Exit Strategies

by Catherine Todd

  Meaning he wished I hadn’t. I felt a flush creeping up my chest toward my neck, heading north. “I might need to engage you to remove the trustee,” I told him. I wanted to make it clear I wouldn’t expect anyone at the firm to work for free, although I certainly wouldn’t object to a discount.

  Taylor made a sort of strangled sound. “That’s putting the cart way before the horse. This is just an informal chat between colleagues. Nothing more, right?”

  I didn’t understand his insistence. “I guess so,” I told him.

  “I’m sure Lauren’s explained to you how difficult it is to effect any significant change in a matter like this.”

  I nodded.

  “I don’t know all the particulars in this case, of course, but you must realize that conflicts of this nature often occur when the beneficiaries of a trust have opposing interests. The current beneficiaries need high-income yields to meet their present needs, while those who expect to inherit the principal eventually have a strong bias toward capital growth. And in this case, where a very young child is involved, so many unexpected situations may arise that could affect the need for income, it’s virtually impossible for a trustee to satisfy all those needs without walking on water.” He gave me a sad little smile.

  “Surely education expenses are a primary need that should be covered by the trust,” I said.

  “Certainly, but to what extent? Suppose a beneficiary wanted to put himself through law school, then med school, in order to become a medical malpractice lawyer. Should the trust cover all of that? It’s discretionary on the part of the trustee.”

  “But—”

  “And I have to say,” he said, not meeting my eyes, “that it appears the trustor—your late ex-husband—had a great deal of faith in the trustee. He’s given her very broad powers of discretion—including the ability to add beneficiaries, if she wishes—and there are certain—ahem—built-in disincentives for attempting a removal.”

  “My ex-husband was probably expecting this,” I muttered.

  Taylor raised his eyebrows. “It’s a reasonable safeguard to protect the assets from being squandered in some prolonged legal battle.” He smoothed the edges of the papers in front of him. “Look, the trust was drafted by a highly reputable law firm. There is a degree of oversight by a team of accountants. Generally, in such cases, it’s very, very difficult to get the courts to overturn the terms of the trust or remove a trustee unless there’s some flagrant abuse on the part of the trustee—like taking the proceeds to pay for a new sports car for herself or something like that. Any attack on the trustee would almost certainly result in the trustee’s demanding a full accounting, and the cost of the entire process would come out of the assets of the trust. So unless you can prove…”

  “What about the offshore investments?” I asked.

  His hands stilled. “What?”

  “The offshore investments. Carole’s put the assets of the trust into some harebrained investments in the Cayman Islands—”

  “There’s nothing ‘harebrained’ about such investments. There are very good reasons for putting your money offshore,” he said.

  “Then why did they all go—what did the accountant say?—‘belly-up’?”

  “Not all of them, surely?” he said, looking pale.

  “Probably not,” I admitted. “I’m not sure. But enough to reduce the income of the trust and probably a significant amount of the principal. Isn’t that reason enough to stop her from losing more?”

  He shook his head. “A trustee is not legally responsible for unhappy investment results as long as he or she uses a reputable adviser. There are no guarantees on return of investment, Becky. In any event, what was lost today might be regained down the road.”

  “How do I know the advice is reputable? The accountant says the Cayman Islands have secrecy laws that can’t be breached.”

  He studied his hands carefully. “I’m afraid that’s true, actually.”

  This couldn’t be happening. I couldn’t be so totally helpless. “Well, what would you advise, then?”

  “Speaking informally,” he said, “what is it that you want?”

  “Right now I want the money for my son’s tuition,” I told him.

  He rubbed his temple with his thumb. “Then if I were you, I’d probably go talk to the trustee again. It’s worth a try.”

  “That’s it? Go hat in hand to Carole? Let her get away with—”

  Taylor raised a hand to stop me. “Getting emotional won’t help. It’s up to you what you want to do about it. You can fight it and take it to court if you want to, but it will cost you and your children a great deal of money, and in the end I don’t think you’ll succeed. You asked for my opinion. There it is.”

