Case of Lies

by Perri O'shaughnessy

  “‘All right,’ he says. ‘You give somebody a message for me.’ I said, ‘Anything.’ He says, ‘Tell Nina Reilly I didn’t kill Hanna’s wife.’ I said, sure. He said, ‘Some other fucker did her. Tell her. You going to tell her like I said?’ I told him I would tell you.

  “So here’s your message,” Bova said. He had lifted his head as the words rushed out. Now he lay back and a groan issued from his torn lips.

  Nina bit her lip. She sat back on her heels. Betty Jo and Wish watched.

  The clock on the wall ticked loudly. The ice machine next to the vending machine right through the wall made clunking sounds. From somewhere came faint laughter.

  “You have any more questions, you can ask tomorrow,” Betty Jo said. “Let’s get you back to Incline,” she told Bova. Wish helped Bova, who was still holding the towel with ice to his face, to his feet, and Betty Jo opened the door and looked around carefully. Her Porsche SUV was right out front.

  “It looks safe,” she said. “But then, we don’t know anything anymore, do we?” All three of them got Bova into the passenger seat, lying almost flat and covered with a blanket.

  Betty Jo shut the passenger door. “Well?” she said to Nina. “I’m not a criminal lawyer. I’m not used to this. I like Jimmy. You have any explanation for Flint’s statements?”

  “Sounds like he didn’t shoot Mrs. Hanna,” Wish said.

  “That’s what the man said,” Betty Jo told him drily.

  “You want us to caravan up to Incline with you? To make sure you get home all right? Would that be okay, Nina?”

  “Yes, let’s do that,” Nina said. It took forty minutes, even so late, to drive the dark lake road to the North Shore and Betty Jo’s mansion on Champagne Way. Wish scouted around and then they brought Bova into the house. Betty Jo’s little old husband stood guard at the door, holding a big dog with a powerful head on a tight leash. He wasn’t smiling anymore, but he didn’t look frightened.

  After Bova was safely in the house, Betty Jo came back out. She handed Nina a bottle of French wine. “Thanks for the guard duty,” she said.

  “You don’t have to do that.”

  “It’s also an apology. I realize our interests are different. I think I’d be taking the same steps you’re taking if I were on your side. Which I am not. But when this case is over, let’s have lunch. If you don’t mind me sailing in on the Good Ship Lollipop.”

  Nina smiled.

  “Drive safe.” Betty Jo smacked the side of the Bronco like it was an old stallion.

  Wish drove back, leaving the windows cracked so he wouldn’t get drowsy. They were alone in a postcard winter wonderland. A brilliant half-moon duplicated itself in a water-moon on the vast lake. Snow clumps fell from the trees and he had to run the wipers now and then.

  When they were almost home, Nina said, “Wish? Are you positive Elliott went back to Seattle?”

  “Positive? He had his ticket. He was in the line inside.”

  “That’s all you know?”

  “You think it was him? Elliott-he couldn’t hurt someone. He couldn’t get that angry. It couldn’t be him, Nina.”

  “There are some psychiatric conditions-”

  “But why would he hurt James Bova?”

  “I’m just asking,” Nina said. “Wish, first thing in the morning, call Roger Freeman. Tell him about the attack. Tell him he needs protection and so does Dave. We need to get the Placerville police involved in this too.”

  “Who is this guy?”

  “I hope to learn more about that tomorrow in Palo Alto.”

  29

  NINA STRAPPED INTO THE LUXURY LEATHER seat and the Cessna took off. They flew due west and left the white Sierra range behind. She watched a cross-section of California unwind below as they flew from Tahoe to the San Francisco Peninsula: greening foothills, the still-dusty San Joaquin Valley with Sacramento and an endless maze of subdivisions and freeways surrounded by patchwork fields of almonds and tomatoes, then on to San Francisco Bay, the city itself shrouded in a fog bank to the north, a long flat bridge below that rode close to the quiet water, and finally the easy runway of the Palo Alto private airport.

  A black Lincoln awaited. Nina thanked the pilot and said hello to the driver. She wore a blue silk suit and round-toed Jimmy Choos, and carried her new briefcase. She was deeply worried about the safety of just about everybody-Sandy, Dave, even Cheney, unable to predict Lee Flint’s demented steps. She carried a hope within her that XYC, Inc. would have an answer or two.

