"Your Honor, my God, are you all right?" The words hit Rick and Dempsey like a freight train loaded with lead. "Judge Montgomery, Your Honor." Dempsey's triumphant sneer vanished, replaced by a sudden, sickening paralysis. His brain desperately tried to reject the audio input.
He blinked, looking from the towering, panicked bailiff to the woman in the tan coat. Nora slowly lowered her hand from her bleeding lip. She looked at Bill, giving him a curt, reassuring nod before turning her gaze back to Dempsey. The look she gave the officer was one of absolute, terrifying, sovereign power. "I am fine, William."
Nora said, her voice echoing with a chilling, perfectly controlled calm. She did not take her eyes off Dempsey. "Though I believe Officer Dempsey is about to have a very, very difficult morning." Dempsey couldn't breathe. The oxygen had been violently sucked from the hallway.
The marble floors suddenly felt as though they were tilting beneath his boots. His stomach plummeted into an endless, icy abyss. He looked at the woman he had just assaulted, the woman he had berated, manhandled, and struck in the face. She wasn't Anya Richards. She was the Honorable Nora Montgomery, the presiding judge of the 12th District, the woman whose courtroom he was supposed to be testifying in, the woman who held the power to end careers with a single stroke of her pen.
And he had just backhanded her across the face in the middle of her own courthouse. For a man who had built his entire identity on intimidation, Richard Dempsey suddenly looked remarkably small. The heavy, oppressive swagger that had carried him up the stairs had completely evaporated, replaced by the pale, clammy sheen of absolute panic. His mouth opened and closed like a landed fish, but the vocal cords that were so accustomed to shouting orders utterly failed him. "Your Your Honor."
Dempsey finally stammered, his voice a pathetic, reedy squeak that barely carried over the hum of the overhead vents. He took a hasty step backward, his hands shooting up in a placating gesture, palms out. I didn't. I thought you were There's been a massive misunderstanding. Judge Nora Montgomery did not blink.
She reached into her pocket, withdrew a crisp white linen handkerchief, and pressed it delicately to her split lip. When she pulled it away, she inspected the bright red stain for a fraction of a second before folding it away. A misunderstanding. Nora repeated, the words tasting like ice. You thought I was Tonya Richards.
The defendant in the case you are scheduled to testify on in less than 45 minutes. And your standard operating procedure for dealing with Ms. Richards, a civilian waiting for her day in court, is to verbally abuse her, physically assault her, and strike her across the face? No. No, ma'am. That's not Dempsey was practically hyperventilating now, his eyes darting frantically around the hallway, praying for an exit, a time machine, anything. She was resisting the other week.