Judge & Jury by James Patterson

Author:James Patterson [Patterson, James]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Mystery, Organized Crime, Mafia, Mafia trials - New York (State) - New York, Women jurors, Fiction - Espionage, Mafia - New York (State) - New York, Legal, General, United States, Suspense, Thriller, Legal stories, Thrillers, Suspense fiction, Fiction, Intrigue, Espionage, Mafia trials
ISBN: 9780446619004
Publisher: Warner Vision Books
Published: 2007-03-01T16:34:32+00:00

Judge and Jury

Chapter 64

R ICHARD NORDESHENKO HAD FILED unnoticed into the courthouse. It hadn’t been difficult to obtain a standard juror’s notice from Reichardt, then doctor the date and name to fit his need. He got in line with the other dour-looking jurors. Then, like every job he had ever done, he walked in through the front door.

For a while, Nordeshenko sat eyeing a magazine in the crowded jury room, listening to people’s numbers being called. Many of them were nervously muttering what-ifs about getting selected for the Cavello trial. Everyone he listened to seemed to feel they had a foolproof excuse.

Nordeshenko quietly chuckled to himself. None of them would need an excuse.

At 10:15 a.m. he checked his watch. Nezzi would be driving the stolen catering van into the underground garage. Nezzi was the best in the world at this. Still, you never knew what could happen on a job, especially one as complex as this.

Last night, Nordeshenko had written a long letter to his wife and son. He had left it in his hotel room, in the event he did not make it back.

In the letter he admitted he was not exactly the good man they may have always thought he was, and that the things they may be hearing about him were probably true. He wrote that it saddened him that he had had to hide so much from them over the years. But in each life, he added, one is never all bad or all good. What was good about his life was the two of them. He wrote that he loved them both very much, and trying to close with a joke, he told his son that he too had grown to prefer poker over chess.

He signed the letter, from your loving husband and father, Kolya Remlikov.

Nordeshenko’s real name.

A name neither of them knew.

At precisely 11:40 a.m., Nordeshenko put down his magazine and made his way outside and up to the third floor. It was mostly court and administrative offices. He found the men’s bathroom along the elevator bank and ducked inside. A heavyset black man with a large mole on his cheek was finishing up washing his hands. Nordeshenko ran the water, waiting for him to leave.

When the black man departed, Nordeshenko removed the top to the trash receptacle, dug his hand through the balled-up paper towels, and removed the carefully wrapped bundle that he knew was there. Just as Reichardt had said it would be.

Nordeshenko went into a stall and unwrapped the bundle: a Heckler and Koch 9mm pistol, his gun of choice. He checked the magazine and, seeing that it was fully loaded, tightly screwed on the suppressor.

He knew the judge was a stickler for regimen. He always let out his court a few minutes before 12:30 p.m. for lunch. The story went that no lawyer arguing before Barnett wanted to be in the middle of a key point around that time.

Only a few minutes more.

From his pocket, Nordeshenko took out a tiny cell phone.

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