by Adam Mitzner
She had a flashback of Will’s smile.
What is he doing now? Does he ever think about me? All the time, like I think about him? Does he miss me? If he does, is it the way I miss him?
37.
The next day, Will received a call from a blocked number. His heart jumped, but the “Hello, Mr. Matthews?” he heard when he answered was clearly not the voice of the late Sam Abaddon.
“Yes, this is Will Matthews.”
“Mr. Matthews, my name is Jessica Shacter. I’m an attorney. I have been asked by Maeve Grant to represent you.”
“About what?” Will said.
Jessica laughed. “Yes, I should have made that clearer. Apologies. My specialty is white-collar criminal defense. My understanding from speaking to Maeve Grant’s lawyer is that there is a criminal investigation involving some of the accounts you were handling when you were employed by the firm. The firm’s lawyers cannot represent you because that would represent a conflict of interest. As a result, it is fairly common procedure for the firm to retain someone like me—at their full expense, I might add—to represent you. I’ll go over all of this again when we meet, but the key point is that I’m going to be your lawyer—assuming you agree to retain me, of course—but Maeve Grant will pay my fees.”
This time Will laughed. “That sounds like a Maeve Grant type of arrangement. No conflict of interest that way, right?”
“I understand your skepticism. But let me suggest we proceed in this way. Come meet with me. There is some urgency, so I suggest today at two o’clock. My office is right next to Grand Central, at 230 Park Avenue. At that time, we can go over everything.”
Will didn’t say anything. His silence was not because he was seriously contemplating turning down the offer of free legal counsel, but more to reflect on the urgency Jessica referenced. It could really only mean one thing: he was on the verge of being arrested.
There was a time when Will could not have conceived of anything worse than a federal criminal indictment. But now, being indicted seemed like the least of his worries.
The silence lasted long enough that Jessica said, “Mr. Matthews, are you still there?”
Will shook the thoughts of a bloody death at Eve’s hand out of his head. “Yeah, I’m here. Okay. I’ll see you at two.”
The office of Jessica A. Shacter did not appear on the building’s directory. Because Will didn’t know what floor she was on, he had to ask the security guard. Unfortunately, the guard had no idea who Jessica Shacter was, which didn’t exactly inspire Will’s confidence. Jessica must not get many visitors, then, which meant that she didn’t have many clients.
“Could be the law offices on fourteen,” the security guard said with a shrug. “A bunch of lawyers up on that floor.”
“Thanks,” Will said as he headed for the elevator.
Another directory appeared opposite the elevators on the fourteenth floor. This one had Jessica’s name, albeit in a font different from the others, indicating that she was a new occupant of the floor. Hers was one of half a dozen names listed as occupying suite 1401.
He followed the signs around the corridor, but when he finally arrived at suite 1401, the glass doors were locked. There was no receptionist inside. Will pressed the buzzer.
After a minute or so, a young man probably not much more than a year out of college, if that, wearing jeans and a button-down shirt came to the door. Will would have sooner imagined this guy almost anywhere else other than working in a law office.
“What can I do for you?”
“I’m here to see Jessica Shacter,” Will said.
“Who?”
“Jessica Shacter. She’s a lawyer.”
“Okay,” the man said, acting as if he didn’t believe Will, although Will was not sure which lie the man thought he’d told—that Jessica Shacter worked there, or that she was a lawyer.
The man retreated back behind the glass doors, and Will waited another minute before they opened again, this time by the hand of a woman who looked to be in her early fifties, with large brown eyes and an inviting smile that seemed somewhat unlawyer-like. Will flashed on the thought that Gwen was a lawyer with an even better smile.
“I’m Jessica Shacter. Are you Will Matthews?”
“Yes.”
“Nice to meet you, Will. I’m sorry it’s under these circumstances, of course. Please follow me. We can talk about everything.”
The space Jessica led him through looked about as much like Taylor Beckett as his high school gym resembled Madison Square Garden. The hallway was dark, with a threadbare carpet. The small conference room they entered was an interior space, and empty aside from a nondescript table and six chairs.
“The way I like to begin is to explain the arrangement we’re about to enter into. As I’d be the first to admit, it seems a bit unorthodox for the uninitiated,” Jessica said once they were seated and he’d declined her offer of something to drink. “For people in my line of work, it’s very, very common, but I’ve never met someone who hears about it for the first time and doesn’t think there’s got to be something improper about what’s happening. So I always think a good place to start is to tell you why it’s all totally on the up-and-up. Okay?”
Will nodded. Nothing was okay about any of this, but he was willing to hear his new lawyer out.
“Good. A large part of my practice is serving as what is called conflict counsel. What that means is that I’m hired by companies to represent their employees. The reason the company’s lawyers can’t represent the employee is because there is a conflict of interest, and professional rules prohibit the representation. Now, the obvious question, and I’m sure the one you’re just too polite to ask, is—if the company’s lawyers can’t represent you, how is it that the company can pay for someone else to represent you?”
Will was thinking that very thing. It wasn’t good manners that kept him from asking, however. He assumed Jessica would address it on her own.
