Sheer Gall (17 page)

“Did Tammy know what you did for a living?”

He frowned in thought. “She knew I was an attorney with a firm downtown. I did tell her that much.”

I glanced at my notes from our prior interview. “You saw her three times?”

He nodded.

“The first night you went to dinner and then back to your place, right?”

“Yes.”

“The other two nights she came directly to your place from the airport. Or at least she said she was coming there directly from the airport, right?”

“Correct.”

I looked at him for a moment, trying to think of an easy way to do this. I couldn't think of a way. “How many times did the two of you have sex?”

He grunted. “Sweet Jesus.”

I waited. It was an old cross-examination trick: wait long enough and most witnesses feel compelled to fill the silence.

“Four times,” he finally said.

“Two times in one night?”

He thrust his chin forward. “As a matter of fact, yes.”

I fought an urge to applaud.
Beware the fragile male ego
. “That was the first night?”

He nodded.

“And once on each of the other nights?”

He nodded again.

“Did you talk about work with her?”

He paused, trying to remember. “Not much.”

“About Sally?”

“I told her I was going through a divorce. I don't recall telling her from whom.”

I nodded. “Did she talk about her job?”

“Only vaguely.” He made a dismissive gesture. “Neither one of us talked much about our occupations. That was part of the understanding.”

“What
did
you talk about?”

He thought it over. “I can't remember.”

“Sports?”

He shook his head.

“Politics?”

“No.”

“Movies? Art? Literature?”

“Not that I recall.”

“Sex?”

He cleared his throat. “What do you mean?”

I shrugged. “It's about all that's left, Neville. You were with her three times. You didn't talk much about work or Sally. You didn't talk about sports or politics or movies or the rest. The only thing you had in common was sex. Did she ever talk about it?”

He cleared his throat again. “Once.”

“When?”

“The second time we were together.”

“Tell me about the conversation.”

He stood up, touching his collar. “Good God, this is damned uncomfortable.”

“So is death row, Neville.”

I waited patiently. Eventually, he sat back down and cleared his throat. “She wanted to know about my other experiences. She wanted to know whether I had ever done any of that, uh, kinky stuff. She said it turned her on.”

“What did you tell her?”

“I told her about some of my, uh, my experiences.”

“Did you tell her about Sally?”

He drew himself up. “Not by name,” he said in an offended tone.

I nodded. “Did you show her your pictures?”

He waved his hand distractedly, obviously ill at ease with the entire subject. “I may have. I don't recall. I can assure you that it wasn't an extended conversation.”

“Did you do anything kinky with Tammy?”

“Of course not.”

“You're positive?”

“Absolutely. Good God, is this line of inquiry really necessary?”

“Yes.”

He cleared his throat. “We engaged in standard intercourse. Missionary position only.”

“Did she ever spend the night?”

“No. She usually left shortly after we, uh, after we had intercourse.”

“Did you use a condom?” I asked.

He coughed again. “Of course.”

“Whose?”

He looked at me, perplexed. “Whose?”

“Yours or hers?” I said. “Did you supply them or did she?”

He tilted his head back, trying to remember. “Hers.”

“You're sure?”

He reddened. “Yes.”

“Tell me about it.”

“What?”

“You just blushed. Tell me.”

“I cannot believe this.” He stood up and walked to the other side of the room, shaking his head. “Have you ever heard of privacy?”

“I'm afraid you've lost yours, Neville. That's what happens in murder cases. Tell me about the condoms.”

He paced back and forth, shaking his head and grumbling to himself. Eventually, he stopped by the counter and lifted the saltshaker, as if to examine it. “She had a special type,” he said, inspecting the shaker. “Ribbed or some sort of texture or some damn thing. She made a game out of it.”

“What do you mean?”

“Sweet Jesus.” He exhaled in exasperation and shook his head. “She, uh, she said she liked to put it on. When we were done, she took it off.”

“What did she do with it then?”

He looked at me as if I had lost my mind. “Are you serious?”

I nodded.

He shook his head in disbelief. “I have no earthly idea what she did with the damn things.”

“It's important, Neville. Try to remember. What did she do with them? Toss them in the trash can? Flush them down the toilet? Drop them on the rug?”

“I'm telling you, I have no idea.”

“Bear with me, Neville. Think hard. It wasn't that long ago.”

