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“Sweet! A live episode ofHousewithout the misanthropic, grumpy doctor.”
“Are you fucking with us?” Rami shows up next to Linda. He’s holding a tumbler that says, “No hablo fucktardo.”
“Wha?” Uri mumbles with his mouth full of fries.
“Exhibit A, the misanthropic psycho.” He points at Raph. “And B, the grumpiest of them all.” He glowers at me. Fuck, he’s still angry. Yesterday night at the factory he played the part in front of Lenny, but as soon as we were alone he flipped me off and walked away. The fact that Lenny seems close to include us in theextra fights—as he called them—is the only reason that keeps my hands away from his neck. Still I need to fix this thing with Rami.
I grab the bag of onion rings Uri is holding and offer them to Rami. He sniffs and turns his head before quickly spinning back just enough to yank the bag out of my hand and flip me off. I can’t hold anything in my hands tonight.
If Ollie were here, he’d have a witty retort for Rami. I wonder how the work on the den is going. I sent him a text, and he just replied withfine.
Sari comes back with a big syringe and a small container on a metal tray.
“Do you want me to do it?” Michael asks him. Sari doesn’t like to get too close to the donors. But he does like to watch.
Sari nods at Michael and passes him the tray.
“We’re coming in,” Raph warns Gabe before tapping the code into the panel. It opens and Raph and Michael enter the room.
“Try the front of the hip for bone marrow and take more tissue samples as well; you can place them in the cassette on the tray.”
“Got it.” Michael walks to the donor with Raph next to him.
“I’ll take care of shipping the samples to the different hospitals,” Rami tells Sari. “It will all look perfectly legit.”
“Sari, there’s not much in the front hip.” Michael’s voice says through the intercom. How can the donor sleep through a thin, but very long needle aspirating his marrow fluid?
“Try the sternum,” Sari suggests.
Michael has his back to me, but I see him swinging his hand back, gathering momentum, and then stabbing the syringe into the guy’s chest.
“Hardcore,” I hear Rami muttering. The donor finally jerks, arching his back, and lets out a loud grunt, reminding me of Frankenstein’s monster coming to life.
“Stay still, shithead,” Raph snarls, pushing his forearm on the donor’s neck, cutting off his air supply. His face turns from red to blue very quickly, but Raph doesn’t let go until Michael is done.
The donor is still coughing when they exit the room with the tray full of gifts.
“Yo, Gabe! The shithead is ready for your circus act,” Rami jokes.
“Good one!” Linda gives him a high-five.
“Is Meg up in her office?” I ask. She’s rarely part of our bloody side business. If we ask her, she helps us by creating a mental and behavioral profile on the donors, since she’s been a forensic psychiatrist for almost forty years. I asked her to make one on Richard Truman.
“No. She’s out,” Linda replies. Meg is probably at one of her consultations. “But she told me to give you this.” The behavioral profile on Truman.
I skim through it not surprised by the words: violent, egotistical, arrogant, immoral, money obsessed and ruthless. The fuck I’ll let him near Ollie again.
Gabe leaves his chair, gathers some tossing knives in one hand and stops around fifteen feet away from the donor. His black shirt sleeves are impeccably rolled up on his forearms, his blond hair neatly styled back. His posture exudes covert danger and intense focus, like a feline predator ready to strike. The knives are held by his side in a loose, casual grip. He stretches his neck left and right slowly, like he has all the time in the world. This is Gabe’s terrifying tactic. And it works like a charm every single time.
“Wha-what…w-where am I? Who a-are you-u?” the donor stutters, looking at Gabe with bug eyes. He can’t see us, since the wall is made of one-way glass. There’s a button on the intercom that turns it into see-through glass, but Gabe doesn’t like the distraction.
He starts tossing the knives.
Whoosh, thump, scream. The knife sunk into the donor’s left thigh.
Whoosh, thump, scream. Right arm.
Whoosh, whoosh, thump, thump, longer scream. Shoulder and ear.
