3

In the judge’s chambers, a messy office that reeked of cigar smoke, Nikki finished her work on the LSAT questions while Finney studied the letters. He took off his reading glasses, rubbed his forehead, and picked up the half-smoked Phillies cigar from his ashtray. Nikki glanced up and frowned her displeasure. She knew he wouldn’t light up in front of her, but he still had a nasty habit of chewing on the cigar and spitting little bits and pieces into the trash can.

He cleared some phlegm from his throat and thrust the letters toward her. “Take a look at these,” he said, “and let me know what you think.”

“I think you ought to flush those cigars.”

“About the letters,” Finney said.

Nikki rose from the worn leather couch and started toward the desk.

“And let me see your answers,” Finney added, pointing to the LSAT questions she had spread out on the coffee table in front of her. “If you get them all right, I’ll quit cold turkey.”

“Like that’s going to happen,” she muttered.

They traded documents, and Nikki settled back onto the couch, arranging the letters before her in chronological order. The first one, written in neat block letters from Stokes to a man nicknamed Juice, was dated April 4.

Nikki chuckled to herself as she thought about Landers’s futile attempt to keep these letters from the court. No wonder. She loved the phrase “did me greasy”—it perfectly described the way Landers practiced law. She turned to the second letter, obviously written the next day.

The defendant, acting like he’d never heard of the Black Gangster Disciples, obviously had a penchant for sarcasm, Nikki thought. Still, this letter seemed to indicate that Stokes wasn’t worried about Carter’s testimony, just like Landers claimed. Maybe that’s because Stokes knew the Disciples would take care of Carter before he ever made it to the stand.

There was one more letter from Stokes.

Nikki just shook her head at this one. Even in jail, Stokes was calling the shots, practically chuckling as his boys beat a new inmate within an inch of his life.

The last letter was a return letter from the gangbanger named Juice, obviously intercepted by the deputies at the jail.

Nikki finished reading the letters and looked up at Finney.

“Well,” he said, the cigar dangling out the side of his mouth. He held her LSAT answers in his right hand. “Guess I’ll be able to enjoy these babies a little while longer.” He licked the end of his cigar and placed it in the ashtray, coughing as he did.

“How bad?” Nikki asked.

“One out of twelve. You would’ve done better if you had just put the same letter for every question.”

Nikki grunted, swallowing a few choice words for the old geezer, and shrugged. “I did that last time. You said I wasn’t trying hard enough.”

“It’s not easy getting less than 20 percent right,” Finney said. He leaned back in his chair, crossed his legs, and locked his hands behind his head. “What do you think?”

Nikki stacked the letters and placed them back on the judge’s desk. “Guilty.”

Finney raised an eyebrow.

“It’s just like Mitchell said,” Nikki insisted, standing in front of the judge’s desk. “Stokes doesn’t have to order the killing of a witness in plain English. He just has to mention to his gangbangers that one of their own is ratting him out, and they take care of the rest. You’ve got to allow the written statement into evidence.”

“Really?”

“Yep.” Nikki stood her ground and crossed her arms. She could see he wasn’t buying it, but she was ready to fight for this one.

“So every time an inmate mentions a witness to someone outside the jail, and the witness later dies, we just flush the defendant’s right to confront the witness in court?”

“Not every time, Judge. But here you’ve got proven gang connections and the timing—one week after the letter, the witness is dead. And the whole tongue thing.”

Finney stood and started putting his robe back on. “You’ll make a good prosecutor, Nikki. But I’m not being paid to be a prosecutor. Sometimes a judge has to hold his nose and still make the right ruling, especially when a constitutional right is at stake.”

“Judge,” Nikki protested, following him out of his office. “You can’t be serious. This guy had a gangbanger cut out the man’s tongue—”

“All rise,” the deputy said as Finney entered the courtroom. Nikki trailed half a step behind, veering toward her seat next to the wall. But first she made one last plea.

“His tongue, Judge. They cut out his tongue.”