Dirty Blonde

CHAPTER 46

“Please pick Micah up!” Cate begged Nesbitt, after she had finished telling him what she had learned at the gun shop. She sat in her car with the engine running in the empty parking lot of a warehouse near the gun shop. Her celebrity gun occupied the passenger seat, in its gift box. The Rossi had cost $495, roughly the price of Manolo Blahniks. The world would be safer if people overpaid for shoes, not firearms.

“That’s quite a little theory.” Nesbitt sounded intrigued, which was more fun than Contempt and Scorn.

“Please go see her. Just feel her out. Find out if she has an alibi. I think she told me she was at work, but see if she can prove it.” Cate gripped the steering wheel, tense. “Please! She’s the killer. The gun was the last piece of the puzzle. It all fits.”

“I’ll talk to my sergeant, then do it tomorrow.”

“But it can’t wait. She could be a flight risk. She’s free and she has money. If she wants, she could just take a little trip.”

“Why would she? She doesn’t suspect anything.”

“Why take a chance if-”

“Don’t you even think about going yourself,” Nesbitt said, raising his voice. “That would screw up any case against her, on the off chance that you’re right.”

“I know that.” It was true, but Cate hadn’t even thought of it. Could Nesbitt be more diabolical than she was? “I don’t want anything irregular, I agree, there’s too much at stake. Just go, please go tonight. I’m about to burst.”

“Okay, calm down. I will.”

“Thank you! Thank you!”

“Now go home and I’ll call you as soon as I know something. You got that?”

“Got it.”

“Go home. Stay home.”

“I will. I am. This is me, going home.”

“And stay!”

“Arf!” Cate felt alive with excitement. Her theory had been right. Her search had ended. She wished there was someone she could tell, Sarah Marz or even Russo, but she couldn’t. She’d have to go home and wait it out. “Go get ’em!” she said, in a fit of enthusiasm, but Nesbitt had already hung up.

Cate had just pulled out of the warehouse lot when the cell phone rang again. She took a left and flipped it open. “Nesbitt?”

“No, it’s Val,” the secretary said, her voice unusually soft.

“Val, what’s the matter?” Cate cruised to a traffic light and stopped.

“I’m bone-tired. I’ve been here all day. Didn’t you get my message? I called you around five-thirty.”

“I must have missed it.” Cate pulled the phone away and checked the lighted display. A telltale tape icon signaled a voice mail. She’d turned off the phone in the hospital and must’ve missed the message icon when she turned it back on again. “Sorry. What’s going on?”

“I have bad news. Chief Judge Sherman told me to pack up your office.”

“What?”

“He came up here himself, at the end of the day. He said that all your case files had to be boxed up and sent downstairs to him in the morning, and all your books and personal files had to be shipped to your house.”

“He can’t do that.” Cate felt her face heat with anger. “He can’t throw me out of my own chambers.”

“I feel just terrible for you, Judge. He offered me overtime to do it, but I don’t want that money.”

Cate tried to get her bearings. She couldn’t process it all fast enough. Her thoughts were still on Micah. “He can’t do this. He doesn’t have the power.”

“I know. It makes my heart sick. I’m so sorry, Judge. I had to do it, you know that.”

“Of course, I don’t blame you, Val. And I’m sorry you had to do such a big job by yourself.” Cate hit the gas, accelerating unnecessarily into traffic.

“And Meriden was with him, practically rubbing his hands together.”

“Meriden! What’s the matter with that guy?”

“God knows. It’s his birthday, and all he can think about’s makin’ trouble for you. The man’s a child. A little boy.”

“So you’re packing my office?”

“Yes. Books, papers, everything. I’ve been at it all night, and the clerks helped. But I didn’t want to go through your desk without talking to you. I know those are your personal items.”

“I’m coming in.” Cate steered the car toward the courthouse. “I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea, Judge. Chief Judge Sherman’s on the warpath. I don’t think he’d like it.”

Cate checked the clock on the dashboard. “It’s past eight. He’s not there this late, and if he sees me, so be it. He has no right to throw me out, and I’d love to tell him that to his face.”

“You sure? Chief Judge Sherman-”

“Yes, I’m sure, and don’t worry, I won’t say you called me. I’ll say I stopped in.”

“But Chief Judge Sherman is so determined. Mo said he’d been bothered all day, and now I know why. I don’t know if you can fight this one.”

“Yes, I can, and I will.” Cate’s fire returned. “I got blown off by George Hartford, but I don’t need a lawyer to talk for me. I am a lawyer.”

“Is that where you were when I called?”

“No, I got sidetracked. But I think I figured out who killed Art Simone, and it’s not Richard Marz.”

“For real?” Val asked, hushed. “Who did it?”

“Tell you when I see you. It’s a long story.” Cate narrowly avoided hitting an all-black Septa bus that advertised a radio station with a scrawled WIRED. It could have been a caption under Cate’s photo.

“I’ll send the clerks home.”

“Good idea. See you in a sec, and I hope he’s there.” Cate flipped the phone closed and threw it on the seat.

Bastard! If she couldn’t find a lawyer with the guts to represent her, she’d file the papers herself. Cate felt absolutely fearless, and it had nothing to do with her new gun. She was armed with the law.

