Lethal Lawyers

by Dale E. Manolakas

  “It’s lunchtime. In case you hadn’t noticed.”

  “Tricia, hello.”

  “Hello.” Tricia took a big bite of pie and didn’t look up.

  “I need to talk to you, Sophia.”

  “I want you to leave me alone, right now.” Sophia glanced at Taylor’s table where all four were watching her.

  “We have to talk.”

  Tricia looked around the room at everyone now watching. “Why don’t you guys meet at Sophia’s office later?”

  “That would be better.” Sophia knew it was unfair to involve Tricia in this. “I’ll be in all afternoon.”

  “Good.” The detective got up without his coffee and headed over to Roger.

  He stood over Roger and said loudly enough for the whole room to hear, “I’d like to talk to you, Roger. And you, Marvin.”

  “In your dreams, Rutger. Quit looking for your promotion up our asses.” Roger turned away and talked to Joe.

  Detective Rutger stepped toward Roger, but Taylor got up and blocked the detective’s path.

  “I’m sorry, we want to cooperate and have. We care about the tragic accidents. But they were just that. Tragic, unfortunate, and untimely accidents. If any of us could help you more, we would. Now, we are having a meeting here and need to get on with it. Please excuse us.”

  Detective Rutger scoffed, “Sure. Meet away, gentlemen.”

  Taylor sat down.

  Detective Rutger walked over to Chet. The private security guards at the door didn’t blink an eye. Detective Rutger was L.A.P.D. after all.

  “Let’s get out of here, Tricia,” Sophia whispered.

  ⌘

  Chapter 84

  Buttons Not Pushed

  In her office, Sophia left the door ajar for the detective. His single-mindedness and ambition were as self-serving as those of any partner in this firm. It made him just as ruthless in her mind, and just as untrustworthy.

  As she waited, Sophia looked through the Beverly Hills Bar Association events for the month, calculating how to get a client and book of business of her own. She hoped to find a young lawyer event where a litigator like herself might make connections with transactional attorneys who could feed her a case or two.

  She had started to check her texts when Detective Rutger barged in and slammed the door.

  “Detective!”

  “I’m tired of getting the run around here.”

  “I’m sorry, but what do you expect?” Sophia was incredulous at his attitude.

  He sat heavily and with obvious frustration in a chair in front of her desk. There was a long quiet. “More, I guess . . . no, on second thought, I don’t. It could be worse couldn’t it?”

  “I think so. At least you have the Management Committee in your confidence.”

  “I guess. Sometimes I even wonder about that.”

  “Really?” Sophia saw that he was not as confident as he acted.

  “It’s you I don’t understand, though. I've tried to warn you that you are in more trouble than you think and with each body more and more.”

  “Fine. I know you want my cooperation. But you have had it. I have told you everything I know,” Sophia lied. “And I can’t tell you what I don’t . . .”

  “Before you go on . . . You have to know Ms. Rubin’s broken neck was a spiral fracture, from a twist, not from a fall. I may not be able to prove who did it, but someone did.”

  “Oh?”

  “Yes, and there’s a pattern. I don’t have anything definitive on Dante yet, but preliminarily the coroner says he had a healthy heart. And while Jim Henning may have been a case of self-defense, I believe all the others were cold-blooded murders. I’m heading up to San Francisco as soon as I testify in another case here. And I’m not coming back until I have proof Frank was murdered. I have some leads.”

  “I . . . I don’t know what to say.”

  Sophia knew this man believed himself, the way many litigators did in court—even when the law and facts were against them. And, by the look in his eyes, she believed he cared about her. But trusting him enough to accept what he said as truth was another matter.

  “You had better be careful, Sophia. I don’t think you should go to the retreat next Friday.”

  Sophia saw that he was sincerely worried for her safety, and now she thought she should be, too. But she also knew that the retreat was her chance to renew her standing at the firm.

  “I can’t do that. You know I can’t. It would be the end of my career here. The end of my legal career. And why? You said yourself you can’t prove anything. Because if you could, you already would have arrested someone.”

