“Are you sure?”
“Yes, absolutely.” Marcus motioned to the stairwell. “Please go upstairs. I’m sleeping downstairs. We’ll see Gary in the morning.”
“Okay,” Christine said, heartbroken.
“Murph, come.” Marcus whistled to the dog, who trundled in after him.
Chapter Twenty-six
Christine and Marcus waited for Gary in his office, sitting in the chairs across from the lawyer’s ornate desk, having been served coffee in real china cups and saucers by his niece Theresa. Christine and Marcus had barely exchanged a word this morning, avoiding each other while they’d showered and dressed for the meeting, Christine into a blue oxford shirtdress and Marcus in a tan suit with a silk tie because he was going to work later. She was going home afterwards, so they had driven here separately, which was merciful. Christine imagined that a car ride together would have been miserable.
“Hello, Nilssons!” Gary boomed, clapping his hands together as he entered his office, scampered around his desk, and plopped into his ergonomic throne. “Sorry about that! Nature called! Ring, ring!”
“Good to see you, Gary,” Marcus said stiffly.
“Yes, hi, Gary,” Christine added.
“Glad you could come in. I love that we’re jumping right on this, no waiting.” Gary opened a manila folder on his desk, extracted two slim packets of papers from inside, and slid them across his glistening desk, one to Marcus and another to Christine. “I’ll take you through our suit papers, so you understand them completely.”
“Gary,” Marcus said, calmly, “before we do that, there’s something you should know. I could explain, but I’ll let Christine.”
Gary turned to Christine, his good cheer clouding over. “Don’t tell me you got cold feet. Did you get cold feet, Christine?”
“No, it’s not that.” Christine braced herself. “This weekend, I went to Graterford Prison with Lauren, and we interviewed Zachary Jeffcoat. I pretended I was a reporter and I didn’t tell him who I really was. He told me that he’s Donor 3319.”
“Are you for real?” Gary blinked in astonishment, then broke into a grin.
“Yes, it’s true,” Christine answered, confused. She hadn’t anticipated a favorable reaction. She was expecting that Gary would be as angry as Marcus, except for the jealousy part.
“That’s amazing! You went right to the source, eh? You used self-help, I love it. I didn’t know you had it in you, teach.”
“Neither did I,” Christine blurted out, with an abrupt laugh, like a release of pressure.
Gary laughed. “With clients like you, I’d be out of business.”
Marcus looked from Christine to Gary, incredulous. “What the hell? Are you two insane?”
“Hold on.” Gary held up a hand. “Let me get the facts—”
“Gary, what facts? What other facts do you need?” Marcus shook his head in disbelief, which seemed as fresh as last night. “Don’t you realize how dangerous that was, what she did? Going into prison? I looked it up online last night, it’s maximum-security. You know the animals that are in there?”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa. Slow your roll.” Gary leaned over the desk, his smile fading. “I told you before about the plumbers in my family. That’s my father’s side. My mother’s side, they’re crooks. Petty crooks, not mobsters. Not mob. Not Mafia. Not every Italian-American is connected, is what I’m saying.”
“What’s your point?”
“That people in prison are still people. I spent my childhood visiting my uncle and my nephew in prison. They were nice guys. They made mistakes. One was an embezzler, the other got into a fight in a bar.”
Marcus bristled. “I’m entitled to be concerned about my wife and her safety.”
“Your wife was safe. She visited an inmate. People do it every day. She didn’t walk around naked in the exercise yard.”
“Gary, the man is a serial killer.”
“In a cage. The man is a serial killer in a cage.” Gary gestured at his pictures from the Serengeti. “You put a lion in a cage and he can’t hurt you—”
“Enough with the lions. We’re talking about my wife. She didn’t even tell me she did it.”
Gary didn’t bat an eye. “Marcus, I understand you don’t want your wife to do stuff like that without your knowledge. That’s a different issue. Don’t get your issues confused.”
“But it ruins the lawsuit now, doesn’t it?” Marcus motioned at the white papers on the desk.
