The flat of the hard dark metal cleaver remained pressed flush against the left main neck blood vessel of Scarface Wei.
The steel was thirty degrees colder than living human skin. Every time the guard’s heart tightened, the rhythmic pulse of his blood bumped against the cold metal, transmitting the wild rhythm directly into Pei Jing’s fingertips.
One hundred and forty beats per minute.
“Don’t kill me...” Wei gasped, his face pressed into the damp clay floor.
His right arm hung limp at his side, the iron needle still embedded in the upper-arm notch beneath his collarbone. His right leg was fully numb, the sciatic nerve deadened by the second needle. Droplets of cold, greasy sweat rolled down his scarred brow, mixing with the mud on his cheek.
“I have stones... Twenty whole stones hidden in the false chimney of my quarters in Gallery Five... I’ll give you the key... I’ll give you everything...”
Pei Jing didn’t remove the cleaver.
He knelt beside the numbed cutthroat, resting his left knee lightly against Wei’s shoulder blade to prevent any sudden spinal twisting.
