Dirty Blonde

CHAPTER 16

“Sorry, Judge,” Val said, rising at her desk as Cate entered chambers.

“Me, too, thanks.” Cate came in, set down her briefcase and purse, and shed her coat. It was a bright winter morning, and the rising sun beamed through the window opposite the reception area, belying her mood. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d had a good night’s sleep. After she’d gotten the e-mail alert, she’d taken calls from Chief Judge Sherman and Val, both telling her what she already knew. She hung her coat on the rack by the door while the law clerks filtered in and collected around Val’s desk.

Cate turned to the clerks, their faces unusually somber. “Hey, guys. Guess you heard the news.”

“This is so awful, Judge.” Emily’s black top and long black skirt seemed appropriate. Beside her, Sam had dressed in his casual sweater and khakis, which somehow bugged Cate.

“Not cool,” Sam said, and Cate turned on him.

“Sam, honestly. A man killed himself. Another man is murdered. That’s more than ‘not cool.’ ‘Not cool’ doesn’t even begin to cover what that is.” Cate felt her nerves unraveling like a suspension cable. “Horrible works. Tragic will do just fine. But ‘not cool’? ‘Not cool’ ain’t even close!”

Sam flushed with embarrassment, plain on his pale skin. “Sorry.”

“I am, too.” Cate felt blood pounding in her temples. “I’m sorry you have so little empathy for another human being. He had a wife, whom you saw in court. He had a mother, too. Can’t you feel that loss, Sam? Don’t you have any respect?”

Sam looked down.

“Damn it!” Cate added for emphasis, which was when she realized the only way she could get control was to leave. She turned to go back into her office just as the intercom buzzer sounded, and they all looked at the security monitor, on the file cabinets next to Val’s desk. Its gray screen showed a man in a dark suit standing at the intercom in the common hallway, and Cate recognized him, surprised.

“Detective Nesbitt, here to see Judge Fante,” he said over the intercom, and Val looked over.

“Judge, okay to buzz him in?”

“Of course,” Cate answered, ignoring the silent law clerks.

“Come in, Detective,” Val said into the intercom, hitting the button to open the door to the secured half of the floor. She turned to hand Cate her messages. “All the usual suspects, the Inquirer again and a bunch of other reporters.”

“No comment,” Cate said, and took the messages.

Five minutes later, she was sitting catty-corner to Nesbitt at her worktable, both of them behind hot coffee in Styrofoam cups. “Where’s your partner, Roots?” she asked.

“He’s back at base, getting ready for the press conference.” Nesbitt sipped his coffee, one hand against his tie, so as not to spill coffee on his camera-ready blue print tie and dark navy wool suit. His thick hair stood up at attention, and he smelled pleasantly of spicy after-shave. “This is an unofficial visit, Judge.”

“Oh, really?” Cate tried not to think of the last time she’d heard words like that, only last night, from a different detective. My coming here sure isn’t procedure. She shooed the words away. She wasn’t going to tell Nesbitt about Russo unless he already knew about it. It was a dicey game, and she sipped her coffee, hot and sweet, gathering the strength to play.

“I spoke with Chief Judge Sherman about the Marz suicide. I presumed he called you at home.”

“Yes.”

“Obviously, you won’t have to worry about Marz anymore.”

“I guess not.” Cate thought of the opinion she’d finished last night, too late. Would it have changed Marz’s mind? If only she’d gotten to it sooner. “It’s a terrible shame.”

“Sure is. Anyway, we’ll be clearing the Simone case. We’re going to announce it at the press conference. Marz shot himself with the same gun he used on Simone. The ballistics tests verified it. So, bottom line, he killed Simone and then killed himself. It fits with some information we got from his wife, too. Depression and all.”

“How’s his wife?” Cate took another sip of coffee, then set her cup down on the conference table.

“As well as can be expected.” Nesbitt shifted in his seat. “But there’s something else I wanted to discuss with you, Judge. I’d like to keep this confidential. I’m here as a professional courtesy to you, now that the Simone case will be officially cleared.”

Russo. “I understand.”

“Let me begin at the beginning. You got the Simone case when you first became a judge, right?”

“Yes, a little over six months ago.”

“Jury selection started, what, about a month ago?”

“Right, about then, yes. It took a long time to pick this jury because everyone had seen the TV show.” Cate didn’t get it. “Why do you ask?”

“When we caught the Simone murder, we went to his hotel suite that night, as part of the investigation. He was staying at the Four Seasons during the trial. He had a huge suite. We liked Marz for the doer, that is, we suspected him because of what had happened in court and because of the videotape. Also he’d taken off. But I thought it wouldn’t hurt to look around Simone’s hotel room and see what we could find out.”

Cate nodded, unsure where Russo fit in.

“I guess I was being a little nosy, because Simone was a Hollywood guy and all. I mean if you had a chance to peek in Steven Spielberg’s medicine chest, wouldn’t you?”

“No doubt.” Cate found herself liking Nesbitt. He wasn’t exactly handsome, but he had a nice, straightforward way about him.