  “I just want you to come back from the retreat safely, if you decide to go.” Detective Rutger stood and walked over to Sophia. He took a long breath as he searched her ebony eyes. “And not because I need you for a witness. I meant that kiss.”

  She hesitated as she stood and gazed into his worried dark blue eyes that had laughed at her when they first met outside Frank Cummings’s office. Her eyes revealed an unguarded moment of fear. She lowered them.

  When she looked back up at the detective, she had the unmistakable guarded eyes of a litigator, not those of a woman afraid. She had chosen sides for her reasons, her very personal reasons. There was no going back.

  Sophia walked to her door and opened it. “I’m sorry.”

  Steve hesitated for a moment, and then he left.

  ⌘

  Chapter 85

  The Road That Should Not Have Been Taken

  During the days before the retreat, the firm “tragedies” had taken a back seat to other firm business. The Management Committee launched a campaign to rehabilitate the firm’s reputation in the press and the legal community and keep the firm’s immense power intact. A publicist assisted Chet in perpetuating the tragic spin on all three deaths and attenuating the impact of Jim Henning’s.

  With the backing of the New York office, Taylor defeated Roger for the junior partner Management Committee seat. In an attempt to appease Roger, Taylor lobbied to put a junior partner on the draw committee that determines compensation, and, specifically, Roger. Roger was not placated.

  Sophia’s parents calmed down, but Ben Kowrilsky still called her.

  * * *

  The time for the firm retreat came amongst the settling chaos. That Friday morning at ten, Paul, Tricia, and Sophia met at the office to carpool to Ojai.

  They loaded their suitcases and hanging bags into Paul’s trunk. They were looking forward to the long weekend. Tricia and Sophia looked forward to wearing the outfits they bought together the prior Sunday when Sophia, yet again, cancelled dinner with her parents. She felt so adult spending money from her own big paycheck.

  The three drove north out of the city under the gray sky; not exactly ideal weather for a retreat. The first big winter storm was forecast. It was coming from the northwest off the Pacific Ocean. It would hit with full force and dissipate inland after it reached Los Angeles.

  Sophia’s concerted effort to get business of her own and be assigned cases at the firm had failed, but she still had hope. At the retreat, she planned to network. She had discovered Toak had enemies, too, and she would cultivate them. After all, the final authority in staffing a case rested with the partner in charge.

  “I thought you were getting a Mercedes?” Tricia asked Paul from the back seat.

  “Soon. Hey, when is Jay coming to the retreat?”

  “Tonight after work. He has closing arguments in a drug trial today. After the judge charges the jury, and he’s out of there. Probably around three-thirty. Or, he may wait out the rush hour.”

  “Are you riding back with him?” Paul asked.

  “Yes. That’s the plan if he can stay ‘til Sunday. Otherwise, I’m with you guys. Changing the subject, Sophia, did you hear anything from Taylor about those creepy buzz-head security guards coming to the retreat?”

  “They’ll be there, but low profile. Evidently, they’re not as popular as they
were.”

  “I know they’re weirding-out the clients,” Paul said

  “But FYI,” Sophia added. “Taylor said the new Management Committee has refused to pay for them anymore. They won’t even split the cost with Chet and Carlisle.”

  “Good.” Paul slammed his hands on the steering wheel in celebration. “Those two have had carte blanche to waste firm money for years when they had the committee majority. Now they have to spend their own. Taylor’s doing a good job. And, the new senior partners in management haven’t stolen anyone’s clients lately . . . that I know of, anyway. It could be a new dawn for junior partners and associates.”

  “I hope so.” Sophia smiled at Tricia in the back seat. “Including me.”

  “It will be.” Paul turned on the windshield wipers as the rain started. “Hey, since you’re in the know, did the Management Committee vote to pay for a private eye to solve the ‘accidents’?”

  “They’re leaving it to Detective Rutger.” Sophia knew that he had failed, in large part, because of her. “Taylor said they decided it was a breach of their fiduciary duty to pay a private detective from firm funds when the L.A.P.D. is still full-throttle.”