  ***

  Five men sat on the other side of a polished mahogany conference table. In a perfect illustration of Silicon Valley schizophrenia, one wore jeans and a wrinkled button-down shirt, and four wore expensive suits. The jeans guy had a beard going gray. He sat in the middle.

  She had entered the penthouse of a five-story building that seemed to be owned entirely by XYC’s outside law firm. The plate-glass window had a view of the clock tower and terra-cotta buildings of Stanford University.

  “Gentlemen,” she said, nodding, and set her briefcase firmly onto the table. “Hello, Professor Braun. Mr. Branson.” Braun nodded back. Nobody got up. Branson said, “This is Greg Foster, a senior partner here.” Three of the suits were now accounted for.

  “How do you do.” Foster, a pale man with distinguished white hair, gave her a curt nod. No handshaking with this crew.

  “Tom Elias, executive vice president for administration at XYC, sitting in with us today.”

  “Hello.” Elias wore the jeans and the facial hair. He gave her a relaxed and curious smile. He had been part of the start-up. The XYC legend had to do with Stanford students and garages and the famous IPO that had made Elias and his friends multimillionaires overnight.

  “And Special Agent Aaron Dietz, from the NSA.”

  “The National Security Agency?”

  Dietz nodded slowly, taking her measure. He had on the stiffest suit of all. The shoulder pads put him in the linebacker class. Nina waited for an invitation to sit down, but all she was getting was stares, so she pulled out a chair and helped herself.

  “Water?”

  “Yes, thank you.” Each had his own glass and carafe of water, the carafes half-full to empty, which meant this meeting had been preceded by a strategy session, of which she had undoubtedly been the focus.

  “You have sued XYC,” Branson began from across the table. His face had lost none of its pugnacity. “We’d like to know why.”

  “I’d be happy to lay it out for you. Your employee committed an armed robbery two years ago, in the course of which my client’s wife was shot to death. He appears to have killed three more people since then, as well as attempting to kill me and another person. Last night he attacked the owner of the motel where the robbery took place. It’s a no-brainer,” Nina said. She folded her arms.

  “Leland Flint has not been in XYC’s employ for a long time,” Foster said. Nina remembered that Flint had been noted on the XYC Web site.

  “Well, if you want to get right to it, maybe you’d like to tell me the date he left XYC’s employ,” Nina said. “That is certainly important.” She uncapped her new Mont Blanc pen and let it hang obligingly over her yellow legal pad.

  “We didn’t bring you here for a free discovery session,” Foster said.

  “Then he was in XYC’s employ at the time of Sarah Hanna’s death,” Nina said.

  “Nobody said that.”

  “It’s clearly implied in your evasive answer.”

  Foster sighed. “Let’s start again. Why have you sued XYC?”

  “I thought I just explained it. The basis of corporate liability is the doctrine of respondeat superior, as you all know, and that’s the fifth cause of action in the amended complaint served on you.”

  “You allege in that complaint that XYC authorized Flint’s robbery attempt. But you don’t have a shred of evidence of that, do you?”

  So she was to be cross-examined. They expected her to be intimidated, but she was much too
focused on finding and stopping Flint to get involved in a male-lawyer-dominance game. She would be straightforward, ignore the rudeness, and-

  Oh, shucks. Live a little.

  “Ask nicely, and I might tell you a thing or two,” she said. She smiled, nicely, and clammed up.

  They all looked at Elias, who still wore his own faint smile. He looked friendly and approachable, which was why he had surrounded himself with warriors. He’s the only one who matters, Nina thought to herself. The others were just legal poundage, except for Dietz. Dietz was from a government security agency, not XYC. Nina had only the vaguest idea what the NSA did, but it was clear that a threat to XYC’s encryption method was relevant here.

  They were apparently less familiar with female-lawyer-domination games. Foster said, “Look here, Ms. Reilly. Forgive our exasperation. We understand that XYC’s former employee has become a menace, and we intend to cooperate to find him as soon as possible. Here is the main piece of information we would like to convey to you today: XYC did not authorize that robbery attempt. Flint heard about Elliott Wakefield’s work from his sister, Carleen-”

  “Who is a consultant with XYC, I believe,” Nina said.

