"Now, Ms. Cooper and Mr. Grassley, will you approach the bench?"

Several jurors stared at Floyd Warren as he shifted his chair to face them. He tapped his pencil on the table and then again started picking at his front teeth with the lead point. If they were trying to discern what had driven this man, who had never opened his mouth to speak throughout the trial, to commit such a brutal crime, they would have to do a lot more than consider his now benign appearance. "Any exceptions to the charge? Any requests?"

Each of us answered, "No."

"Then I'll send them inside to begin. Their sandwiches have already been delivered, so they'll start out with lunch," Lamont said. "This could be a quick one. You both in the building this afternoon?"

Gene Grassley and I nodded and stepped back to our places.

"That concludes all our business, ladies and gentlemen. You will now retire to begin your deliberations."

We waited until the twelve jurors were excused and the judge asked the four alternates to wait in the witness room. "I'll see you both later,"

Lamont said as he dismissed us.

"Locking up?" I asked Louie Larsen. "Yep. You can leave your files. Mercer's in the hallway to take you downstairs."

"None of my amigos lurking today?"

"Three of them showed up in the middle of Gene's argument,"

Louie said, shrugging his shoulders. "I didn't have the personnel to do any manual searches, and they're the jerks that broke the machine, so I told 'em they'd just have to wait. Guess that didn't suit them."

"You get that group ID'd yesterday?"

"Only the ringleader, the kid we locked up. The others ran too fast. I gave Mercer the information about Ernesto Abreu."

"Priors?" I said, opening the courtroom door.

"Drugs, drugs, and more drugs. Felony arrests all knocked down to misdemeanors."

"How'd it go?" Mercer asked. "You got a slam dunk this time?"

"Fingers crossed. Don't jinx me."

"Kerry's in the conference room. She wanted to be here this afternoon, to wait out the verdict with us."

"I like that. Have you spoken with Mike today?"

"Yeah. He's home, waiting on the results of the Huff autopsy." The phone was ringing as I stopped at Laura's desk for my messages. "Hold on," she said. "Alex has just come in. Let me ask her."

"Who's that?"

"It's Ed, the intake supervisor from the Witness Aid Unit," she said to me, holding the receiver aside. "A young woman tried to get in to see you this morning. Lobby security knew you were in trial and sent her around to them to see if they could offer her some counseling."

"Why does she want me?"

Laura started to repeat the question but the person on the other end had obviously heard what I asked. "Ed's telling me she wants to report a rape. That the advocate at St. Luke's told her to ask for you specifically, because she's ambivalent about going forward and they want you to encourage her. Doesn't want her parents to know, so you'll have to explain the realities of a prosecution."

"Can it hold for another day?"

Ed was talking to Laura, who repeated to me what she learned.

"Yeah, that's fine. She's been examined and all. Wants answers about what's involved before she makes her decision about pressing charges."

"You're the keeper of my book this week. What have I got?" The only thing I knew for certain was that Friday evening-the next day-the new guy I had met a couple of months ago was coming to town and I was determined to make time for dinner with him. Laura had my appointment book open in front of her.

"For tomorrow, there's still a big question mark next to Floyd Warren's name. I guess that's in case the jury's still out. Then you've got it highlighted from eight to four, if the trial's over. Says you're accompanying Mike to the range. Rodman's Neck."

"I can put that off." The notation referred to the NYPD's shooting range, where officers were required to go twice a year to qualify with their handguns.

"Not again," Mercer said. "You made a solemn promise, Alexandra.

Joe Berk and his cronies almost put your lights out. Mike insisted he'd teach you how to use a gun at the end of that case and I do believe I heard you say 'amen.' "

"Just a minute," Laura said to Ed, the social worker who was trying to book the date. "We're just checking Alex's availability. Let's try for next week. Can it wait until Monday, at eleven? And why don't you tell me the young lady's name?"

"I hate guns," I said to Mercer. "You know that."

Laura was penciling in the appointment. "Clarita Munoz. That's confirmed. You'll send up the paperwork and her contact information, Ed? Thanks a lot."

"You're around guns too much not to know what to do with one,"

Mercer said as I opened the door and went to my desk.

The red light on my telephone hot line-the intercom that linked the district attorney directly to my desk-was flashing as I walked in the room.

"Paul?"

"What the hell went on between you and Herb Ackerman?"

"I had no time to tell you. You weren't in yet when I went up to court this morning."

"Come on over right now," Battaglia said. "I need to know what he's got to be so sorry about."

"What do you mean?"

"That's the note he left. 'Sorry for everything.' Herb Ackerman walked out your door, went up to his office at the Trib, and swallowed a bottle of pills. I didn't tell you to kill the man, Alex, did I?"

Madam Forelady," Judge Lamont asked at 5:22 p.m., after waiting for Gene Grassley and me to arrive back in the courtroom, "has the jury agreed upon a verdict?

"Yes, sir, we have."

"Please rise, then, while my clerk records it."

The jurors had filed in like a prosecution panel. None of them were smiling and none attempted any eye contact with the defendant. I stared straight ahead, my heart pounding as the first juror rose to deliver the news

How say you as to Floyd Warren, charged with robbery in the first degree?"

"Guilty." Her voice was strong and clear.

Off to my right, Warren moved his chair closer to Gene Grassley and mumbled something.

"How say you as to Floyd Warren, charged with rape in the first degree?"

"Guilty," she said, even louder this time.

"Bullshit." I could hear Warren clearly now, and so did the two court officers standing behind him. Each took a step closer in.

For Kerry Hastings, who had never expected to see it, there would be some belated satisfaction. Floyd Warren would spend the rest of his life in prison.

The word guilty was repeated again and again. Sodomy, robbery, possession of a dangerous instrument-they had convicted him of every count in the indictment.

"Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, hearken to your verdict as it stands recorded," the clerk said, continuing the official business of the trial.

Lamont made short work of thanking the jurors and dismissing them. He wanted the defendant put back in the holding pen as quickly as possible. Tomorrow, they would all read newspaper stories reporting the conviction and the links to more than fifty other brutal crimes from this city south to his adopted home in Georgia.

"I'm going to suggest to you, Gene, that we put this matter on the calendar for Monday," Lamont said.

It was the practice to have three to four weeks between the verdict and the sentencing. "I've got more than enough to work from, and I'm not going to ask Ms. Hastings to make another trip cross-country to present her impact statement. Ms. Cooper says her witness is willing to stay for the weekend and get this whole thing behind her. You going to fight me on this?"

"I hear you, Judge. That's fine."

Floyd Warren pounded his fist on the table.

"I'll take your motions then. If there's nothing further," Lamont said, "we stand adjourned."