Free Supreme Justice by Phillip Margolin

He handled Brad and the guard easily, and his gun was equipped with a silencer. He definitely had some type of training.”
    “Can you think of any reason for this attempt on your life?” Keith asked.
    “No, I can’t. My assailant may just be a mental case or some right-wing fanatic.”
    “Are you considering a case this term that might set off someone like that?”
    “No, we don’t have any hot-button issues like abortion or gay rights before the Court this term.”
    “What about a case that affects an individual or a business?” Agent Sparks asked.
    “That would be almost any case. They’re all very important to the litigants, but I honestly can’t think of a case that would get someone so upset they would try to kill me. And what would be the point. There are eight more justices. There have been instances where a justice has had to recuse himself or herself or has been unable to sit because of illness, and the Court has conducted business as usual.”
    “What about personal enemies? Can you think of a court employee who was fired or someone in your personal life with a grudge?”
    Moss shook her head. “I’ll give it some thought, but right now . . . No, I can’t think of anyone who would want me dead.”

Chapter Fifteen
    Felicia Moss had lived alone for most of her life. There had been a brief marriage to a civil rights lawyer when she was in her late thirties, but that had only lasted two years, through no fault of her spouse. After the divorce, there’d been an occasional lover, but her work had been her real significant other. Felicia didn’t regret the lack of companionship. She had decided long ago that she preferred to live alone, so the only tics and foibles she had to put up with were her own.
    With the exception of her stint on Wall Street, the judge had never had an income comparable to those of men like Millard Price, but she had been a wise investor, and the returns from her portfolio allowed her to afford a pleasant apartment in an old and elegant high-rise in the Kalorama Triangle near Connecticut Avenue. Three policemen accompanied her home from the Court. One watched her door while the other two searched her apartment to make sure no one was waiting for her inside. When the search was complete, two of the officers left, leaving the third on guard in the hall outside her apartment.
    Felicia could tell that Brad had been shaken by the attack in the garage, but she had always possessed the ability to shuck off the violent emotions that crippled others when they faced danger. She experienced no trembling of the hand or shortness of breath when the officers left her alone. However, she was overwhelmed by fatigue, and she dropped into an armchair and closed her eyes as soon as the door closed. She had always possessed an inordinate amount of energy, but she was in her midseventies, and age was catching up to her more rapidly than she would have wished.
    After she’d been sitting for a while, Felicia became aware of a second sensation, hunger. With all the excitement, she had forgotten about eating. Her apartment building had been built in the early 1940s. An antique clock graced the mantel of the marble fireplace that was the centerpiece of the high-ceilinged living room. Felicia was shocked to see that it was after nine. She pushed herself to her feet and walked to the kitchen. Felicia was a talented chef, but she had only enough energy to slap together a sandwich made from odds and ends she found in her refrigerator. After pouring a glass of milk, she sat at the kitchen table. She barely tasted her sandwich because she was preoccupied by the events in the garage. She was too old to fear death, but she was as curious in her seventies as she’d been in her teens. What was the motive for the attack? The assassin could just be a fanatic, but she didn’t think so. There was nothing going on in her personal life that could have engendered such hate. She examined a number of possible reasons