Wrangling with the Laywer (14 page)

“My client’s not agreeing to play nice with you,
Davidson.” Gabe sat back, already seeing where this was going. “I’d suggest you let me and Jack discuss the points laid out in the judge’s settlement plan before we move on. I wouldn’t like you to compromise yourself by speaking out of turn.”

Jack Granger, a tough-looking man in a black suit, leaned over to
Davidson on the screen.  When he spoke, his voice was like gravel. “What’s up, Gabe? What do you make of the plan?”

“Jack.” Gabe sighed, turning over the document on the table. He and
Harper had marked specific comments in the information, which he knew they would be able to see. The document was covered in red. “It’s not exactly watertight. We’ve got a few minor concerns. Some very specific ones relating to the use of certain algorithms that Mr Davidson claims his team were working with at least just prior to the patent application.” Gabe’s brows lifted. “My client has some concerns about the timeline on these.”

In fact
Harper had told him her team hadn’t written these algorithms until after the patent application. Since they were original work, never seen before, she doubted Davidson’s team had come up with them previously. She seemed confident enough that in a fight she could prove he and his team couldn’t actually solve them to an expert’s satisfaction. She’d broken one down for him that morning, much to his enjoyment. When she worked, her normal self-consciousness slipped away. She became animated like a child with a new toy; her eyes had met his without any hesitation, bright and intelligent. It had been inspiring how much she loved her work.

He forced his mind back to the present, taking a sip of water.
Davidson and Granger had another brief discussion with the mute button on. Gabe turned to Harper with a distant smile, unwilling to give anything away on his expression. She was sitting patiently; she met his eyes with a small returning smile. He could sense her discomfort.

“My client’s
not clear on the background to this point,” Jack started without preamble. “We would need a list of the exact algorithms in question.”

Harper
made a small sound of derision. Gabe hit the mute button immediately.

“He wants me to tell him what they are so that he can get his team working on them now,” she supplied without hesitation. She kept her expression even but he could see the tired amusement in her eyes. “As far as I’m concerned he’s going to have to reverse engineer the entire program and work it out himself if he wants to fight this.”

“Reverse engineer?”

“Pull the program apart, decipher it. Take it back to its basic elements.” Her brows lifted. “Which will be virtually impossible, even with the money he can throw at it. This is one of the most complex programs we’ve ever created. It’s totally open to modification, we want it to be open source where possible, but the basic building blocks behind it are dense. And very new.”

Gabe flicked the audio back on. “We won’t be providing an exact list right now, Jack.”

“So you can ambush us with it during the trial?”

Gabe laughed. “It won’t be an ambush if your client’s telling the truth in his patent application.”

The opposing team muted the speaker yet again. This time the patent attorneys joined the intense discussion. “I’m going to suggest we prepare a dual report listing out our concerns and submit this to Judge Abernathy next week,” Jack suggested. “Tuesday good for you?”

“Fine for me.”

“Okay. Let’s go from there. I’m sure we can find a way to settle without starting up a lengthy trial.” Jack seemed ready to end the conversation, closing the brief in front of him. “Is there anything else your client wants to cover?”

“We’re good.”

“Okay. Speak to you next week.”

Davidson lifted his hand in a regal manner before his counsel could cut the connection. “Just a point about the algorithms,” he offered smoothly. He frowned into the screen. “Harper, if I remember correctly you were already discussing some of these during that weekend we spent in Las Vegas just before the E3 conference.”

Gabe turned.
Harper’s expression was suspended somewhere between confusion and incredulity. There was a pregnant pause. “I don’t think so, Joe.”

“Yes. The weekend we spent in the cabins at the golf resort. Remember? We had those Mojitos that blew your head off.” He laughed. “We lost a packet at the blackjack table and we went back through to the bar, and you were scribbling furiously on those paper napkins-”

“Joe, I’m not quite sure what this has to do with Cross Screens.” She was visibly impatient.

“Those weren’t the cloud server algorithms you used?”

Gabe turned and stared ahead at the screen. Davidson’s expression was forcibly confused, but the smugness shone through.

Feeling his eyes darken of their own accord, Gabe strengthened his tone. “Mr
Davidson, if you have anything to add to the report after next week that pertains to the background of the dispute, I’d suggest you channel this through your legal advisors. My client’s too busy to be trying to remember an equation scrolled on a paper napkin several years ago.” His tone dropped; he couldn’t resist a final barb. “I realise the moment may have been significant to you, but clearly my client’s unable to recall it in any real detail. From what I’ve seen she’s had substantially more than one original thought in her career so far.”  He brightened his expression again. “Are we done here, Jack?”

Jack looked miserable. “Sure, Gabe. Have a good one.”

When he turned, Harper was biting back a grin. They said their goodbyes and he cut the video quickly so that she could release her pent-up amusement. It didn’t last long before irritation surfaced. “That was working weekend with our senior team leads. He always has to make these things sound like we were away on some illicit, romantic weekend for two.”

“He’s an idiot.” Gabe sat back, crossing his hand
s on his lap and leaning his elbows on the chair arms. “I knew him at Harvard, and he was an idiot then, too.”

“Why am I not surprised to hear that...?”

He was surprisingly pleased to see the amusement returned to her eyes. He tried to maintain a clear expression, but something was eating away at him. It was only further compounded by her next words.

“This’ll sound petty...” She shifted her weight in her seat, her winged brows steepened in irritation. “Did you see that wall hanging in the background in his office? It was for sale at that event we attended a while back, hosted by Natalie van der Sar? He only bought that because I said I liked it.” She bit the words off and then laughed, clearly embarrassed.

