She hit the gas.
CHAPTER 45
PISTOL RANGE IN REAR, read the blue neon sign, and Cate pulled up in front of the gun shop just as a man was locking the door. She had come straight to the gun shop in Old City and had gotten here just in time. If Micah were going to buy a gun, this had to be the place. The shop was only blocks from her office and apartment.
Cate switched off the ignition and jumped out of the car, shouting, “Excuse me! Please don’t close!”
“What?” The man turned from the door, his steel key ring still in the lock. A security spotlight shone above him, showing an immensely beefy six-footer. The man’s head was shaved, his bumps in bas-relief under the bright light, and he wore only a red Sixers windbreaker, despite the cold.
“Please! Wait!” Cate dashed around the car to the big man. Traffic rushed behind them on four lanes.
“Lady, you need a gun that bad?”
“Uh, yes, I do.” Cate wanted information, not weaponry, but she hadn’t had time to get a story in order. His assumption was as good as any. “Yes, I need a gun.”
“Wait a minute.” The man looked down at her. Up close, he looked about thirty years old, with large dark eyes and thick lips with a scar that vanished when he smiled, like now. “I know you. You’re that judge, been in the papers.”
Rats. “Yes, that’s me.” Cate introduced herself and stuck out her hand, and he shook it without crushing it.
“Lou Behrens.”
“Pleased to meet you, Lou.” Cate had to find a way to use it to her advantage. “So then you know that I’ve been getting a lot of publicity. My house was broken into, and I need protection. I can’t go another night without a gun.” She tried to sound like a damsel in distress, which she had seen on TV. “I feel so unsafe. Please, can you stay open a little? I won’t take long, I promise.”
“Well, okay,” Lou answered, his voice softer, and Cate started to think sexism had been getting a bad rap.
“Thanks so much. I appreciate it.”
“But you can’t buy a gun and start blastin’ away, you understand.” Lou twisted the key ring in the lock, setting it jingling, and opened the front door. “You have to take lessons. Learn firearm safety. We have classes on Saturdays and some weeknights.”
“I will, I will. I just want to have a gun tonight, so I can sleep better. Just in case.”
“Come on in, let’s see what we can do for you.” Lou flicked the switch, turning on old-fashioned fluorescent lights. He ushered Cate inside, then closed the door behind her and headed toward a doorway on the left. “Wait here while I turn off the burglar alarm.”
“Sure, thanks.” Cate looked around at a rectangular store that seemed almost stop-time. Old glass display cases framed with real wood flanked the room on either side, and ancient red-and-black linoleum tile covered the center aisle. On the right wall hung an array of dusty flags, a faded blue one that read COLT and next to it a sun-bleached yellow for RUGER. Under the flags, at least fifty antique guns had been mounted on cheap pegboard, leading to a rack of modern rifles lined butt down in the back, next to a room closed off with bars and padlocks. The air smelled vaguely of dirt and stale cigarettes, like a hardware store with attitude.
“Step over here, Judge,” Lou said, reemerging from the doorway. He set the store keys on the glass top with a clatter and went behind the counter on the left. A grimy cash register sat at the end of the counter, and the wooden shelves behind were filled with stacks of colorful boxes that read American Eagle, in cherry red and white; Winchester, in tomato red; and Remington, in kelly green and chrome yellow. It looked like a cute and cheery display until Cate realized the boxes contained bullets. She shuddered, thinking of the heat that had whizzed past her cheek last night. It reminded her of her purpose.
“So what’s a good gun for girls?”
“A girl gun?” Lou smiled, his scar dissolving into sweetness. “You mean pink? Or like these with the mother-of-pearl handle?” He waved a hand at some smaller guns, their whitish handles shining with opalescence.
“I mean a gun you’d sell to a woman, for example.” Cate leaned over the counter, which displayed an array of guns on top of their boxes. She skimmed the brands: Beretta, Colt, Rossi. Rossi. That was the gun that was the murder weapon. She remembered the name because it sounded like Russo. “What do you think about those Rossi guns?”
“The revolver? Good choice.” Lou reached for the keys, unlocked the back of the counter door, and plucked the gun from the top of its blue box. He pocketed the keys, brought out the gun, set it on the counter in front of Cate. “This is a good basic gun. It would be a fine choice for you.”
“Revolvers don’t have safeties,” Cate said, for lack of something better. How could she find out if Micah had bought this gun from him?
