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…

Thinks that gives

against right-handers. I've done

Fast.

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

close, I smell

Sweat. Sour.

sour scent of

Not excitement.

Fear.

suddenly I'm overreaching…

neck but as he swings away,

up on my advantage, I bully forward, reaching

with my right hand and he twists away, still grinning manically, but he doesn't

The other knife...

Ambidextrous?

swerves away from my

the rib

Got you, you bastard…

her. The Indian

and Baxter, she charges between us and I twist away to avoid slicing

staggering back, my foot

Drinks slops?

Blood?

In slow motion...

arms

I go down...

Baxter’s on top of

…

as his blade slices

The rasp of

The metallic

Whose?

Mine…

his moment,

vein, he reaches into

My Glock?

for my forehead, he

not use the

the

round wildly, one way or the other, searching

There are none.

straight up the barrel of my own fucking

Is this it?

all this time… this

irritation. Of all the ways I could have died over the

something I

Live by the sword…

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

think

and huge. The rest of the world vanishes around me. My peripheral vision grows

My throat tightens…

contempt in

know

swing to its owner. So do

the spiked heels. The matching skirt just clears the crotch and

shoulders and frames a face made up with emerald eyes

“Mitch?”

it. I

So does Baxter.

full of women offering their all. But nothing

seen her dressed like

to strike a pose. And with an eye

She hooks a finger into the

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