The 9th Judgment Read Free

is it first? Dinner or poop?”
    “Poop first,” she said.
    “All right, then.”
    Pete Gordon picked up the baby, as dear to him as a sack of cement, not even sure the little shit was his, although even if
     he was, he still didn’t care. He put the baby on its back on the changing table and went through the ritual, holding the kiddo
     by the ankles, wiping him down, dusting his butt with powder, wrapping him up in Pampers, then putting him back in the kiddie
     cage.
    “Franks and beans?” he asked his daughter.
    “My absolute favorite,” Sherry said, putting a pigtail in her mouth.
    “Put a shirt on the stink bomb,” Pete Gordon said, “so your mother doesn’t have a gas attack when she gets home.”
    Gordon microwaved some formula for the stink bomb and opened the canned franks and beans. He turned on the undercabinet TV
     and the stove, what wifey should be doing instead of him, the bitch, and dumped the contents of the can into a pot.
    The beans were burning when the breaking news came on.
    Huh. Look at that,
Pete thought.
    Some dork from ABC was holding a microphone, standing in front of Borders. College kids mugged behind him as he said, “We
     have learned that there has been a shooting at the Stonestown garage. Sources report a gruesome double homicide that you will
     not believe. We’ll keep you posted as details are released. Back to you, Yolanda.”

Chapter 4
    YUKI CASTELLANO STEPPED out of her office and called down the line of cubicles to Nicky Gaines, “You ready, Wonder Boy? Or
     do you want to meet me downstairs?”
    “I’m coming,” Gaines said. “Who said I wasn’t coming?”
    “How do I look?” she asked him, already moving toward the elevator that would take them from the DA’s office to the courtroom.
    “You look fierce, Batwoman. Miss Hot Multicultural USA.”
    “Shut up.” She laughed at her protégé. “Just be ready to prompt me if I blank, God forbid.”
    “You’re not going to blank. You’re going to send Jo-Jo to the big house.”
    “Ya think?”
    “I
know.
Don’t you?”
    “Uh-huh. I just have to make sure the jury knows it, too.”
    Nicky stabbed the elevator button, and Yuki went back to her thoughts. In about twenty minutes, she was going to make her
     closing argument in the state’s case against Adam “Jo-Jo” Johnson.
    Since she’d been with the DA’s office, she’d taken on more than a few crappy cases that the DA was determined to try: she’d
     work eighteen-hour days, earning “atta girls” from her boss, Leonard “Red Dog” Parisi, and score points with the jury, all
     of which would give her high expectations.
    And then she’d lose.
    Yuki was becoming famous for losing—and that stank because she was a fighter and a winner. And she just frickin’ hated to
     lose. But she never
thought
she’d lose—and this time was no different.
    Her case was solid. She’d laid it out like a hand of solitaire. The jury had an easy job. The defendant wasn’t just guilty,
     he was guilty as
sin.
    Nicky held open the studded leather door to the courtroom, and Yuki walked smartly down the center aisle of the oak-paneled
     chamber. She noticed that the gallery was filling up with spectators, mostly press and law students. And as she approached
     the prosecution table, she saw that Jo-Jo Johnson and his attorney, Jeff Asher, were in their seats.
    The stage was set.
    She nodded to her opponent and noted the defendant’s appearance. Jo-Jo’s hair was combed and he was wearing a nice suit, but
     he looked dazed as only a mope who’d fried his brain on drugs could look. She hoped that very soon he would look worse, once
     she nailed him on manslaughter in the first degree.
    “Jo-Jo looks like he’s been smoking ganja,” Nicky murmured to Yuki as he pulled out her chair.
    “Or else he believes his lawyer’s bull,” Yuki said loud enough for her opponent to hear. “Jo-Jo may think he’s going to walk,
     but he’ll be busing it to Pelican