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…

Cara… Your gift to

day I met Charlotte, my Virgin, we have helter-skeltered from

robbed her of what she deserves. None of it her fault, she has simply been the survivor of everything life

I change any of

No. Nothing.

in the dire situation she’s in, imprisoned in her cell, racked with pain, coughing up green slime, she found the way to tell

coming for you,

And me?

I’m the decoy.

the merest hush of a breeze. High cloud makes a haze of the stars but does little to blanket in what

rendezvous point,

not that late, but the cold is keeping people indoors and, after all,

with warmth 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

I pass by.

few minutes I’m leaving the relative safety of the residential zone and passing into more uncertain territory. This end of Marsh Street is not a good

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

is noted for hoax calls of fire or medical emergency followed by muggings for cash and drugs, and attacks on medics and fire officers for the sheer hell

I'm feeling windy about

Better than the alternative.

to

concrete supports for the overpass, dim under inadequate sodium lighting. From the road above, moisture trickles down, streaking stark concrete walls white before settling to iced sculptures over ground-level

me, on the overpass, late evening traffic grumbles past. But

“Hello?”

echoes briefly, then dies

I

Nothing…