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…

scratching. And a

if you gaze long enough into an

Who said that?

Nietzsche?

Depressing bastard…

equipped with teeth and whiskers. I come equipped with fists and feet. Between us, we

*****

you know

Interest flickers over her eyes. She takes something from her lunchbox, unwrapping one of her usual dainties from a napkin.

a kidnap or hostage situation, the

saying you're getting attached to

“… But there's a reverse condition. It's called Lima syndrome, where the captor comes

“So?”

your only

brigadeiro. A flake of chocolate cracks off the small round cake, dropping back into the napkin and she dabs

why do you keep

her chewing, mouth

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

me to feed you? We can always change

and come once a week. Or even, once a month. But,

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

head, giggling. “So, you're my

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

crosses her arms, sits back in her seat, arches her brows. “I am making you

I'm not claiming to have changed. Who ever really changes?” I raise my gaze again, look into her face. “Have you changed

“Solana…” she hisses.

from her lap. The contents spill and scatter over the rancid concrete, some of it dropping just this side of that painted line, now less than white. Even under

her heel,

snaps taut, I snatch up the discarded meal from the filthy concrete, scrabbling to grab broken fragments of meat in one hand, a cake with

blind, my eyes adjust to the green blink of the camera. It hardly matters.

untouched, only a single bite taken from the corner.

anything

For how long?

idea. Weeks? Months? My sense of time is out of the

I had a

of empanada, then another, I

way and suddenly I’m no longer

I barf it up, where it plops in

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