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

if you gaze long enough into an

Who said that?

Nietzsche?

Depressing bastard…

my case, the abyss comes equipped with teeth and whiskers. I come equipped with fists and feet. Between us, we settle an

*****

you know what

her lunchbox, unwrapping one of her usual dainties from a napkin. “What is

kidnap or hostage situation, the prisoner forms an

sniggers. “You saying you're

me...” Her head tilts. She pretending mockery, but I have her attention. “… But

“So?”

I your

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

why do you keep

her chewing, mouth hanging

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

you. I assume you do want me to feed you? We can

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

and swallows, not speaking, simply regarding me. I continue. “Am I your only friend, Sola? Is that it? You've murdered everyone else that might get close to

swings her head, giggling. “So, you're my friend

when she was a kid? That middle-aged hooker? You've not changed, Larry. I can

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

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

“Solana…” she hisses.

it dropping just this side of that

on her heel,

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 in one hand, a cake with the other before, with a

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

taken from the corner. And

not eaten anything

For how long?

Weeks? Months? My sense of time is out of the

had a

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

goes down the wrong way and

my scavenged meal, I barf it up, where it plops in a saliva-coated mess onto

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