Free V.I. Warshawski 04 - Bitter Medicine by Sara Paretsky Page A

tongue like a sommalier trying to recall an elusive vintage.
     
    “A doctor. Killed in Uptown a couple of days ago. He treated Fabiano’s girlfriend and her baby last Tuesday before they died.”
     
    “Doctor! Oh, yeah, now I remember. Black dude. Someone broke into his apartment, right?”
     
    “Right. You wouldn’t happen to know who that was, would you?” He shook his head. “Not me, Warshawski. I don’t know nothing about it. Black doctor, minding his own business, got nothing to do with my business.”
     
    That sounded final. I turned and looked at the other three. Tattoo was rubbing the tailfeathers on his left arm. Pink Shirt was staring vacantly into space. Fabiano was smirking.
     
    I turned my chair sideways so I could see all four of them at once. “Fabiano doesn’t agree. He thinks you know a lot about it-isn’t that right, Fabiano?”
     
    He sprang away from the wall. “You fucking bitch! I didn’t say nothing to her, Sergio, nothing at all.”
     
    “Didn’t say nothing about what?” I asked.
     
    Sergio shrugged. “About nothing, Warshawski. You gotta learn to mind your own business. Ten years ago I had to spill my guts to you. I don’t need to do that no more. I got a real lawyer, one who don’t act like I was a worm or something when I need help, not a broad who gotta earn a living because she can’t get a husband.”
     
    He shook me momentarily-not about the husband, but about the worm. Had I treated my clients that way? Or just Sergio, who had badly beaten an old man and whined when I wanted to talk to him about it instead of flirting with him.
     
    I was mentally off-balance and saw Tattoo coming only a second before he hit me. I rolled low off the chair onto his legs, upending him in a crash against the desk. I kept rolling and bounced to my feet. Pink Shirt was on me, trying to pin my arms. I kicked hard against his shin. He grunted, dropped back, and tried to slug me this time. I took the blow on my forearm, came in close, and kneed him in the abdomen.
     
    Tattoo was behind me, grabbing my shoulders. I relaxed in his hands, turned sideways, and slammed my elbow into his rib cage. He loosened his hold enough that I could wriggle free, but Sergio had joined the fight. He yelled orders to Pink Shirt, who seized my left wrist. Sergio tack-led me around the waist and I fell ungracefully, with him landing on top of me.
     
    Fabiano, who had done nothing during the brief struggle, kicked me in the head. It was merely a gesture; he couldn’t kick too hard without landing his foot on Sergio. Sergio tied my hands behind me and stood up.
     
    “Turn her over.”
     
    I got a close-up of the tattoos, then looked up into Sergio’s dazzling smile.
     
    “You thought you did me such a good deed, back in that courtroom, getting me off a ten-year stretch to two? Well, you were never inside, Warshawski. If you’d been inside, you would have worked a little harder for me. Now you can see what it’s like-what it feels like to be in pain, to have someone you hate telling you what to do.”
     
    My heart was beating so fast I thought I might suffocate. I shut my eyes for a count often and tried to speak calmly, keeping my voice steady with an effort. “You remember Bobby Mallory, Sergio? I left a letter for him with this address, and your name. So if my body shows up in the city dump tomorrow, not even your expensive mouthpiece will be able to buy you out of trouble.”
     
    “I don’t want to kill you, Warshawski. I got no reason to kill you. I just want you to mind your own business, and leave mine to me… Sit on her legs, Eddie.”
     
    Tattoo obliged.
     
    “I don’t want to ruin you in case you ever get a man, Warshawski, so I’m just going to leave a little reminder.”
     
    He took out a knife. Smiling angelically, he knelt down and held it close to my eyes. My mouth felt like paper and my body was shaking with cold. Shock, I thought clinically, it’s shock. I willed myself to