The Near Death Experience (Thaddeus Murfee Legal Thriller Series Book 10)

by John Ellsworth

  “No, but I could be. By Monday, with your help.”

  “What do you say we meet tomorrow and talk this through?”

  “What time?”

  “Nine a.m.”

  “Where?”

  “Bank of America building. Three-oh-four.”

  “See you then.”

  “Mr. Millerton. I wouldn’t mention our little talk to your wife.”

  Jack looked at his wife and looked back at Wang.

  “Who said I was going to?”

  Wang smiled. “Nine a.m. then.”

  “And the lawsuit against the devil doctor. Would I be in charge of that as well?”

  Wang looked Jack over. He nodded, a gleam dancing in his eye.

  “You would.”

  Jack smiled. His chest swelled with glad anticipation.

  “That’s the whole mission. To make a case against this charlatan and hit a huge payday.”

  “Agreed,” said Wang. He stuck out his hand.

  They formed their grip and shook.

  The deal was made, it only remained now to clear away the debris (Roy) and drive ahead.

  15

  Lincoln Mascari had done his genealogy. When one was living in Sicily under blue, cloudless, Mediterranean skies, one had time to do one’s genealogy.

  His paternal great-grandfather, Salvatore Paulo Mascari, and grandmother Pietra Gaetani were married in Termini Imerese in 1879. His grandparents were married in 1910 in New York City. They were Giuseppe Mascari and Helena Gaito. His parents were married in 1937 in Chicago and he was born in Skokie in 1950. He was the eleventh of eleven children and he swore up and down that being the youngest is what had made him the meanest, for he was. Additionally, there was a world of brother and sisters, of course, like all good Catholic families. And there was a greater universe of cousins, nieces, and nephews, the majority of whom he had never met. Nor would he ever meet them, not since he had fled Skokie and returned to the birthplace of his great-grandparents in Termini.

  Like many Sicilian men returned from Chicago and New York, Lincoln Mascari had a secret.

  A secret about his money. A secret that would have to remain a secret at all costs, because the money that Mascari had arrived in Sicily claiming as his own was actually money he had extorted from Thaddeus Murfee. In return for the safe return of Murfee’s baby daughter, Mascari had received from Murfee a wire transfer of three hundred million dollars. It was money that Murfee had been awarded in court against Mascari, and it had come from the sale of a certain Las Vegas casino the court had transferred from Mascari to Murfee in satisfaction of that court award. The way Mascari saw it, he had only taken his money back. Money that was his in the first place. It honestly never occurred to him that Murfee might be seeing it differently.

  Every morning at seven o’clock, Mascari went down to the docks and walked along the sidewalk, smelling the salt air, the scents pouring out of the holds of the oceangoing vessels at moorage, and the abundance of fish markets along the way. He was so taken with the return to his roots that he had even returned to the Church of his youth and was once again actively practicing his faith. And so after walking for an hour, he then appeared at the daily eight o’clock Mass. Mention of the extortion of Murfee’s money had never pierced the panel separating priest from penitent during any trip to the confessional. In fact, it was buried in Mascari’s brain so deep that he had forgotten all about it and presumed everyone else had, too. No, in his confessional, Mascari stayed on the safe topics: lust of the eyes, yelling at the wife, cursing at the butcher, cheating at Friday night poker: minor sins that were just bad enough to demand dogged Hail Marys. And so Mascari was repentant but shunned going so far as sackcloth and ashes. And shunned going so far as returning Murfee’s money to him. Or asking forgiveness of the young lawyer for kidnapping his two-year-old baby girl, taking her out into the desert north of Las Vegas, and abandoning her there in a fallen-in shack without water or comfort, to die.

  It had taken him a full year to hide. Which included time to cover his tracks. There was new identity: Zurich. There was plastic surgery: Geneva. There were banking ministrations complex enough to make even the Cayman officials lose track. There was travel around the globe under three different names claiming three different nationalities claiming three different hairstyles, disguises, and backgrounds. The final goal had always been Sicily, of course. But no one ever came to Sicily directly from Chicago. It just wasn’t done.