  Paul laughed. “Besides, they don’t care why the three died as long as they don’t follow. Smart . . . using the ever-nebulous and flexible ‘breach of fiduciary card’ as an excuse to do or not do things.”

  “Typical,” Tricia added. “But if the ‘things’ cut into our profits and our bonuses, I agree. The accident theory works for me.”

  “If they leave it to the detective, nothing’s going to happen.” Paul turned on the windshield wipers. “I mean, what do you expect? He has no social IQ to investigate normal-people murders. He belongs with drug dealers and gang-bangers.”

  Tricia asked, “Normal-people murders?”

  “Yeah, normal-people murders. You know, people like us.”

  “White collar?” Sophia remembered her last meeting with the detective that she had kept to herself and wondered what he would find in San Francisco.

  “Yeah. Besides, who knows if they were murders? The deaths were close together— too close. No one is that stupid. Not here at this firm.” Paul quickened the windshield wiper pace. “I hope this rain doesn’t wreck the hayride and hoedown.”

  “Wouldn’t that just be a shame?” Tricia leaned forward from the back seat. “I’d be left with room service and Jay.”

  “Not shabby,” Sophia said.

  “You have Taylor,” Tricia replied.

  “I’m not so sure. Can he really have been too busy to get together for all this time?”

  “Yes.” Paul came to his fellow man’s defense. “He ran a hard campaign for that management spot. That takes dinners, lunches, and meetings. One right after another. I saw him in everyone’s office talking about new policies and selling himself. Besides, no one running for management can be seen boinking an associate. Sexual harassment!”

  “Don’t be crass, Paul.” Tricia messed the back of his hair. “They’re in love. That should be his first priority.”

  “But maybe he’s in like, not love.” Sophia wondered if she was even in like with him any longer—let alone love.

  “He’s in love,” Tricia declared. “He . . .”

  “Guys don’t have to be in love to get laid,” Paul interjected.

  “I’m beginning to hate you, Paul.” Tricia messed Paul’s hair again. “I forget you’re a guy sometimes.”

  “Don’t do that. I have to concentrate. It’s pouring, in case you haven’t noticed.”

  “Ignore Paul.” Tricia sat back in her seat and relaxed.

  “I’ll try.”

  “I say Taylor should have made the time. Girl to girl, I’ll hate him with you.”

  “You’re a good friend, Tricia.”

  “What about me?” Paul asked.

  “You’re part of the boys’ club when it comes to this stuff,” Sophia answered.

  “Did you and Taylor make plans to hook up this weekend?” Tricia asked.

  “I don’t know. We thought it might just be too public.”

  “That’s right,” Paul chimed in. “And don’t touch my hair, Tricia, but Sophia doesn’t want to be known as an associate who slept her way up.”

  “You are crude, but you are right,” Sophia replied.

  “I hate to admit it, but probably.” Tricia kept her hands to herself.

  They rode on in silence.

  Sophia looked out the window at the droplets of rain fighting against the wind and then her new Omega watch that she and Tricia had bought last weekend, too. It looked like her old Timex, but it cost a boatload. She remembered Detective Rutger’s warnings and then his kiss.

  She didn’t want to be alone with her thoughts. She just wanted to get to the retreat and find Taylor.

  “Paul, are you lost?” Sophia blurted. “We should be there by now.”

  “Relax. The rain slowed us down. We’ll be there in fifteen minutes max. Just hold your horses, Sophia. No pun intended.”

  Sophia looked at her new watch.

  “It’s almost noon. New watch. See?” She held it up for Paul to see.

  Paul glanced over.

  “That’s nice. Hey, don’t make the mistake I made and spend more than you make. It’s a treadmill of payments once you’re in debt. The firm loves that because you can never quit. They have you by the balls forever,”

  Tricia remarked, “I didn’t know you were a big spender.”

  “You don’t know a lot about me,” Paul chided.

  “How mysterious and intriguing,” Sophia laughed.

