The Auction (10 page)

Chapter Eleven

His toolkit was right where he’d left it, another reminder of his old life. The more he thought about it, the more Foster realized that he hadn’t gotten rid of many of the old toys associated with his past. Did he keep them because subconsciously he knew he’d fall back into an underworld that none of his current associates knew about? His best friend Dare knew some of it, but what would the other man say if he knew the entire story? Dare didn’t exactly have clean hands himself, but Foster was certain
Dare had
never done the things Foster had, or was about to do this very night.

When he’d gotten the call from Lars, stating that Myers had been found and secured, Foster had battled with himself internally. Did he really want to take this step, and immerse himself so deeply into the mind of the madman he’d once been? Then he remembered that sweet girl he’d made a promise to. He’d done a lot of shitty things in his life.
Finding
Macy seemed like a step toward real redemption. But he couldn’t help but wonder if it was worth the cost.

With his toolkit in hand, he got into one of his of his older vehicles, one no one would recognize him in. On his drive to the designated location he purposely kept his mind blank and concentrated on the road. The more that he thought about the task at hand the more anxiety it caused, and he needed a completely clear head.

Foster
parked his vehicle down the street from the spot he needed to go and walked the rest of the way. It had been a while since he’d been in this part of town, full of abandoned buildings and old businesses barely managing to hang on. The streets were mainly empty because there were very few residents in this section. It was one part of town where a lot of the underworld players conducted their illegal activities.

He quickly
made it to the designated building and headed to the side entrance
. Foster gave the door
a
special knock and it slid open. He walked inside to see one of Lars’ men gesturing for him to follow.

He was taken upstairs and down a hall that led to a metal door. Foster’s guide placed his hand against the hand sensor to get inside. Lars was waiting for him.

Foster squinted from the brightness of the light. The room was covered from wall to
floor in plastic. In the center,
was a man in a metal chair with a ball gag in his mouth. His hands were tied behind his back, his feet were tethered to the chair with thick ropes and he was blindfolded. It was pretty safe to assume that he wasn’t going anywhere.

Lars nodded in his direction before heading out the door, his man following behind. Foster acknowledged him with a nod of his own. Finally he was allowed in the room with his prey.

His heart started beating and his pulse raced. Sweat beaded his forehead and the adrenaline began to flow in his veins. It was the old rush
,
back in full force. He took a deep breath to calm himself. He had to have a steady hand for what he needed to do.

Foster placed his toolkit on the table next to the bound man.

His victim
grunted through his ball gag as drool ran down his chin. He struggled against his restraints. He seemed desperate in his movements and Foster couldn’t exactly blame him.

In most cases
Foster
left the blindfold on while he did his work, but not to keep his identity hidden. In fact, he preferred his victims to know it was him. No one who’d had a session with him told tales because they were either too scared, in hiding or dead. The dead ones weren’t killed by him. A dead man couldn’t remember the lesson. Usually those people had other enemies who caught up with them.
Foster kept the blindfold
on because it enhanced the torture. When the person couldn’t see what was coming, the mind
could sometimes be a man’s worst enemy
.

With Myers, Foster didn’t fool himself into thinking this wouldn’t be traced back to him. His identity in the underworld was a well-known secret despite him being away from it for so long, and his handiwork was very distinct. Someone had already tapped into his line. It was clear he was already being watched. That was fine because now they knew that he couldn’t easily be fucked with.

Slowly, he rolled up his sleeves. He then reached into his bag and placed each of the instruments inside his kit on the table lining them up by size from biggest to smallest. He then pulled out a pair of black rubber gloves that covered him from fingertip to elbow. Finally he donned a pair of clear goggles, and tied a surgical mask around his neck to fend off any blood splatter.

Foster moved behind the still squirming Meyers and unlatched the man’s ball gag.

Myers screamed! “Who’s there?”

Foster walked around the chair so that he was facing his captive. Part of him wanted to walk away and never look back, but he’d already set off on this course
and he intended to see this to completion
. Besides, the other part of him was secretly thrilled, the side of him that got a rush from hearing someone’s scream when he applied just the right amount of pain. Most of his victims were scumbags, people who deserved every bit of
torture
they got, while others were
those who had
crossed him in some way. Myers had never done anything to him personally but he definitely fit into the scumbag category.

Foster had taken the liberty of collecting information he could dig up on this guy in the past couple of days. He’d been a low-ranking government official who was controlled by a handful of corporations to do their bidding. There wasn’t anything unusual about that but what was interesting was one of those companies had funded his legal defense when children of a prominent family went missing. They were able to make those charges disappear and payouts were made to the family. There was another incident involving a young boy, no older than ten, who was found brutally beaten, raped and unresponsive in his home. Again, it had been a child of a family with means. In this case, the family wasn’t willing to go quietly. There were a couple of articles regarding the incident, but just as quickly as the scandal had broken out, it went away when the family, the boy included, mysteriously disappeared.

Shortly after that, Meyers retired from his government job and began working as a consultant for this company.
Based on this information,
Foster came to the only logical conclusion: the business was a somehow involved in the trafficking. Foster was determined to get to
the truth
, and figured when he was through with Myers he’d hopefully have the answers he needed. One other
decision
Foster had come to was that Myers was a disgusting pedophile. Any remorse that Foster might have felt for what he planned on doing quickly disappeared.

