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...

eight inches.

Well used…

Left-handed…

gives him an

right-handers. I've done

Hard. Fast. Teeth bared.

but I grab him by the arm. We grapple. His blade to my throat. My

I smell

Sweat. Sour.

sour scent of

Not excitement.

Fear.

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

but as he swings away, my fist lands

bully forward, reaching for his blade, slashing

slash at his chest with my right hand and he twists away, still

The other knife...

Ambidextrous?

I’m not. Just well-practised. As he swerves away from my right hand, my left hand

the rib cage and

Got you, you bastard…

her. The Indian

and Baxter,

back, my

Drinks slops?

Blood?

In slow motion...

arms wind-milling

I go down...

on top of

…

gasp as his blade slices

rasp

The metallic

Whose?

Mine…

his moment, the knife poised at my

he reaches into his

My Glock?

my forehead, he backs

use the

got the

I swing round wildly,

There are none.

I’m staring straight up the barrel of my own fucking gun and to Baxter’s

Is this it?

time… this is

the ways I could have died over the

for something I

Live by the sword…

these moments. The brain does odd things under extreme

don’t think

looms close and huge. The

My throat tightens…

man.” The voice is sultry, smooth, and drips honey and contempt in equal measure… “A hero with a gun and a knife against an unarmed

I know that

to its

matching skirt just clears the crotch and the zip-front leather vest hugs a narrow

gloriously over smooth white shoulders and frames a face made up with emerald eyes painted Goth-dark and

“Mitch?”

admit it.

So does Baxter.

full of women offering their

never seen her dressed like this, not even in

to strike a pose.

She hooks a finger into

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