Callie’s Last Dance

22.

Two Hours Earlier…

FRANKIE REGAINS CONSCIOUSNESS in gradual stages of ascending violence. When he’s lucid enough to realize he’s on his back with his wrists and ankles securely tied, he screams bloody murder. Callie turns the lights on so he can see what he’s up against.

Cheesecloth.

She’s holding a small wad of cheesecloth in one hand and a kitchen knife in the other. Puts the knife blade against his lips.

“Open up,” Callie says, cheerfully.

“Fuck you!”

She moves the knife tip a few centimeters to the right and jabs it into his cheek. When he yells to protest, she pushes the center part of the cheese cloth into his mouth. When he gags, she forces the knife in his mouth and presses the blade against his tongue to keep him from spitting out the cheesecloth.

He yells and bucks his body, but wisely keeps his head still.

“Hot?” she says.

Frankie makes a pain sound. His eyes bug out. Tears collect in the corners of his eyes and drip down his cheeks.

“You’re tasting distilled habanero,” Callie says, “from the Chili pepper. In its purest form, the habanero tops three hundred and fifty thousand Scoville heat units. Very few people can handle this type of heat on their tongues, and it’s clear you’re not one of them.”

“Uhhhnnn! UHHHNNN!” He cries out. It’s the only pain sound he can make without hurting himself worse.

She sighs. “I won’t lie to you, Frankie, you’re in for a bad time. Because while this seems blisteringly hot to you, it’s the weakest extract I brought. And I brought many.”

She lets the heat intensify another thirty seconds, then says, “Okay. Unclench your jaw and I’ll remove it.”

“W-water!” he gasps.

Callie says, “You’re eyes are tearing up. Here, let me help you.”

He closes his eyes so she can wipe them. She does, but when he opens them again, he sees her holding a medicine dropper above his left eye. Before he can blink, she squirts something in his eye that makes him shriek in pain.

“That’s what it feels like in your eyes,” she says. “In liquid form.”

He blinks his eyes and shakes his head from side to side in super speed, like an old cartoon character in distress.

“AHH! AHH! AHH!” he yells, reminding her of a guy she interrogated years ago, before she began packing torture kits in her backpack. That day she boiled a pot of water and poured it on his bare skin a cup at a time. He made this same sound, Ahh! Ahh! Ahh!

When Frankie stops shaking his head he focuses his good eye on the medicine dropper, unaware of what’s in Callie’s left hand.

A second swab of cheesecloth.

The center of which she stuffs in his mouth.

She holds her left hand over his lips to keep it in place.

Frankie makes a moaning sound.

Callie says, “You’re bluffing. You can’t feel the heat this time. Not yet, anyway. But give it another fifteen seconds and see how you feel. While we wait, I’ll tell you that what’s in your mouth is a Bhut Jolokia pepper, which, only a few years ago, was considered the hottest pepper in the world. DNA tests confirmed it’s an interspecies hybrid of Capsicum chinense and frutescens genes.”

The involuntary spasms contorting Frankie’s body tell her he’s begun to feel the heat.

She squirts some in his right eye, saying, “This little baby packs one million Scoville heat units. Can you believe it?”

He can.

Frankie shrieks like a wounded wolverine. His body feels like it’s shutting down.

Callie removes the cheesecloth from his mouth.

After a full minute of blubbering, he forms the words, “Wh-what do you w-want?»You know what really pisses me off?” she says. “You haven’t even bothered to ask about your wife.”

“Wh-what have y-you…wh-what’s h-happened to An-An-Angie?” he sputters.

“She’s resting quietly,” Callie says. “Thanks for asking.”

“P-please,” he says. “S-Stop!”

“Frankie, listen to me. In a few minutes I’m going to ask you some questions. You’ll want to answer them because I’ve got lots of these vials, and trust me, some are particularly nasty.”

A few feet away, on the laundry room floor, Digby starts twitching. Callie shakes her head and says, “Your dog is getting on my nerves.”

She removes the syringe from her backpack and gives Digby another dose. Then puts it up and gets another length of cheesecloth and says, “Open your mouth, Frankie.”

“N-no! Ask y-your qu-questions. I’ll tell you wh-whatever you w-want to know.”

“Not yet. You need to know how bad this can get. Will you open your mouth for me? Or no?”

He shakes his head.

“I figured you’d say that.”

She removes a can of lighter fluid from her backpack and a long-stemmed lighter. Squirts the fluid on his crotch and sets his pants on fire.

