I, Michael Bennett

“Anyway, we thought it was going to be a slam dunk at first,” she said. “We interviewed fifteen eyewitnesses who were ready to testify that they saw Melekian turn and stumble into Perrine as he was ru

She sighed again.

“That number of witnesses is now down to seven. Only three of the wait staff and four patrons are willing to say what they saw. We’re not sure if the witnesses are apprehensive since the courthouse shooting or if Perrine is getting to them in other ways, but people are becoming less and less willing to testify. That’s why I need you to be ready to go as soon as the jury is picked. We need to jump right into this with both feet—put you on the stand to set the whole thing up and get the ball rolling quickly. Because the longer we delay, the more witnesses we’re going to lose.”

I shook my head.

“You’re right,” I said. “With Perrine’s money and global reach, he’s already started to go all-in to ruin the government’s case through violence. It’s unbelievable.”

“You don’t have to tell me,” Tara said. “The Mob used to do the same thing at the height of their power in the nineteen freaking thirties. All they seemed to do was find witnesses and kill them. The most depressing thing about it is that the bloody tactic has a tendency of being highly effective.”

She checked her watch and stood, stacking papers.

“Come on. Tempus fugit. We need to get to the courthouse. Grab one of these file boxes for me.”

Back at the elevator, Tara smiled at me sort of slyly after she pressed the button.

The last time we’d been in an elevator together was that night at the St. Regis.

I stood there in the pregnant silence, thinking about that night—Tara bringing me up to her room, how nice she looked in her fuzzy white bathrobe. For all its nuttiness, it was actually quite a fond memory. A man could get used to putting this vivacious young prosecutor to bed. In theory, of course.

The elevator binged open.

Tara stared at me, puzzled.

“After you,” I said.

She suddenly smiled again as we got into the car.

“Sir Michael Be

CHAPTER 55

AND I THOUGHT Foley Square in front of the federal courthouse had looked like a zoo when the trial first started.

As Tara and I exited our cab and mounted the marble steps, it again looked like a zoo, only this time with open cages. There were reporters, protesters, cops, and sidewalk barriers everywhere. Most of the faces in the crowd looked even more nervous than the ones on the 7:21 out of Beacon. And why wouldn’t they be afraid?

The federal court in New York had been around since the days of Alexander Hamilton, and this was the first time a judge had been murdered in her own courtroom in the middle of a trial!

I elbowed Tara gently and pointed my chin up at the NYPD chopper that sailed into view above the courthouse.

“Wow, this is the first trial I’ve ever been on that required air cover!” I yelled as we moshed our way through the nervous crowd of photographers and newsies at the top of the stairs.

“Come on, Mike. Didn’t you read the paper?” she said. “The mayor insists that Perrine’s trial will move forward. New York City will not be intimidated by a drug cartel and its boss!”

“Of course. Not intimidated. How silly of me,” I said over the deafening rotor wash. “Isn’t it fu

Because bullet holes were perhaps not the greatest visual stimulus for potential jurors, the trial had been moved from the majestic courtroom where Judge Baym had been gu

Perrine was already sitting at the defense table when we arrived. I’d seen a lot of security inside a courtroom before, but this was over the top. There were at least eight uniformed court officers and another half dozen or so U.S. marshals standing in a wide semicircle around him. The men were all huge and intimidating, like an angry, violent defensive squad on a football team waiting tensely for the snap.

But if Perrine was intimidated or even noticed all the fuss, he hid it quite well. His demeanor and posture were as impressive as always, his head canted back commandingly, his crease-free prison jumpsuit worn officiously, as though it were formal military dress.

There was a playful sparkle in his blue eyes as he smiled at something that his thousand-bucks-an-hour lawyer said. You could tell the mass murderer thought the whole thing was a joke, that he was playing us and loving every minute of it.

CHAPTER 56

THE NEW JUDGE, Mary Elizabeth Fleming, was a tall, elegant black woman with a striking resemblance to Condoleezza Rice. She was just entering the courtroom from her chambers with the court clerk when it happened. There was a sound from outside, a sudden and tremendous window-rattling bang that seemed to increase in volume as it rose up from the street fourteen stories below.

At the massive booming noise, the courtroom broke into complete bedlam. Spectators immediately hit the deck in the seats behind me as the dowdy stenographer screamed. She knocked over her typing stand in a clatter and left a shoe behind as she dove into the witness box for cover.

It was unbelievable how fast all the court officers drew on Perrine, as though it were a Wild West show.

“Hands!” they screamed at him.

A six-foot-five redheaded cop circled in front of Perrine, the chunky device in his freckled hand pointed a foot from Perrine’s chest.

“Hey, you deaf? Hands up now or you will be Tasered, you son of a bitch!” he yelled.

The ghost of a smile played on Perrine’s lips as he sat as still as a paperweight in his chair. After a moment, he raised his hands in a slow, graceful motion.

“What’s that expression? ‘Don’t Tase me, bro’?” he said in the tense silence.

He turned toward the judge then, laughing softly.

The towering redheaded cop’s radio gave off a loud beep followed by the long squawk of a message.

“It’s okay. All clear, Judge,” the cop said, listening to his radio. “Looks like a truck at the construction site on Centre Street dropped a load of scaffolding.”

“How ironic. I almost dropped a load myself,” Perrine said with a girlish giggle.

“Can the comedy routine, Perrine,” the judge said. “I mean it. One more word out of you, and I might not Taser you, but I will gag you … bro.”

Closest to the witness stand, I went to help the shaken stenographer up from the floor of the witness box. I exchanged smiles with Perrine at the nearby defense table as I helped right her stenotype. When he gestured me over toward the defense table with his shackled hands, I was more than happy to oblige.

As I leaned in over the table, the drug lord flashed me a grin.

“You don’t scare easily, do you, Michael Be