Dirty Blonde (26 page)

“The prospect of this TV series about judges, of course, is completely unacceptable.”

“I hate the idea, too.”

“They’re saying it’s fictional, but no one will believe that. I don’t want
anyone
making a TV show about my court.” Sherman stiffened. “It’s anathema to me. I assume you will file suit, with your resources. I had heard that you’ve been in touch with Matt Sorian. He’s exactly whom I’d hire, Cate. A lawyer with
teeth
.”

Meriden
. “I did call Matt, but he advises me that I wouldn’t win, and I agree. I’ve been thinking that suing would do more harm than good. I’ve decided not to sue.”

“How so? Why?” Sherman’s lips parted in surprise. “You can’t be seen as
acquiescing
. This is a question of appearances. You
must
sue.”

“No, I won’t. I think it would bring more attention to the show.” Cate had decided last night, after talking to Gina. She wouldn’t compound the damage she’d already done. “It’s protesting too much, giving it publicity. Making it bigger than it is.”

“You couldn’t make it bigger than it is.” Sherman frowned deeply, and his tone took on a new urgency. “
Attorneys@Law
is a hugely popular show. Everyone watches it, even me. Ellen’s book group switched their night to Monday, because of it.”

“I’m going to weather it, Chief.”

Sherman set his reading glasses down quietly. “What are you saying? The relevant question is, can our court weather it? Are you saying you’ll stand by and do nothing to stop this? To stop them from hurting our court?”

“I have no choice, Chief.”

Sherman eyed her for a moment, over his folded reading glasses. “Then I’ll have no choice. You’ll be leaving me no choice. If you don’t sue, I’ll have to ask you to resign.”

Cate almost fell off the chair. “Resign? From being a
judge
?”

“Yes. Of course. I’ll have to ask for your resignation if you won’t sue. At least that.” Sherman shook his head, as if the explanation were simple. “I have to protect our court. Our judges, our staff. We all work too hard to get dragged through the mud on television. Or in the press. You have to sue, Cate. Then you’d at least be doing something to remedy this terrible situation you created. Then at least I could defend you.”

“Chief, this will die down, it has to, and—”

“Not if they make a TV show about it. Not the way the press massages TV, and vice versa.” Sherman scoffed. “It’s a twenty-four-hour news cycle, as they say, and I cannot have the entire Eastern District on TV, as news or entertainment. You tell me which is which, nowadays. Cate, won’t you sue? Please, rethink your position.” Sherman hunched over, in appeal. “Give it a day. Confer with Matt. You’re not thinking clearly. You’ll be an excellent judge someday, Cate. Don’t throw it away. Don’t make me ask you to step down.”

“You don’t have to—”

“Yes, I do, and I will. If you don’t sue.” Sherman edged away in his chair, watching her as if from a distance, and Cate flash-forwarded on what it would be like to be frozen out of his friendship, much less off the bench.

“But I just got on the court. I’m not giving it up. I earned this job.” Cate thought about what Gina had said.
You wanted the promotion, but did you want the job?
And then she knew, just as she was about to lose it. Maybe, finally, because she was about to lose it. “Chief, I want this job.”

“Then you should have taken better care of it.” Sherman faced-off with her over his desk. “We can do this easy or we can do this hard. Resign or sue.”

Cate reconsidered it, her resolve wavering. It would be so easy to sue. Just file the papers. Then she remembered.
But what’s right for you might be wrong for Warren and me.
“I can’t.”

“Then step down.”

“I won’t.”

“Then that’s that, I tried.” Sherman’s tone hardened, and he shrugged as if shedding her. “Effective immediately, your cases are reassigned.
Blendheim, D’Alma
, all of them. You’re off the bench. I’ll reassign Val to another judge. Nobody wants those law clerks. They’re on their own.”

“You can’t do that, Chief. You don’t have the power.”

“I most certainly do. I manage the dockets, and your docket just got cleared. You left me no choice. Federal judges hold their office only during good behavior.”

Cate rose. “The Constitution doesn’t speak to this, Chief, and you don’t have the power to execute, even if it did.”

But Sherman had stopped listening. He rose, too, then pulled a sheaf of papers from his desk and handed them across the desk. “This is a complaint of judicial misconduct against you. It will be filed by the end of today.”