“No, if anything, it helps the lawsuit.” Gary slid the papers back toward him. “If Jeffcoat told Christine that he’s 3319, then I would argue to Homestead that he’s waived his right to confidentiality. In other words, I would argue that they don’t have to keep his identity confidential because he’s already disclosed it. If he didn’t follow the agreement, then they don’t have to follow the agreement.”
Christine brightened, surprised. She hadn’t thought she’d hurt the lawsuit, but she hadn’t thought she’d helped it, either.
Marcus stiffened. “But what about the fact that she tricked him, that she got that information by false pretenses?”
“That’s irrelevant, legally.” Gary frowned, seeing that Marcus remained not only unconvinced, but unhappy. “Marcus, it’s all about what a court would do. It’s contract law. The reason Homestead wouldn’t disclose the identity before was because they signed a contract with Jeffcoat to keep it confidential. Once the other contracting party, namely Jeffcoat, discloses, then the only other person who would sue them for breach drops out. Jeffcoat could never sue in court for breach of confidentiality to an agreement that he’d already breached. The court would say he has ‘unclean hands’ and throw the case out.”
Marcus shook his head again, nonplussed. “Then what effect does it have? What do we do now? I don’t want to drop the lawsuit. I want to hold Homestead responsible for their negligence. It’s ruining our lives, our marriage.”
Christine swallowed hard, realizing that Marcus was right. It was ruining their marriage. She could feel it, too. She had to admit it to herself. They were in crisis. This was all happening, to them. To her. To their new family.
But Gary only shrugged in response. “Marcus, who said we’re dropping the lawsuit? We’re not. Now, what I would do is pick up the phone and see if we can do this quickly and more efficiently. I’m going to tell Homestead we have bad news for them—their donor waived, and they need to settle with us. Confidentially. Quietly. Just like before, nobody will be the wiser, they pay us to go away.”
Marcus fell silent.
Christine’s thoughts raced. “Do you think they’ll settle?”
“I would, if I were them.” Gary paused. “But, but, but. Here’s the caveat. There’s a possibility that they won’t, depending on what their insurance company tells them or their parent company. If they don’t agree, then we file our papers, just like before. We haven’t lost anything.” Gary slid his computer keyboard in front of him and hit a few keys. “But let me back up a minute. Christine, I need to get the facts about what you learned from Jeffcoat. Tell me what he told you.”
Christine filled Gary in, telling him that Jeffcoat had applied but hadn’t gone to medical school, about the religious parents, even the death of his baby sister. Gary typed as she spoke, and Christine could feel Marcus listening hard, realizing that he hadn’t gotten any of the details last night. She had a vain hope that hearing the full story might soften him up, which might have been a pipe dream. She also told them how Zachary told her his exact donor number. She didn’t say anything about going to Gail Robinbrecht’s house because it didn’t seem relevant to the fact that Zachary was their donor—and she didn’t want Marcus to hit the ceiling. Also she remembered not to call Zachary by his first name.
“So, that’s it?” Gary looked up expectantly, his small, slim fingers poised over his keyboard.
“Basically, yes.”
Marcus sipped the last of his coffee but didn’t say anything, replacing his cup in th
e saucer with a loud clink.
Gary started typing again. “Christine, do you know if Jeffcoat is represented? I like to know who my opposition is.”
“Yes, he had a public defender but I think he might be getting a private lawyer.” Christine realized that Zachary would be meeting with Griff right now, at the exact same time that she and Marcus were meeting with Gary.
Gary kept typing. “How do you know that, did he tell you?”
“I think he’s going to hire a local lawyer named Francis Griffith, from West Chester.”
“Good to know.” Gary typed away. “Griffith’s a criminal lawyer, right?”
“Yes,” Christine answered, aware that Marcus was weighing her every word. Suddenly her phone rang in her purse. “Sorry, I should have turned it off.”
“No worries, I’m no phone Nazi.” Gary typed away.
Christine reached down and slid her phone from the outside pocket, seeing that the screen read GRIFF. She pressed the red button to decline the call, but Marcus saw the screen, too.
