Hot Revenge Box Set 2

Chapter 15

Klempner

Although I can hear chaos from down the stairs, up here now, it’s quiet. There’s no-one in the dance room.

In the pool room, the only sound is the crunching of glass under my boots. I carry on to Finchby’s office.

All empty?

It seems so.

The time?

Time to go.

Except… as I’m about to turn and leave a girl, I see her; barely a teenager, some variety of Asian, Indian perhaps. Streaming tears, she skitters out from behind the desk, making for the kitchen.

I follow her and she cringes back into the corner. I offer my hand. “I’m not going to hurt you. You have to leave.”

She babbles at me in I’ve-no-idea-what language, then abruptly, her face swings up to mine and fingers outstretched, leaps up at me, clawing at my face. Reflexively, I jerk back, and she bolts past me and out, back the way I came.

Fuck!

I dash after her, but in the few seconds, she’s gone, vanished.

Where did she go?

Out?

Or somewhere deeper inside?

I check my watch… Three minutes…

Christ!

I have to find her… If she’s on the stairwell, perhaps I’ll hear her. I turn for the bar, heading for the stairs up and down, and there…

Fuck.

Baxter.

I reach for my Glock… And it’s not there.

Damn… When did I put it down?

Baxter flashes brows. And the knife in his hand. “Going somewhere?”

“I was planning on leaving.” I slip the knife from my belt. “Your friend Finchby has already left the building. I believe the money may be with him.”

“I’m not going to weep over Finchby. And I didn't do it for the cash. Well… mainly not for the cash. And I have my half anyway.”

We circle, eyeball to eyeball.

Make the first move?

Wait for him?

I move slowly, watching for the twitch of the hand. The nudge of the shoulder. The tell that he's going to stop talking and...

He slashes out… moves fast…

But it’s a feint and we both know it, calculated to draw a reaction from me.

Testing me…

My speed…

My reactions…

Younger than me...

How much by?

Ten years?

His knife...

inches. Well cared

Well used…

Left-handed…

that gives him an

right-handers.

Fast.

through, but I grab him by the arm.

close, I smell

Sweat. Sour.

scent of

Not excitement.

Fear.

suddenly I'm overreaching… off-balance… and I pull back

I lash for his neck but as he swings away,

following up on my advantage, I bully forward, reaching

and he twists away, still grinning

The other knife...

Ambidextrous?

As he swerves away from my right

rib cage

Got you, you bastard…

it’s her.

nowhere, pelting for the exit, apparently blind to me and Baxter, she

back, my foot skids on

Drinks slops?

Blood?

In slow motion...

my arms

I go down...

on top

…

gasp as his blade slices across

rasp

The metallic

Whose?

Mine…

grinning maniacally, he hovers, enjoying his moment, the knife poised at my

point nipping at the vein, he reaches into

My Glock?

for my forehead, he

not use

the

wildly, one way or

There are none.

of my own fucking gun and

Is this it?

all this time… this is

have died over the years, I’m

for something I didn’t

Live by the sword…

mind works at these moments. The brain does odd things under extreme

think

muzzle of the gun looms close and huge. The rest of the world

My throat tightens…

and contempt in equal measure… “A

I know

its

skirt just

white shoulders and frames a face made up with emerald eyes painted

“Mitch?”

admit it. I

So does Baxter.

It might have been full of women offering their

seen her dressed like this, not even in

a pose. And with an eye on Baxter that dares him to do his

tag dangles, an open silver loop. She hooks a finger into the

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