“I meant I got up fast and ran because I knew she wanted to beat the crap outta me.” I walked over to the defense table and made a show of picking up the file and looking it over.
“There’s nothing in your statement to the police that indicates that she threatened you, is there?”
“No. I mean she didn’t have to say it.”
“You’ve never called the police before, have you?”
“No, but there’s always a first…” I cut him off.
“You made a comment to her before she allegedly shoved you, didn’t you?”
“I think I may have said, ‘better luck next time, babe’ or something like that but I was kidding around, you know?”
There were actually some boos from the spectator section and a voice called out, “You’re lucky you weren’t with me, baby, or this would have been a murder trial!”
“I want order in this courtroom!” Judge Blasko banged her gavel. I glanced over at Braden. He was barely hiding his disgust for the “victim” in his case and he looked like he wanted to leave.
“After you said, ‘better luck next time babe,’ she said ‘get off of me, you loser.’ Correct?”
“Something like that.”
“You’re six feet two inches and weight two hundred and twenty pounds, right?”
“Yeah.”
“She’s five foot two and weighs one ten, right?”
“Sounds right.”
“It doesn’t say here that she was armed, does it?”
“She wasn’t, but she threw stuff at me.” He was starting to sound like a petulant child.
“She threw your clothes out the door, correct?”
“But I was out the door so it was the same thing.” He looked like he wanted to stick his tongue out at me.
“And when your elderly neighbor threatened to call the police because you were outside unclothed and yelling obscenities yourself that was when you claimed to be in fear for your safety, right?”
“Yeah.” Mr. Virillo gave me a mean look and sat there sulking. Inner-Gabrielle would have liked to have assaulted him for real. I suspected that most of the courtroom, including the judge and the prosecutor would have happily helped. I had accomplished what I set out to do and Mr. Virillo wasn’t laughing now. He was starting to look worried and I didn’t blame him. He might need a police escort to get out of this courtroom.
“No further questions.” I sat back down. Ms. Murphy looked triumphant.
“Redirect?”
“No, Your Honor.” Braden wasn’t stupid “The Commonwealth rests.”
“The Defense rests, Your Honor, and we’ll waive argument unless the court deems it necessary.”
“The Commonwealth waives argument and stands on the evidence as presented,” Braden added. He was so sexy when he was being all prosecutorial even in dumbass cases like this one. Judge Blasko deliberated for five minutes and returned a verdict of not guilty. I had won a trial! In case you didn’t know this, that didn’t happen all that much for public defenders, even really experienced ones. And even better than winning, my client was actually innocent! That happened even less! Ms. Murphy thanked me and left with her head held high, to the vocal support of several women in the courtroom. Mr. Virillo attached himself to a deputy and slunk out. Braden came over to the defense table.
“Was it a hard whack?” I asked with amusement.
“Come and talk to me. Please?”
“Oh, poor Mr. Pierce,” I said with a smirk.
“Maybe you can comfort me. Oh wait, I meant not confront me,” he teased, and I felt my cheeks heat up. He was much too good at teasing me.
“Fine, I’ll come talk to you but you had better not leave before I’m finished.”
“Oh, don’t worry!” he said with a laugh.
I grabbed my stuff and stood closely beside him, (I wasn’t taking any chances with this crowd), as we walked out together and headed for the same interview room we had gone to the day before.
“I know we’ve only had a couple of dates, and so we haven’t really gotten very far with the physical side of our relationship yet,” he said as soon as the door was closed behind us, “but please fucking tell me that you realize that I wasn’t excusing his performance. I wish that she had beaten him!”
“If you say so,” I teased. “I don’t know though, sometimes I think you guys all stick together.”
“Oh come on! I wanted to apologize to every woman in that courtroom and then I wanted to grab you and take you back to my place and make you come like ten times.”
“Oh my! You’re much more ‘virile – o’ than I realized.”