The Vendetta Defense by Lisa Scottoline

Author:Lisa Scottoline
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub, pdf
Tags: Trials (Murder), Philadelphia (Pa.), American Mystery & Suspense Fiction, Legal, Fiction, Homing pigeons, Italian Americans, (¯`'•.¸//(*_*)\\¸.•'´¯), Fiction - Espionage, Thrillers, Thriller
ISBN: 9780060185077
Publisher: New York : HarperCollins, c2001.
Published: 2010-04-24T07:00:00+00:00

Chapter 27

The sun shone bright Tuesday morning, in an almost impossible run of good weather in Philly, but Judy was too psyched to care. She couldn’t see the blue sky for the TV and still cameras, tape recorders held high, and klieg lights. She couldn’t breathe the fresh air for the reporters exhaling coffee in her face. It was a Starbucks contact high.

Judy plowed in her navy suit and lucky pumps through the press outside the Criminal Justice Center, with Pigeon Tony wedged between her and Frank. For the first time, she not only tolerated the reporters, she welcomed them. She felt safer for all of them with 384 witnesses on the scene, and the media was key to Judy’s new and improved plan.

“Ms. Carrier, any comment about Kevin McRea’s disappearance?” “Judy, over here! What do you say to reports that Marco Coluzzi was trying to buy McRea Excavation?” “Ms. Carrier, do you believe Kevin McRea has met with foul play?”

“No comment,” she shouted. She threaded her way to the courthouse entrance, putting on a professional mask to hide her glee at their questions. Obviously her late-night telephone calls, placed anonymously to any newspaper that would pick up, had worked like a charm. She had planted the story about Marco Coluzzi’s attempted purchase of McRea Excavation, and eager reporters had investigated the facts and gotten sources to confirm. It had been a year or two since a Philly paper had won a Pulitzer and nobody was forgetting it.

“Ms. Carrier, do you care to comment on Marco Coluzzi’s expansion into the concrete and quarry business?” “Judy, who you gonna call now that Kevin McRea’s out of the picture?” “Ms. Carrier, what goes into a $130,000 driveway anyway? Gold?”

Judy didn’t break a smile. Headlines on the morning newspapers had read DEFENDANT DISAPPEARS, with sidebars like “Marco Coluzzi’s Expanding Business Empire,” and Judy couldn’t have written them better herself. Reporters had interviewed the McReas’ landlady and, more important, had unearthed Marco’s tax records and SEC filings, which showed an increasing concentration of power in the construction industry, much of it through shell companies that disguised their true ownership. Judy was hoping the acquisitions had been hidden from John Coluzzi as well, and that he would feel surprised and threatened by Marco’s growing might.

She looked quickly around, wondering when and how the Coluzzis would arrive. Together or apart? At peace or at war? She couldn’t stay to find out, because she had a murder case to defend.

“Ms. Carrier, come on, cut us a break!” “Ms. Carrier, is Pigeon Tony gonna get off?” “Ms. Carrier, did he do it or not?” “Judy, did you hire a bodyguard yet?” “Judy, how’s your car?”

Judy exchanged glances with Frank, who grinned, his teeth white and even against his freshly shaved olive skin. He looked handsome dressed up in a white oxford shirt, casual rep tie, and light tweed jacket he’d bought during a trip to the King of Prussia mall, when he was supposed to be calling his lawyer.

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