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, soldiers,

It’s just a rat…

dark openings, more scratching. And a

say if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the

Who said that?

Nietzsche?

Depressing bastard…

with teeth and whiskers. I come equipped with

*****

know

flickers over her eyes. She takes something from her lunchbox, unwrapping one of her

the label for a psychological condition where, in a kidnap or hostage situation,

sniggers. “You saying you're getting

misread me...” Her head tilts. She pretending mockery, but I have her attention. “… But there's a reverse condition. It's called Lima syndrome, where the captor comes to

“So?”

I your only

chocolate cracks off the small round cake,

you keep coming

in her chewing, mouth hanging a little

you wanted was to 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

do. But if that were the only reason, you could leave me a bag of potatoes and come once a week. Or even, once a

me. I continue. “Am I your only friend, Sola? Is that it? You've murdered everyone

“So, you're

someone's going to come and save you, Larry? You believe you're worth saving? That there's anyone out there 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 not changed, Larry. I can see right through you. The same heartless bastard that shipped me out to dig up potatoes for the rest of my life. Along with

in her seat, arches her brows.

keep my voice mild. “Did I say otherwise? I'm not claiming to have changed. Who

“Solana…” she hisses.

Instead, she stands, the lunchbox tumbling from her lap. The contents spill and scatter over the rancid concrete, some of it

on her heel, she

in my ankle as the chain snaps taut, I snatch up the discarded meal from the filthy concrete, scrabbling to grab

green blink of the camera. It hardly matters. My attention is on

taken from the

eaten anything like this

For how long?

My sense of

I had a

a mouthful of empanada, then another, I ram the

Half-chewed pulp goes down the wrong way and suddenly I’m no longer eating,

I barf it up, where it

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