Page 24 of Hush
“Like investigating crimes?”
“That’s more the FBI’s job.” Mike sighed. “I wanted to make sure that this country always had a fair system in place for everybody. That our legal and justice system worked more times than it didn’t. Judicial security seemed like a good fit. Protect the best, and keep the system honest.”
Slowly, Tom smiled, his grin stretching until his cheeks hurt. Mike snorted and looked away, a flush dusting the arches of his cheeks.
“I know, I’m a sentimentalist.” Mike shrugged.
“I think it’s great. You’re great.” He spoke too quickly, words tumbling from him, filling the empty table and the space between them. Mike’s gaze flicked to his, but Tom froze, overly exposed like he’d been caught unprepared in a trial. His mind was a blank hum, his words repeating in a loop.
The waitress bustled back, saving him and dropping their drinks and queso on the table. Mike ordered tacos, along with a side of guacamole and a stack of flour tortillas. Tom ordered the same.
“Going to give my way a try?” He tried to redirect the conversation, get them back to safer ground.
“Yep. So, tell me about this trial that has you fearing you’ll die behind a stack of law books.”
Tom groaned. “If I tell you about it, you’ll die of boredom, too. Then where will the court be without its best JSI?” He grinned as Mike’s flush returned. “How’s Judge Juarez’s trial?”
“Going well. The defendant has gotten uppity a few times, but he’s settled down when Judge Juarez has warned him. He’s on his last warning, but seems to be behaving. No outbursts for the past two days.”
“That’s good.” Tom grabbed a chip and broke off a corner. “What’s next, after her trial? Judge King have anything coming up?” Judge Tonya King, by some mystery of the universe, usually got civil cases instead of criminal cases. Every case was randomly assigned to each of the fifteen judges, but out of the four on their combined fourth-floor docket, Judge King handled three times as many civil cases as him, Judge Juarez, and Chief Judge Fink all together.
“I have a week without trial protection, actually.” Mike grinned. “I can catch up on everything else I’m supposed to do. I’ve got fifteen different intelligence reports I need to analyze, low-level threats I need to circle back on for their three-and-six-months checks, monthly prison gossip analysis from headquarters to review—” He stopped, shaking his head. “Hopefully I can get it all in in that week. What about you? What’s after this trial, if you manage to survive?”
Tom groaned. “A patent trial, unfortunately. The only thing worse than this current case is a contested patent.”
Mike frowned. He took a long drink, his throat working, and then set his glass down, licking a bead of water from his bottom lip.
Tom fought not to stare. “Patent cases are a special kind of awful. There’s no jury. It’s just the patent lawyers and me. And, patent lawyers are usually engineersandattorneys. Double doctorate plus a law degree type of person. They’re specialists in the field of the patent, and the whole case is two legal and technical experts arguing oververy, veryspecific technical knowledge. The one patent case I heard last year made my brain bleed, and I still have no idea what the patent was actually about. I really thought about flipping a coin to decide whether to validate or invalidate it. I was that inadequate.”
“What did you do?”
“I validated the patent, and I waited for it to go to appeal. I figured Chief Judge Fink was going to be in my chambers by the end of the week, reading me the riot act and telling me what I should have done. He likes to do that. But… there wasn’t an appeal. They accepted my ruling.” He shrugged, scrunching up one side of his face. “I hope I did both parties justice, but I honestly didn’t have a clue what they were talking about. And, I like to think I’m a pretty smart guy.”
“Kinda smart. You are a judge, after all.” Mike winked. “So, what’s this patent case about? What’s the dispute?”
Tom ignored the compliment, just pushed it out of his brain, or he’d go silly like a teenage girl. “From what I can tell from the brief, it’s challenging whether a section of code… within a section of code… within a section of code—” Tom arched his eyebrows as Mike grinned. “—was lifted from another company’s proprietary software. It’s more than a decade old, as well, so there’s civil ramifications if I invalidate the patent, or give the patent to the plaintiff. But, I am in for a crash course in computer technology and software code next week.”
“Sounds exhilarating.”
“You’ve never seen one, I take it? Drop in. You can share my pain. And, hey, if you understand what’s going on, I’ll get you to rule on the patent.” Somewhere, there was a boldness within him, a hint of the younger man he’d once been. He knew how to flirt, once.
Mike laughed. “I am still amazed at the breadth of cases you all hear. Watching TV, it’s like judges hear only the big murder cases, or only civil cases, or only drugs. But in a month, you’ve had two civil cases, two drug cases, and a white-collar crime case.”
“And that terrorism case is gaining speed. It might be coming to our court. We’re all watching the news on that one.” The FBI had foiled a homegrown terrorist months before, stopping his plan to bomb the DC Metro by using an undercover FBI agent posing as a member of ISIS. He’d gone silent after he was arrested and the case against him was made by the government. Slowly, rumors of his case—was he or wasn’t he cooperating? Would he or wouldn’t he go to trial? Would he just plead guilty?—grew.
Nodding, Mike crunched a chip. “Winters, Villegas, and I have been working on some plans for all new terrorism cases. There are a lot of angles on those.”
“They’re media circuses, for one.”
“Andeveryonewill need protection. The jurors, the prosecutor, the judge.” He pointed a chip at Tom. “If it goes to trial—and there’s a really good chance he could just plead guilty, according to what we hear—then we’ll take care of you. Or whoever gets this case.”
Mike heard a lot of gossip from his fellow marshals, especially the ones on prison transport and in the jails. He should probably ask Mike more about the rumors he heard, and for information on the judicial grapevine. It was likely more accurate that the information he got from the U.S. Attorney’s Office. “With my luck, it will probably be me.”
“Then we’ll be working together again.”
Mike’s words shouldn’t make him giddy. They shouldn’t fill him with warmth, with happiness. He shouldn’t want high-risk trials just so he could be near Mike, fill his days with sights and sounds of the man.
Their waitress arrived, bringing their food. The plates were a riot of color, boisterous with spirals and flamboyant flowers, and she spread out tortillas and cups of guacamole between the two of them. When she left, Mike looked questioningly at Tom.
