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

It’s just a rat…

scratching. And a

an abyss, the

Who said that?

Nietzsche?

Depressing bastard…

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

*****

know what Stockholm syndrome

lunchbox, unwrapping one of her usual dainties from a

a kidnap or hostage

“You saying you're

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

“So?”

I your

off the small round cake,

do you keep coming

pauses in her chewing, mouth hanging a little

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

you do want me to feed you?

come once a week. Or even, once a month. But, so far as I can reckon, you're here every day or

I continue. “Am I your only friend, Sola? Is that it?

“So, you're my

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 for the rest of my life. Along with all the others you did the same to. You’ve not changed. And I’m going

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

have changed. Who ever really changes?” I raise my gaze

“Solana…” she hisses.

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 has changed. White-faced, white-lipped, scarlet spots

on her heel,

no supernatural 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

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

bite taken from the corner. And

eaten anything like this

For how long?

Months? My sense of time

I had a

mouthful of empanada, then another, I ram the

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

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

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