“So I looked around on Simone’s desk and there were the usual items, a laptop, a PalmPilot, a coupla cell phones-he had five of ’em.” Nesbitt paused, pursing his lips. “He didn’t have a lot of business papers around except files from the lawsuit. We confiscated them, which is procedure, and I logged them in at the evidence room.”

“Okay.”

“I did see some loose papers in a fancy folder. The folder was leather and it had a yellow pad inside and a clipboard. Well, inside the folder was a record of your personal whereabouts, starting from about six months ago.”

“My personal whereabouts?” Cate didn’t understand.

“I found a record, a chronological record of everything you did, for about six months, up to now. From the looks of it, Simone was having you followed for some reason. Everywhere you went. To court, home, or well, out.”

Cate’s mouth went dry. “That’s impossible.”

“I thought you might say that, so I made a copy of the papers.” Nesbitt reached inside his jacket pocket, withdrew a packet of papers that had been folded in two, and handed them to Cate, who opened them up and read the first page:

September 7-Judge leaves work at 5:15 p.m. Drives to 263 Meadowbrook Lane, at 6:34 p.m. Leaves at 10:16 p.m. Drives home at 11:30 p.m.

Meadowbrook Lane? That’s Gina’s house! Cate read on.

September 8-Judge leaves work at 7:06 p.m. Goes to Warwick Hotel, 1822 Locust Street at 8:09 p.m. Keynote Speaker at Reception for Trial Lawyers of Philadelphia. Leaves hotel at 11:02 p.m. Arrives Mike’s Bar, 1003 Locust Street at 11:37 p.m. Leaves bar with unidentified man at 11:57 p.m. Goes to Holiday Inn with same man at 12:10 a.m. Leaves Holiday Inn at 1:35 a.m., alone. Goes home at 2:05 a.m.

Cate remembered that night. That speech. That man.

September 29-Judge leaves work at 6:23 p.m. Drives to Roosevelt Blvd Conference Center and receives award from woman lawyers association. Leaves Conference Center, 9:07 p.m. Arrives Mack’s Shack, 1030 Cottman Avenue at 10:02 p.m. Leaves with unidentified man at 10:32. Drives to…

Cate skimmed the record. Oct 30…Unidentified man; Nov 24…Unidentified man; Jan 10…Unidentified man…

Cate felt sickened. Her private life, exposed. There were ten pages in the packet, and she couldn’t bring herself to read the rest in front of Nesbitt. She was so ashamed she could barely look up and meet his eye. Somehow seeing her behavior in black and white made it look so much worse. Or maybe she’d just been in denial for too long.

“Why would he do this?” Cate asked, stunned, and if Nesbitt thought less of her, he didn’t let it show.

“Did you ever receive any unusual calls from him?”

“I’ve never spoken with him on the phone. That would be an ex parte communication, that is, a communication with one party in a lawsuit, which isn’t done.” Cate heard the huffiness in her voice and almost laughed at the irony. I’d whore around but I’d never take an ex parte call.

“Did you ever receive a note from him, or a letter?”

“No.”

“Do you have any reason to think he had an interest in you, romantically?”

“No.”

“Did you have any encounter with him at all? An intimate encounter?”

“No, of course not,” Cate answered, though she couldn’t blame him for asking. “I never met the man until the trial.”

“Then I can’t explain what he did. It’s like he surveilled you, or had you surveilled. I’ve seen that in divorce cases, mostly. Like Cheaters, on TV.”

Cate let it go. She was getting sick of TV. “You think he hired a private detective?”

“No, these papers don’t look professional enough. Private detectives, their reports tend to follow the same format. This is an amateur’s work.”

“He wouldn’t do it himself. He couldn’t. He doesn’t have the time and I doubt he was even in the city. I thought he worked in L.A.”

“Maybe someone who works for him did it.”

“He has an assistant,” Cate said, thinking aloud. She thought of Micah Gilbert, the young woman from the front row of the gallery, with the long hair. Simone was never without her during trial. “What kind of man has someone else do his stalking?”

Nesbitt smiled briefly. “That’s not all, Judge. There were pictures, too. Look on the last page. I photocopied a few.”

“Pictures?”

“Not like that. I mean, not of that.” Nesbitt cleared his throat, and Cate was already tearing to the back of the packet. “They were color but they came out in black-and-white on the Xerox.”

Cate squinted at the first photo, taken at night. It was a picture of the Chestnut Grill, a bar in Fort Washington. A black curve at the top of the picture frame suggested the edge of a car windshield. The second photo was a candid photo of a good-looking man with a mustache, also taken at night on a city street. Oh boy. Cate recognized the mustache. She flipped the page. Oh no. The last photo pictured Cate herself going into another bar, her face clearly visible as she waited at the door for someone else to leave.

My God in heaven. She couldn’t pretend anymore. She set the papers down and buried her face in her hands, smearing lots of expensive makeup.

“Don’t take it so hard, Judge. I’m divorced three years now because I ran around. I don’t judge anybody, not anymore. Besides, you’re a single woman.”

