He paid no attention to the progress he made. As though the only thing in the universe that could bring him pleasure was each small kick, giddy with ecstasy every time he came closer to the knife.
His sole obsession: to kick, to move.
He saw the blade near his head. That made him only kick more. He had to get past the blade, yes… get it closer to his hands.
Taking so long. Too long. No way he’d make it.
Fuck that idea, he thought.
I’ll make it.
He couldn’t get his head in position to see if he was close enough. It would be a guess, an estimate of how far he had come.
He might have only one chance.
He stopped.
Was the knife close in line with his tied hands?
Because, he thought, while my wrists are lashed tight to the chair… my fingers, my palm—they are goddamned free.
He looked around and saw the other end of the table nearby, a foot away.
An estimate.
He guessed he was close to the knife.
Now, more rocking, leaning left and right, needing to get the chair’s back to edge closer to where he thought the knife was. Then, more inaccurate kicking, using his weight, his legs.
Fingers scratched desperately against the floor, feeling nothing.
Again, more rocking, more crazy grasping with his fingers.
Then, a different sensation. Metal.
Another kick, and his right hand briefly grasped the blade, felt the sharp metal dig into the soft skin of his fingertips.
No matter; he was close.
One hand would have to hold the knife. By the handle or by the blade—it didn’t matter—then slowly saw the rope. Ignoring the metal if it slid past the rope and bit into his hand, his wrist.
Another crazed grasp and his right hand locked around the knife, partly around the handle, partly around the blade.
Now his fingers had to perform a weird fumbling, knowing that the knife could simply slip away. More guesses as he positioned it, hoping he had the knife tip resting against rope.
His palm and fingers could make the blade go back and forth with only the smallest movements.
His new obsession now, and he thought of nothing else but this movement.
Once he felt the tip of the blade dip, burying itself in skin.
If I hit a vein, this will all be for nothing.
He slowed a bit, taking more care with his strange sawing at such a difficult angle.
He felt the rope actually loosen.
Loose, and that meant he could make bigger slicing movements, now almost a mad butcher himself.
Looser still.
His tied wrists now had some space.
He forced himself not to rush. One wrong move here could fuck it up.
Slowly, slowly, as that beautiful distance between the two wrists opened even more. He felt he could slide a hand out, maybe both. But he kept at it.
The need to be absolutely sure that important.
Then… as if they had never been tied at all… his wrists were free.
His hands, free.
Now, with a mad speed, he cut the band around his chest. Not bothering to sit up, he sliced the ropes at his legs and ankles.
He was untied. Still on the floor, still in the same odd position that he had landed in.
Then, a creak. The cookery door opening. Early evening air from outside.
Dunphy’s voice.
“Willy, want another hit? You want—”
The voice stopped.
Jack didn’t move.
He realized…
They think I’m gone.
37. 6:01 P.M.
Jack heard a clanking noise, the sound of metal. Dunphy and his helper had stopped talking.
The sound of them grabbing blades. The clang of metal.
Jack still held the knife that had freed him. But then he heard a sound like a lawn mower. The smoky smell of gas.
There was no time to wait anymore.
Jack crawled to the far end of the table, deeper into the building. There was no point in escaping with these two alive.
He stood up, and clocked the position of the two of them. Dunphy holding some kind of gas-powered saw, something for chewing through bones, cutting up carcasses.
The cook’s helper held a cleaver in one hand and a long curved blade in the other.
“Just stop right there, buddy,” the cook said, “and nobody has to get fucking hurt.” Dunphy grinned, his bowling-ball face one leering smile. “After all, if we had wanted to hurt you, that would have happened hours ago, right?”
The helper had taken a few tentative steps closer to Jack.
Jack acted as though he didn’t notice.
There was no point talking to these two.
More steps from the helper.
Now the cook began to walk away from the far wall, the saw spitting out smoke, the chained blades grunting as they cut through the air. Dunphy’s massive arms held the saw with ease.
Obviously given it a lot of use.
Could Jack depend on his leg?
The two men had moved so each was at the limit of Jack’s peripheral vision.
Jack started to lower his knife.
Sharp enough to cut through rope, but how would it do with skin and bone?
He was about to find out.
Lower still.
The cook’s smile broadened even as he moved toward Jack, the saw held at chest height, blade pointing forward like the barrel of a bizarre gun.
Then Jack moved.
He turned to the helper. Smaller, he was probably faster. He looked scared, while the cook didn’t.
The smaller man immediately stuck out his two blades, a classic and bad move by someone who wasn’t used to fighting with a knife.
Jack held his blade close, maximizing his ability to send it jutting out and back.
Sticking it out… that just wasted seconds.
Jack took painful steps toward the man and when close enough, he did just that—jabbing his right hand with the blade out. He nailed the man’s arm holding the cleaver. The man screamed as he released it and it fell to the floor.
From the sound of the saw, Dunphy had started moving toward Jack.
Only seconds.
The helper now slashed wildly from left and right with the thin blade, a mini-sword ending in a fine pointy tip.
Jack tilted to the left, dodging one wild swing, then another dodge as it came swinging back. He held back on his second strike until that wild arc had been completed.
And when that had happened, the man’s midsection lay wide open to an attack.
Another jab, this one straight at the man’s guts, then a violent pull up. The whirr of the gas-powered saw right behind Jack.
He left the blade buried.
Saving a precious second or two.
He spun around, the move agony now. Dunphy marched toward him like a human tank, stepping on and over his partner.
Dunphy kept jabbing with the saw. A stupid grin still filled his face. He wasn’t scared. He was fucking enjoying this.
Blades all over the room, but Jack was cut off from them.
But the saw was heavy despite the strength in the cook’s meaty arms.
“Come on, you dumb bastard!” the cook yelled. His mouth a dark hole.
As much a Can Head as any Can Head Jack had ever faced.
Nothing human about this monster at all.
Close, and Jack was forced against the wall.
But there was a table right in front of him, covered in blood, bone, skin.
Jack did a diving roll onto the table, spinning around on the bone and flesh that had been left there. The smell of decay covering him.
The roll worked. Dunphy spun around, marching around to the other side, his saw sputtering. The smile had vanished.