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...

maybe eight inches. Well

Well used…

Left-handed…

that gives

practice against right-handers. I've done

stabs out. Hard. Fast. Teeth bared.

the arm. We grapple. His blade

I

Sweat. Sour.

scent

Not excitement.

Fear.

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

as I lash for his neck but as he swings away, my fist lands

I bully forward, reaching for his blade,

hand and he

The other knife...

Ambidextrous?

from my right hand, my left

rib cage and

Got you, you bastard…

it’s her. The Indian

Baxter, she charges between us and I twist away

my foot skids on

Drinks slops?

Blood?

In slow motion...

my arms wind-milling

I go down...

on

…

as his blade slices across

The rasp of shredding

metallic

Whose?

Mine…

his moment, the knife poised at my

the vein, he reaches into his jacket, he

My Glock?

for my

use the

the balls for

up on my elbows I swing round wildly,

There are none.

of my own fucking gun and

Is this it?

this time… this is how I

have died over the years, I’m taken out by a shite like

I

Live by the sword…

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

think I’m

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

My throat tightens…

and contempt in equal measure… “A hero with a gun and a knife against an unarmed

know

swing to its owner. So

matching skirt just clears the crotch and the

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

“Mitch?”

it.

So does Baxter.

might be a brothel. It might have been full of women offering their

never seen her dressed like this, not even in

one leg a little curved to strike a pose. And with

open silver loop. She hooks a finger into the loop and tooth by tooth,

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