“Don’t worry about that. You don’t need a safety on a revolver. It takes some doing to squeeze off a shot. Check it out for yourself. Pick it up and squeeze.”
Cate hefted the heavy gun and pressed the trigger, which made a loud click. “I see what you mean. The other judges already have guns. I don’t want to be the last judge on my block to get one.”
Lou laughed.
“Judge Sherman told me he likes the gun he got, but I don’t know if he got his here. Do you know?”
Lou set his scarred lips. “I shouldn’t say, to be honest with you. We keep our customers strictly confidential. Nobody will know from me that you got your gun here.”
Great.
“But on the QT, I can tell you that the Common Pleas Court judges shop here and most of the Sixers. A few Eagles, too. We sell to police, also. We’re responsible. That’s why I say you have to have the lessons.”
“Cops buy this gun? I thought you said it was a girl gun.”
“Men use it, too, of course. It’s one of our bestsellers. It’s on TV all the time. Gangster gun of choice.” Lou ran a thickly ridged fingernail along the glistening silvery chamber, with its perfectly machined indentations. “Leaves no casings behind to identify the gun. Not like a semiauto.”
“I don’t usually watch the cop shows. Except that now I’m going to be on one, I guess.”
“I read that.” Lou warmed up immediately. “They use this gun on Cold Case, if you saw the episode the other night. It’s the same gun as you’re holding, only not all black. They like to use the stainless steel on TV, because it shows up better for the camera.”
“Really?”
Lou nodded. “They film parts of Cold Case in Philly you know, ’cause it’s set here. They had a casting call when they first started, and I went down to try and be an extra, but they didn’t hire me. Too big. I stand out.”
“I bet.” Cate smiled. “
[email protected] is filmed here, too. The exteriors.” Cate remembered the lingo from Micah. “I wonder if they use this gun in the show.”
“Sure, the Rossi’s on all the time. It’s the one the main detective carries. They buy from me.”
Cate blinked. Just like that? “For real?”
“Sure.” Lou perked up. “Hey, this is kind of a funny thing. If they make you into a character, you bought your gun here, for real.”
Funny. “Who buys the guns for them?”
“One of the assistants. She’s a nice girl.” Lou leaned over the glass counter. “Hey, they gonna make you a consultant? You could get five Gs an episode, they do that. It’s real money. You got an agent or a manager?”
“I’m a judge.”
“So what? You need an agent. I know people. I could ask around. Get yourself a good deal. Least they could do, since they based the character on you.”
“Good point.” Hmmm. “So you sell them the guns? This very store?”
“Yep.” Lou’s immense chest puffed under the red windbreaker.
“Who buys the guns for them? There was one assistant who used to watch the trial.”
“Micah Gilbert.” Lou grinned, his scar disappearing.
Yikes! “Yes, I think that was her name.” Cate squi
nted as if she were thinking, but her heart almost leaped through her chest.
“Sure, Micah. I know Micah. She works for Art Simone. She comes in here all the time. She buys the guns for the show, for when they shoot in town.” Lou chuckled. “I mean, shoot scenes, not guns.”
“Sure, right.” Cate managed a laugh. “So she buys the guns?”
“Yes. She handles props on the Philly end. They don’t want to deal with airport security, flying the guns here from L.A.”
Whoa. “So Micah bought these guns for the show? This exact one? I want to buy exactly what she bought.”
“That’s the exact one. Your gun will be on TV.”
Yay! “When did she buy it?”
“She bought a few. That one, she bought from me about six months ago. She bought three, as I remember. Two black Berettas, too, for the other characters. She picked up a few silencers, too.”
“You sell silencers?”
“Sure. They’re easy to use, you just thread ’em on. Can’t put a silencer on a revolver, though.” Lou pointed through the case. “Berretta, Walther, Glock, H&K, they take a silencer. A Sig, too, some of the models.”
Cate could barely contain her excitement. “Did she have to take the lesson, too?”
“No, but she wanted to. That girl can shoot. I taught her myself, at our range.” Lou smiled with a fatherly pride, and Cate reached for her wallet.
“I’ll take it,” she said, and Lou laughed.
“Don’t you wanna know how much it is?”
“Doesn’t matter. This is a celebrity gun.”
Cate couldn’t wait to get to a phone.
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 de
nying 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.”