CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
After a week later where they still had no answers as to why Tish was targeted and why his ex was killed, JJ continued to take Tish to work with him. But she wasn’t the type to sit around twirling her thumbs. She assisted his staff in any way she could. And on what was to be his first day back on the bench, she was seated at the conference table in his chambers handling a big job: compiling binders filled with reams of papers that had to be sorted and placed in folders appropriate to their new filing system. She started two days ago. She wasn’t even a quarter of the way done.
But her main focus was JJ. Especially when it was time for him to get to court. She sat at that conference table and watched as he stood up from behind his desk, looking flawless as usual in his Armani suit, and began taking off his suit coat. Then he put on his black robe and suddenly looked like a different person. She smiled. “You look like a fat man in that robe,” she said, and JJ laughed.
But then she could see the strain in his eyes too. “You’re okay?” she asked him.
“I’m always jittery before court.”
“Really? Why?”
“That small matter of people’s lives in my hands,” JJ responded. “I take that seriously. But I also take seriously the public’s right to not have criminals back on the street with some judge giving them a slap on the wrist, only for them to reoffend as soon as the ink dries.”
Tish smiled. “Some say you gave me a slap on the wrist.”
“You aren’t a criminal,” JJ said matter-of-factly as he straightened his robe. Then he looked at Tish. “Other than fat,” he said, “how do I look?”
“Like a very conscientious judge. One I’d be proud to stand before.”
Even though it was just words of encouragement, she had that way of making him feel better about himself. As if he was actually doing some good. He went over to the table, gave her a kiss, and then Artie walked in.
“Ready to give’em hell, Harry?”
JJ looked at Tish and shook his head. “And he’s supposed to be a great campaign manager.”
Artie and Tish laughed.
“I’ll be in the courtroom,” Artie said, “just in case somebody from the press shows up and I can spin a good story in your favor for them.”
Tish pointed. “That’s why he’s good,” she said.
“No it’s not,” JJ said, they all laughed, and then Artie left first, and then JJ made his way out of his chambers and into his courtroom.
“All rise,” the Bailiff said, “the honorable Chief Judge James Joseph Brant presiding. You may be seated,” he added after the judge sat down. But JJ noticed something missing.
“Where’s Reeva?” he asked his deputy clerk who usually sat behind Reeva to assist her.
“She’s coming. She had to use the restroom. Female stuff.”
Her deputy was a male. “TMI,” he said to him. “She was in the restroom would have been sufficient.”
Then he got on with his cases.
Back in the judge’s office, Tish heard his door open but was counting the pages that were to go in a particular folder and she didn’t want to lose her train of thought. But when she counted all the pages, eighty-seven in all, she did look up. But when she saw that a gun was pointed at her, and when she saw who held the gun, she backed up and nearly fell out of her chair.
“Stand up!” she yelled.
Tish stood up.
Then she walked around the table, took the back of the gun and knocked Tish in the side of her head, knocking her down. Then she hurried over and aimed that gun directly at Tish’s face.
But Tish knew this was not going to end well if she didn’t defend herself. She defended herself. As soon as she saw that gun move close enough, she grabbed it and aimed it away from her. She couldn’t take it away, and the two ladies fought for control. But Tish managed to fling her assailant to the ground, and they wrestled for the right to bear that arm.
Tish fought hard, but she was too small. She ended up behind her attacker and was then placed into a chokehold, with the gun to her head.
“How did that song go?” her attacker asked. You know the one. ‘Them good ole boys were drinking whiskey and rye singing this’ll be the day that I die?’ That song. Because it spells it out perfectly. Because on this day, you will finally leave that good judge alone and join your thug boyfriend in that thug hell where you both belong. This’ll be the day that you die,” she added, and pressed the gun even harder against Tish’s forehead and her arm even tighter around Tish’s neck. Then she stood her up, still applying pressure.
“Your Honor,” the defense attorney decried, “the State is being unreasonable. If anybody deserves bail, it’s my client. He has a job. He was born and raised right here in Jacksonville. And yes, he and the perpetrator were friends, but that was as far as their relationship went. It was the perp, not my client, who tried to leave the country. But if you believe the prosecution, my client is totally guilty by association because they were friends. That’s the only connection. They were friends.”
“Miss Jeffers?” JJ asked. “What is the State’s counter?”
Jeffers, the prosecutor on the case, stood up too. “They were friends,” she said, “and yes that is their connection. But sometimes that’s the only connection that’s needed to prove that the Defendant is not only guilty by association, but guilty because of that association. We want a denial of bail, sir.”
But suddenly the lightbulb came on in JJ’s head. And he looked up. Then he looked over where Reeva would have been seated, and it made sense. He saw the connection! They were friends. All of his staff befriended Candiace when they were married. But Reeva was especially close to her. Could she have asked Candiace to find a criminal like that nephew to do Tish harm? Was that why she had suddenly disappeared just before court, when she used to always be in court, no matter what, by his side?
Then he suddenly thought about Tish. And the fact that Reeva was uncharacteristically absent. And his heart dropped.
He jumped up from that bench and began running through that side door like a man on fire. He could hear the deputy clerk ask if he was okay, but he didn’t look back. He ran.
Tish knew she was in trouble when more pressure was applied to her neck even as the gun was pressed even harder against her head. But she couldn’t do anything. Any false move and she might not make it.
And then suddenly the door burst open, and JJ ran inside.
“Stop where you are!” the assailant yelled, “or I’ll kill her right now.”
“Okay, okay, I’m stopped,” he said, his hands out from his body to make it clear he posed no threat. But he was confused. “What are you doing?”
“Judge, why aren’t you on the bench?”
The voice behind him caused all of them to look back. And Reeva stepped into his chambers too. But when she saw Nancy with a gun to Tish’s head, she stepped back. She was as floored as the judge was. “Nancy?”
