James Patterson - The 9th Judgment

Yuki stood up, buttoned her jacket, and walked past the kitchen and into the main room. Her hand was on the front door handle when, on impulse, she turned and walked back to the bar.

The bartender had dark curly hair, an easy smile, and a name tag stitched onto the fabric of his wild-printed shirt.

“Miles?”

“That’s my name,” he told her. “Wait. I’ve seen you before. You and your friends-beer and margaritas, right?”

“I’m Yuki Castellano,” she said, shaking his hand. “What do you drink to celebrate a good day in court?”

“You beat a traffic ticket?”

Yuki laughed.

“Do that again,” Miles said. “I think the sun just came out.”

“I’m a prosecutor,” she said. “Things turned out fine for the good guys today. So what do you think? What am I drinking?”

“Classic. Traditional. Always in style.”

“Perfect,” Yuki said as Miles poured champagne. “You know, today was stupendous, except for the one stone in my shoe.”

“Tell me about it.”

Yuki ordered a spicy crab salad, then told Miles about the case against Jo-Jo Johnson and how the victim, the dead Dr. Harris, was a very bad dude but that Jo-Jo was worse. He’d let the man die in his own vomit over the course of fifteen hours.

“Should have taken the jury about five minutes to find Jo-Jo guilty,” Miles said.

“Shoulda, but it took a day and a half. Jo-Jo’s lawyer is very smooth, and Jo-Jo is disarmingly simple. Like, you could believe that he really didn’t know that Harris was dying if you totally squinted your eyes and put your common sense in the deep freeze.”

“So it’s terrific that you won.”

“Yeah. I’ve been at this a couple of years. I’ve had a lot of losses.”

“So you didn’t say. What’s the stone in your shoe?”

“His name’s Jeff Asher. Opposing counsel. He came up to me after his client was taken out in handcuffs and said, ‘Congratulations on your win, Yuki. What is that? One in a row?’”

“He’s a sore loser,” the bartender said. “You hurt him, Yuki. Definitely. Guess what? Your champagne’s on the house.”

“Thanks, Miles. Yeah. You’re right. He’s a sore loser.”

“Bartenders never lie,” Miles said.

Yuki laughed.

“Here comes the sun,” he said.

CINDY’S BLOUSE WAS a cloud of silk chiffon in the rear foot well of Rich Conklin’s car. Her skirt was rolled up to her waist, and her panty hose dangled from one foot. She was damned uncomfortable, but she wouldn’t change a thing.

She rested her hand on Rich’s chest, damp from the romp, and felt his heart thudding. He pulled her in tight and kissed her.

“What a concert,” he said.

“Tremendous rhythm section,” she said, both of them cracking up.

They were parked in an alley near the Embarcadero, where Rich had pulled the car into the shadows because Cindy’s hand on his leg had made it impossible to wait.

He said now, “I can almost hear the cop knocking on the window with his flashlight, saying, ‘Hey, what’s going on in there?’”

“And you putting your shield to the glass, saying, ‘Officer down.’”

Conklin started laughing. “I don’t have any idea where my shield is. You are so witchy, Cin, and I mean that in the nicest possible way.”

She gave him a sly smile and ran her hand over his naked chest and slid it down, then kissed him, starting up his breathing, and there he was, hard again, kissing her, pulling her on top of him.

“Keep your head down,” he panted. “Headlights.”

Cindy leaned over and fastened her mouth to his, broke away, raised and lowered her hips, and worked him with her eyes open, watching his face change, letting him see her, really see her. She slid up and away from him, and he put his hands around her waist and pulled her down on him, hard.

“You drive me crazy, Cin.”

She put her cheek down on his collarbone, letting him drive the action, feeling secure and at risk the whole time, a powerfully explosive combination. And then she was calling his name, and he released himself into her.

“Oh my God,” she said, panting, then fading, wanting to fall asleep in Rich’s arms. But there was something bothering her, something she’d never felt it was okay to ask him until now.

“Rich?”

“Want to go for three?” he asked her.

“Dare you,” she said, and they both laughed, and then she just blurted it out. “Rich, have you ever-”

“Maybe, once or twice before.”

“No, listen. Did you ever do it with Lindsay?”

“No. No. C’mon, Cindy. She’s my partner. ”

“So that’s what-illegal?”

“I think my arm’s dead,” he said to her.

Cindy shifted her weight, and then there was a whole lot of looking for articles of clothing and deciding where to spend the night.

She’d spoiled the mood, Cindy thought, buttoning her blouse. And she wasn’t even sure he’d told her the truth.

PETE GORDON WAS standing in the kitchen, whipping up some instant mashed potatoes on the stove while watching the baseball game on the undercabinet TV, when his wife came through the door.

“Whatcha burning?” she asked.

“Listen, princess, I don’t need your frickin’ cooking tips, and now you made me miss that pitch.”

“So why don’t you rewind it, sweetie?”

“Do you see a DVR in here? Do you?”

“Sorry, Mr. Cranky. I’m just saying you could save that if you put a little milk in it and turned down the flame.”

“For Christ’s sake,” Pete said, switching off the gas, scraping the potatoes into a bowl. “You just can’t let me have a single simple pleasure, can you?”

“Well, I have a surprise.”

“Let’s hear it.” He dialed up the volume and ate the potatoes standing in front of the set. He spit into the sink as the food burned his mouth, glancing up in time to see the opposing team crossing the plate. “NO!” he screamed. “Goddamn Giants. How could they lose this game?”

“My aunt said she’d like to take all of us out to dinner tomorrow. Special treat-on her.”

“Yippee. Sounds like fun. Your fat-assed aunt and all of us around a table at the Olive Garden.”

“Pete.”

No answer.

“Pete,” she said, reaching up and turning off the television. He swung his head around and glared at her.

“It’s not about you, handsome. It’s about the kids having dinner with their family.”

“You guys can get along without me. Just wing it, princess,” Petey said, not quite believing it when she took the remote off the counter, jammed it down the disposal, and hit the switch.

“Go to hell, Petey,” she said as the machine gnawed on the plastic. “No, I really mean it.”

Pete shut off the grinder and watched his fucking wife flounce out of the room. He reran the last scene in his mind, only this time he put wifey’s hand into the grinder. Yeah. The metal teeth chomping through muscle and bone as she screamed her head off.

He was going to get her.

He was going to get her and Sherry and the stink bomb one day really soon.

WCF, people. Wait for it.

MY EYELIDS FLEW open at 5:52 a.m. exactly. I know because Joe has a projection clock, a high-tech gadget that shows the time and temperature in red digits on the ceiling.

I like knowing this information by simply opening my eyes. But this morning, I saw the red numerals and thought, WCF .

That goddamned baby-killing psycho had infiltrated my mind, and I didn’t hold it against Claire one bit that she was so incensed and freaked and practically murderous herself. The insidious lipstick letters-the clue that led to nothing-were like the freight train heading toward the house when there was no place to run.