“I'm telling you, I don't recall.” He started pacing around the room again, his hands in his pockets, jangling his change. “Now can we please change the subject?”

Chapter Seventeen

Vincent Contini crossed his arms over his chest and shook his head firmly. “Never, Rachel. I would view it as a betrayal of my relationship with my ladies.”

It was Sunday afternoon, and Vincent and I were in my office going over a few matters in preparation for the libel trial, which was just four days off. Although I don't usually work Sundays, it was a day more convenient for Vincent, and this particular Sunday I didn't mind getting out of my house, which was teeming with employees from St. Louis Shield Security, who appeared to be installing a security system for a CIA safe house.

Ozzie and I had gone for a jog through Forest Park and dropped by Basically Bagels for a snack—an onion bagel with cream cheese and a large coffee for me, a pumpernickel bagel and a small bowl of water for him. Then we drove over to my office, where Ozzie promptly collapsed on the rug with a sigh and fell asleep, his paws over his ears.

“But, Vincent,” I assured him, “I can tell these women that I got their names off a guest list for the event. They'll never know my real source.”

“But I would know, Rachel. A secret betrayal is no less a sin than a public one.”

I leaned back in my chair and silently groaned. Ten thousand retailers in St. Louis, and I end up representing the Sir Thomas More of designer dresses. “It's hardly a sin,” I said, trying to hide my frustration. “Three of your customers bought dresses for the Children's Hospital benefit. You said yourself that all three are loyal patrons of yours. If one of them remembers what Cissy Thompson was wearing that night, I'm sure she'd be delighted to help you by testifying at trial.”

Another adamant shake of the head. “Out of the question. This unpleasant dispute is entirely my problem, Rachel. I would never ask one of my darlings to sully her hands in a coarse piece of litigation on my behalf. Never.”

He reached into the breast pocket of his elegant suit and removed the white handkerchief. He patted it against his forehead and replaced it, making sure to position it perfectly in the pocket. Unlike Neville McBride, Vincent Contini's weekend attire was no different from his outfits for the week. He was in a navy pinstripe double-breasted suit, white shirt, gold-and-gray striped tie, and black Italian shoes buffed to a brilliant shine. We made quite a Sunday contrast, with me in my St. Louis Browns baseball cap (to keep my curly hair out of my face as I jogged), an oversized gray
Jane Austen Rules!
sweatshirt, black jogging tights, and Nikes.

“Vincent,” I said patiently, “Cissy Thompson has sued you for millions of dollars. She will swear that she never wore that dress.”

“But she's a liar.”

I sighed. “Nevertheless, we still have to prove it's a lie. Otherwise, she's entitled to a judgment in her favor.”

He gave me a serene smile. “Ah, but that cannot possibly happen.”

“Oh? And why not?”

He made a sweeping gesture with his hands. “Because, my dear Rachel, you will not allow it to happen.”

I smiled in resignation. “Vincent, my name is Rachel Gold, not Perry Mason. Remember, he had Erie Stanley Gardner to solve his cases for him. I'm limited to admissible evidence, and, frankly, Vincent, we could use some more.”

“But, Rachel, I thought that you and your assistant found some. What about that fellow from the newspaper—the chap who took all of the photographs of the event?”

I shook my head. “It doesn't look great. Jacki went through the one roll he developed the day after the event. Cissy isn't in any of the pictures.”

He grimaced. “Ah, a pity.”

“He thinks there may be a few more pictures from the event on another roll he hasn't developed yet. He promised to do it over the weekend.”

Vincent nodded with satisfaction. “There. You see?”

“Don't get your hopes up.” I leaned back and sighed. “I'm not optimistic.”

“Oh, but you should be.” He paused and gave me a warm, paternal smile. “You are such a lovely young lady, Rachel, and so intelligent. God smiles down upon you, my dear. I have great confidence in you. I am certain you will find us our evidence. And if not, well”—he paused and gave me a long-suffering shrug—“such is the way of the world. But,” he said solemnly, placing his hand over his heart, “you must not chide me for refusing to allow any of my darling ladies to get dragged into this case.”

I rested my chin on my fist and smiled at my courtly white-haired client. “I would never chide you, Vincent.”

He leaned over and patted my hand. “I promise to be a good witness. It will be her word against mine. That may be the best we can do. We will pray that justice prevails.”