“Stay where you are,” Nancy said. “Everybody’s so surprised. Why? I’ve been with that man since K Street. Devoted to him, I was. When he left to come to Florida and became a judge, he didn’t even offer me a job. I applied to be his secretary and that’s the only reason I got it. And for year after year after agonizing year I longed for him. But he didn’t give me a second glance. And I hated you, Reeva, because you wanted him too. And you pined for him too. And you and me and Candiace would get together and talk about him all the time. Like we were happy to be her friend. When all we both wanted was to know everything about his life. We wanted to be where she was.”
JJ could see Tish reaching to her side as his secretary talked, which distracted her. He had to keep her talking. “Did you hire Michael Belvins?” he asked her.
“Of course I hired him. Candiace gave me the name of somebody who would kill for money, and I withdrew most of my savings to pay him. And he ended up shooting you instead.” Tears appeared in her eyes. “It broke my heart. I pretended I was meeting him at his mobile home in Mayport to give him the rest of the money. But that’s why I killed him. Because he almost killed you.”
“And Candiace?” asked JJ, doing all he could to give Tish time. “What happened to Candiace?”
“I took care of her myself. I’m from Wyoming. I was born with a rifle in my hand. Was hunting duck and deer before I was ten. I put a silencer on it and shot and killed her right under your nose. You didn’t even know what hit her. That gave me time to get away. I didn’t want her telling you that I asked her to find me a hitman. I would have took out this bitch, too,” she added, motioning toward Tish, “but I couldn’t get a clear shot.”
“But what would killing LaTisha accomplish?” JJ asked her.
“Better results than killing your sister and nephew got me,” Nancy said.
Wait. What? When JJ heard his secretary mention his sister and nephew his heart nearly stopped. “Sylvie and Logan? What are you saying, Nan? You hired that man too?”
She smiled this time. “And you had no idea.”
Now JJ was frowned. “But why?”
“Because she never liked me, and you loved her. That’s why! She would have never let us be together because you would have listened to her. You would have done anything she told you to do. When all I wanted was you. But you still didn’t pay me any attention. But I figured you were still grieving. And once that was over with, I’d stand a chance. That time you took me out for lunch on my birthday, the first time you ever did that, was the best day of my life. I knew I stood a chance.”
JJ was still shaken about Sylvia and Logan, and about Tish and in what way could he ensure that she got out of this alive, to even comprehend what else she was saying. But he knew he had to forget all of that and play along. “It was a wonderful day to me, too, Nan.”
She seemed shocked. “It was?”
“It was. I knew then we were going to be together. But you have to give me some time.”
“But what about her? You proposed to her!”
“I don’t give a damn about her, are you serious? I don’t want her!”
Nancy seemed enthralled. “You don’t?”
Nancy’s chokehold was virtually nonexistent when JJ spoke those words. That was when Tish was able to grab his Glock that she still kept in her jacket pocket. And before Nancy knew what was happening, she had put it against Nancy’s side. “Drop the gun or I’ll shoot,” Tish said. “I declare I will!”
Nancy dropped the gun to her side immediately and JJ began rushing to her. In that instant she knew it was all lies and she lifted her gun again before JJ could get to her. And as he screamed noooo, and before Tish could pull the trigger herself, Nancy fired. It wasn’t a bullet to her side, but a bullet to her head. It, too, had a silencer on it. And she dropped down dead.
JJ ran to Tish, and pulled her into his arms. Nancy had killed herself. And they were grateful.
But then Tish realized something realistic. Why did she come back to his chambers when the restrooms were just off from the courtroom? She didn’t have to go anywhere near his chambers to get back to court.
And Tish realized in that instant that it wasn’t just Nancy. She looked over at Reeva. “It was you too,” he said to her.
JJ looked at Tish, and then at Reeva.
“I didn’t know her long,” Tish continued, “but even I knew Nan couldn’t have had the mental capacity to plot and plan all she took credit for. Somebody had to push her up to it. To do their dirty work for them. Somebody like a Princeton-trained law clerk who wanted the boss for herself. Somebody who could have made Nan believe she was helping her secure her man. When all you was doing was helping Nan kill so that you could secure her man.”
JJ slyly removed the Glock from Tish’s hand as Tish spoke with Reeva.
“His sister and nephew?” Tish shook her head. “You fed that baloney to Nan too. You got her believing that she had to get rid of his sister and nephew because they didn’t like her. But you wasn’t getting rid of JJ’s sister and nephew because they didn’t like you. They probably did like you.”
That was when JJ realized something too. “But they would have been my heirs,” he said. “We had it all wrong. Nan wanted to marry me for love. You wanted to marry me for my money. But you wanted them out of the picture first.”
JJ stared at Reeva. “Is that true?” he asked her.
But what they didn’t know was that Reeva already had her pistol in her hand, with her hand in her pocket. “Yes, it’s true,” she said. But just as she said it, she reached into her pocket, quickly pulled out her pistol just as JJ was about to shoot, too. But then gunshots suddenly rang out behind Reeva and she began shaking and buckling and then, when the final shot was fired, she dropped dead.
When she fell, it was only then did they see Artie Kramer behind her, his gun still smoking, as the bailiff and other law enforcement ran up the corridor after hearing all the gunfire.
“She killed my wife and son,” Artie said, as if he was in a trance. “She killed my wife and son.”
JJ was stunned too. That she would have talked Nan into hiring a hitman to take out his family. And she worked for him? He trusted her?
He pulled Tish back into his arms and smothered her with his protection. Had Tish not figured it out, he might have never known. And the targeting would have continued. And for that he was eternally grateful to her.
“I had no idea,” he said, with a look of agony on his face and pain in his voice. “I had no idea.”