Page 95 of Wicked Little Nightmare

He swallowed hard. "I can't... I won't tell you that."

I chuckled, the sound dark and hollow. "Wrong answer, pal. Let's try something else. You got one of these fancy neural chips too? Your GPS suggests you do. I can see two blinking dots and we sure as fuck don’t have them."

Beaver nodded reluctantly. "Yeah. Standard procedure after... after Patient X and Y escaped."

Lakey's laughter shattered his resolve as he flinched at the sound. It was that manic giggle - my favorite one.

"Oh, honey," she grabbed his hair, crouching down to Beaver's eye level. "You have no fucking clue who we are, do you?"

Beaver's eyes darted between us, panic rising. "You're... you're psychopaths. Murderers. A bulletin was put out on two nuts who were on a war path."

Her grin widened, all teeth and no warmth. "Oh, we're so much more than that, sugar. Cam, should we tell him?"

I matched her grin, feeling that familiar rush of power. "Why not? Might as well let the poor bastard know just how fucked he really is."

She turned back to Beaver, her voice melodic and chilling. "Guess what, chomps? You're looking at the one and only Patient X and Y. And babe, you are so, so fucked."

The color drained from his face, and I couldn't help but savor the moment. For someone entrusted with such valuable information, he was a bit slow in the head, wasn’t he? It was like watching a man realize he'd wandered into the lion's den wearing a meat suit. Part of me almost felt bad for the guy.

Almost.

My girl’s eyes lit up with that glazed over look I knew all too well. "Cam, baby," she purred, "let's put our new friend on the table. I'm thinking it's time for our little... impromptu surgery."

I couldn't help but chuckle. "Now that's what I call a great idea, sweetheart."

Grabbing Beaver by his shoulders, I cut off his ties and hauled him onto the kitchen table. The guy was squirming like a worm on a hook, but he was no match for me. With a groan, I flipped him over, pinning him down. Rose was there in a flash, grabbing some new zip ties and fixing his arms to the table legs before attaching a few zip ties together and doing the same to his legs. He looked like a turtle all splayed out.

"Hold still, buddy," I growled. "Trust me, you don't want us to slip."

Lakey was practically bouncing with excitement, a wicked smile playing on her lips. "I've always wanted to play doctor," she giggled, reaching for one of her knives.

But something made me pause. If the remote was an activator, then theoretically we didn’t need to cut it out, but figuring out how to get it out would be useful. Either way, I caught Lakey's wrist before she could start carving.

"Hold up, sugar," I said, my mind racing. "I've got an idea. What if I can disable the tracker without cracking his skull open? Might be cleaner."

Lakey's bottom lip jutted out in an adorable pout. "But where's the fun in that?"

I grinned, pulling her close. "Tell you what. If this doesn't work, you get first dibs on the cutting. Deal?"

She sighed dramatically, but I could see the smile tugging at her lips. "Fine. But you better make it quick. You said I could do it and I’m not happy that you lied.”

“I didn’t lie, I just… you’re a bit impulsive, babe. We need to actuallytryto not kill him.” She huffed and crossed her arms, pinning me with a stare.Yeah, I’m gonna pay for that later.

Examining the back of his head, he too, had a small wire sticking out, hidden in his hairline. I tried to tug, but it wouldn’t give, only serving to make him scream.

“Sooo… we can cut his head open right?” As Lakey spoke, she grabbed a dirty sock off the floor and shoved it deep into his mouth. He gagged around it, his eyes watering.

Pretty sure I wiped baby juice off on that sock.

I took a deep breath, steadying my hand as I pressed the tip of the curved blade to Beaver's skull. His muffled screams were still pretty loud as I made the first incision. Blood welled up, warm and sticky against my fingers.

“Ugh, babe. You said I could do it.” Lakes pouted before leaning forward, putting her fingers into the cut and tugging on his scalp as I cut.

I sighed, holding the blade up and poked around, “Yes, babe, but as I already said… I’m kind of worried you’re just going to kill him and then we won’t know if we can disable it without causing death. So, when I’m done, then you can play Nurse Ratchet, okay?”

“Fine. But if you don’t let me play after I’m going to be very, VERY upset.”

Shaking my head, I sliced up, letting Lakey pulled his skin off his scalp by his hair and laying it flat against his head. He was thrashing around on the table, making it hard to cut with precision. It didn’t help that I was using a butterfly knife and not a scalpel, but semantics, really.A knife is a knife is a knife.

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