Cate stayed hidden in her hands. Her cheeks felt like they were spontaneously combusting.

“The way I look at it is, now you know about it, Judge. You can protect yourself in the future.”

Cate knew what he meant. “I’m never doing this again,” she said, still behind her hands.

“As far as I’m concerned, your business is your business. It’s not my business, and I don’t want to know about it.”

“But now you do,” Cate said, finally lowering her hands and looking at him, and they both understood what she meant.

“Judge, my lips are sealed. I’m a by-the-book kind of guy. Always was.” Nesbitt made a hand chop. “It stops here.”

“But you came to me with these papers. That’s not by the book.”

“Beg to differ.” Nesbitt held up a warning finger. “I don’t like people spying, and I’m not violating procedure by being here. I’m giving you a heads-up, and that’s something the department does all the time for important people like yourself. A city councilman, or a CEO-type-a guy. We do it more than you think.”

“Does Russo know about this?” Cate asked, when it occurred to her.

“No. Just me.”

“You didn’t tell him?”

“No. This investigation’s on the Simone case, so it stays with the Simone case. The Roundhouse can be a friggin’ sieve, so I always keep my investigations close to the vest. No leaks.” Nesbitt shook his head. “I didn’t even tell Roots about those papers on you. He doesn’t need to know. That’s why I came alone this morning.”

Cate felt grateful. “But you and Russo are friends.”

“No, we’re not. We used to be partners, is all.”

“On the cop shows, the partners are always best friends.”

Nesbitt smiled. “This is no buddy movie. Fact is, Russo’s okay, but there’s a reason we’re not partners anymore. We’re like Nick Nolte and Eddie Murphy. Opposites. Russo’s not a by-the-book kinda guy.”

No, he certainly isn’t. “He came to my house last night,” Cate ventured, since she was feeling safer about confiding in him, and Nesbitt stiffened, his mouth tightening.

“He shouldn’t have. What happened?”

“He’s angry that he lost the case. He showed me a videotape of amateur porn and a man in a hotel room.”

Nesbitt’s features darkened. “He shouldn’t have done that, either.”

“So you saw it? With the man in the hotel room?”

“Yes. He showed it to me. He thinks the woman with the man, Partridge, is you.”

Cate’s heart hiccupped. “And what did you think?”

“I wasn’t sure. I thought it could be you, Judge, but I didn’t tell him that. I figured if it was you, with some guy you picked up-” Nesbitt caught himself. “I mean, dated.”

Cate flushed, mortified.

“I don’t know why you threw money at the guy, but it doesn’t mean you’re crooked. Or being blackmailed. Knowing what I know”-Nesbitt gestured at the papers lying between them on the worktable-“I figured it was a lovers’ quarrel.”

Cate winced.

“Hey, whatever. If there’s no murder, it’s not my job. Partridge wasn’t a homicide, so it’s just another weird coincidence. Philly’s a small town in lots of ways, and given what you were up to, it’s not unlikely you’d run into a guy like Partridge. In fact, it was just a matter of time.” Nesbitt pursed his lips under his brushy mustache. “Look at it this way. Russo doesn’t know about you, what you’re up to, so he figures it is what it looks like-a crooked judge. Or a judge being blackmailed. Not that I’m making excuses for him.”

“Did you know he was going to my house with the tape?”

“Of course not. You think I’d let him get away with that? Makes the squad look bush league.”

Cate believed him, because he looked so offended.

“Don’t worry about Russo. I’ve seen him like this before, and he gets over it. He had his hopes up about the TV thing. Me and him used to talk about it, and he took the verdict bad. He’d started spending the money before he even had it. Picturing himself at one of those infinity pools, or on the golf course. He’s a hothead, an emotional guy, but then it goes away.”

Cate wasn’t so sure. “I thought about reporting him, but I’m not, for obvious reasons.”

“Please, don’t.” Nesbitt looked worried again. “You don’t need that kind of blowback, and there’s no reason to. Trust me, I’ve known the guy twenty-some years. He’s all talk, no action.”

“Have you seen him since the news about Marz?”

“No, and he’s off today. I’ll catch him soon as I can.” Nesbitt rose to go, brushing down his dress pants. “Anyway, I got to get moving. The conference.”

“Right.” Cate rose, too. “Thanks for coming by. I do appreciate your judgment, and your discretion.”

“You’re welcome, Judge.” Nesbitt smiled. “I’m sure this has been a rough coupla weeks for you, but it’s all over now.”

“Case closed, as you guys say.” Cate walked him to the door, and Nesbitt smiled.

“You mean, ‘case cleared.’”

Cate laughed as he turned to go, and she shut the door behind him.

She leaned against the door for a minute, then looked out the window without seeing anything, and wondered why Simone would have someone follow her. Was something going on between him and his assistant? Was Gilbert jealous, and that’s why she followed her? That didn’t make sense. If that were the reason, why do it for so long? And why be so precise? 9:33. 10:23. From these papers, it looked like work, or research. She felt confounded.

Until a suspicion snuck up on her.