Endurance - Jack Kilborn [70]
It showed a woman, strapped to the very same table Mal was lying on.
Jimmy was using a hacksaw to cut off her leg.
Though the sound was turned low, the woman’s screaming stabbed Mal in the ears.
The scene cut to a different angle of a different person. An older man. He was begging, beating his bound fists on the table, while Jimmy had a hand inside his stomach cavity.
Next came a close-up of a woman’s breast, being filleted off as she thrashed.
“This next one is my favorite,” Jimmy said.
On the screen, he was using a spoon to pluck out a man’s eyeball.
“Did you hear the pop sound when it came out? I can rewind it if you didn’t.”
Mal squeezed his own eyes closed.
This isn’t happening. This can’t be happening.
“It’s not over yet!” Jimmy whined. He stuck Mal with the scalpel again. “Keep watching!”
Mal forced his eyes open, one nightmarish image after another searing itself onto his brain. Amputations. Organ removals. Procedures that weren’t even remotely medical, like the one involving a power sander.
“Dermabrasion,” Jimmy said. “It removes acne.”
“You’re insane,” Mal said. “You’re fucking insane.”
Jimmy switched off the TV, then stared over Mal’s head.
“You have a potty mouth, Mr. Deiter.”
Mal looked up, saw Eleanor had walked into the room. She was wearing a robe and a hairnet, a frown creasing her ugly face.
“Eleanor, what the hell—”
Eleanor clamped a hand over his mouth. “Any more foul language and I’ll have Jimmy sew your lips together. Understand?”
Mal saw she was serious, and he nodded. Eleanor let her eyes, and her hand, trail down his naked body.
“I see that you keep in shape,” she said, drawing a circle around his belly button with her finger. “That’s good.” Then her hand brushed over his penis, which was almost as awful as being stabbed with the scalpel.
Mal swallowed, biting back fear. “If you want money…”
“We have all the money we need, Mr. Deiter. But thank you for offering.”
“Applying styptic to control bleeding,” Jimmy said. Mal watched him take a pinch of white powder and press it into his thigh wounds.
He uttered, “Son of a…” but managed to stop himself before bitch came out.
“Self-control,” Eleanor said, tying a medical face mask across her mouth and nose. “I admire that in a man.”
“What do you want?” Mal said through gritted teeth.
“What I want, Mr. Deiter, is the same thing I’ve wanted for forty years, from the first time I felt my eldest child George kick inside my womb.” She leaned in closer. “I want one of my sons to become President of the United States.”
Mal realized this wasn’t some sort of kidnapping scheme, or an attempt to frighten him. Eleanor wasn’t just eccentric. She was truly out of her goddamn mind.
“All forty-three of our Presidents carry the royal bloodline.” Eleanor said. “My family has the very same bloodline, Mr. Deiter. We’re Roosevelts. And one day, another Roosevelt will sit in the Oval Office.”
Mal pulled at his straps, hard as he could. They didn’t give an inch.
“Did you know the term blue blood was applied to nobility because those of royal descent tended to have fairer skin, which allowed blue veins to show through?” Eleanor asked. “While having royal blood makes someone like me genetically superior to someone like you, such purity does come with its particular challenges. Anemia and hemophilia are two of them. Phocomelia. Amelia. Porphyria. Achromia. Scoliosis. Alopecia. Thrombocytopenia.”
Insanity, Mal mentally added.
“These have plagued royal families for generations. My sons bear these burdens heroically, as nobility should. But they require regular transfusions in order to remain healthy. Y’all can’t buy blood at the corner market, Mr. Deiter. Especially not the rare type we need. When one of my boys becomes President, we’ll no doubt have unlimited access to the nation’s blood banks. In the meantime, the only way for me to get a regular supply of fresh blood is to acquire it myself.”
“You want my blood,” Mal stated.
“Goodness no, Mr. Deiter. Your lady friend, Deborah, has the type we require. Yours is no good to us. But you can still be