Cut to the Bone(50)
Branch shook his head. “Covington’s gonna have a stroke if this screws up Friday.”
“Wouldn’t be the worst thing to happen,” Cross said.
6:14 p.m.
Swallow.
Again.
Swallow.
Again.
Swallow.
Again.
“Ahhhh,” the Executioner said, kissing the handle.
He could gulp at will now. Open his mouth, snap in the fishing line, and let the plastic hang down his throat like a pendulum.
He’d much rather have crafted the knife from steel, like all the others. But the tiniest scrap would trip the metal detectors, so he started grinding plastic. Not that flimsy milk-bottle stuff, but the expensive polymers used in aircraft wings and pistol frames.
Eight months of trial and error gave him exactly what he needed - an unbreakable polymer blade with a handle just big enough to grip. It wasn’t pretty like his mirror-polished creations, but for this job, pretty was as pretty does.
He secured the swallow knife in the floor safe next to his workbench and removed the dagger he’d use tomorrow morning. Held it to the light. The double-edge blade was perfectly symmetric. The tip drew blood with the lightest tap. The S-30V stainless steel was mated seamlessly to the high-gloss walnut handles. It balanced perfectly, fit him like a handshake.
Tingling with satisfaction, he scraped the arm patch he’d left unshaved to gauge knife sharpness. Black hair peeled away, leaving the skin underneath as smooth as glass. Not unlike Frank Mahoney’s hot shave. He tested the opposite edge.
Hairs prickled and snapped.
“You shave your legs with this?” he kidded, giving Bowie a back-rattling slap. “Wait, don’t answer. I don’t want to know!”
He sat in the Aeron chair that kept his back from aching during his long hours at the machines. Retrieved an Arkansas sharpening stone and a bottle of oil from the middle drawer. Diamonds cut faster, but he liked the gritty smell and sound of the traditional method. He laid three fat drops on the stone, spread them with his finger. Tilted the edge to the most efficient cutting angle – twenty-two 22 degrees - and firmly pushed blade against stone.
Skriiiiiich.
Some people likened it to fingernails on chalkboards. He found it soothing. The cows didn’t, of course. Then again, he never gave them long to think about it.
Skriiiiiich.
The hair peeled perfectly.
He wiped off the slurry, huffed breath on the blade, and burnished it on his leather strop. Put it back in the safe, dialed right, left, right, glanced at the clock. Time to call it a night. He needed to eat, shower, review the plan, and get to bed.
He had to be in place before sunup.
10:56 p.m.
“Oof!” Corey Trent blatted as a knee flattened his belly against his spinal cord.
Own damn fault, he realized as he rolled off his bunk, going fetal to protect himself from the sand-filled socks thundering in from everywhere.
Every con swore Death Row was free of the gang beat-downs you suffered in general population. After several years of seeing it was true, he started falling asleep without his third eye watching.
Big mistake.
“C’mon, jerkoff,” he heard somebody hiss. “Make another wisecrack about her.”
Not gangs, he realized. New CO from breakfast.
Knowing that didn’t make it hurt less.
Rockets exploded in Trent’s brain. Something heavy smashed his balls into his shoulder blades. The disgusting nutrition loaf left his body the same way it went in. Belly blows kept him from screaming. The blanket wrapping his head would have muffled it anyway.
“Think seriously about drowning yourself in the toilet,” his tormenter hissed, mashing the semi-digested glop in his face. “Better than what’s gonna happen to you Friday.”
The rockets skidded sideways, and Trent passed out.
MAY 23, 1968
“How ‘bout a cigarette?” Earl Monroe asked the passing guard. “Come on, I haven’t caused you a single bit of trouble since I got here, right?”
The guard considered that. Nodded. Lit a Marlboro, poked it through the bars.
Snatched it back when Earl reached.
“Only smoke a cop-killer gets,” the guard said, handing it instead to the nun-strangler across the aisle, “is what curls up from the chair.”
“He wants me to run for state’s attorney,” Wayne said, bouncing on the balls of his feet. “He’s retiring after Earl’s execution, wants to give me my shot. Arranging it with the powers-that-be so I’m a shoo-in. Isn’t that great, honey?”
His wife nodded.
“What’s wrong, Kit?” Wayne said. He was exquisitely attuned to his wife’s moods, but couldn’t figure this one.
“Nothing,” she said.
“Come on, doll,” Wayne said, padding across the white shag carpet and perching next to her on the bed. “It’s me. I can tell something’s wrong. What?”