“That comes down to an issue of trust in me,” she said. “I am your lawyer. I’m not Maeve Grant’s lawyer. I have a professional duty to represent your interests, and your interests alone. I keep your secrets. If Maeve Grant wants to know what we’ve talked about, I tell them to go to hell. If Maeve Grant wants you to . . . for the sake of argument, take a plea deal, I tell them to go to hell. Or, on the other hand, if they want you to turn down a plea deal, I tell them to go to hell. That—and every other decision—is yours and yours alone to make. And the advice I give you to help you make that decision is rendered solely based on what I think is in your best interest. The bottom line is that the one and only time I don’t tell Maeve Grant to go to hell is when they ask me where to send the payment for my services. Then I say, ‘Thank you very much,’ and give them my wire instructions.”
Will considered he’d done well in the lawyer lottery. Jessica not only had an easy way about her, but she could also tell a story and drive home a point. He figured that she must be pretty good in court, while at the same time hoping that he would never have to test that assumption.
“The truth of the matter is that I wasn’t really selected by Maeve Grant anyway,” she continued. “Cromwell Altman recommended me to Maeve Grant for this assignment. And the reason they did that, at least I like to think this is the reason, is because they know that I’m going to represent you well. To them, that means that I’m not going to do something that will hurt Maeve Grant, because I’m smart enough to know that I can’t hurt them without hurting you much worse. Lots of people sitting where you are now don’t appreciate that. I know that Maeve Grant fired you. And I know that you owe them ten million bucks, and I’m going to take a wild guess that you don’t have it.”
Will nodded. He couldn’t explain his relationship with Eve to Jessica. Not in a way that wouldn’t make her run screaming from the office. Better for her to think that he was like all the other clients she had represented.
“Yeah. That ten million is a problem,” he said.
; “I’ve seen it all before, Will. Too many times to count, in fact. And more than enough times to know that what you want more than practically anything else is to throw gasoline all over everything and everybody at Maeve Grant and set it aflame. But believe it or not, they do not want you to go to prison either. Not because they really care about you, of course. That’s my job. Not theirs. The reason Maeve Grant doesn’t want you to go to prison is because that would be bad publicity for them.”
Prison. That was where this was heading. Will could hardly wrap his mind around what that would mean.
“Now, if there was a way that I could get you out from under all of this by turning on Maeve Grant, you need to know that I would do it in a heartbeat. I’ve done it before as conflict counsel. Maeve Grant knows that I’m not doing my job if I act otherwise. All they ask in that case is that I give them a heads-up, and sometimes I don’t even give them that if I think it’s not in my client’s best interest.”
Will had long ceased believing in things that were too good to be true, but he still had to ask. “Is that possible for me? Turning on Maeve Grant to get out from under this?”
“Right now, I don’t see it, unfortunately. Not unless you tell me that you were instructed by people above you to engage in the activity at issue. Or you alerted them to the possibility of criminal wrongdoing and they told you to be quiet. I’m assuming that none of that happened, or else you would have told that to the Cromwell Altman lawyers when they interviewed you. Am I right?”
“Maeve Grant’s Compliance department approved everything I did. Right up until they fired me.”
“I understand, but that’s a different defense. If you were going to cooperate against Maeve Grant, you’d have to admit that what you did was wrong—and that you knew it was wrong—and they ordered you to do it anyway. What’s often called the Nuremberg defense, so named after the German soldiers in World War II who were accused of war crimes and claimed that they were only following orders. By contrast, I understand you told Cromwell Altman in your interview that you didn’t think anything was wrong, and you based that assumption, in part, on the fact that Maeve Grant Compliance and your supervisors didn’t raise any concern.”
He nodded. That was his defense.
“What crimes do they think I’ve committed?” he asked.
“I’ll tell you what I’ve been told. But keep in mind that I’m getting this from David Bloom over at Cromwell Altman, and he was relaying what the US Attorney’s Office communicated to him, so there’s room for confusion because of this game of telephone. On top of that, the US Attorney’s Office might have withheld critical information from David, and David might have done the same with me. Anyway, with all those caveats, he told me that the focus of the investigation is your client”—she looked down at her notepad for his name—“Samuel Abaddon. Now, it seems that this Abaddon fellow is something of a mystery to the US Attorney’s Office. So much so that they can’t even locate him. In fact, Maeve Grant wanted me to find out from you if you had any idea where to find him.”
Will considered the question. It was hardly a surprise that would be the first order of business.
“I already told the FBI that I didn’t.”
“Is that what you’re telling me too? Like I just said, I’m not going to share this information with anyone, including Maeve Grant. But I can only do my job if I get the truth from you. Otherwise, you might as well represent yourself. You may not know the law, but at least you know the truth. And I swear to you, that’s the more important of the two in terms of keeping your freedom.”
Lying to his lawyer right off the bat was not the best approach. On the other hand, admitting he’d already lied to the FBI wasn’t much better. And, of course, given that Eve had planted evidence linking him to Sam’s murder, the last thing he wanted was for the FBI to learn that the John Doe in the Suffolk County morgue was Sam Abaddon.
“I don’t know where he is.”
