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, soldiers,

It’s just a rat…

scratching. And a nose pokes

say if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss

Who said that?

Nietzsche?

Depressing bastard…

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

*****

do you know what Stockholm

her eyes. She takes something from her lunchbox, unwrapping

in a kidnap or hostage situation, the prisoner forms

you're getting attached to

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

“So?”

your

napkin produces a brigadeiro. A flake of chocolate cracks off

why do you keep coming

her chewing, mouth

do you keep coming? If all you wanted was to watch me rot, you have your camera

do want me to feed you? We can always change that

if that were the only reason, you could leave me a bag of potatoes and come once a week. Or even, once

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

swings her head, giggling. “So,

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. And

crosses her arms, sits back in her seat, arches her

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

“Solana…” she hisses.

the rancid concrete, some of it dropping just this side of that painted line, now less than white. Even under the

on her heel,

as the chain snaps taut, I snatch up the discarded meal from

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

is almost untouched, only a single bite taken from the

anything like

For how long?

sense of time

I had a

empanada, then another, I ram

goes down the wrong way and suddenly I’m no longer eating, but

barf it up, where it plops in a saliva-coated mess

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