Matt Hilton - Cut and run

A stack of twenty-dollar bills on the counter were all that stood between Rickard's anonymity and the doctor's hopes for a long life. It would be a shame if he had to kill the doc; he was one of the few people that Rickard actually liked.

'Two thousand,' Rickard said. 'It's the fee you always asked for before.'

Adam Rothman, the disgraced surgeon who had once numbered the social elite of Florida among his clients, picked up the thick wad of notes and riffled them between his long, almost feminine fingers. 'Times change, Luke, and so does my expense bill.'

'It's more than you make performing illegal abortions and cutting gangrenous limbs from junkies poisoned by dirty needles.'

Rothman was a big man, flabby and ungainly. He looked nothing like the man who'd served his internship at Johns Hopkins before moving into private practice in downtown Miami. But his looks suited him now that he'd relocated to this dingy apartment on the fringe of South Beach. His face was florid, with broken veins across his bulbous nose, testament to his secret drinking problem. With his grey watery eyes and thin lips; he did not look like someone you'd trust to guide a scalpel. He waved the notes towards Rickard, who was sitting on the gurney checking out the dressings on his wounded ribs. 'As ever, you are not buying my expertise, you are buying my silence.'

Rickard looked up at Rothman, the contact lenses removed so he caught the man under a baleful, icy stare. 'Silence works both ways, Doctor.'

Rothman smiled. 'That it does.'

He stuffed the two grand in the pocket of his white overcoat. Then he reached into a cardboard box and pulled out a couple of packets. He tossed them on the gurney beside Rickard. 'Take those three times a day; they'll keep any infection at bay. Take the NAIDs as and when required.'

Rickard studied the packets. The first contained brand-named antibiotics, but the second was an anonymous white box. 'NAIDs?'

'Non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs. They'll keep the fever down without impairing consciousness. You want to remain alert, don't you?'

'For two thousand dollars I get cheap drugs you've purchased off the internet?'

Rothman flicked him a smile. 'If you're not up to paying my going rate I have to make a profit elsewhere. Any way, what are you complaining about? I've thrown the bandages in for free.'

'You're all heart, Doc.'

'Yeah, right.' Rothman bustled over to a trash can overflowing with blood-speckled tissue and used syringes. He peeled off his latex gloves and dropped them in the can. He pointed a skinny digit at Rickard. 'The bullet barely grazed your ribs, Luke. It's your shoulder wound you'll have to be most careful of. Luckily the wound was a through and through, superficial, but there is the threat of infection if you don't keep it clean.'

Rickard touched the wad of dressing on his left trapezius muscle, just below his collar-line. 'Feels OK to me.'

'It'll stay that way if you dress it regularly. Here.' He passed over a tube of antiseptic cream. 'No charge.'

'Thanks,' Rickard said with no real enthusiasm.

'The sutures will dissolve themselves, no need to come back to have them removed.'

'You don't want to see me again?'

Rothman pulled a hurt face that was as much a sham as Rickard's pout. 'Luke, I'm quite willing to take your money any time you please. Just more of it next time, eh?'

Rickard stood up off the gurney and studied himself in a full-length mirror riveted to the wall of the consulting room. Apart from the criss-crossed bandages, he still struck quite an imposing figure. He'd changed his looks, but this time without the need of Rothman's expertise. His latest disguise was purely cosmetic. He thought that his newly shaved head gave him a tough look that the bruising on his face actually helped. Turning from his reflection, he pulled on a black T-shirt emblazoned with a Gothic image for a rock band he'd never heard of. He let the shirt hang outside his jeans to cover the blade clipped on his belt. Then he shrugged into a black leather motorcycle jacket that had a contrasting red collar and stripes down the sleeves. Lastly he thumbed a pair of wraparound shades on.

'What do you think?'

'If I was a woman I'd have you back on that gurney in a flash.'

Rickard grinned. 'No wonder you got yourself struck off, Doc!'

Rothman seemed pleased with that. He fed a hand into his coat pocket and pulled out a slip of paper. He held it out to Rickard. 'Here.'

'You got it for me.' Rickard eyed the handwritten address, a smile playing over his lips. He folded it over and placed the note in his hip pocket.

'Cost you.'

Rickard dug another stack of bills from his jacket pocket and handed them over. 'I didn't think you'd be able to get this for me. Not now you're the pariah of the medical world.'

Rothman nipped his bottom lip between his nicotine-stained teeth. Then he nodded at the out-of-date certificate displayed on his wall. 'I called The Cedars. Asked. Simple as that, when you have letters after your name. No one checks credentials these days, especially not a first-year intern who's already done a twenty-three-hour shift with God knows how many more before he gets to go home.'

'Letters after your name.' Rickard read Rothman's glowing endorsements as he shoved his handgun into his waistband. 'Just make sure RIP doesn't join them, Doc. I might need you again before long.'

'I'm pretty fond of the green stuff,' Rothman reassured him, 'and I don't intend dying any time soon.'

'Both things we have in common,' Rickard said. He clapped a hand on the doctor's shoulder as he passed him by. 'Take it easy, Doc.'

'You too, Luke. You know how badly the cops are searching for you, right?'

'Keeps life interesting.'

'Hey, when you find her give your wife a kiss for me, will ya?'

Rickard lifted his sunglasses and peered back at the doctor from the doorway. 'That I will do, Doc.'

He left Rothman chuckling to himself, letting himself out into a corridor in the apartment block where the quack had set up practice. The hallway stank of urine. A little way up the hall a kid no older than sixteen was huddled in a doorway. Rickard walked past him and the boy stuck out a grimy hand. 'Any change, sir?'

'Yes,' Rickard said, 'the doctor's a miracle worker: I'm feeling quite good now.'

The boy blinked at him in a confusion hindered by his latest fix. He slowly withdrew his hand as Rickard walked away, laughing at his own joke.

He was three floors up but there was no way he would use the elevator. He suspected it was the source of the smell. Instead he went down the stairs, negotiating the trash and puddles while he made a call on his mobile phone. He'd finished the call by the time he pushed through an exit door on to the sidewalk. It was a fine morning in SoBe. The shadows of the buildings across the way blocked much of the sunlight, but it was already growing warm. By midday these streets would be bleached out, so the sunglasses were a good idea.

He walked across the street, flagrantly ignoring the jaywalking laws, and approached his newly acquired Honda Fireblade. The bike was a beauty, voted top for its looks and performance by many aficionados, but it was just a tool to Rickard. And part of his new disguise. Two young gangbangers were leaning on the hood of a muscle car, the bumper of their Chevrolet Camaro almost nudging the Fireblade. They stirred as he approached.

'Thanks for watching my ride, guys.' Rickard peeled a couple of twenty notes out, thinking that he might have to withdraw some more pocket money from his emergency stash. He'd already given the young toughs a hundred bucks each, but the extra cash would sweeten them even more. He wasn't afraid of them, but at least this way he wouldn't be troubled by having them follow him with the idea of taking everything from him. On any other occasion he'd lead them somewhere remote and then show them who the fuck they were trying to roll, but he had a more pressing date with Alisha.