“Wait,” he snapped. “Isn’t that the name you just said? Griff? Is that a nickname for Griffith? Jeffcoat’s lawyer?”
“Yes.” Christine slipped the phone back in her purse, kicking herself for putting Griff in her contacts list.
“Why is he calling you? How does he have your number?”
“I helped Jeffcoat get him,” Christine answered because there was no reason to lie.
“What do you mean? How did you help?”
“He had a public defender and he wanted somebody local, so I helped.”
Gary stopped typing, listening to them both, his head of glossy black hair swiveling back and forth, shiny under the lights.
Marcus frowned, confused. “You didn’t know any local lawyers, did you?”
“I made a few phone calls, it wasn’t that difficult,” Christine answered, without elaborating.
Marcus’s lips parted. “Why would you help him?”
“Because he said he’d tell me anything I wanted to know if I helped him, and I wanted to know if he was our donor, so I helped him.” Christine glanced at Gary, who sat listening, his hands still.
Marcus’s eyes flared. “He’s a serial killer, he manipulated you, don’t you see that?”
“No, he didn’t,” Christine answered, trying to reason with him.
Gary put up a hand. “Marcus, let me handle this. We need to keep it on a legal track.”
“Why? I can talk to my own wife.”
Gary turned to her. “Christine, did Jeffcoat ask you to help him get a lawyer?”
“Yes.”
“Did he ask you anything else?”
“Yes.” Christine hesitated, but whatever, it was too late now. “He asked me to pay half the retainer, which is $5,000.”
“What?” Marcus shifted toward Christine in his chair. “How could you even think of helping him?”
“I didn’t.”
“But did you consider it? How could you?”
“How could you not?” Christine thought it was time to stand up for herself. “Let’s assume that he’s innocent and behind bars for a crime he didn’t commit. That means our donor could spend the rest of his life in prison, wrongly accused. Am I just supposed to turn my back on him?”
“Yes,” Marcus answered instantly.
“Yes,” Gary added, a second later. Both men exchanged glances, then Gary turned to her. “Christine, let me explain the legal reason you can’t help him. You’re about to sue Homestead because of their negligence in using Jeffcoat as a donor. Even if Jeffcoat isn’t technically a party to this litigation, his interest is adverse to yours. He’s on their side.”
Marcus interjected, “That’s what I tried to tell her.”
Gary kept speaking to Christine. “I understand why you went to see him, and you got good information. But my legal advice to you is, this far, and no further. Capisce? Understand me?”
“I understand you.”
“Good.” Gary leaned over the keyboard, newly urgent. “Now for my non-legal advice, Christine. I’ve been in more prisons than you. I’ve known more inmates than you. I’ve known more con artists, bullshit artists, and every other artist there is. Everybody in prison says they’re innocent.”
Marcus interjected again, “Exactly.”
Gary ignored him, his dark eyes trained on Christine. “Even my uncle and my nephew, when they went before the parole board, they said they were innocent. Take it from me, they weren’t. Now, a guy like Jeffcoat, he’s in a heap of trouble. He will grasp at any straw and he can manipulate, deceive, and use you to get what he wants.”
“He asked for $2,500 for a lawyer. It’s not like he asked for the moon.”
“So far. That could just be the beginning. Besides, it might not be money that he wants from you. He can want a willing ear, a sympathetic shoulder. A friend. You’re a nice lady, and he’s got nothing but time.”
Marcus interrupted, speaking to Gary, “She doesn’t even consider that he could be lying about being our donor. Why should we even take his word for it?”
“We’re not going to, Marcus,” Gary answered calmly. “When I call Homestead, I’m going to tell them what we know and how we know it, and I’m going to ask them to confirm or deny.”
“Good.” Marcus nodded, sitting back in his chair. “He’s taking advantage of her, and she’s falling for it.”
Christine looked over. “No, I’m not, Marcus.”