  Before ever entering Sicily, Lincoln Mascari had taken care of one last little problem: his name. It was changed by using the names of his forebears Salvatore Paulo Mascari and Pietra Gaetani. His new name was Salvatore Paulo Gaetani. All driver’s licenses, passports, official documents and banking documents were changed to reflect the new identity. At last, Lincoln Mascari felt safe.

  There was, however—as there always must be—one loose thread in all this. That thread was in Palermo—100 miles west of Termini, at a lawyer’s office. His name was Edoardo De Filippo. “Edoardo” loosely translates to “keeper of the richness,” and it was this role to which Edoardo had been born, raised up, and trained. He was a Sicilian Mafia lawyer, a man surrounded by bodyguards, and the overseer of great wealth not his own. He had taken the oath of omertà and if he traded on any client’s secret he could expect to be suddenly and mercilessly killed, but not before watching his attackers first kill his wife, his children, and his children’s children right before his eyes.

  But there was a tell. There is always a tell. Unlike the understated grays and blacks of his Sicilian neighbors, Edoardo’s wardrobe ran to the light greens, soft blues, luminescent oranges, and daring yellows of the Italian fashion world. He was a fashion peacock and kept not one but two walk-in closets for himself inside the five-hundred-year-old house he shared with his wife and quartet of children.

  It was this colorful plumage that would prove to be his undoing. That and a change of name.

  16

  The court set its first status conference in Conservatorship of Nadia Turkenov v. Emerick Sewell for eleven a.m. Friday. Thaddeus was ordered to attend, not his associate.

  Boomer Magence arrived at 9:20 a.m. from L.A. Boomer was larger than life, and came into the airport wearing a $3000 Valentino Newman suit with French cuffs and diamond cufflinks, a $500 navy silk tie with a diamond pen, and Italian sunglasses that Thaddeus was sure they weren’t selling at Walgreen’s. The famous Hollywood lawyer brought along his associate attorney, M.J. Jones. Jones was more caddy than lawyer, scurrying after the baggage as Boomer swept Dr. Sewell into his arms and embraced him, air-kissing both sides of his head Continental style. Thaddeus was then introduced by Sewell to Boomer, who took little notice of Thaddeus because Thaddeus was only involved in the case at all, in Boomer’s view because Boomer wasn’t licensed to practice law in Arizona and needed local counsel so he could appear pro hac vice. Thaddeus had been selected by Sewell’s Hollywood agent as local counsel. Upon seeing his new co-counsel, Thaddeus groaned, knowing how rural juries in Arizona would be immediately put off by such puffery. After bags had been retrieved, they loaded into Thaddeus’ SUV and headed back to town.

  They seated themselves at Thaddeus’ desk at the office.

  “As I understand, Mr. Murfee, you practice in both Chicago and Flagstaff?” said Boomer.

  “Correct. We’re eventually going to be free of Chicago and all cases will then originate in the West.”

  “I don’t follow that. Chicago’s where the money’s at. Seems like damn poor planning, to me. Dear,” said Boomer to Katrina, who had arrived from the receptionist’s desk to lend a hand, “do you suppose you could rustle up a mocha latte for me?”

  “There’s the Starbucks on the corner,” she said to Thaddeus, “should I leave the phones and go down there?”

  Thaddeus said he thought BAT could handle the phones while she ran the errand. He rolled his eyes at her when no one was watching and she understood. Tom Terrific would be catered to, she understood, but just
so far. She had seen Thaddeus rain down on visitors who overstepped before. She hurried out to the elevator.

  “Where were we? Oh, yes, your leaving Chicago. Well, never mind. I just received a letter from Physicians’ Mountain Mutual Insurance, our good doctor’s malpractice carrier. They are going to defend the case, but with a reservation of rights.”

  Thaddeus frowned. “May I see it?”

  Boomer Magence handed over the letter. It was a serious development in the case, for a reservation of rights letter was an insurer's notification to an insured that coverage for a claim might not apply. Such notification allowed an insurer to investigate a claim without waiving its right to later deny coverage. Thaddeus read on. The insurer was using the reservation of rights letter because all the insurer had so far were various unsubstantiated allegations in the complaint and, at best, a few confirmed facts.

