Free Bitter Medicine by Sara Paretsky

volume.
    Three young men were with Sergio. One wore a T-shirt, revealing tattoos all the way up his arms. On the left forearm was a peacock, whose elaborate tail feathers probably covered track marks. The second hadon a long-sleeved pink shirt that clung to his slender body like a leotard. He and Tattoo both ostentatiously carried guns. The third was Fabiano. As far as I could see he was unarmed.
    “Bet you didn’t expect to see me here, bitch.” He smirked importantly.
    “What’d you do—run straight to Daddy after talking to me?” I asked. “You really must be scared of Sergio asking too many questions about that Caddy.”
    Fabiano lunged toward me. “You bitch! You wait! I show you what fear is! I show you—”
    “Okay!” Sergio said in his husky voice. “You be quiet. I handle the talk tonight…. So, Warshawski. It’s been a long time. A long time since you worked for me, huh?”
    Fabiano retreated to the back of the room. Pink Shirt moved with him, guarding him a little. So the gang didn’t trust Fabiano, either.
    “You’ve done very well, Sergio—meetings with aldermen, meetings with the Office of Community Development—your mother is very proud of you.” I kept my voice level, expressing neither contempt nor admiration.
    “I’m doing okay. But you—you’re not any better off than when I saw you last, Warshawski. I hear you’re still driving a beater, still living by yourself. You should get married, Warshawski. Settle down.”
    “Sergio! I’m touched—after all these years. And I thought you didn’t care.”
    He smiled, the same breathtaking, angelic smile that had dazzled me ten years ago. It was how we’d gotten the sentence reduced.
    “Oh, I’m a married man now, Warshawski. Got me a nice wife, a little baby, good home, good cars. What you got?”
    “At least I don’t have Fabiano. He one of yours?”
    Sergio waved a negligent arm. “He runs a few errands from time to time. What’s your beef with him, anyway?”
    “I don’t have a beef with him. I’m overcome with admiration for his style, and empathy for his grief.” I turned to pick up a folding chair—only Sergio got to sit in comfort—and saw Fabiano make an angry gesture, while Pink Shirt laid a calming hand on him. I pulled the chair up next to the desk and sat.
    “I would like to know for sure that his grief didn’t take the regrettable form of beating Malcolm Tregiere’s brains out.”
    “Malcolm Tregiere? The name is vaguely familiar… .” Sergio rolled it around his tongue like a sommelier 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 tail feathers 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