“Silenzio.” Gary waved them both into silence. “You two have to get on the same page. You’re in this together. Go out to coffee, talk this over. You’re going to get through this together, you’ll see. Now, meeting’s over.”
“Thank you,” Marcus said, rising, but Christine knew it was only because he finally felt validated.
Her cell phone rang again, so she pulled it out, and when the name GRIFF reappeared, she hit the red button.
Marcus frowned. “I don’t want you to return his call, obviously.”
“Why not?” Christine stood up, getting her purse.
“We’re going to leave Jeffcoat to his own devices. You got him a lawyer, and now you have to wash your hands of him.”
Christine didn’t like being told what she could and couldn’t do. “Griff is not going to represent him if he can’t pay the retainer.”
“It can’t be our problem.”
Gary rose, flashing a forced smile. “Okay, basta! Get out of my office, you crazy kids. Go out, have a cuppa coffee together. You can figure this out. I have faith in you.”
But Christine didn’t.
Chapter Twenty-seven
“That was enlightening,” Marcus said, exhaling, when they were outside the tony brick building that housed Gary’s offices. It was located on the business end of Main Street, which morphed into one of the most expensive shopping blocks in town, containing ritzy boutiques, interior designers, a custom wedding-cake baker, and imported English antiques so exclusive that a sign in the window read BY APPOINTMENT ONLY.
“Marcus, maybe he’s right, we should just go sit down and talk a minute.”
“I can’t, I have to go, my car’s over there.” Marcus gestured to the right, where there was a small parking lot between restaurants that opened only for lunch. Dappled sun shone on the sidewalks, which were neatly swept or hosed down for the day, and the stores were just beginning to open. A pretty young salesgirl unfurled a navy-and-white striped awning over the gourmet chocolate shop, her long hair swinging each time she turned the old-school brass crank.
Christine said, “Let me walk you to your car. We can talk on the way.”
“No, where’s your car? You shouldn’t walk that much, and we don’t need to talk any more.”
“Marcus, please. Don’t you think—”
“I can’t talk right now. I have to get to work.”
“Marcus, you own the firm, you can be late. You’re clearly pissed.”
“Yes, I am. What are you going to do about it?” Marcus eyed h
er, his lips pursed.
“I can’t do anything about it except help you understand it.”
“I don’t need your help, and I do understand it. I disagree with you.”
“What do you disagree with?” Christine asked, pained.
“Everything you did. That you went there. That you’re fine with that. Even that he’s fine with that.” Marcus nodded in the direction of Gary’s office. “He thinks he understands, but he doesn’t. You think you understand, but you don’t.”
“Then make me. Explain it.”
“How do you think that makes me feel, finding out that you helped Jeffcoat get a lawyer? That the lawyer is calling you? That you call him by his nickname? That you would even consider giving him our money?”
“I wasn’t going to use our money, I was going to use my own, and I didn’t.”
“Still,” Marcus shot back, and the young girl looked over, having unfurled the awning.
“Marcus, I’m sorry if it makes you feel bad.”
“Try humiliated.”
“It shouldn’t be humiliating.”
“Well it is.” Marcus’s blue eyes looked wounded and tired. “Didn’t we learn in therapy that you’re not supposed to tell me how I should feel? Isn’t that what I learned from you and Michelle? What do you want from me?”
“Okay, well, I’m sorry you feel humiliated.” Christine felt for him, because she could see he was hurt, not angry. “I didn’t mean to humiliate you.”
“Fine, but that’s not the point either.”
Just then, Christine’s phone began ringing in her purse. “Sorry, I’ll send it to voicemail.”
Marcus stepped closer. “Check your phone. I want to see if it’s that lawyer.”
“Fine.” Christine bristled, but she slid her phone from her purse. They looked down at her phone screen, which read: GRIFF.
Marcus pursed his lips. “Man, he wants his money. Are you going to help pay for his defense?”
“I don’t know.” Christine’s hands fumbled as she hit the button to decline the call.
“You better not give him a cent, Christine. Not one cent.” Marcus’s tone turned bossy, and Christine looked up sharply.
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