Hot Revenge Box Set 4

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…

more scratching. And a nose pokes

long enough into an abyss,

Who said that?

Nietzsche?

Depressing bastard…

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

*****

do you know what Stockholm syndrome

Interest flickers over her 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,

sniggers. “You saying you're

have her attention. “… But there's a reverse condition. It's called Lima syndrome, where the captor comes

“So?”

your only

chocolate cracks off the small round cake, dropping back into the napkin and she dabs it up with a fingertip

you

chewing, mouth hanging a

was to watch me rot,

assume you do want me to feed you? We can

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

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

giggling. “So, you're

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

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

eyes, 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 her face. “Have

“Solana…” she hisses.

she stands, the lunchbox tumbling from her lap. The contents spill and scatter over the rancid concrete, some of it dropping just this side of that

heel, she stalks

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 meal from the filthy concrete, scrabbling to grab broken fragments of meat in one hand, a cake with the other before, with a click, the light winks out and I'm left

the camera. It

taken from the corner. And

eaten anything like this for…

For how long?

Weeks? Months? My sense of time is out of

had a

a mouthful of empanada, then another, I

Too soon. Half-chewed pulp goes down the wrong way and

to swallow, gagging on my scavenged meal, I barf it up, where it plops in