The Vendetta Defense

“Frank—” she said, but she caught herself before she finished the sentence. Because she both did and didn’t want to tell.

“Judy, my love,” Frank said, but his tone wasn’t loving. He walked to the conference room door, then paused. “Someday it won’t be about my grandfather anymore, or about his case. Someday it will be about you and me. And I hope we’re still together when that happens.”

Judy was left standing, jelly-kneed, long after he had gone.

Judy spent her last few hours of alertness at the office laying out her cross-examination of the Commonwealth’s witnesses, then working on her own defense case. Her strategy taxed her brain and her talk with Frank tugged at her heart, and long after coffee had stopped working, fear wasn’t even doing the trick. The security guards rested in the firm’s reception area, awake because they were the night shift, and protecting her and Bennie. She checked her watch.

Midnight.

As tired as Judy was, there was something she liked about being at work at this hour. The city was so still outside, the night so dense it was hard to believe it would ever fade to light, setting cars cruising onto highways, coffee dripping into glass pots, and jurors coming to court to decide if another human being should live or die.

She got up, stretched, and made her way to Bennie’s office. She took it as a measure of some sort of personal growth that she had stopped thinking of Bennie as the boss. The only boss Judy had ever known was her father, and she suspected that every boss after that was just a stand-in for him. But at some point, when she wasn’t looking, Judy had become her own boss. Maybe it happened when someone had entrusted his life to her.

“Hey,” Judy said from the threshold, and Bennie looked up from the brief she was editing, her hair falling across one eye. She pushed it away.

“Hey back at you.”

“I forget what my dog looks like. Do you remember?” Judy sat down in the cushy chair across from Bennie’s desk.

“It’s yellow. That’s why they call them goldens. Is your puppy still with Tony Two Feet?”

“Si, si. The hotel isn’t having her.” Judy sighed. “Boy, do I feel sorry for myself tonight. My case is in trouble, my client freaked in open court, and I just lost a boyfriend I didn’t have.”

“Count your blessings. Your best friend is alive and well.”

“But still not back at work”

“You’ve survived the Coluzzis.”

“Only so far.”

“You’re suing the Coluzzis.”

“We’re bogged down in paper.”

“Also you know your client is innocent, even though he did it. Which is a neat trick.”

“The neatest.” Judy nodded in agreement. “I am Cleopatra, queen of denial.”

Bennie sipped undoubtedly cold coffee. “Also you can win this case.”

Judy blinked. Had she heard her right? It was late. Her Italian was poor. “What did you say?”

“Or more accurately, you can win this case if you figure out how.”

“What do you mean? Why do you say that?” Judy edged forward, and Bennie leaned back in her chair, which creaked in the silent office.

“I’ve tried lots of murder cases, back in the day, as you know. And there’s one thing that I have learned, and every criminal defense lawyer should know it.”

“Hit me.” It reminded Judy of Santoro. Every murder case is a simple story. If Judy were going to try murder cases for a living, she had to get a generalization of her own.

“Every murder case is about two questions.” Bennie held up an index finger. “One, did the guy who got killed deserve to die?” She added another finger. “And two, was the defendant the man for the job? If the answer to both questions is yes, then the defense has a shot. Which is the most you can ask, especially in this case.”

Judy blinked. It was a helluva theory. Better than Santoro’s. But so was Bennie.

“In this case, the answer to both questions is yes, but you have to give the jury something to go on. Hand them a defense they can talk themselves into believing. You’re all set up for it. You did a great job with the neighbors today. The jury will go for you if you just give them the chance.”

Judy frowned. “Think I can do it?”

“I know you can.”

“Think I can fail?”

“Of course.”

Judy blinked. “Ouch.”

“I’m a lawyer, not a cheerleader,” Bennie said, but Judy couldn’t manage a smile.

Chapter 41

“No comment!” Judy shouted, putting her head down and plowing through the press outside the Criminal Justice Center. Two musclemen in suits flanked her, serving double duty against bad guys and reporters. Umbrellas covered the TV anchors, and video cameras whirred through thick plastic bags. Despite the rain, there were more reporters than yesterday, attracted by Pigeon Tony’s courtroom tarantella. The morning headlines had made her shudder: TONY’S TIRADE. ITALIAN CURSES COP. GRUMPY OLD MAN. THE DIATRIBE AND THE DETECTIVE.

“Ms. Carrier, just one picture!” “Ms. Carrier, you gonna put him on the stand?” “Judy, any comment on Judge Vaughn’s ruling against you?” “Ms. Carrier, what happened in chambers? Did he read you the riot act?”

Judy ignored them and climbed the slick curb to the courthouse entrance, almost tripping over wet TV cables that snaked along like pythons. If the Coluzzis didn’t kill her, the press would. The newspapers had reported Pigeon Tony’s outburst, but nobody could translate it, and the courtroom stenographer hadn’t transcribed the Italian. Judy could only hope that Frank remained as uncertain as everybody else. He hadn’t called to say good night last night and wasn’t answering his cell phone. She’d be meeting them upstairs in court, since they entered through the secured entrance.

“Judy, what are you gonna do to Jimmy Bello on the stand?” shouted one of the reporters just as Judy reached the revolving door, where she stopped.

“Best question of the morning,” she called back, and entered the courthouse.

Judge Vaughn was wearing a light blue shirt under his robes, with a dark blue tie whose knot peeked through the V at the neck, and he spent most of Detective Wilkins’s routine testimony glaring at Pigeon Tony from the dais, which worked for Judy. Pigeon Tony fidgeted a little but, as promised, didn’t make a peep, so Judy didn’t have to kill him. The courtroom was over-air-conditioned, to keep the humidity low on this rainy day, and Judy felt chilled even in her navy blazer and skirt. Or maybe it was the way Frank had looked this morning that left her cold. She glanced back at the gallery through the bulletproof shield.

Frank met her eye only briefly, then focused again on the witness. His face was pale beneath his fresh shave, and there were circles under his large eyes, emphasized by the darkness of his corduroy suit and knit tie. He kept stealing looks at John Coluzzi. Obviously Pigeon Tony had told Frank about his parents. Judy didn’t know what would happen next, but she had to put him out of her mind. She was trying to save his grandfather’s life. She returned to the testimony, taking notes while Detective Wilkins spoke, but it concluded quickly, with Santoro taking his seat at counsel table.

“Ms. Carrier, your witness.” Judge Vaughn shifted his icy gaze from Pigeon Tony to Judy, and she stood up and went to the podium.

“Thank you, Your Honor.” She faced Detective Wilkins, who eyed her with remoteness. If he remembered that day in her apartment, when he was so nice to her, it didn’t show. Today they were adversaries and they both knew it. “Detective Wilkins, we have met, haven’t we?”

“Yes, we have, Ms. Carrier.” The detective’s blue-eyed gaze met Judy’s levelly, and his demeanor remained steady. He even wore the same suit as yesterday; the jury would like that, Judy knew. And they’d already be on his side, after Pigeon Tony’s display. She had to defuse it.

“Detective, you have my client’s apologies for his conduct yesterday, as well as my own apology,” she said,