I said nothing. My client was in a sentimental mood, and I saw no reason to shake him out of it. Praying that justice will prevail is a good recipe for losing. Moreover, as any decent lawyer will tell you, justice isn't usually part of the calculus, and praying is beside the point. The goal is to win for your client, and your job as attorney is to make that happen.

This was Sunday. I still had four days to make it happen.

***

Benny pushed back from my kitchen table and stood up. He walked to the doorway to the living room. From there, the front yard and the street were visible through the window.

“So he's gone?” he asked.

“Who?” Amy Chickering asked. She stood up to see where he was looking.

Benny said, “The security guard. Rachel had one here overnight and then all day today while they installed the security system.”

It was Sunday evening, and Benny and Amy seemed to be hitting it off well on their first date. Tonight I was in the role of matchmaker. Benny's on-again-off-again relationship with my best friend from Harvard Law School, Flo Shenker of Washington, D.C., was off again, which meant he was on the prowl for female companionship. With his memories of Amy's television commercials still vivid, he had begged me to fix him up.

I invited them both to drop by Sunday night, ostensibly to discuss issues related to Sally's estate. Benny “spontaneously” suggested that we have dinner, and Amy agreed. He had arrived an hour ago with enough barbecue takeout and Ben & Jerry's ice cream to feed an army.

Benny came back to the kitchen and peered into the takeout carton that had contained the rib tips. “Ah, excellent,” he said, lifting it up. “Still some left.” He started to dump the contents onto his plate, but paused to look at us. “Anyone care for a tip?”

I shook my head.

“You're still hungry?” Amy asked in astonishment.

“Benny's always still hungry,” I said.

“And with excellent reason,” he said as he dumped the contents onto his plate. “You ladies have no conception of the sheer volume of protein and complex carbohydrates required to maintain my sexual prowess at world-class performance levels.”

I glanced over at Amy with a skeptical expression. She giggled.

“Another beer, you awesome stud muffin?” I asked him.

He nodded, his mouth full. I turned to Amy. She shook her head. I went over to the fridge and took out two bottles of Sam Adams, one for Benny and one for me. Benny was, I had to admit, an acquired taste. The trick was to find a woman willing to stick around long enough to acquire it. Amy had lasted more than an hour so far, and she still seemed in an acquisition mode.

Later, while they were helping me clean up the kitchen, Benny asked, “You still going to Chicago tomorrow?”

I nodded.

“What's in Chicago?” Amy asked.

“The parent company of Douglas Beef,” I explained. “I'm going to see whether their numbers back Brady Kane's story.”

“What's his story?” Amy asked.

“He told me the purpose of all of those phone calls with Sally Wade was to work out settlements of workers' comp claims. He says he was able to settle cases cheaper by doing an end run around the attorneys. I'm going to do an end run on him and see what they have at the corporate headquarters.”

“You don't believe him, eh?” she asked.

I shook my head. “There's something else going on. That's why I had you put together all that information Friday. We'll see how it compares with the information in Chicago.”

Chapter Eighteen

Betsy Dempsey joined Abbott & Windsor three years after I did, and from the day we met I knew that she had made a profound mistake. She was intelligent, meticulous, and cautious. She could spot potential issues that her superiors missed and propose solutions that worked. She was modest and considerate and a little bashful. She baked a scrumptious carrot cake for my birthday and selected an adorable jumper for her secretary's new baby. She was a little frumpy and didn't play on the firm's coed softball team and didn't curse and preferred to leave the litigation department's happy hours early to get home to her husband, who was in his last year of divinity school at the University of Chicago. She was, in short, completely miscast as a litigation associate at Abbott & Windsor—a macho subculture where even the women strutted and bragged about “kicking butt.”

I came of age as a lawyer within that subculture. Like our counterparts at the other powerhouse Chicago firms, we at A&W knew we had more smarts and wile and skills and balls than our opponents. We were the Green Berets, the SWAT teams of the law—gathering each morning in tribal counsels in our conference rooms high above the battlefields, reviewing the day's combat strategies before boarding our paratrooper planes (the elevators) for the forty-floor drop into the war zone. Being a woman meant that you had to be tougher than the guys, or at least pretend to be.

