The transvestite went back to the tattoo parlor as Kovac helped Carey Moore to her feet. As wobbly as a newborn fawn, she tried to steady herself with a hand on the roof of the car, but started to fall again as her knees gave way.
Kovac caught her against him. “Easy. You should have stayed in the hospital. I’m taking you back.”
“You’re taking me home,” she said stubbornly. “I can vomit without a medical professional supervising.”
“You’re dizzy.”
“I have a concussion. Of course I’m dizzy.”
Kovac helped her ease back down into the passenger’s seat and squatted down in front of her so he could see her face in the glow of the streetlight and the neon in the window of the pawnshop behind him. She looked like she might have been an extra in Dawn of the Dead, but there was still a glint of determination in her eyes.
“You’re a hell of a tough cookie, Judge. I’ll say that for you. But that’s not always the smartest thing to be.”
“Just take me home,” she said. “You can come back and visit your girlfriend later.”
Kovac recognized the glow two blocks before they came onto the source. The brilliant white lights the television news people used to create the impression that the sun had crashed to earth.
“Oh, fuck this,” he growled as the vans came into view. It wasn’t going to matter a damn whether the perp had gotten Carey Moore’s address out of her wallet or her briefcase. He could get it now, sitting at home in his underwear, watching the goddamn news. “They double-teamed us.”
He glanced over at the judge. She looked as stunned as she had probably looked when she got hit from behind in that parking ramp.
“Looks like one of your neighbors ratted you out,” Kovac said, just to be cranky. The truth of it was, it isn’t all that hard to find people.The State v. Karl Dahl was a huge case that had garnered national attention. Newspeople could have been trailing Carey Moore since the day the trial was assigned to her. Anyone could have.
A couple of police cruisers were parked cockeyed in the street, the uniforms trying to keep the newsies corralled in a manageable space, a job about as easy as herding cats.
“Oh, my God. This is my home,” the judge said, mostly to herself.
“All’s fair in the news business,” Kovac said. “These people would plant themselves in the devil’s asshole if they thought they could get a jump on the competition.”
“I don’t want them here.”
“Yeah, well, good luck with that. Is there a back way in? An alley?”
“No.”
“Duck down before they see you,” Kovac said. He turned the wheel and glided the car in along the curb, running his window down.
“Hey!” he shouted at a reporter and a cameraman who had snagged a prime spot in the judge’s driveway with a wedge of the house as a backdrop. “Get the fuck out of the driveway! You’re on private property!”
He turned to Carey Moore and lowered his voice. “Let’s hope they were rolling live. Their producers flip out if someone uses the F word.”
Kovac put on his game face, got out of the car, and approached the news crew, holding up his badge. “Pack up your toys and get out in the street with the rest of your kind.”
He recognized the reporter, a perky blonde with too much blush. Mindy. Mandy. Cindy. She stuck a microphone at him. “Detective, Candy Cross, Channel Three News. What can you tell us about Judge Moore’s condition?”
“Nothing. Pack it up and get out of the way.”
“We’re here to speak with Judge Moore-”
“I don’t care if you’re here for the Second Coming, princess,” Kovac said. “You’re on private property, and I can have you removed and charged for that. How would you like your pals out there to roll that film at ten?”
The mob was now moving toward them, handheld lights bobbing up and down, red lights glowing on cameras. They sounded like a pack of dogs at dinnertime, all barking at once, each trying to drown out the others.
“Move it or lose it,” Kovac said, starting back toward the car. “I’m driving up to this garage, and I don’t care if your shit’s in the way.”
The second team, Kovac thought as his gaze scanned over the herd. The stations had sent their first teams to the hospital at the news of Carey Moore’s attack. The second teams had ended up here.
He held up a hand to ward them off. “I got nothing to say. Lieutenant Dawes will have a statement for you tomorrow.”
They went back to shouting questions as if he hadn’t spoken at all. Kovac shook his head and went to the nearest pair of uniforms.
“Get them off this property,” he instructed. “They can go to the other side of the street. I’ve got Judge Moore, and if I see one flashbulb go off in her face as we go into this house, I’m gonna shoot somebody. Got it?”
“They don’t use flashbulbs anymore,” the younger officer said as if that would change everything.
Kovac glowered at him. “Are you brain damaged?” He turned to the older partner. “Is he brain damaged?”
The partner shrugged. “Maybe.”
Kovac shook his head. “Just get them out of here.”
“Will do, Detective.”
As he turned toward his car, Kovac saw no sign of Judge Moore, and had a second’s flash of panic. Then he realized she had slid way down in the seat and covered herself with her coat.
“Stay right there,” he murmured as he slipped into the driver’s seat. “They’ll be out of the way in a minute.”
Carey Moore said nothing. Kovac took a peek under the coat to make sure she hadn’t expired. She hadn’t, but she looked like she might welcome death soon. Her skin was gray, her face pasty with sweat. She looked like she was maybe going to be sick again.
“Hang in there,” Kovac said, his eyes on the reluctant migration of the media. As he waited for the reporters to retreat, he took a moment to check out the judge’s digs.
Her home was a well-lit, impressive redbrick colonial with a couple of white columns flanking the front door. Kovac figured his whole house and garage combined was maybe half the size. The shrubbery was clipped, the leaves had been raked, a trio of uncarved pumpkins sat beside the glossy black front door. A tasteful wrought-iron gate kept the riffraff from going up the walk.
It was the kind of place where a person would want to go in and expect to feel warm and welcome. Kovac would go home to a dark, square box that needed paint.
He put the car in gear, pulled up into the driveway at an angle to minimize the view of the passenger’s side. He went around to open the door and helped Carey Moore out of the car, keeping her coat pulled up high around her face. With an arm around her shoulders to support her, he shielded her as they went through the side gate and up to the front door.
As they stepped up onto the stoop, the judge rang the doorbell and leaned against the sidelight, peering into the house.
“Where are your keys?”
“I don’t know,” she confessed.
“You had them with you before the attack?”
“In my purse.”
“You’ll change these locks tomorrow. First thing.”
“Yes.”
“And you’ll have a radio car sitting out front until that happens,” he told her. “What else did you lose that you haven’t told me about?”
“Nothing,” she said, but he knew she was lying. The perp probably had her phone numbers, her mother’s maiden name, and half her credit cards. He would get a list of the cards and alert the credit card companies. If the perp was using them, he was leaving an electronic trail.
The door swung open and a gorgeous blond twenty-something in a pink velour tracksuit looked wide-eyed at the judge. She said something in what Kovac figured was Swedish or Norwegian or something else from one of those Scandinavian places where everyone looks like they’ve been designed by computer as models for the master race.