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

It’s just a rat…

more scratching.

say if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the

Who said that?

Nietzsche?

Depressing bastard…

come equipped with fists and feet. Between us, we settle an

*****

you know what Stockholm syndrome

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

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

sniggers. “You saying you're getting

but I have her attention. “… But there's a reverse condition. It's called Lima syndrome, where the captor

“So?”

I your

a brigadeiro. A flake of chocolate cracks off the small round cake, dropping

do you keep coming

pauses in her chewing, mouth hanging

wanted was to watch me rot, you have your camera there.” I jerk my

assume you do want me to

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

simply regarding me. I continue. “Am I your only friend,

head, giggling. “So, you're

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

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

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

“Solana…” she hisses.

it dropping just this side of that painted line, now less than white. Even under the heavy make-up, her colour has changed.

heel,

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 in one hand, a cake with the other before, with a click, the light winks out and I'm left

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

taken from the corner. And I have half of a

anything like this

For how long?

Weeks? Months? My sense of

I had a

then another, I

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

barf it

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