  “I appreciate your candor,” I told him. I did, in a way. It was better to know at the outset what the likely outcome would be. It’s just that I felt as if someone had emptied a very large bucket of ice water on my plans for the future.

  He studied me thoughtfully. “I hope you do. Sometimes the hardest part of being a good lawyer is knowing when not to fight.”

  “Lauren said the same, in essence. But if I do decide to fight—”

  “Let’s not even think about that now. Lauren is a brilliant lawyer. You can learn a lot from her.” He leaned forward solicitously. “I hope you know I’m very, very sorry about all this.” He put his hand on my wrist. I looked down. His watch had a platinum face, a bit on the gaudy side.

  “Thank you,” I said noncommittally. I was busy with my own thoughts, which were mostly of the monetary kind.

  “If money’s a problem…” he said.

  I lifted my eyes to his.

  “What I mean to say is, if things continue going so well with Crystol Enterprises, I think you can count on a substantial bonus this year.”

  “Thank you,” I said again, with more enthusiasm.

  I stood up to go before Taylor started glancing at his watch.

  “Hope it all works out,” he said. “Oh, and Becky?”

  I turned at the door.

  “How’s your mother?”

  “Fine,” I said. “Thank you for asking.”

  “Good,” he said. “That’s really great news.”

  “How did it go?” Lauren asked me when I had staggered back to my office.

  “Not that well,” I said. “I’m sort of stunned.”

  “Is the firm going to represent you?” she asked.

  “I’m not even supposed to think about that. I’m not supposed to do anything but say, ‘Pretty please, Carole, won’t you give me more money for my children?’” I said bitterly. “I’m just not sure I can leave it at that.”

  “I did warn you that might be the case, Becky,” Lauren said. “I’m sure Taylor gave you the best possible legal advice. He is an expert.”

  “I’m not even sure it was legal advice,” I said, remembering the conversation. “He kept stressing that it was just an informal chat.”

  “Really?” asked Lauren. “Maybe he just didn’t want you to feel financially obligated.”

  “Maybe,” I said.

  “So what are you going to do?”

  “I’m not sure,” I told her.

  “Try to do something to take your mind off of it,” she said. “Sometimes the best inspiration sneaks up on you.” She grinned. “Get out of here. Go shopping.”

  “I have something else in mind,” I told her.

  “Shit,” Isabel said, when I told her about my meeting with Taylor. “I can’t believe there’s nothing you can do.”

  “It’s not so much that there’s nothing I can do, but that any victory is going to be Pyrrhic,” I told her. “At least if I understand it correctly. He was definitely warning me off taking the issue to court.”

  “For your own good?” Isabel asked.

  “I know. I hate it when people say that too. There’s always another agenda.” I took another bite of chocolate cheesecake, my surefire take-your-mind-off-it, let-inspiration-sneak-up-on
-you remedy for depression.

  “Does Taylor have another agenda?”

  “I don’t know. The advice is reasonable, even if unwelcome—I have to give him that. But he was so…I don’t know, elusive. He kept insisting on the ‘informality’ of our little talk, like he thought I was going to try to get him to commit to something he found distasteful.”

  Isabel made a rude noise. “Men!”

  I smiled. “Yes, but there’s something more to it I can’t put my finger on. It bothers me.”

  “Not, I take it, his devastating sex appeal?” Isabel asked lightly.

  “Missing in action, at least for the moment. No. I’ll think of it eventually. In the meantime…”

  “Yes?” Isabel prompted me.

  “In the meantime I have to come up with some options. I have to start thinking outside the box.”

  “Outside the box? That sounds like geek speak.”

  “My recent association with dot-com billionaire wannabes has not been entirely wasted,” I said.

  “So what does it mean?” she asked me.

