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…

down

It’s just a rat…

more scratching.

say if you gaze long enough into an abyss,

Who said that?

Nietzsche?

Depressing bastard…

comes equipped with teeth and whiskers. I come equipped with fists and feet. Between

*****

you know what

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

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

you're getting attached to

no. Don't misread me...” Her head tilts. She pretending mockery, but I have her attention. “… But there's a reverse condition.

“So?”

your only friend,

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

do you

pauses in her chewing, mouth

all you wanted was to watch me rot, you have

I assume you do want me to feed

were the only reason, you could 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 every day or

your only friend, Sola?

her head, giggling. “So, you're

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 all the others you did the same to. You’ve not changed.

seat, arches her brows. “I am making you

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

“Solana…” she hisses.

concrete, some of it dropping just this

on her heel,

supernatural premonition to know what's coming. Launching myself at the fallen food, ignoring the jab of pain in my ankle as the chain snaps taut, I snatch up the discarded meal from the filthy concrete, scrabbling to grab broken fragments of meat

my eyes adjust to the green blink of the camera. It hardly matters. My attention

delicacy is almost untouched, only a single bite taken from the corner. And I have half

anything like

For how long?

no idea. Weeks? Months? My sense of time is out

I had

another, I ram the food into

and suddenly I’m no longer eating, but coughing and choking

I barf it up, where it plops

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