“Who’s there? I want answers dammit.”

Foster chuckled. “You’re not exactly in a position to demand
anything
. But I’ll answer your question. I’m someone who is in need of information and you’re going to give it to me.”

“Fuck you! I’m not g
iving you a damn thing. You had
someone take me from my home. Don’t you know who the fuck I am? I can destroy you. And don’t think for a second just because I’m blindfolded it doesn’t mean I won’t figure out who
you are
.”

Foster leaned forward, and yanked down Myer’s blindfold. “There. Now you don’t have to guess.”

The older man’s eyes widened. “I recognize you. You’re…you’re that banker! Why do you have me here?”

Foster walked over to his table of tools and picked up a scalpel. “I’ve already answered that question for you. I’m in need of answers.” He held the instrument up to make sure it was sharp enough since he hadn’t used it in a while. It was perfect.

“W-what are you going to do with that?”

“Hurt you.”

As Foster walked over to his prey, Myers began fighting against his restraints in earnest. Foster sliced the sleeves of Myers’ shirt to expose his skin. He then popped each of the other man’s buttons
, slowly just to fuck with the other man’s mind
. Once
that task was complete
, Foster ran the scalpel down the front of Myers’ undershirt, making sure that the tip nick the skin from chest to bellybutton.

“Ow! That fucking hurt. Wait a minute. If you let me go now I promise there won’t be any consequences. We’ll pretend like this never happened.”

Foster’s only reply was a smirk. He walked back to the table and picked up a vial and syringe. Sticking the needle into the clear liquid, he drew out precisely, 10 cc’s. He plucked the syringe to get rid of the excess medicine before placing it back on the table.

“What the hell is that?”

“Adrenaline. I’ll administer it to you in case your heart stops.”

“Let me go, you fucker! What kind of sick bastard are you? If you’re going to kill me, you might as well just do it now because if I get out of this alive, you’re going to regret that you messed with me. I have very powerful friends. They’ll retaliate. They’ll destroy everything you care about.”

“Interesting. Who might these friends be?” Foster asked without turning around. He faced his tools, deciding which one he’d use first, and then his gaze landed on a small velvet pouch.

He approached Myers. “How much I hurt you will depend on you. If you tell me the truth I
’ll
show some mercy. If you lie to me or fail to answer my questions in a timely manner, you’ll pay the price. First question: what is your involvement with the auction?”

The man’s eyes widened before he shook his head. “Auction? I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Foster sighed. “And here I was hoping you wouldn’t be so tedious.” He then pulled out a small steel pin. Moving behind the chair, Foster knelt and lifted one of Myers’ forefingers. He shoved the pin beneath the man’s fingernail and pushed until the pin was completely embedded.

Myers howled in agony. “Nooooo! Please don’t do this. I’ll pay you whatever you want. Just let me go.”

Foster took out another pin and forced it under Myers’ thumbnail.

“Oh, God! Please no!”

“Lie to me again, and I’ll jam then
beneath
the rest of your nails. Now tell me why money from the auction is being transferred to your account.”

“I’m just a middle man. I swear I have nothing to do with that money. I mean, I get a small fee for being an intermediary but that’s it.”

Just as he promised, Foster proceeded to shove a pin beneath each of Myers
’ finger
nails.

The other man howled in pain. Tears streamed down his ruddy face.

“If you’re only the middle man as you claim, where are you transferring the money to?”

“Another dummy account. I don’t know where it goes from there.”

Foster sighed. “I see you’re going to be difficult about this. “I’ll tell you what. How about we just cut to the chase? I had planned on using every single one of tho
se tools on you, but tonight
I have something even better in mind.” Foster stood up and walked to the table. He picked up the scalpel and a small black plastic disc about an inch in diameter.

“Wait, wait. I’ll tell you what you want to know!” Myers screamed.

Foster ignored his pleas. He’d done this enough time to
realize
what Myers would tell him: just enough
,
while still withholding the most vital information. He sliced Myers’ forearm open, careful to avoid any vital veins and arteries.

“Oh Christ! What do you want from me? I fucking told you I’d tell you. Please just stop! I swear I’ll tell you!”

Foster slashed another line across the cut he’d already made, tearing into muscle tissue, before shoving the disk into the
wound. He pressed it deep to assure
it would do what it was meant to.

His prey cried, sniveled and screamed, alternating between begging for mercy and cursing everything about him. Foster returned to the table and picked up a tiny remote. “I just implanted a muscle stimulator in your arm. These little babies were originally invented to ease back and muscle ache for people who suffer from chronic pain. A doctor implants it and when the patient is hurting, all they have to do is press a button and this tiny disc sends soothing waves throughout the body. Funny thing about that is the device wasn’t properly tested before it went out on the market because the company who manufactured it wanted to save money, so they didn’t run the proper tests. Anyway, when these things were used on real people, instead of the disks causing relief, it had the opposite effect. It caused severe pain. In the older patients, it even caused death. I heard it once described as razors moving beneath your skin. I’ve always found this thing to be the most effective when I need to make people talk. Although I usually save it for last, I’ll make an exception for you. Now here’s what’s going to happen, I’ll ask you a question and you’re going to answer. If I don’t like your answer, I’m going to press this button which sets it off. And if your heart stops, I’m going to stab this needle into
your chest to bring you back.”

Myers eyes were as wide as saucers.
“You crazy bastard!”