Hot Revenge Box Set 2

*****

James

The message from Charlotte’s abductors…

Finchby…

Baxter…

… replays in my head…

Marsh Street under Barnbridge Road overpass 9pm

Bring the money

No police. No other people or she dies

If late she dies. So does the baby

Brandy and rage burn inside me.

The bag containing the ransom money swings heavy in my hand. I'm the decoy and at some level, I know I may not come out of this alive. Klempner's Kevlar vest gives me a little comfort, but it’s the fury inside that warms me against fast falling temperatures.

I should be afraid…

But I’m not.

Jade-Eyes…

My beautiful Jade-Eyes…

Your gift to

my Virgin, we have helter-skeltered from one crisis

None of it her fault, she has simply been the survivor of everything life has dealt

change

No. Nothing.

in, imprisoned in her cell, racked with pain, coughing up green slime, she found the

coming for

And me?

I’m the decoy.

little to blanket in what passed for the heat of the day. The streets are glazed to a hoared sheen, except for where streetlamps glare yellow over

trek of perhaps half a mile to reach the rendezvous point,

the cold is keeping people indoors and, after all, Christmas is coming. Most folks will be with friends, at parties or

and welcome, sparkling with fairy lights, dressed with spray-on snow and Santa, Please Stop Here signs. In my own home, we never finished the trimming up. Charlotte’s abduction killed

I pass by.

relative safety of the residential zone and

the City, it was built before the main highways were developed, a remnant of the old town, under the overpass which carries

are cautious. The area is noted for hoax calls of fire or medical emergency followed by muggings for

feeling windy about being

Better than the alternative.

to

dim under inadequate sodium lighting. From the road above, moisture trickles down, streaking stark concrete walls white before

traffic grumbles past. But here below, all

“Hello?”

voice echoes briefly, then

I pace, circling,

Nothing…