Page 78 of Hush

But Mike didn’t come back, and Tom fell asleep with the TV still on, just after two in the morning.

He woke with his face smashed in Mike’s pillow and his cell phone ringing. He answered before his blurry gaze focused on the caller ID.

“Mike?”

Silence.“Tom, it’s Dana Juarez.”

Shit. Judge Juarez. His fellow federal judge. “Hi, Dana. How are you?”

“As well as can be.”She sighed heavily.“I got a call from Clarence.”Chief Judge Fink, to Tom.“He wants us all to come in. We need to prepare for this.”

Prepare for this. For the trial of the millennium. It was coming, a hurricane that was bearing down on them all. “All right. I’ll get dressed and head downtown.”

“We were told DC police are providing extra security around the courthouse. Have you heard anything from the marshals?”

His stomach clenched, a fist tightening in his belly. “From the marshals?”

“You seem close to Inspector Lucciano.”Judge Juarez spoke carefully, softly.

He swallowed. “Just friendly at work.”

She was quiet again. The phone line scratched, like she had sighed away from the microphone.“I’m driving into DC in an hour, Tom. Do you want me to pick you up on the way?”

“I’d appreciate that.”

He showered and dressed and fed Etta Mae, taking her out to the backyard as he texted Mike.Going to the courthouse. Fink called everyone in.

[Don’t take the Metro. I can get PD to pick you up.]

Juarez is swinging by and we’re driving in together. How are you?

[Processing his house in Chevy Chase.]

Tom exhaled slowly. Processing the scene. Building evidence. Building a case.Don’t run yourself ragged.

[I’ve got a few more hours in me.]

Tom watched Etta Mae sniff the roses, the planter bed. His cell buzzed again.[I’ll see you soon. Miss you.]

I miss you too.

No more texts. Mike must be back at work. He curled over his lap, holding his phone in both hands, the case pressed against his forehead. What had Judge Juarez meant when she said she thought he and Mike were close? Did she suspect something? Or had she just seen them going to lunch together? What did it mean? God, he was going to second-guess himself to death. Anxiety rose inside him like bile, burning his throat.

Judge Juarez called him when she pulled up, and he gave Etta Mae a kiss and then ran out the door, grabbing his briefcase on the way. They didn’t speak on the drive downtown. Judge Juarez had the radio on, the news continuing in an endless stream of updates and speculation on what came next.

They had to show identification blocks away from the courthouse, and then were escorted through two separate police barricades by a uniformed DC patrol car. Armed guards with automatic rifles stood post outside the courthouse.

“Welcome to the bench of the DC federal court, Tom,” Judge Juarez said as she slid her car into the underground garage. Darkness wreathed them in shadows. “As judges, we have to preside over the biggest investigations on the planet. And, we’re all on the world stage with this one.”

His heart hammered, a furious, racing rhythm. “I feel for the judge who’s going to get this case.”

“We’ll find out soon. Clarence called us all in to make the assignment.”

Everyone met in Chief Judge Clarence Fink’s chambers. As Chief Judge, he had the panoramic chambers at the top of the glass-walled silo on the southern end of the Annex. He had a picture-postcard view of the National Mall and of the Capitol. Standing in Fink’s chambers, they were only a hundred feet away from where he and Mike had watched the shooting unfold, the murder and assassination attempt. There was Grief, hiding her marble face against the stone shoulder of History, almost the exact position he’d ended up with Mike, burying his face in Mike’s shoulder as he screamed. The helplessness, the crippling fear he’d felt. What had happened? Where were the shots coming from? He still felt like he was huddled beneath the statue, but Mike wasn’t there to shield him anymore. He was adrift.

Fink’s chambers were massive, the entirety of the top floor of the south-facing rotunda. Sunlight bled into the office, casting every judge’s face into harsh angles and half shadows. He’d been on the DC federal bench for a little over a year, but he didn’t know all his colleagues. Most he knew by name only and their reputation in the papers. There was Judge Bonham, the favorite contender for the next opening on the Supreme Court. Judge Walsh, a surly, cantankerous man who was as harsh as Fink. Judge Tonya King nodded at him from her seat at Fink’s long conference table, and Judge Juarez sat beside him.

Fink, looking every one of his ninety-six years, sat hunched at the head of his table. Without the black robes, he seemed smaller, a diminutive version of the lion that presided over his courtroom and roared from the bench. He seemed no stronger than a kitten, dressed in his plaid button-down and loose khakis.