  “I’m not sure,” I said, licking chocolate off my fingers. “I’ve read that if you have to worry about thinking outside the box, you’re already so far inside the box the whole exercise is futile. But I have to try. If a frontal assault on Carole and the trust is counterproductive, I’ll have to think of some other line of attack. I don’t know yet. But I do know I’m not giving up!”

  “Good for you,” Isabel said. “Let me know if I can help. And, um, Portia?”

  I laughed. “‘My deeds upon my head! I crave the law.’”

  “I hate English majors,” she said. “Always showing off. As I was about to say, you won’t forget my little dinner party, will you?”

  I hesitated. I was scarcely in the mood. Plus I might never be hungry again after my 965-calorie cheesecake orgy.

  “You promised,” she said in a warning tone. “It’s all set up.”

  “Right, sure,” I said, giving in. “I’ll be there.”

  As Taylor said, sometimes the hardest thing was knowing when not to fight.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Isabel’s little dinner party turned out to be a major charity event, a fund-raiser for the hospital, the kind you see written up in the back of San Diego magazine or the society pages of the paper. I didn’t know until I’d already agreed to go that it was in that category. I’d run the gamut of these parties when I was Mrs. Dr. Pratt—the dedication of the new endoscopy center, the afternoon of food and wine to benefit hunger relief, the opening of the Rat Lab at the medical school.

  Okay, I’m kidding about the last one, but really, these events are totally lacking in irony. I mean, does anyone really want to stand around munching caviar on toast to celebrate a place that sticks tubes up your hind end or down your throat? Doesn’t anybody see the ridiculous incongruity of consuming 5,500 calories in homage to those who don’t have enough to eat? What difference does it make whether someone appeared at such-and-such an event in an Anna Molinari jade-green knit dress? Well, it makes a difference to the someone, and that’s what inspires attendance at such functions. But I had definitely had enough to last me a lifetime, and now that I was no longer dispensing my ex-husband’s largesse, I couldn’t afford them anyway.

  Not only that, but my date was a doctor and a Texan, two groups that tend, for various reasons, to make me nervous. I don’t have to explain about the doctors. Texans make me nervous because they make me feel undersized and inhibited, plus their social norms are not in sync with those of the rest of the country. They play by their own rules, and if you aren’t a Texan too, you don’t know what those are. This makes them unpredictable, although interesting.

  It was too late to lose seven pounds so that I could fit into the dress I’d worn the last time I went to a formal event. I pulled the dress out of the closet anyway to see if the seams were big enough to be let out. I’d thought that if I starved for a couple of days beforehand and was very lucky it might work. It was just a simple black sheath, the kind you wear if you want to show off really good jewelry. Ha, but at least the style wasn’t hideously dated.

  “Too tight,” the alterations lady at the cleaners told me, her mouth full of pins.

  “I know,” I told her sadly, looking in the mirror at the zipper, which was losing its struggle to close. “Can you make it bigger?”

  She looked dubious. “Very weak material.”

  “What?” The dress had cost a fortune in the old days.

  “Weak. If I let out, there will not be big enough seams. You see?”

  I saw. “Try anyway,” I told her. “I don’t want to have to buy a new one.”

  She nodded sympathetically. “Okay. But don’t bend over, all right?”

  My date, Lyman Wilson, might have come from a part of the world where it is not unheard of for people to have multiple first names (Johnny Bob, Billy Ray) and wear reptile boots to church, but he bore not the slightest resemblance to J.R., to my great relief. In fact, he turned out to be—not to gush too much—divine—charming and funny and perfectly at ease. He was an oncologist in San Antonio, out visiting his older brother for a couple of weeks while attending a medical meeting at the Hotel del Coronado.

  The only tiny fly in the ointment was that at the very moment little Lyman was emerging into the world ready to take on the birthright of brains and good looks that was patently his, little Rebecca Weston was riding her bicycle off to fourth grade. Or maybe fifth. Not that going out with someone younger has ever stopped older men, but it made me a little uncomfortable, mostly because I wasn’t sure how he would feel.