Not surprisingly, the casualty rate in litigation departments is high, especially among women attorneys, many of whom chose to flee private practice entirely for the duller but sheltered life of an in-house counsel. Betsy Dempsey had been one of the casualties. Fortunately for me, her safe harbor was Bennett Industries, Inc., an international conglomerate whose myriad holdings included Douglas Beef Processors and its five slaughterhouses. I had called her last Friday after my meeting with Brady Kane. She sounded thrilled to hear from me, and said she'd be happy to meet on Monday morning.

It was now Monday morning, and I was in the heart of the Chicago Loop, up on the sixty-third floor of the Bennett Industries Tower, standing in the office of assistant trademark attorney Elizabeth R. Dempsey. Although her office was tiny, it was along the south wall and featured a spectacular view of the Chicago Board of Trade below and, farther off, the Field Museum, Soldier Field, and the Shedd Aquarium.

“Oh, my,” I said, picking up the framed photograph on her desk. “Are these your boys?”

Betsy beamed. “Roger is four, Peter is two.”

“They're absolutely adorable, Betsy.” I felt a slight pang of envy. I looked up from the picture and smiled at her. “And you look great.”

“Ugh,” she said, her broad face reddening. “I'm fatter than ever, and I'm already getting gray hairs. Even worse, I'm going to flunk out of Weight Watchers for the third time. But look at you, Rachel.” She put her hands on her broad hips and smiled, shaking her head in admiration. “I always thought that you were the prettiest lawyer in Chicago. All of us used to envy you so. And now you're even more beautiful. You look wonderful, Rachel.”

It was my turn to blush.

Her secretary brought us coffee. We talked some about life as an in-house counsel at Bennett Industries (good hours, decent benefits, so-so work, nasty office politics) and reminisced about names and events from our Abbott & Windsor days. It didn't take long to exhaust the conversational topics for two people who shared almost nothing in common beyond their brief time together at the same law firm.

Betsy steepled her fingers under her chin and gazed at me earnestly. “Tell me how I can help.”

“I need to look at some numbers on the East St. Louis slaughterhouse, and I probably need to talk to the people up here who ought to know about those numbers.”

“What kind of numbers?”

I explained what I had learned about Sally Wade's communications with Brady Kane, the plant manager.

Betsy frowned. “She actually dealt with him direct?”

I nodded. “If Brady Kane is telling the truth, then the comparative settlement numbers ought to show it. Was East St. Louis settling workers' comp cases on the average for less money than your other slaughterhouses? The person up here in charge of the Douglas Beef workers' comp claims ought to know those numbers.”

She gave me a guarded look. “Okay,” she finally said.

***

I soon understood the reason for her strange expression.

All Douglas Beef workers' comp claims fell within the exclusive jurisdiction of Lamar Hundra. According to the nameplate on his desk, he was Assistant Risk Manager, North American Operations—all three hundred well-marbled pounds of him. Lamar had a massive bald head, hooded eyes, and a thick, unkempt mustache. There were moist red blotches along the bottom of his mustache which I initially mistook for blood until he tilted a Dominick's bakery bag toward me and asked, “Would you care for one?”

“Uh, no, thanks.”

He reached a meaty paw into the bag, pulled out a big jelly doughnut, and held it at arm's length, as if admiring a work of art. “Raspberry,” he sighed. “I'm addicted to the damn things.”

He closed his eyes and opened his mouth, revealing an uneven set of teeth and several gold crowns. I watched in silence as he proceeded to shove nearly half of the doughnut into his mouth—a maneuver that added an additional smudge of red and smear of glaze to his vile mustache.

Although I had spent countless hours and days around a man with powerful hungers and an ample waistline, Benny Goldberg in no way resembled Lamar Hundra. In Benny, there was a robust, exuberant quality to his prodigious appetites; by contrast, Lamar reminded me of a bloated, lethargic hog at the trough. Benny was my Falstaff—stout, merry, and ribald. Lamar Hundra was just plain gross.

When Lamar and I initially shook hands, I had assumed that he was cursed with a clammy handshake; but now, fifteen minutes later, my hand was still moist, which was making me think that what I had assumed was perspiration was in fact doughnut grease. I watched in disgust as he chewed in bliss.

“I'm getting better,” he said with a spark that quickly drowned in those torpid eyes. “Six weeks ago I cut my daily intake from a dozen of these babies to just six.”