“A
misconduct
complaint!” Cate snatched the papers but she was too emotional to read them. “The misconduct statute wasn’t meant for an overactive sex life. The statute is aimed at conduct on the bench, within the scope of office. Bias, conflict of interest. It doesn’t cover me! Who drafted this? Jonathan?”

“He feels very strongly that the court is being harmed, and now that we’ve spoken, I agree.”

“Chief, this is insane!”

“No, it’s insane to sacrifice an entire court for one individual, no matter who it is. I won’t have my court turned into a television spectacle.”

“They’ll still do the show!”

“If you aren’t on the court, it won’t be about a sitting judge. It won’t involve us any longer.” Sherman bore down, leaning across the desk. “Cate, last chance. Don’t make me file against you. The complaint goes to the chief judge of the Third Circuit, and he can hold hearings, take testimony. Is that want you want?
You
, on trial? A judge, as the
defendant
?”

Oh no.

“Your misconduct is clear. It’s all over the press, and it affected the performance of your official duties. You just admitted as much.”

“Admitted?” Cate blinked. Where had she heard that before?
Russo, at her door
.

“You canceled important court appearances. You dismissed an ongoing proceeding because you were unprepared. I had to leave the bench to rule in a motion you hadn’t rescheduled.”

“
Are you taping me
?” Cate looked around in disbelief, and Chief Judge Sherman flushed red.

“I have a court to protect, and so do you. Now, will you resign?”

“Hell, no.” Cate turned on her heel and ran from the office.

CHAPTER 33

Cate stormed into the unfamiliar chambers, ahead of a bewildered Justin Case and Special Agent Brady. Meriden’s secretary looked up from her computer keyboard. “Judge Fante?”

“Hi, Denise,” Cate called over her shoulder, flinging open the door to Meriden’s office and gesturing Justin and Brady inside. “Follow me, gentlemen. Judge Meriden’s going to need protection.”

“Judge?” Justin said, but Cate was already striding to Meriden’s desk, where he sat on the phone, in his shirtsleeves, his rep tie flopped over his shoulder and his feet crossed on the desk.

“Say good-bye, Jonathan.” Cate reached over and pressed down the hook. “What do you think you’re doing?”

“What do you think
you’re
doing?” Meriden hung up the phone and whirled around in his chair, facing her. “I was on a very important phone call.”

“Listen, you little bastard.” Cate leaned over the desk. “I was just with Sherman and I saw the complaint you wrote. I know what you’re trying to do and I know why you’re trying to do it. And you won’t win.”

“You should look at yourself in the mirror.”

“No, you jerk. You had it in for me from the beginning. You were never a colleague.” Cate glared into his baby blues and realized that not all monsters had scary red eyes. Some even wore starchy white collars and boring ties. “You don’t like me. You’re jealous and you’re mean, small, and petty.”

“I don’t have to take this.” Meriden stood up. “You threw me out of your office, and I’ll throw you out of mine.”

“Don’t bother, I’m going. I was dumb enough to hand you a card, and you played it to the hilt. But this isn’t over, because I know how to fight for my life and you don’t. You never had to, and so you’re afraid.”

“Oh please.”

“That’s why you kept hatch marks on me, why you send your law clerks to spy, and why you run to Daddy all the time. You’re not man enough to confront me and you never will be. I’ll win because you’re afraid. You’ll see.”

“I’ll hold my breath.”

“Please do.” Cate turned, shaking with anger, and stormed out of the office with Justin and Brady falling in place behind her. She stalked out to the reception area and threw open the chambers door, then stormed down the hall to her own chambers.

“You all right, Judge?” Justin asked, while Brady kept his own counsel.

“Never better,” Cate said, fuming. “Bet the Mossad never taught you about a pissed-off Italian.”

“No.”

“Watch and learn, pal.” Cate was at her own door in the next few steps and opened it just as Val was hanging up the phone. She knew from the secretary’s shocked expression that she’d just been called by Sherman’s office.

“Lord, Cate,” Val said, her tone hushed as a prayer.

“He doesn’t waste any time, does he?”

“He’s
suspending
you?”

“Looks that way.”

Val’s hand flew to her mouth. “I am so sorry.”

“Me, too.” Cate walked over to her desk, and the clerks came out of their office and gathered around the way they always did, except that this might be the last time they did it.

