair enough,” I said. I grabbed the edge of the charred t-shirt that was now seared to his skin and ripped it right off. It took a layer of burned flesh with it.
Evaristo’s screams were deafening and seemed to go on forever. I didn’t feel anything but hope. Hope that when he calmed down, maybe he would finally talk. This was starting to become something of a chore, and if he was a masochist, that was going to take most of the fun out of it.
But every masochist has a breaking point. I wondered how much of a sadist I’d have to be to find it.
I didn’t want to do the burn method again. The chance that he could go into shock was too high, and generally most people died after the third try. By then the internal organs are fried.
So Diego lifted his foot and very slowly I began to saw off his pinky toe.
Evaristo still didn’t talk, despite the excruciating time I took to cut through the gristle and bone, and we had to inject him with adrenaline to keep him alert and conscious.
Finally — finally — as his toe rested on the ground in front of him, severed from his foot, and after Diego had taken off his own shirt to soak with gasoline, Evaristo muttered, “Please …”
I motioned for Diego to pause and pulled Evaristo back by the hair. “Please what?” I asked, staring down at his face, puffy, black and blue. He’d aged centuries at my hands, and I was shocked to find that the need to hurt, maim, and destroy was still inside me.
He opened his eyes and stared right at me. They were red, all his blood vessels having burst at some point. “You’re worse than they say you are,” he said slowly, painfully.
I tried not to smile. “Then you’ll talk? Or do you want more?” My eyes slid to Diego and back.
Evaristo breathed in and out, thinking. I nodded at Diego who slapped the shirt down on his raw back.
I kept my fist in his hair as he cried out, screaming again. “No, no more. No more, please! Don’t light it. Don’t light it! I’ll talk.” He shut his eyes, and for a moment I thought he might cry, but when he opened them again he said, “If you keep your promise.”
“That I let you go?” I asked. “I gave you my word and that’s the truth.” If Evaristo ended up dying in the desert, food for vultures, I didn’t really care. But I would let him go.