  “This isn’t good, Dr. Sewell,” Thaddeus said to his client, and then explained what it meant and what it might portend: that the carrier could at any moment jerk the rug out from under him, stop paying his lawyers, and claim a situation where there was no insurance coverage.

  “But do I still have insurance?” asked the doctor.

  “Dear man,” said Boomer, “I’ll sue them for you if they get out of line. Not to worry.”

  “Well, it’s actually a little more serious than that. Of course, Mr. Magence can sue them, but in the meantime you would have to pay your lawyers yourself and there would be no insurance to cover your loss if the other side did prevail against you. It’s not a welcome development at all.”

  “Are you still willing to serve, Thaddeus?” said the doctor.

  “Sure I am. We can always work something out.”

  “But I would have to bow out,” said Boomer laconically, drumming his fingers on the desk. “I wonder what happened to my mocha latte?”

  “We’ve got about ten minutes to get over to the courthouse and get situated,” Thaddeus said. “I suggest we walk across the street now.”

  Boomer sighed. To M.J., he said, “You wait here. When my drink arrives, bring it right across the street to the courthouse. Room—”

  “Judge Raul Mendoza’s court. Third down on your right, second floor.”

  “Yes, sir,” said M.J., acting as if this was the daily routine he had signed on for. Which, in fact, it was. Thaddeus wondered if the man ever practiced law—probably not, not from within the shadow of Tom Terrific.

  The men walked across the street. It was early May and there was still a chill in the air. But overhead the sky was crystal blue and the mountains shimmered in the north, still snow-capped, still visited by nighttime snows and howling winds, while down below, there in Flagstaff, mere mortals enjoyed milder weather.

  * * *

  Raul Mendoza had run for governor in the last general election and was still licking his wounds from the thrashing he had received at the hands of the Phoenix candidate, one Lemuel Goddard, a Republican, who had carried all counties. Mendoza had won his hometown of Flagstaff, Democrat though he was, and now vowed he’d never run for public office again. The lawyers cooled their heels in his outer office while Judge Mendoza hovered over his desk, clearing away new filings and dictating minute entries for Edwarda to keyboard and distribute. He was a dour, middle-aged Basque, descended from three hundred years of shepherds who still toiled in the high valleys and plains of the Coconino and Kaibab forests. He wore progressive eyeglass lenses which forever had him reaching for coffee cups that weren’t precisely where the lenses said they were, so it wasn’t uncommon for the files that crossed his desk to be stained with coffee spills and cigarette ash from the Camels he chain-smoked. The courthouse—and his office—was a non-smoking building but, as Chief Judge, Mendoza had entered a special order for his own office, allowing smoking within the Judge’s chambers.

  Edwarda came into the Judge’s office and shut the door behind her.

  “Quite a crowd out there. One of them is some important dude out of L.A.”

  “Good. I’m not quite ready.”

  “Yessir.”

  “Five minutes, then send them in.”

  “Yessir.”

  Five minutes later, they clamored into the office without further ado. Boomer immediately took a seat in front of the judge and Ellen Roddgers took the other one. Ellen was a solid citizen in Thaddeus’ view; a competent, outspoken attorney who didn’t suffer fools, especially misogynist lawyers who dared cross her. Boomer knew none of this, of course.

  “Okay,” said Judge Mendoza. “We’re on the record in my chambers. First some housekeeping. Ellen, you’re representing who?”

  “I’m here for Roy Underwood.”

  “And he is—”

  “He is the younger brother of the ward, Nadia Turkenov. Roy has received a petition to substitute conservators filed by Jack Millerton, his niece’s husband.”

  “And who has that case?”

  “You do, Your Honor,” said Milbanks Wang, the lawyer for Jack Millerton in his effort to unseat Uncle Roy Underwood.

  “And you represent who?”

  Milbank leaned forward dramatically. “As of this moment, I represent Nadia Turkenov in her lawsuit against Dr. Sewell. I am representing her through the conservator, Roy Underwood, but I’m trying to substitute in Jack Millerton for him. Jack is a CPA and—”

  “Whoa, hold it,” said the Judge, leaning away from the throng in exasperation. “You’re telling me you’re representing two clients with competing interests? Isn’t that a conflict of interest, Milbanks?”