Gabe absorbed her indignation thoughtfully. He knew he was going to have to broach the subject of the nature of her relationship with Davidson again. That fevered excitement he’d seen in the latter’s eyes at the beginning of the call had been disturbing. There had been something malicious about it. Being challenged in a dispute like this, especially one that commanded expertise and intelligence to understand was undoubtedly something that a competitive man like Davidson would get off on. The problem occurred if his enjoyment of the issue had gone beyond reasonable parameters. If he was fabricating information to pursue these claims falsely against his client...

Gabe felt a firing in his blood. That was the kind of behaviour that brought great men tumbling down, and brought down with them the very fabric of corporate business. Gabe wouldn’t mind at all seeing Nemei Corp undergo a historic change of guard on his watch. Not at all.

He noticed Harper was watching him closely. The room was very silent and still. He allowed his eyes to comb her features, even though he could see she was fully aware of his interest. He couldn’t help himself. He admired her for fighting this case. Nemei was a corrupt organisation that would take millions to bring down, but she somehow seemed to be managing, this half-pint determined woman. She was beautiful, but he saw so much more than this in that moment. He saw her courage, and her tenacity. He saw her intelligence, which was greater than all of those men in that room put together and yet without any arrogance attached to it, and within she seemed to possess the unwavering knowledge that she was doing the right thing by defending herself. He realised he wanted to help her get the best of them more than he wanted to win any other case in his career.

Her phone rang, cutting the connection.

She paused for a moment, as if confused, before tearing her eyes from his. She looked down at her phone screen. “I need to get this.”

He pushed his chair back, unfolding himself with a deep inhalation. His heart was beating heavily. This had to stop. Why was he sitting in a quiet conference room staring at some woman he barely knew like she held the secret to life?

Her voice, sharper than usual, cut through his internal monologue. He turned, watching her hurriedly finish up a conversation.

“What is it?”

She looked stunned. “That was the man who’s damp-proofing my house. He says it’s infested with bed bugs.”

Chapter Eight

Harper stood on the sidewalk in front of her house with the contractor, her phone limp in her hand. She had no idea who to call. Megan, her first emergency contact, was in Bermuda until the following weekend. Her parents lived in Idaho, so... She watched a man in a futuristic-looking plastic body suit wander up the steps to her house with a tank on his back. The sun was making a quick dip behind the winter horizon. Time was running low.

She called ahead to Jenny Frank. Finn was spending the night at Jenny’s with her son, Marcus, in their one-bedroom condo nearby.
Harper had no plans to ask to stay, she just made sure Finn was safe and explained the problem to Jenny. “I’ll be contactable on my phone. I’ll let you know as soon as I know where I’m staying.”

“You’re more than welcome on the couch,” Jenny reassured her with genuine encouragement.

“I know. It’s sweet of you.” Harper pushed a hand through her hair as she watched her curtains being removed from the den. “They’re going to start spraying this afternoon, but they said it might take up to two days. I guess I’ll wait until they’ve finished inspecting to decide what to do.”

“Well, you let me know if there’s anything at all you need.”

Hanging up, Harper waited until the specialist had finished his review. They stood on the steps as he ran through the damage, both to the house and her wallet. “There hasn’t been an infestation in this area for a while,” he told her sympathetically. “You’re lucky the damp-proofers noticed them before they got out of hand. The spraying can be pretty unpleasant to live with, but you can probably come back tomorrow evening.”

She went inside and packed a small case, having the specialist check it for bugs before she left. Outside, she stared at her car, wondering if she should call an old friend out in New Jersey, or one of her colleagues, or just save all the bother of explaining and stay at a hotel for a night. Snow was starting to fall again and it was nearly dark. The final option was starting to seem like a good one.

A familiar, black town car pulled to a stop in front of her. She bit back a smile, feeling a pinch of embarrassment to be standing out in the middle of the street in the cold half-light. To her surprise, the door to the driver’s seat opened and Veda got out. She experienced a sense of disappointment that was unflattering to Veda, for which she experienced a mental kick from her conscience.

“Miss
Green.” He came around to greet her politely. “Mr Stahl wanted me to check on things.” He looked sheepish. “Actually he asked to check discreetly to make sure you were okay. But I can see you’re in a quandary.”

She laughed, feeling a bit hysterical. “Yeah... you can say that again, Veda.” She touched his arm reassuringly. “It’s kind of you to stop, but
I was just on my way to a hotel.”

“The boy?”

“Sleepover.”

He nodded in satisfaction. “I’m under instruction to escort you wherever you want to go. Mr
Stahl tells me the roads will freeze over tonight and he doesn’t think it’s wise for you to be out driving.”

She resisted the urge to laugh again. Was she hearing correctly? She’d been driving herself around for over twenty years. “That’s... kind of him.” She felt like a stuck record.  “I’ll need my car tomorrow, though. So-”

Her phone started ringing. Looking down, she saw Gabe’s number shining like a beacon. As always, her mind responded by putting her body on red alert. “It’s Mr. Stahl,” she explained to Veda.

“You should answer it, Miss
Green.”

She bit back a smile. Pressing the receiver button, she lifted the phone to her ear.

“Harper?” His deep tone was undergoing some noise interference. “What’s going on?”

“I’m standing in the middle of the street with Veda,” she told him evenly.

He paused, the background noise taking over. “Why are you standing in the middle of the street?”

She thought about explaining and then discarded the notion on a sigh. “It doesn’t matter. What’s up?”

“I’m calling to find out what’s going on with the bed bugs,” he insisted with an obvious air. “I presume if Veda’s talking to you, it’s not going well.” The background noise took over again and she heard him reassuring someone that he would just be a moment. “Have him take you to my apartment. There’s plenty of room. It’s the least I can do.”