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Steve Martini

The Judge

PROLOGUE

She is like a rose: tall and slender, with complexion of a dusky hue, eyes and teeth that flash, and a manner that at times produces its own barbed thorns.

Lenore Goya has been a friend since my brief stint three years ago as special prosecutor in Davenport County. Except for a couple of brief encounters in the courthouse, I have not seen her since shortly after Nikki’s funeral. On several occasions I have considered calling her, but each time I suppressed the impulse. I have never aspired to the image of the widower on the make, and have silently subdued all desires.

Yet when she called I knew she could sense the yearning in my voice.

Tonight I meet her at Angelo’s, out on the river. It is brisk. A light breeze sends flutters through the Japanese lanterns overhead. The tables are set on the wharf at the water’s edge. Pleasure boats bob at their slips in the marina beyond. I’ve dressed in my casual finery, a look that required two hours of preparation. It sounded more like business than pleasure when she called. Still, I am hopeful.

When I see her, she is across the way, on the terrace, a level above me. Lenore is dressed for the occasion, wearing a pleated floral skirt, tea length, and a bright pastel sweater with a rolled collar. Lenore as the shades of spring.

She sees me and waves. I am casual, breezy in my return, just two friends meeting, I tell myself, though in my chest my heart is thumping.

This evening she is lithe and light, both in body and spirit. Lenore’s fine features are like chiseled stone-high cheekbones and a nose that, like everything else about her, is sharp and straight.

She wends her way through the mostly empty tables. The crowd has opted for the indoors, a hedge against the chill of the evening air. It is not quite summer in Capital City.

She turns the few heads as she approaches. Lenore is one of those striking women who become a focal point in any room. Hispanic by heritage, she has the look of the unspoiled native, a visual appeal that hovers at the edge of exotic, Eve in Eden before sin.

“What a wonderful place,” she says. A peck on my cheek, the squeeze of her hand on my arm, and I am rung out.

“It’s been such a long time,” she says.

“A while,” I say. My moves are all calculated for cool.

I tell her that she looks wonderful, slide her chair in for her. Then I manage to trip over her purse on my way back to my own seat.

She laughs, putting one hand to her mouth. Our eyes meet and I see the spark in hers. Even in this, her laughter at my expense, there is something that fascinates.

She is often in my dreams, but not in the way one might envision. My dream is inspired by memory: the hulking figure of Adrian Chambers poised over me, the metal stake arcing toward my chest, and behind him, Lenore, fire and wind, sparks on the air, the burnished image of some ancient goddess of war.

We do not mention it, but in every conversation there is always the undercurrent of that perilous day and the knowledge that Lenore killed a man to save my life.