“Why so much?”
“When the stock market tanked a couple years ago, a financial planner talked me into believing that whole-life insurance was a good retirement vehicle. Maybe it would have been worth something by the time I reached sixty-five. But at my age, the cash surrender value is practically zilch. Obviously the death benefit wouldn’t kick in until I was dead, which didn’t do me any good. I wanted a pot of money while I was alive and well enough to enjoy myself.”
Jack nodded, seeing where this was headed. “You did a viatical settlement?”
“You’ve heard of them?”
“I had a friend with AIDS who did one before he died.”
“That’s how they got popular, back in the eighties. But the concept works with any terminal disease.”
“Is it a done deal?”
“Yes. It sounded like a win-win situation. I sell my three-million-dollar policy to a group of investors for a million and a half dollars. I get a big check right now, when I can use it. They get the three-million-dollar death benefit when I die. They’d basically double their money in two or three years.”
“It’s a little ghoulish, but I can see the good in it.”
“Absolutely. Everybody was satisfied.” The sorrow seemed to drain from her expression as she looked at him and said, “Until my symptoms started to disappear.”
“Disappear?”
“Yeah. I started getting better.”
“But, there’s no cure for ALS.”
“The doctor ran more tests.”
Jack saw a glimmer in her eye. His heart beat faster. “And?”
“They finally figured out I had lead poisoning. It can mimic the symptoms of ALS, but it wasn’t nearly enough to kill me.”
“You don’t have Lou Gehrig’s disease?”
“No.”
“You’re not going to die?”
“I’m completely recovered.”
A sense of joy washed over him, though he did feel a little manipulated. “Thank God. But why didn’t you tell me from the get-go?”
She smiled wryly, then turned serious. “I thought you should know how I felt, even if it was just for a few minutes. This sense of being on the fast track to such an awful death.”
“It worked.”
“Good. Because I have quite a battle on my hands, legally speaking.”
“You want to sue the quack who got the diagnosis wrong?”
“Like I said, at the moment, I’m the one being sued over this.”
“The viatical investors?”
“You got it. They thought they were coming into three million in at most three years. Turns out they may have to wait another forty or fifty years for their investment to ‘mature,’ so to speak. They want their million and a half bucks back.”
“Them’s the breaks.”
She smiled. “So you’ll take the case?”
“You bet I will.”
The crack of the gavel stirred Jack from his thoughts. The jury had returned. Judge Garcia had finished perusing his mail, the sports section, or whatever else had caught his attention. Court was back in session.
“Mr. Swyteck, any questions for Dr. Herna?”
Jack glanced toward the witness stand. Dr. Herna was the physician who’d reviewed Jessie’s medical history on behalf of the viatical investors and essentially confirmed the misdiagnosis, giving them the green light to invest. He and the investors’ lawyer had spent the entire morning trying to convince the jury that, because Jessie didn’t actually have ALS, the viatical settlement should be invalidated on the basis of a “mutual mistake.” It was Jack’s job to prove it was their mistake, nothing mutual about it, too bad, so sad.
Jack could hardly wait.
“Yes, your honor.” he said as he approached the witness with a thin, confident smile. “I promise, this won’t take long.”
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I am indebted to a great many people who helped make this dream come true.
A very warm thank-you to my first readers—Carlos Sires, James C. Cunningham, Jr., Tern Pepper, Denise Gordon, and Jerry Houlihan—who were good enough friends to sullen through the truly rough drafts. Jerry was a special help. His advice and courtroom instincts proved as invaluable to me as a writer as they were to me as a young lawyer. Thanks also to James W. Hall, Deputy Sheriff and Search and Rescue Coordinator in Yakima County, Washington, for his law-enforcement expertise.
From the very start, I had the extremely good fortune of dealing with the best in the book business. Special thanks to my literary agents, Artie and Richard Pine, for patiently waiting until I got it right, and for running—and howling—like the wolves when they knew we had something. I am equally grateful to Joan Sanger, whom I met through Artie, and whose editorial guidance helped turn an outline into a novel. And Rick Horgan, my editor, was an amazing teacher. He has left his mark not just on the book, but on the writer as well. Rick is one of the many reasons I am eternally thankful for the backing of a publisher of the quality and repute of HarperCollins.
Thanks also to the lawyers, paralegals, secretaries, and staff at Steel Hector & Davis for their support and enthusiasm. I’m happy to say I’ve spent the last ten years working with friends and colleagues who are rightfully proud of what they do for a living.
Finally, my deepest gratitude goes to my wife, Tiffany, and to my family. Without your love, prayers, and encouragement, I would still be just talking about writing a book.
About the Author
James Grippando is the bestselling author of A King’s Ransom, Under Cover of Darkness, Found Money, The Abduction, The Informant and The Pardon. He lives in Florida, where he was a trial lawyer for twelve years.
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The Pardon
“Great storytelling . . . The Pardon arrives with the pistol-shot crack of a gavel cutting through a courtroom.”
Tampa Tribune
“A gripping mélange of courtroom drama and psychotic manipulation, The Pardon possesses gritty veracity, genuine characters that elicit sympathy, and superb plotting and pacing . . . A bonafide blockbuster.”
Boston Herald
“Move over John Grisham! The legal thriller of the year!”
Paul Levine, author of Mortal Sin
“One of the best novels I’ve read in a long time. I was unable to put it down.”
F. Lee Bailey
“Takes us into the seamy side of Florida law, politics, and murder . . . Grippando writes about what he knows and it’s good?”
Sunday Oklahoman
“Sensationally effective.”
Kirkus Reviews
“Grippando ratchets up the suspense every few pages . . . A promising, cleverly plotted, and taut first novel.”
Booklist
A King’s Ransom
“Fast-paced . . . hair raising . . . a great escape.
[You] won’t want to put it down.”
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
“Gripping . . . Grippando is able to make his characters jump off the pages.”
Larry King
Under Cover of Darkness
“Thrilling.”
Newark Star-Ledger
“Powerful . . . undeniably a page turner . . . Grippando wins you over.”
Miami Herald
Found Money
“A grand beach book with more twists than a licorice stick.”
New York Daily News
“Grippando writes in a nail-biting style.”
USA Today
The Abduction
“Breathless.”
Philadelphia Inquirer
“Deftly plotted political fun.”
Library Journal
“Truly dirty politics and crime . . . Hits a nerve . . . As timely as today’s headlines.”
San Francisco Chronicle
The Informant
“Spectacular effects . . . entertaining
. . . Grippando has done his homework on FBI forensics, criminal profiling, and the internal protocol for backstabbing.”
New York Times Book Review
“Surges with tension . . . an absorbing tale written with cool competence.”
Publishers Weekly
“Grippando writes with the authenticity of an insider . . . A thoroughly convincing edge-of-your-seat thriller.”
John Douglas, former chief of the FBI’s Investigative Support Unit and New York Times-bestselling author of Mind Hunter: Inside the FBI’s Elite Serial Crime Unit
Also by James Grippando
A King’s Ransom
Under Cover of Darkness
Found Money
The Abduction
The Informant
Beyond Suspicion
Copyright
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
THE PARDON. Copyright © 1994 by James Grippando. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
Excerpt from Beyond Suspicion copyright 2002 by James Grippando.
EPub Edition © SEPTEMBER 2002 ISBN: 9780061809606
First Avon Books paperback printing: May 2002
First HarperPaperbacks printing: November 1995
First HarperCollins hardcover printing: September 1994
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