  “Technically, yes, I supp—”

  “Naw, I think it’s more than technically, Mil. I think you’ve got an ethical thing going on here that you need to straighten out before we can proceed with you involved. For the record, I’m going to show the ward, Nadia Turkenov, as being unrepresented at today’s hearing. You’ll not be asked to speak on the record again, Mils. Not until you come back to me with an agreed order involving your two clients. Ms. Roddgers will, of course, be involved as she also appears for Roy Underwood although you’re still, technically and legally, representing him by order of the court appointing him to serve as conservator. Either the first one agrees to stay and the second agrees to bow out, or the first agrees to bow out and the second agrees to stay. We need that for you to proceed.”

  “Let us take them into the outer office and hash it out, Judge.”

  “Be my guest.”

  “Roy and Jack? Would you come with us, please?”

  “I don’t think so,” said Roy. “I need to stay here and represent my sister. Ms. Roddgers is gonna help me now.”

  “The judge just said you can’t speak on the record,” said Milbanks Wang.

  “No, he said you couldn’t. He didn’t say anything about me.”

  “Tell you what, Roy,” said Judge Mendoza. “I won’t take any action regarding your sister until her rights are secured by a sitting conservator. So you’re free to go out and discuss this matter with your attorney and Mr. Wang. Who is also your attorney.”

  Roy swelled out his chest. “Wang is not my attorney. Not after this!”

  “Well, go talk to your ex-attorney, then. This needs to be resolved.”

  Roy stood and glumly followed Wang and Millerton and Roddgers out of the chambers. At which point, Boomer Magence rolled his eyes at the judge and said, “May we get on with it?”

  Judge Mendoza leaned forward. “And who might you be?”

  “I’m the attorney for Dr. Emerick Sewell, the defendant in the lawsuit we’re here on.”

  “I don’t have an entry of appearance for you in the file. Only from Mr. Murfee. Good morning, Thaddeus. Be right with you.”

  “Good morning, Your Honor. Mr. Magence has brought along a motion to appear pro hac vice. Maybe he can hand that to you now.”

  With a flourish and a flutter, Magence handed over his motion. “Signed, sealed, and delivered,” he said.

  Judge Mendoza took the pleading and placed it face down on hi
s desk without reading.

  “So you think Dr. Sewell needs two lawyers on his case? Are you licensed in Arizona?”

  “No, my motion goes into all that.”

  “Well, what makes you think that a lawyer who knows nothing about Arizona law and procedure would be helpful in an Arizona medical malpractice case in my courtroom?”

  Thaddeus felt his limbs warm up a degree or two. Judge Mendoza was known to bend over backward to help deserving litigants, no matter who they happened to be. But out of town—much less out-of-state—lawyers were not given quite the same freedom as local counsel were given. Thaddeus could see that Magence had his work cut out for him. And he was glad for that. He had decided on the walk over that he didn’t want the guy on the case at all and worried that Magence could only hurt the doctor’s presentation in front of a local jury. The guy was a liability and Thaddeus was hopeful the judge would disqualify him.

  “What makes me think I would be helpful? Judge, do you know anything about my eighty-five-and-oh jury trial record in Los Angeles County?”

  Judge Mendoza sat back and folded his arms on his chest. “Do I know about your record? No, and I don’t really give a damn about your record. I’m concerned about your record in Arizona courts and you, sir, have none. Mr. Murfee, is Mr. Magence essential to your defense of this case?”

  Thaddeus was suddenly thrust into the middle of it, something he had hoped to avoid.

  “Essential? I don’t know. I’m sure he would be helpful.”

  “You sound less than enthusiastic.”

  “Your Honor, I only met Mr. Magence just this morning. I’ve never seen him appear in front of a jury or even a judge. So in all honesty, I’m afraid I’m not going to be much help.”

  “Put it this way, then, Thaddeus: do you want him on your team?”

  Booker Magence swung around and stared daggers at Thaddeus. While he did, the judge continued.

  “And what about the defendant himself, Dr. Sewell? Do you want this man defending you in an Arizona court when he’s never appeared in Arizona and definitely isn’t licensed in Arizona?”