Jessica nodded, but in a way that conveyed she believed there was more to the story than Will was letting on. Will felt a perverse sense of comfort that his lawyer could tell when he was lying to her, as well as some shame that he was lying even to people who were professionally obligated to keep his secrets.
Jessica didn’t call him on it, however. Instead she said, “Well, if you did know where to find him, that would be a good card to play. In fact, the only path that I can see for you to truly get out of this is to cooperate against Abaddon. So if you come across that information in the future, please be sure to tell me.”
Will nodded that he would. Jessica took a moment to read his expression, as if she was trying to memorize his tells, and then went on.
“David Bloom also said that Maeve Grant’s side of this is strictly financial. Money laundering. But he got the distinct impression the investigation went far beyond that. That’s hardly a surprise, though. Money laundering is always the midway point to criminal activity that throws off cash that needs to be laundered in the first place. So, the real Holy Grail for the prosecution is evidence that leads to the crime being committed that generated the dirty money.”
“Sam was always pretty cagey with me about how he made his money.”
“I don’t doubt it. David told me that the Assistant US Attorney wouldn’t even tell him what they suspected. But the FBI agents working the matter are out of antiterrorism.”
“Antiterrorism,” Will said, not so much a question as just repeating the statement to make it seem real.
“FBI agents move around, so it doesn’t definitely mean there’s a terrorism angle, but that is the safe assumption. Your friend Sam Abaddon was probably either supplying arms to enemies of the United States or, more likely, financing those people so they could buy their own weapons. Either way, some seriously bad stuff.”
“Jesus,” Will said. “I had no idea.”
“I’m sure you didn’t. But if you did, my job would be a hell of a lot easier. Like I said, if you help them make a case against Abaddon, you have something to trade, which puts you on track to get a reduced sentence or even an immunity deal. The more you have, the better the deal I can strike. On the other hand, if the FBI thinks you could help them but you aren’t, they’ll squeeze you until you do by threatening a very long prison term. And if you don’t eventually offer up someone else to serve that term instead? Well, guess what? It’s all yours.”
Will could barely manage a sigh. “And let me guess. They think that I can give them Sam?”
Jessica nodded. “According to David Bloom, the FBI is convinced you can lead them right to him—and provide enough evidence that they can lock him up and throw away the key.”
Will considered his options. Telling Jessica that Sam was dead meant he’d have to explain how Sam died. That would mean involving Eve, which meant that Will would likely be dead soon too.
“I can’t,” Will said, concluding it was his only way to stay alive. “Sam was just a client.”
Jessica frowned. “You can’t tell them what you don’t know. But in that case, you better buckle up good and tight. This is going to be a very rough ride.”
38.
“We only have about twenty minutes, Jasper, so I’m going to have to make this quick,” Ethan said.
He was standing, his palms flat on the table. Toolan sat before him, Gwen to his side. The venue for this discussion was the witness holding room, which was not much larger than a walk-in closet with a small round table. It lacked any windows but had two doors: one leading out to the hallway, the other into the courtroom. It was empty now because the defense had only one witness left to call: Jasper Toolan.
“It’s my strong advice that we should rest now—and do so without you taking the stand.”
Gwen could tell from Toolan’s expression that he was not going to be so easily persuaded. He was shaking his head vigorously.
“I need to tell them my side of the story, Benjamin.”
“That’s my job. During closing argument. And I know this is
hard for you to accept, but I can do it much better than you can because I’m not going to be cross-examined about it afterward.”
“It’s not the same if they hear it from you. You know that.”
“I know you want to testify, Jasper. All defendants do. But trials are fluid, and the strategic decisions have to reflect the real-time realities on the ground. Judge Pielmeier let us get in everything we needed about Jennifer’s mental state—the medication, the depression diagnosis, the prior suicide attempt. Hell, I even got her doctor to say that he didn’t think suicide was out of the question. And you know that Hannah’s testimony went better than we dreamed. But everything we’ve done so far goes away in a heartbeat if you take the stand. The moment you’re sworn in, the trial becomes about one thing and one thing only: Do those twelve men and women think you’re telling the truth?”
“And you don’t think they will?” Toolan said, challenge in his voice.
“No. I’m not saying that at all, Jasper. I’m saying there’s a risk they won’t. Testifying will be difficult and emotional for you. It doesn’t matter if everything else has been laid out perfectly for them. If your testimony contains a single lie—even about something relatively insignificant—that lie is like a drop of cyanide in an otherwise-gourmet stew. It’ll make the entire dish toxic. And my point is that this is a risk you don’t have to take. Think of it this way: You’re ahead on points in the last round of a boxing match. You’re asking me if you should go for the knockout, and I’m telling you it’s too risky. I’m not saying I don’t think you can do it; I’m saying why even try?”
The speech seemed to do the trick. At least to the extent that Toolan stopped arguing his case.
“At the end of the day, it’s ultimately your choice,” Ethan said. “If you insist on it, you can testify. I’m duty bound to let you. But remember that you’re paying me a pretty penny to maximize your chances of acquittal, and it is my very strongly held view that you should not take the stand.”
