Murder in the Supreme Court (Capital Crimes Series Book 3) Read Online Free Page A

red wool scarf around his neck. Next to him was an aluminum Canadian crutch he’d used since his last stroke. The final draft of an article he’d written for
Harper’s
magazine on the growing perils of censorship was on a place mat.
    A grandfather clock in the dining room chimed out the time, 7:00 A.M. Conover poured what was left of coffee made for him by the housekeeper and looked out a window over formal Japanese gardens, a gift to his second wife, who was Japanese.
    “Good morning, Temp,” his current wife said from the doorway. Long blond hair flowed down over the shouldersof a delicate pink dressing gown secured at the waist by two buttons. A childlike, oval face was puffy with sleep. She leaned against the open archway, the toes of one foot curled over the top of the other, the bottom of the robe gaping open and revealing smooth white thighs.
    “Hello, Cecily,” Conover said. “Do you want coffee?”
    She came to the table, saw that the glass carafe was empty. “I’ll get more.”
    “Call Carla.”
    “I’d rather get it myself.”
    She returned ten minutes later with a fresh carafe, poured herself a cup and sat across from him, one shapely leg dangling over the other. He coughed. “How do you feel this morning?” she asked.
    “Well. The article is finished.” He slid it across the table. She glanced down at it, then sipped from her cup.
    “How was the concert?” he asked.
    “Boring.”
    “Where did you go after?”
    “To Peggy’s house for a nightcap.”
    “More than one. You didn’t come home until almost two.”
    “We talked. Okay?”
    “You might have called.” He started coughing again. His eyes teared up and he gulped water. She started toward him but he waved her away. When he stopped coughing he asked, “Why didn’t you call? I worry, you know.”
    “I didn’t want to wake you.”
    “Who was there?”
    “The usual group. Temp, I’m tired of the questions, of the suspicion every time I go out.”
    “Is it so without cause, Cecily?”
    She exhaled a burst of air and returned her cup to the table with enough force to send its contents slopping overthe rim. “
Please
don’t start on that again. One single incident doesn’t—”
    She was interrupted by the self-conscious clearing of a male throat. Standing in the doorway was a tall dark man of about thirty whose name was Karl. He wore tight jeans and a gray tee shirt stretched by heavily muscled arms and shoulders. A helmet of black curls surrounded a face full of thick features, heavy eyelids, a full sensuous mouth and a nose worthy of a prizefighter. He’d been hired six months earlier as a general handyman, gardener, and occasional chauffeur to Justice Conover. He lived in one of three garage apartments at the rear of the property.
    “Sorry to barge in,” he said with a trace of a German accent, “but I wondered if you needed me today to drive. You said yesterday that the Court limo might not be available.”
    Temple looked at the young man, whose attention was fixed on Cecily. “In an hour,” he said. “I’ll be ready in an hour.”
    “Yes, sir.” Karl vanished from the doorway.
    “What happened to your Court limo, Temp?”
    “Maintenance, I think, or being used for the funeral.”
    “You’re not going?” she asked.
    “Of course not.”
    “You should. He was chief clerk.”
    He tried to control the trembling in his right arm but couldn’t, and it quickly spread throughout his body. The crutch crashed to the floor and his hand hit the carafe.
    “Are you all right, Temp?”
    “Look at you.”
    “What do you mean?”
    “Can’t you at least have the decency to cover up when a man enters the room?”
    She looked down, then up at him. “I’m wearing a
robe
, for God’s sake.”
    “It has snaps, why don’t you use them—?”
    “This is ridiculous,” she said as she pulled the hem of the robe over her bare legs and tugged the upper portion of it across her chest. “Excuse me, I have to get dressed for