When he opens his mouth to scream she stuffs another swatch of cheesecloth in it. He bucks his body up and down and twists from side to side. Tries to spit the cloth out, but his lips, mouth, and tongue won’t cooperate. They’re blistered and raw.

“I’m going to let your pants burn for a minute, Frankie, while I tell you about the Naga Viper. This is an unstable hybrid of three peppers. A devil’s trifecta, if you will.”

She squirts some in his left eye and he begins speaking in tongues.

“This one registers one-point-four million heat units.”

She notices he’s wet his pants.

“You put the fire out all by yourself!” she says. “That was really clever.”

Callie feels her cell phone vibrating softly in her pants pocket. She opens it, reads the text message. Call me. Midnight?

She smiles, texts “Yes,” closes the phone, puts it back in her pocket. Then she unbuckles Frankie’s belt, pulls his smoldering pants and boxers down to his knees.

She says, “I’d hold still if I were you.”

She uses the knife’s sharp edge to scrape a layer of skin off his nuts. Then she opens the vial of Naga Viper extract and pours it on his nuts, and Frankie goes unconscious.

When he comes to she says, “Now that I’ve got your attention, I hope you’ll believe me when I tell you I’ve got two more vials. One is the Trinidad Moruga Scorpion, the current world’s hottest pepper. It weighs in at over two million heat units. The other is pure capsaicin, a hydrophobic compound that registers a whopping sixteen million Scoville. If that doesn’t get you talking, I’ll dump a jar of acid on your penis. It’s really up to you.”

“Please,” he begs. “Put the fire out.”

“The fire’s out.”

“No. It’s burning the skin off my nuts. You’re killing me! I’m gonna die!”

“You’re just feeling the after-effects of the liquid pepper extract. This is why you don’t want me to open the bad vials.”

“P-please. Check for f-flames. M-My skin’s on fire!”

“I’m looking, Frankie. I know it hurts. That’s why they call it torture. But your balls are blistered, that’s all. So, will you talk to me?”

He nods.

“Good boy. You know Donovan Creed?”

Frankie nods.

“He was hoping to be here. And no better than you’ve handled this? You’re getting off light. But while I’m more civilized than Creed, I’m just as determined to make you talk. Do you understand?”

“I’ll talk.”

“Good, ’cause you’re one squirt away from losing your eyesight.”

“P-please!”

“Creed says you’re skimming money.”

“No. I would never-what are you doing?”

She opens the vial of Trinidad Moruga Scorpion…

“No!”

…And pours it up and down the length of his penis.

And Frankie cries. Sobs like a child.

When at last he settles down, Callie says, “You’re not going to make me use the pure cap, are you?”

“Drugs,” he says.

“What about them?”

“I’m selling drugs on the side.”

“What type of drugs?”

“Heroin.”

“Who’s your contact?”

He shakes his head.

Callie reaches for the vial of pure capsaicin and says, “I’ll remind you. This is eight times worse than the last one. And I’ve got to say, your penis isn’t looking very happy.”

She starts to open the vial.

“Wait!” he says.

She pauses.

“Are you going to kill me anyway?”

“That depends.”

“On what?”

“On you giving me the right answers. I know you don’t trust me, so I’m going to tell you a little secret. Sal hired Creed to kill Angie, not you. Sal doesn’t know you’ve been skimming. Creed planned to kill Angie, then torture you until he got a reason to justify your death to Sal. If Creed hadn’t been called away on business, you’d both be dead by now.”

“But you work for Creed.”

“Well, here’s the thing. Creed and I work for the government. They’ve offered me the top job. I said no, so they’re giving it to Creed. So I’m thinking, maybe I tell Creed I tortured you and couldn’t get anything because you’re clean. So I spare your life. Meanwhile, you cut me in on your drug deal.”

“What about Angie?”

“She’s resting quietly.”

“But what about her? Are you going to kill her?”

Callie sighs. “I can’t protect her. She’s been saying things that could bring down the whole organization.”

“I know. Shit. I told her to stop, but she can’t keep her fuckin’ mouth shut. She hears shit, she tells it. But still. She’s my wife. Maybe I can talk to Sal, get him to give her another chance.”

“Sorry. That’s not part of the deal.”

“But I love her, you know? I can’t bear to watch her suffer.”

“I understand. Look, if it makes you feel any better, she’s been dead for the past twenty minutes.”