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…

the dark openings, more scratching. And a

into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back

Who said that?

Nietzsche?

Depressing bastard…

with teeth and whiskers. I come

*****

you know what

her lunchbox, unwrapping one of

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

you're getting

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

“So?”

your only friend,

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

you keep coming

pauses in her chewing, mouth hanging a little open.

coming? If all you wanted was to watch me rot, you have your camera there.” I jerk my chin up

me to feed you? We can always

reason, you could leave me a bag of potatoes and come once a week. Or even, once a month. But,

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

giggling. “So, you're my friend are

finger at me, “You think 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

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

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

“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 the heavy make-up, her colour

her heel, she stalks

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

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

taken from

anything like

For how long?

no idea. Weeks? Months? My sense of time

had

in a mouthful of empanada, then another, I ram

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

on my scavenged meal, I barf it up, where it

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