He took another gurgling chug from his sixteen-ounce bottle of Diet Coke, screwed the top back on, and stifled a rumbling, subterranean belch. There were five empty Diet Coke bottles on his credenza next to his computer, along with several crumpled Butterfingers wrappers. From where I sat, the keyboard looked filthy.

“Okay, let's see,” he said, shuffling through what looked like computer printouts. “Damn,” he grunted, looking at his index finger.

“What's wrong?”

He put it in his mouth. For one creepy moment I thought he was going to bite it off. “Paper cut,” he said, holding it up. A thin line of red was visible. I wouldn't have been surprised to see gravy oozing out.

He was so repulsive that he had to be very good at what he did to be still employed at Bennett Industries. At least that's what I hoped.

Those hopes remained unfulfilled two hours later. Amy Chickering, under my instructions, had prepared a representative sampling of Douglas Beef workers' comp cases over the past three years. We designed it to include what we hoped was a statistically significant number of claims in each of several areas, ranging from carpal tunnel syndromes to amputated fingers to back problems. My purpose in coming to Chicago was to see whether a comparison of those numbers to settlements of similar claims at the other slaughterhouses supported Brady Kane's contention that his back-channel dealings with Sally had enabled him to save the company money. Unfortunately, Lamar Hundra's organizational system, partly computerized and partly manual, made that type of comparative analysis difficult and imprecise, leaving us with no clear pattern one way or the other.

At my request, Amy had also pulled closing statements for about two dozen settled claims. If there was a kickback scheme involving Brady Kane (or anyone else at the plant, for that matter), I thought I might find it by comparing the actual settlement check issued by the company to the amount shown on the closing statement Sally gave to her client. For example, she could have settled a case for ten thousand dollars with Brady Kane but told her client that the case settled for nine thousand. Then when the ten-thousand-dollar check arrived, she could deposit it, send Brady Kane a grand, and prepare a client closing statement showing a nine-thousand-dollar settlement.

To say the least, Lamar Hundra was not intrigued by the kickback theory. After much wheedling by me and grumbling by him, he finally heaved his bulk out of the chair and plodded down to the accounting department to locate the records for the settlement checks. Unfortunately—or fortunately, I couldn't tell which anymore—the closing statements Sally gave to her clients matched the company's check records. In other words, if Sally's closing statement showed that the claim had been settled for ten thousand dollars, so did the company's records. Every time.

***

I peered out the window. “Rats,” I sighed, shaking my head.

“Pardon?”

I turned to the elderly woman in the seat next to me. “I'm sorry.” I gave her a tired smile. “Just talking to myself.”

“That's quite all right, dear.”

I turned toward the window and stared into the darkness. We were, according to our captain, twenty-seven thousand feet in the air heading south from Chicago to St. Louis. I was sipping a glass of apple juice and thinking that I should have ordered a double Jack Daniel's on the rocks.

My head was spinning. For the past week I'd been talking to people and following leads and sorting through evidence, but I couldn't tell whether I was getting any closer or just moving in ever-widening circles. The only tangible thing I could point to was my state-of-the-art home security system, and I wasn't even certain that I could link that to my investigation. After all, the warning note taped to the rearview mirror hadn't referenced anything specific to Sally Wade. Moreover, it was clear from the police detective's questions that when lawyers receive anonymous threats, the first place to look is their divorce cases. Unfortunately, there were plenty of those. During my first year in St. Louis I had, through an odd series of events, represented a succession of wealthy women in bitter contested divorces. When it comes to divorces, hell hath no fury like a man burned, and I'd burned a few.

The plane touched down at 5:40 p.m. On my way out of the airport, I stopped at a pay phone to pick up my voice-mail messages. There were fifteen of them, mostly routine, except for message number eleven:

“Rachel, this is Jonathan Wolf. It's four-fifteen. I'll be here until about six. If you can't reach me by then, call first thing in the morning. Neville received a telephone call from Tammy.”

I dialed his number. His secretary told me he was in conference. I asked her to interrupt. He came on a moment later.

“We need to talk, Rachel, but I can't right now. How about in forty-five minutes? I can meet you somewhere for a drink on your way home.”

“That's fine.”

“You're at the airport. I'm downtown.”

“How about the Ritz?” I said. I needed to go by there anyway to talk to someone about the Children's Hospital function, and with the libel trial just three days off, the sooner I did that the better.

“Six-thirty?” he asked.

“I'll see you there, Jonathan.”