Hot Revenge Box Set 4

Chapter 52

Klempner

What's the obsession with potatoes?

I called her Potato Face when she was a kid.

What does she look like now?

Jenny was no looker at that age…

… But she matured. Bloomed.

Juliana... Never the same twice.

I scratch at my beard. I’ve never liked facial hair in hot climates, but I don’t have a choice right now. Even so, the flourishing colony of lice that has stowed aboard adds an extra edge of irritation.

Lice…

Where the fuck did they come from?

Can rat lice live on humans?

Having a fucking good go at it…

I catch one, squeezing the revolting thing between my fingernails. It bursts with a Pop!

Only another 999 to go…

*****

The boredom’s the worst. Endless hours. Endless days and nights. I’ve no idea how long.

The only breaks in the monotony are Juliana’s visits: just long enough to sit, eat something at me, toss a potato at me.

No, not Juliana: Solana.

Why's she so obsessed with the name?

How many names have I used over the years? Worn like a suit of clothes to be discarded when the weather changes and something different is needed.

I’ve never been defined by my name.

But she sees it differently…

Something skritches and I jerk a look sidelong

It’s a rat…

Just a rat…

faced down gunmen,

It’s just a rat…

more scratching. And

say if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze

Who said that?

Nietzsche?

Depressing bastard…

come equipped with fists and feet. Between

*****

you know

takes something from her lunchbox, unwrapping one of her usual

a psychological condition where, in a kidnap or hostage situation,

saying you're

have her attention. “… But there's

“So?”

your only friend,

A flake of chocolate cracks off the small round

you keep coming

in her chewing, mouth

watch me rot, you have your camera there.” I jerk my chin up to the

feed you. I assume you do want me to feed you? We can always change that you

leave me a bag of potatoes and come once a week. Or even, once a month. But, so far as I can reckon, you're here

and swallows, not speaking, simply regarding me. I continue. “Am I your only friend, Sola? Is that it? You've murdered everyone else that might

head, giggling. “So, you're my

who thinks you're worth it? The daughter you had slated as a sex-slave when she was a kid? That middle-aged hooker? You've

her seat, arches her

voice mild. “Did I say otherwise? I'm not claiming to have changed. Who ever really changes?”

“Solana…” she hisses.

stands, the lunchbox tumbling from her lap. The contents spill and scatter over the rancid concrete, some of it dropping just this side of that painted

on her heel, she stalks

at the fallen food, ignoring the jab of pain in my ankle as the chain snaps taut, I snatch up the discarded

camera. It hardly matters. My attention is on

single bite taken from the corner. And I have half

eaten anything like

For how long?

no idea. Weeks? Months? My sense of

had a

another,

down the wrong way and suddenly I’m no longer eating, but coughing and

it up, where

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