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…

openings, more scratching. And a

if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the

Who said that?

Nietzsche?

Depressing bastard…

I come equipped with fists and

*****

know

lunchbox, unwrapping one of her usual dainties from a

kidnap or hostage situation, the prisoner forms an attachment

“You saying you're

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

“So?”

your

produces a brigadeiro. A flake of chocolate cracks off the small round

do you keep coming

chewing, mouth hanging a little

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

do want me to

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 here every day

chews and swallows, not speaking, simply regarding me. I continue. “Am I your only friend, Sola? Is that it? You've murdered

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

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

back in her seat, arches her brows.

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

“Solana…” she hisses.

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

her heel, she

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

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

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

anything like this

For how long?

Weeks? Months? My sense of time is

I had

of empanada, then another, I

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

I barf it up, where

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