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

It’s just a rat…

dark openings, more scratching. And a

gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back

Who said that?

Nietzsche?

Depressing bastard…

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

*****

you know what Stockholm

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

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

“You saying you're getting attached to

She pretending mockery, but I have her attention. “… But there's a reverse condition.

“So?”

your only friend,

A flake of chocolate cracks off the small round cake, dropping back into the napkin and she dabs

why do you

in her chewing, mouth hanging a little open.

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

have to feed you. I assume you do want me to feed you?

But if that 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

I your only friend, Sola? Is that it? You've murdered everyone

her head, giggling. “So,

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

back in her seat, arches

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

“Solana…” she hisses.

it dropping just this side of that painted line, now less than white. Even under the heavy make-up,

her heel, she stalks

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

camera. It hardly matters. My attention

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

eaten anything like this

For how long?

Weeks? Months? My sense

had

another, I ram the food

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

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

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