And her aim was very, very good.

Fifteen minutes later, Cate parked on the street, because it was quicker at this hour, then hurried through the frigid night air to the panel of glass doors at the front of the courthouse. She went directly to the door at the far right, used for after-hours entry and late filings. She buzzed the intercom, hoping that Sherman hadn’t put out a court-mail denying her entry altogether. Still, she knew most of the marshals, from working late, and they liked her. And her legs.

“Yes?” came the mechanical voice through the black plastic.

“It’s Judge Fante, come to clean out my office,” Cate said, with a tone that brooked no disagreement, and after a second, the door buzzed loudly and she yanked it open. She climbed the dark marble steps and pressed through the glass doors at the top as if she owned the courthouse. The judges’ entrance was to the far right, and the public entrance was fifty feet across the lobby on the far left, manned by two marshals, hanging out by the metal detectors. Cate recognized one and gave him an official wave.

“Hi, Tony,” she called out, her voice echoing in the cavernous lobby, her heels clacking across the granite floor as she hustled to the judges’ entrance. “I’m moving out tonight.”

“Okay, Judge.” Tony tipped his neat, dark head, and Cate knew he didn’t have the heart to embarrass her by stopping her, and she owed him forever for it. She fished out her white passcard on the fly, passed it over the wall-mounted magnetic sensor, then bustled without breaking stride toward the walnut doors that led to the judges’ elevators on the right. She reached the doors without being tackled, then yanked the door open, only to find the elevator doors opening onto a bundled-up Val, her eyes drawn with strain.

“Judge,” Val said, startled, stepping off the elevator, and Cate wrapped her arms around her secretary, in her nubby wool coat.

“You okay?”

“I have to go, I’m so sorry. I got a call from my daughter, and the baby has the croup. She said he can’t catch his breath, like a spasm. She has to take him to the emergency room and she needs me to stay with Tiffany.”

“My God. Go. You have a ride?”

“Jerome’s a block away. He just called.”

“Give him my love. You need help?”

“No, thanks.” Val gave her another, final hug. “You’re all packed upstairs, except your desk, and the clerks went home.”

“Thanks.”

“Sorry, Judge.” Val hurried to the doors, buttoning her coat. “See you.”

“Good luck,” Cate called after her, hitting the UP button. The elevator cab opened again, and she stepped inside, inserted her passcard, and watched the doors close on her, thinking about what she’d find in her chambers.

There, Cate surveyed the reception room, trying to maintain control of her emotions. Boxes of files covered the rug, wedged between the wing chairs and coffee table. She let the door close behind her, then went over to one of the open boxes and thumbed through the accordion jackets, reading the case captions. U.S. v. Alvarez, U.S. v. Bustagni, U.S. v. Chollo. It was her docket, on the way out. Cate felt her anger rising.

She went to the next file box and thumbed through the pleadings. More of the same. There had to be at least twelve boxes blocking the way. She turned, looked over the boxes, and walked to the threshold of her office. The large room sat perfectly quiet and seemed bigger, now that it had been emptied. The expanse of glass windows formed a black mirror, with the glittering lights of the city and the Ben Franklin Bridge ghosted darkly beyond. Her few framed diplomas had been taken down; the law books she’d shelved had vanished. Her long work table had been wiped clean, as had all the chairs she’d used to store her case notes. Boxes lay everywhere, closed and labeled in Val’s careful hand, in Magic Marker. CIRCUIT CONFERENCE. SPEECHES. JUDICIAL CODE.

Cate picked her way through the boxes to her desk, and walked around it, sliding out of her heavy coat and setting it on the top, along with her purse and plastic shopping bag. The bag held the celebrity gun; she hadn’t risked leaving it in the car. She sat down in her desk chair and scanned her office, assessing it with new eyes. The truth was, except for the sealed boxes, the place didn’t look all that much different. She felt her jaw clench in anger, now at herself. So many things I’d do different. So many ways I went wrong.

“Gimme a second chance,” she said aloud, then realized something. Nobody was going to give her a second chance, least of all Sherman. If she wanted the second chance, she’d have to take it. She pushed thoughts of Sherman, and even Nesbitt and Micah, to the back of her mind, rose to her pumps, and walked over to the first cardboard box. Brown masking tape sealed the box, and she ripped it off in a sticky curl and opened the top flaps. It was time to start over. Now, she knew she could be a judge. And she would begin by moving into her new chambers.

Cate unpacked the first few books, mostly casebooks from law school, her go-to reference books, with sentimental value. She chose one, noting that Val must have wiped each one down before she packed it. She took the book to the empty bookshelves near the work table and set it on the shelf with a satisfying thud that echoed in the silent office, her thoughts skipping ahead with renewed energy. She’d replace all of her rules books and other reference books in the shelves nearest her desk, then rehang her diplomas and awards. She’d haul boxes she had never opened from the closet and unpack them for the first time, making arrangements of treasured photos and certificates from practice. She’d unwrap the office-warming gifts that her partners had given her and decorate the place. She’d finally make the office her own.

She turned back to the box of casebooks, shelving the next two with a happy, determined feeling. She’d just reached the middle of the box when she heard a noise in the reception area. The sound of the door to her chambers, opening.

Cate looked up from the law books in surprise.