“What’s going on?” Emily asked worriedly. “What do you mean, you’re suspended?”

“Can they do that?” Sam went pale. “Just because you screw around?”

Cate was beyond wincing. “Evidently, yes. At least until I figure out what to do about it.”

“What does that mean, for us?” Sam asked. “Are we suspended, too?”

“Of course not, silly,” Emily said, rolling her lined eyes, and Cate didn’t have the heart to tell them what Sherman had said.

“Gimme a minute, folks. Everybody go to their desks, please. I’ll be right back.” Cate hurried into her office, closed the door behind her, and made a beeline for the phone on her desk, pressing in the main number.

“Beecker & Hartigan,” said the quavering voice, when the call connected. Mrs. Pershing.

“Matt Sorian, please.”

“Judge Fante? Is that you?”

“No.”

“Oh, I’m sorry, please hold,” Mrs. Pershing said, and the next voice was Matt’s.

“Matt, it’s Cate.”

“My God, Cate! I saw the papers—”

“We both did. Listen I have some hard questions. Law-review type issues. One, is it within the power of a chief judge to suspend a district court judge for off-the-bench sexual conduct? Obviously, the issue is what you read about in the paper.”

“Well, Cate—”

“Wait, hold on, there’s more. Two, does sexual misconduct rise to the level of judicial misconduct within the meaning of the statute? And third, what is meant by ‘good behavior’ in Article III of the Constitution?”

“Cate, I can’t undertake that research for you. Chief Judge Sherman just called.”

“He called
you
?”

“We just hung up. He’s angry with me, and with Beecker, for advising you not to sue.”

“What? What are you talking about? He has no right to do or say that.”

“I’ll tell you what I told him—that I did not so advise you. I merely suggested that your chance of prevailing would be low, and that the decision to sue or not to sue was a personal decision, which you should make.”

“
What?
” Cate thought she’d entered a parallel universe, where your boss taped your conversation and your partners betrayed you. “That’s not what you advised me at all, Matt. You advised me not to sue.”

“That’s not what I said.”

“And where do you get off talking with Sherman or anyone else about my legal business? What about client confidentiality?”

“You waived it, Cate. You spoke to him about my advice, and I thought it only fair to clarify what I told you.”

“Clarify? You lied! My speaking to him waives nothing, and you know it.”

“I can’t afford to have my legal advice misconstrued to the chief judge of our district court. Beecker can’t afford that, either, Cate. You, of all people, should understand.”

“Screw you, too, Matt.” Cate slammed down the phone, just as there was a knock on the door. “Come in,” she called out, flustered, and the door opened onto two federal marshals, a bodyguard, and an FBI agent. Cate tried to recover. “Yes, gentlemen?”

“Judge Fante?” The marshals entered her office in their dark blue jackets, looking so somber that Cate felt a bolt of alarm.

“What is it? Is Russo back?”

“Judge, we’ve been asked to escort you out of the building.”

“But I’m not going anywhere,” Cate said, then came up to speed, incredulous. “Am I being
thrown
out of the courthouse?”

“The clerk’s office asked us to take care of it, Judge. We don’t know any more about it. We’re just doing what we’re told.”

“I’m with you, wherever you go,” Justin said, his lips pursed.

“So am I,” Brady added, and Cate wondered fleetingly whether Justin and Brady could take the marshals.

“Okay, I’m going.” Cate rose and looked around her desk, trying to think clearly. She hadn’t seen this coming. She didn’t think any of this could happen. What should she take? What should she leave? Would she ever come back? She hadn’t even got the chance to unpack. She picked up her purse and went to the door, smiling at the marshal. It was one she recognized. “Please don’t cuff me, Mel. I’d like to avoid the obvious handcuff joke.”

“No cuffs, Judge.” He smiled sadly, and Cate led her entourage out and into the reception area, where Val and the clerks were standing, stricken. The clerks looked at her, blinking like baby chicks, and even Val looked worried as a mother hen.

Cate said, “Nobody freak. I’ll get us out of this. Here’s what matters—Val, they’re going to reassign you.”

“To who?”

“I don’t know yet. I’ll assume they’ll give you some time to organize my files.”

“I’ll need time. I mean, I just won’t leave you. I can’t just walk out of here. I don’t want to.”