James Patterson - Judge & Jury

Four spades. Nordeshenko had been right. He had read her trying to make a flush. He still had high hand. And the Cowboy was bluffing.

The dealer turned over a queen of diamonds. Nordeshenko didn't even flinch. Now he had aces and queens.

Julie winced. She hadn't made her flush.

"Well, what'ya say we just put a little more coal in the burner and see what the river brings?" Cowboy cackled loudly, pushing the rest of his chips into the center-$10,000.

Murmurs went up from the people watching. It was clear this would be the final hand. The winner would take the entire $30,000 buy-in.

Cowboy stared at him, not smiling now."You stickin' around, Ivan, or what?"

" Miraslav, " Nordeshenko said.

Cowboy took off his shades."Huh?"

"My name is Miraslav," Nordeshenko said, meeting the bet.

The dealer turned over his last card, the river. A deuce of hearts.

Julie groaned.

Nordeshenko knew his aces and queens should be a winner. He couldn't even imagine what the asshole Cowboy had. He counted out twenty hundred-dollar bills and tossed them outside the pot as a side bet.

Then, amazingly, Cowboy countered with a $5,000 raise of his own. Nordeshenko was stunned.

"Ivan, still with us?" Cowboy tilted back in his chair, clucking unpleasantly.

Nordeshenko reached in his jacket, counted out $5,000 in hundred-dollar bills, and laid them in the center of the table. This was no longer just an amusing diversion.

"Aces and queens." He flipped over his hole cards.

"Oooh." Cowboy blinked, as if stunned.

But then he grinned."This is gonna hurt, Ivan."

He flipped over his hole cards. Two more deuces. The last card had given him three. Nordeshenko felt as if he'd fallen off a cliff. The moron had been pushing the pot the whole way with just a pair of twos.

Cowboy leaped up, ooo-eeing like a donkey, raking in his chips. Nordeshenko thought he'd like to wipe the grin off the fool's face. But just as quickly, the irrational urge subsided.

Not tonight. He had work to do in the morning. Important work. Whatever he had lost tonight was just a fraction of his fee.

"You know what they say, Ivan," Cowboy said, stacking his winnings,"sometimes it's better to be lucky than good. No hard feelings," he said, stretching out his hand.

Nordeshenko stood up and took it. The imbecile was right about one thing: he'd been lucky tonight. Luckier than he would ever know.

The Israeli was going to let him live.

IT WAS AFTER EIGHT O'CLOCK that night when I finally made it back to Casa Pellisante.

Home for me was the same rent-controlled apartment in the Hell's Kitchen section of Manhattan on Forty-ninth and Ninth I'd lived in for the past twelve years. I had a view of the Empire State Building from my study window and could kick back on the roof after work with a cocktail, looking out on the red sunsets over Jersey City. On weekends, I could step out the front door right into the Feast of St. Ignatius or a West Indian parade, or grab a beer at an Irish bar sitting next to some Westie I once put away.

I also had Ellen Jaffe there.

Ellen was a hotshot anesthesiologist over at St. Vincent's, with wavy auburn hair, a small button nose, and long, slim runner's legs that were a joy to behold. We'd met at a clambake thrown by a friend of mine and been together for the past two years.

Ellen was pretty, smart as a whip, and just as dedicated to her career as I was to mine. That was a problem. I worked days-and half the nights, lately, preparing the case. She was taking doctoral classes at Cornell Medical and doing her hospital rotations at night. We used to spend entire weekends together in bed. Now we could barely find a night to be in the same room and watch TV.

She said I was fixated on Cavello, and she was probably right. I shot back that she must be having an affair with Dr. Diprovan-Diprovan being the solution of choice when putting people under these days.

Whatever it was, it was killing me how things were sliding downhill between us. But you either fight for it or you don't, and lately, neither of us was fighting a lot for anything.

So I stopped at Pietro's on the way home and picked up an order of the best amatriciana in New York -Ellen's favorite. She didn't work Monday nights. Let's not call it a party, but it would be the first quality time we'd spent with each other in at least a week.

Add to that a bouquet of sunflowers from the Korean grocer up the block. I had also left Ellen a message on the machine to set the table.

I turned the key in the front door and saw the table in the dining alcove set for one.

" Buonasera, signorita."

"Nick?" I heard Ellen call from the bedroom.

She came out of the bedroom in her navy Burberry windbreaker and running shoes, knotting her long brown hair. Not exactly the fantasy I had in mind."I'm sorry, Nicky. I was going to leave a note. Benson just called. They're on overload tonight. They need me in."

"Diprovan again." I sniffed, trying to hide my disappointment, placing the food and flowers on the kitchen counter. Ellen's cat, Popeye, brushed against my leg."Hey, Pops."

"I can't help it, Nick." Ellen's eyes went to the flowers. She smiled, making the correct connection to a meadow in the Chianti District outside of Siena, an amorous urge we couldn't hold back a couple of summers ago.

"Jeez, what'd you get fired or something?"

"Just a little carried away, I guess."

"No." She shook her head and sighed as if to say, Nothing's going right for us, lately. "Not carried away. I'm sorry, Nicky. They're waiting on me. I can't even put these in a vase."

"No sweat." I shrugged."Actually, they were for me."

Ellen had these red glasses on that I found sexy as hell for some reason. Her small breasts peeked from under a tight-fitting top. I found myself getting aroused. Foolish. Maybe it was just this momentary feeling that I was free from the anticipation of the case. Or the sense that I had to do something… for us. I don't even know. As she tossed a few things in her purse, I put my hands on her shoulders.

"Nick, I can't. I'm AWOL." She tensed against me."I gotta go. Hey, I almost forgot. How'd it go today?"

"Well." I nodded."We got a decent jury. Everybody's ready. Let's just hope Cavello and his lawyers don't pull any fast ones."

"Nick, you've done everything humanly possible, so stop killing yourself. Manny would be proud." She gave me a soft kiss on the cheek, not what I had in mind, but it made me smile.

"Tell Diprovan hello."

" Nick… " Ellen shook her head, unamused. She turned back in the doorway."I'm sorry about the dinner. It was a nice thought." Then she looked at the sunflowers on the counter."You're such a romantic."

FOR A WHILE I just stood there. Popeye, my new dinner partner, purred against my leg.

I guess, like some spurned high school kid, I was hoping that Ellen might have second thoughts and come back. I had this feeling that the weight of our relationship was suddenly hinging on a hope no stronger than that.

But there was no sound on the stairs. No saving key in the door. I was thirty-eight, head of a major anticrime task force, a big shot in the FBI, and here I was scooping out a container of pasta meant for two-a stranger in my own home.

The silence was suddenly orchestral.

I went into the bedroom and took off my tie and jacket, then checked in the study for a fax. There was a long brick wall covered with bookshelves. Most of the books were from my days at school, and there were a few of Ellen's medical texts. The desk was piled high with briefs from Cavello's trial. On the wall there was a large framed black-and-orange banner: