Dirty Blonde

Val’s hand flew to her mouth. “Are you for real?”

“He’s angry that I ruled against him, best I can figure.” It was partly true, and Cate would die if Val knew about the videotape. “I already have a call in to Detective Nesbitt.”

“I can’t believe it. Your house, down Society Hill? He take anything?”

“No. He didn’t get in.”

“Praise God. Wait, that where you went this morning? How’d you know your house was gonna be broken into?”

Micah. “No, I had something else to do, then they called me in the car.”

“I see.” Val mulled it over. “Well. So, a detective did this? Trying to make your life miserable? Seems like he’s after you, or looking for something in here. He didn’t mess up my office, or the clerks’.”

“I have no idea what he’s looking for. I think he’s just plain mad.”

“Off his rocker?”

“Yep. He can’t want to be a detective anymore. He just killed his career.” Cate eyed the wreckage of her office. Russo had just broken the last barrier, and she didn’t know if he could ever get back. “He must have reacted strongly to Marz’s suicide. He must blame me for it.”

“I’m glad he didn’t kill you. Or me.”

“Or Sam.”

“Hmph! Save me the trouble of killin’ him my own self!” An unlikely grin spread slowly across Val’s face, and Cate burst into laughter, which felt unexpectedly good. Val said, “I tell you, I’ve seen clerks come and go, every year new ones. I’ve watched them get married, have babies, get divorced. But in all my years, I’ve never seen as strange a two as these. Each one’s crazier than the other. Sam, he takes the cake.”

“Nah, he just got scared.”

“He got scared? Now I’m scared. You scared?”

Cate felt it too, then. “Honest? Yes.”

“It’s not safe around here, all of a sudden.” Val pursed her lips. “I better tell the marshals and they’ll tell the FBI. And the chief should send out another court-mail, about Russo this time.”

“Oh, here we go.” Cate didn’t know how long she could keep a lid on that videotape. This was about to get public. There would be questions from the FBI. “I bet Meriden’s on the phone to the chief as we speak.”

“Probably on the cell on the way down the hall.” Val clucked. “That man is a jerk, and he does not like you at all.”

“All of a sudden, nobody does.”

“Can’t understand why. I like you.” Val smiled warmly, and Cate smiled back.

“I like you, too.”

Val turned on her heel, her dress swirling, then turned back. “Judge, I almost forgot. You have a plea hearing at two-thirty this afternoon and a sentencing at four-thirty. I should cancel both.”

Cate groaned. “No, I can’t keep canceling these court dates. It backs up my docket and I’m on trial next week, in that products case. Keep the four-thirty.”

Ring! went a phone, and Cate sprinted for her purse, which she’d left in the reception area.

That better be Nesbitt. Or Sorian. Or the cavalry.

CHAPTER 23

Cate froze, standing in her ruined office, her phone at her ear. When Nesbitt told her, she was facing the window, so she remained facing the window, though she suddenly saw none of the view.

Nesbitt had said: “Judge, Russo stole my case file, on Simone. He has the record, about you.”

“Judge? You there?”

“He really has the record?”

“Yes. I gave you a copy. I kept the original in the file.”

“The record of my”-what had Nesbitt called it, only hours ago-“personal whereabouts?”

“Yes, I’m sorry.”

“What about the pictures?”

“Those too. Copies, not the originals.”

Cate tried to process it and couldn’t. “How did this happen?”

“Come down to the Roundhouse, Judge. We need to talk about it.”

“Be there in fifteen minutes.” Cate let the phone snap closed.

Cate had never been at the Roundhouse before and couldn’t ignore its seaminess. The lobby downstairs was a dark, empty space, reeking of cigarette smoke that blew in from the smokers in front of the building. Nesbitt met her there, clamping a strong arm on hers, and whisking her up a funny, podlike elevator to the Homicide Division. They passed a cramped waiting area with two black couches, arranged facing each other against a wall that read WANTED and was covered by rows of eight-by-ten glossies of scary, affectless faces. Then Cate was pressed through a swinging half-door she’d seen in only the cheapest bars.

“This way, Judge,” Nesbitt said, and led her through a large, dim squad room that contained about twenty institutional-gray desks, stacked with files and arranged in no apparent order. Water-stained curtains hung unevenly, and on the right side of the room sat a row of file cabinets of different colors and sizes, in grimy gray, black, tan, and even olive green, lined up like rotten teeth. Detectives in shirt-sleeves talked on the phone at the desks, and one read the Daily News, his shiny loafers crossed on his desk. All of them pointedly ignored Cate and Nesbitt.

“Come on in, Judge,” Nesbitt said, gesturing her into an office off the squad room, and at Cate’s entrance, a tall, thin detective in a houndstooth suit stood up, with a professional smile. Nesbitt stepped in behind her. “Judge, this is my sergeant, Marvin Shiller.”

“Hello, Sergeant.” Cate extended a hand across the desk, trying to act as dignified as possible. Both men knew her secret, and it felt lousy. She could only imagine the jokes they’d made before she got here, and she wondered how many of the other detectives in the squad room knew, too. She forced herself to meet Shiller’s eye as he shook her hand, and he almost crushed it in a large, rough palm. She said, “Quite a handshake.”

“It impresses the chicks.” Shiller grinned, showing unusually small teeth in a broad, fleshy face.

“And nobody else,” Nesbitt added, and both men laughed.

“Thanks for coming, Judge. Sorry about the inconvenience.” Shiller was about fifty-five years old, with wide- set blue eyes and bushy gray eyebrows that looked dyed to match his wavy gray hair, expensively layered. He had a large, doughy fighter’s nose, and redness tinged his flat cheeks, as if he’d just come in from outside. “Oh, yeah, of course, call me Mitty.”

“That’s the nicest thing he’s been called recently,” Nesbitt said, and they laughed again. “Can I get you some coffee, Judge? Ours is the worst.”

“No, thanks, and I already make the worst.”

“Please, sit down.” Shiller waved a large hand at the stiff chair across from his desk, and Cate took one seat while Nesbitt took the other. A synthetic American flag stood in the corner of the room, slightly askew in its gold stand, next to a three-drawer set of file cabinets. Degrees and framed certificates hung on the scuffed walls. Shiller eased into his chair, which squeaked. “Judge, I’ll get right to the point. We have a problem with Frank Russo.”

“Clearly.” Cate told them what Russo had done to her house and office. “So at this point I’m afraid for my safety, and that of my staff.”

“Before we begin, you didn’t call the FBI, did you?”

“The marshals will, if they haven’t already.” Cate had known it would be the first thing Shiller asked. Everything was jurisdiction with the locals, and nobody wanted the FBI involved, least of all Cate. “I’m not that