  If Lyman was less than delighted by what he had won in Dating Lotto, he didn’t show it. He did ask me if I was a partner at RTA.

  “An associate,” I told him. “A first-year associate.” I smiled. “I got a late start.”

  He laughed. “Grandma Moses got a late start. Yours is just leisurely. How’s it going?”

  “I’m not sure,” I told him. “It’s appalling how much I don’t know.”

  He nodded. “It’s like being an intern, or even a resident. You just have to hope you don’t kill anybody.”

  “I guess I should feel relieved that the consequences for lawyers aren’t usually that dire,” I said. “Although there’s always the possibility of getting sued for malpractice.”

  We both shuddered. It looked like the start of a very promising evening.

  Hotel ballrooms all have the same look. Glitzy chandeliers, pastel hues, snowy tablecloths over round tables. A big podium in front, from which to be (1) thanked, (2) exhorted to give more money, and (3) bored.

  A few acquaintances from palmier days were kind enough to greet me with enthusiasm, although I hadn’t seen or heard from them since my divorce.

  “Becky,” cried Dorothy Beekman, offering me a scented cheek to kiss. As I did, I got a close-up of her Mikimoto pearls, the size of gumballs or sparrows’ eggs. They were much more impressive than diamonds. “It’s been absolutely ages.”

  “It’s lovely to see you, Dorothy,” I said obediently. I introduced Lyman, who gave her a long, easy grin and called her “ma’am.” For just an instant, I could see the memory of appetite flicker across her face. Despite that and the world-class pearls, however, the intervening years had not been kind to her. Her skin looked dry and stretched, and she had dark shadows under her eyes. Her arms beneath the too-bare sleeves looked flaccid and very thin.

  “And I hear you went to…what? Med school?” she asked me.

  “Law school,” I told her.

  “So you’re a…”

  “An attorney,” I said.

  “Oh, a lawyer,” she said, in the tone in which people always say it, as if it were a species you’d walk right by at the pound. I was always tempted to remind them that Abe Lincoln and Thomas Jefferson were lawyers too, but recent revelations about the doings at Monticello made it somewhat dangerous to invoke historical icons.

  “Isn’t that wonderful?�
� she added kindly.

  “Thank you,” I said.

  “Have you found your table?” she asked.

  “We can’t just sit anywhere?”

  “Oh no,” she said, sounding shocked. “It’s all prearranged.”

  Isabel was beaming and beckoning like a mother whose child has just won first place in the talent show. She wanted to show me how gratified she was that I’d shown up, although I saw her do a quick double take when she got a glimpse of Lyman. So much for her foolproof checkup procedures, I thought, but I was starting to mind less. In fact, I wasn’t minding at all that my debut date was attracting attention for his charm and good looks.

  “We’re at this table,” she said cheerily. “They’ve put us all together.”

  “Us,” so far, consisted of Isabel and Lyman’s brother Daniel, Lyman and me, a well-dressed older couple I didn’t know, and Mark Lawrence with a tall, thin, glamorous-looking woman who was clinging to him as if he were the last lifeboat on the Titanic. She was definitely not the dusky beauty from Jonathan’s. He seemed to get around.

  There were two empty seats.

  Mark smiled at me. “Hi, Becky.”

  “Hello.” Suddenly, all the rules of introduction I’d memorized in Girl Scouts deserted me. Whom should I introduce first? What should I say about each person? Where was Miss Manners when you needed her? “This is, um…”

  “Lyman Wilson,” said Lyman, reaching across the table with a manly handshake.

  “This is Maria Oblomova,” Mark said. He completed the introductions.

  “We’re the Seftons,” said the woman next to me. She was wearing black, like three-quarters of the rest of the room. “Dr. and Mrs.”

  “Pathology,” Maria said to me.

  I wondered if I could have heard her correctly. “I beg your pardon?” I had momentarily recovered my manners.

  “Pathology,” she reiterated. “My specialty. What’s yours?” She looked me up and down in a manner I was starting to dislike.