Calculated in Death

laugh.
    Then the ambulance shifted a little with the weight as the MT levered himself inside, slammed the double doors. With a rumble, they began to move.
    “Don’t forget the good drugs.” Parzarri smiled, looked up at the ceiling and thought of women in tiny, tiny bikinis with skin gold from the sun, wet from the sea. “Aloha.”
    He felt so warm, his body so heavy. He turned his head, with effort when he felt the straps clamp around his wrists. “What’s that for?”
    “Keeps you where you are.”
    Puzzled, Parzarri turned his head again, stared into a familiar face. “Hey. What’re you doing? Your boss order security for me?”
    “That’s right.”
    “’Preciate it.”
    “He wants to know if you talked to anybody.”
    “Huh?”
    The man reached up, turned the clamp on the IV. “Mr. Alexander wants to know if you talked to anybody about the audit, about anything.”
    “Jesus, I was in a coma half the time, getting poked and prodded and imaged the rest. Who’m I gonna talk to? I need those drugs, man. It’s starting to hurt.”
    “Mr. Alexander wants to know if you have any documents or files.”
    “’Course I do. I’m the accountant. I’ve got everything I need to finish the audit. I can do it from the hospital once I get the files and my notebook. He can send Jake for them. He’d know what I need.”
    “Mr. Alexander wants to know if you have any documents or files, or any information on his business in any other location?”
    “What the fuck? Turn the drip back on, will you? Come on, man.” The pain shot through him like lava when the fist rammed into his healing ribs. As he drew in his breath to scream, the driver hit the sirens, drowned him out.
    “Answer the question. Do you have any documents or files or any information on Mr. Alexander’s business in any other location?”
    “No! God! Why would I? I’ll take care of it, like always. I’ll do my job.”
    “Mr. Alexander says you’re terminated.”
    With that he clamped his big hand over Parzarri’s mouth, pinched his nose closed. While the sirens screamed, the lights flashed, Parzarri’s body bucked from the lack of air, from the pain. His eyes wheeled like a terrified horse’s.
    Blood vessels burst in the whites of his eyes, so it seemed he shed bloody tears. His fingers clawed at the gurney, at the air as his hands strained against the straps.
    His bladder voided, and those reddened eyes rolled back, and fixed.
    Removing his hand, the big man pounded a fist on the ceiling. The driver cut the sirens, the lights, and drove onto the broken ground of an underpass. Both men got out, the big one hefting the Pullman Parzarri had taken to Vegas and back. He tossed it in the trunk of the waiting car before getting into the passenger seat.
    He liked sitting in the big, roomy car, he thought, being driven around like he was
somebody
. And now that he’d done it—twice—he liked to kill even better.
    •   •   •
    E ve stood inside the ambulance bay where she’d been directed. According to the log, Parzarri was being transported via ambulance while Arnold, ambulatory, was on his way in, driven by his wife.
    “How do you want to play it?” Peabody asked her.
    “I want a look at him for myself, see what kind of shape he’s in. We’ll let him get to his room, interview him there. I want to read him his rights straight off, not only to cover it all, but to scare him a little. You should look grim.”
    “No good cop?”
    “I don’t think we need good cop.”
    In her pink boots, Peabody did a little heel-toe dance. “Yay!”
    “We need to talk to Arnold, too. We can get him out of the way while they’re fooling around with Parzarri.” She stopped when she spotted Sylvester Gibbons.
    “Lieutenant Dallas. Detective. I didn’t expect to see you here so quickly.”
    “We need to speak with your last two employees.”
    “Of course. Sure. Ah . . .” He let out a breath, rubbed his face with one hand. “Can you give me a few minutes with Chaz? Jim knows about Marta. But I asked him not to say anything to Chaz. The poor guy was in such bad shape, and they didn’t want him overly excited or upset. They even banned ’links and screens. I want to tell him myself, what happened. I don’t want him to hear it from cops, no offense. I think it’ll be easier to hear it from a friend.”
    “We’ll talk to Mr. Arnold first.”
    “I really appreciate it. That’s Jim’s car. There he is. That’s Jim. God, he