  “I am.” Paul turned off his windshield wipers. “Hey, the rain stopped. Hoedown here we come! I love barbeque and I love to sing.”

  Sophia and Tricia moaned.

  ⌘

  Chapter 86

  When Calm Is Anything But

  They arrived a little after noon at the resort. Paul slowed at the entrance to turn in. There were news vans, not many, but a few, eager to scavenge any photos they could.

  Paul pulled in and went down the long winding asphalt drive ran along the golf fairways. The massive main building was a Spanish-style three-story stucco hacienda with a Spanish tile red roof. Behind it, and spreading out, were rows of smaller two-story, architecturally compatible buildings.

  The front had expansive lawns trimmed with flowerbeds planted with multi-colored pansies and primroses for the winter months. There were multiple red Spanish tiled verandas terraced down to the lawn. The largest one near the building was covered and had tables and natural wicker furniture arranged on red Spanish floor tiles.

  “Looks like it only sprinkled here.” Paul stopped his Jag at the valet under the overhang at the entrance and popped the trunk.

  “Good.” Sophia thought about the hayride and Taylor.

  A bellhop took the sets of hanging bags and luggage from the trunk and put them on a polished-brass roller.

  The lobby was vaulted the whole three stories high, with thick dark beams across the ceiling. The textured ochre walls had oversized paintings of early California ranches and churches. The three were early enough to get rooms in the main building on the top floor. They agreed to meet for a quick lunch at one o’clock in the restaurant. After all, the firm was paying for everything.

  “This is gorgeous.” Sophia gawked up at the ceiling.

  “Yeah, I was amazed the last time. Careful, or you’ll catch a fly.” Tricia reached over and pushed Sophia’s mouth closed from her chin.

  Sophia was thrilled. She had grown up in a small one-story tract home, and her family took no vacations except to visit other relatives in other towns, in their own small houses.

  * * *

  When Sophia got to her ranch style room, she was not disappointed. While it was smaller than her room at the San Francisco Westin, it was nicely decorated in shades of coral. The bathroom was tiled in beige with multi-colored Spanish tile accents and stocked with little soaps, lotions, hair products, and a crysta
l jar of puffy white cotton balls.

  There was a fruit basket and a bottle of champagne on ice on the small table near the window. The card welcomed Sophia to the firm and her first retreat. The irony of the card’s sentiments and her being stonewalled from billables did not escape her.

  She opened the curtains to look out, both the heavy floral black out set and the opaque sheers. Her room did not overlook the golf course, but had a view of the hills in the distance. The sky was a grayish blue with unthreatening clouds hovering in patches to the west.

  She shut the sheers and unpacked. She changed into her new midnight-blue slacks and a red and blue plaid sweater and left for the dining room. She realized she was hungry and also wanted to see who else had arrived.

  ⌘

  Chapter 87

  Golf, Massage, and the Good Life

  The dining room was large, and only a few law firm people were eating. Paul waited at a table near the huge wall of French doors overlooking the golf course, putting green, and driving range.

  As Sophia sat down with Paul, she saw men from the firm outside waiting to tee off at the number one hole. Others were practicing on the putting green and driving range. She put golf on her list of things to learn more about, along with football and wine.

  “Hi, Paul. Shouldn’t you be out there with the other men?”

  “I need sustenance first.”

  Sophia laughed.

  “There’s Taylor, teeing off with Marvin and Joe,” Paul said. “Roger’s over there, practicing with Chet on the putting green. See?”

  “Yeah, and there’s one of those security guards watching.”

  Sophia remembered again Detective Rutger’s warnings, but then decided to enjoy herself and avoid Roger if she could. She put the detective’s warnings—and his overtures—out of her mind. She refocused on Taylor and her new life. He was still breathtaking to her, teeing off with his lightweight red jacket blowing against his body in the wind. He hit the ball not high, but far. It just kept going and he kept watching it. The sun came through the clouds and spotlighted him as he picked up his tee and turned, smiling victoriously at Joe.