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 gunmen, soldiers,

It’s just a rat…

dark openings, more scratching. And

into an abyss, the abyss will

Who said that?

Nietzsche?

Depressing bastard…

my case, the abyss comes equipped with teeth and whiskers. I come equipped with fists and

*****

know what Stockholm syndrome

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

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

saying you're

“… But there's a reverse condition. It's

“So?”

I your only

The napkin produces a brigadeiro. A flake of chocolate cracks off the small round cake, dropping back into the napkin

do you keep

mouth hanging a little open.

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

do want me to feed you?

me a bag of potatoes and come once a week. Or

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

head, giggling. “So, you're

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. And I’m

her seat, arches her brows.

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

“Solana…” she hisses.

working, she says no more. Instead, she stands, the lunchbox tumbling 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

her heel, she

up the discarded meal from the filthy concrete, scrabbling to grab broken fragments of meat in one hand, a cake with the other before,

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

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

anything like

For how long?

sense

had

a mouthful of empanada, then another, I ram the food

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

it up, where it

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