  “Here is what happened. XYC has been following Mr. Wakefield’s work for years.”

  “Through the professor here, and through Carleen Flint,” Nina said.

  “Never with any intention of harming Elliott or stealing anything from him,” Professor Braun interjected. “In fact, we met with him and offered to hire him.”

  “I heard about that,” Nina said.

  “He is difficult to deal with.”

  “Back to Flint,” Foster said. “He is an ex-Navy operations officer who worked at XYC’s headquarters in our security division. He was not a supervisor. He was not a high-level employee. Obviously, we regret hiring him now. He had been with XYC about a year when Carleen discussed Mr. Wakefield with him. Carleen was a summer intern with us at that time, still at MIT, and in fact Flint had persuaded her to apply for the internship. Anyway, Flint decided that Mr. Wakefield was a threat, and he decided, unilaterally, without any authorization from XYC, let me make that clear, that he would obtain Mr. Wakefield’s notebook.”

  So Elliott was right. Elliott was sane, and he was right. The man in the mask had wanted the notebook. Nina mentally apologized to Elliott for doubting him.

  “No one, including Carleen Flint, and I emphasize, no one, at XYC knew of his intention.”

  “That’s your position,” Nina said.

  “It’s not just a position. It’s the truth. You can litigate this case for years if you want, depose every single XYC staffer, and you will not learn anything different.”

  “Is that correct, Mr. Elias?” Nina asked.

  Elias smiled and said, “Greg’s doing the talking.”

  Foster went on. “Flint called his sister the day after the robbery and told her that he was going underground. She informed management immediately. He was fired and XYC had no further contact with him. Carleen stayed with us and became a valued member of our team. Your client, Mr. Hanna, filed a lawsuit that was about to die a natural death, and then you came along.”

  “Yes,” Nina said. “It’s all my fault. Where is Mr. Flint? You know where he is, don’t you?”

  Another exchange of glances. Foster said, “I haven’t said that.”

  “Well, do you?”

  “I wouldn’t say that, not in so many words.”

  “He’s still listed as an employee on your Web site.”

  “That’s a mistake.”

  Nina turned to the NSA agent. “What is your interest?” Dietz did not respond. He was regarding her as Nabokov might have regarded a specimen butterfly just before impaling it on a pin.

  “I’m getting to that,” Foster said. “The point is, we may be able to help regarding Mr. Flint.”

  “Except that?”

  “We still have an interest in Mr. Wakefield’s work. An even stronger interest, at this point. And he won’t talk to us. In fact, he told us you represent him.”

  “I see,” Nina said. She would have to talk to Elliott, quickly. It put her in a pickle, because she didn’t represent him. On the other hand, she couldn’t pretend to represent him, that would be unethical.

  Professor Braun had been listening quietly. Now he said, “I wonder if you have any idea how dangerous Elliott’s work is.”

  “Well, it sure has been dangerous to him,” Nina said.

  “It’s a danger to the whole world. It’s a lethal bomb. It’s the equivalent of Hiroshima.”

  “I won’t let you get away with that, Professor. People won’t die in the hundreds of thousands because of Mr. Wakefield’s work.”

  “They will be homeless in the millions. Their national economies will be in ruins. The Internet will be down for the foreseeable future, Ms. Reilly. I don’t think you have the slightest idea what that means in this day and age.

  “Elliott doesn’t understand. He doesn’t care about large institutions and he thinks individuals will not suffer. He has to be made to understand that they will suffer. How will they pay their bills? How will they talk to each other? Do you have any idea how this will impact civil liberties? Ordinary people can now encrypt their E-mails to each other. They can talk to each other and there is some check on the government’s technical ability to listen in. That check will be gone.

  “He’s young, his judgment is poor, and he has chosen you to be his representative. That’s why we are talking with you today, Ms. Reilly. We need your help.”

  Aaron Dietz of the NSA cleared his throat and said, “The nation insists on your help.”

  “Civilization as we know it will disappear,” Nina said.

  “Don’t take this lightly, Ms. Reilly.”

  “This code has only been used for ten years, Professor. All codes are broken eventually. Isn’t the real problem that XYC is built around this encryption code? Your corporate world may be in danger, but I think the rest of the world can adjust in due course.”

  “You simply don’t understand. The impact-”

  Nina interrupted. “When did you talk to Mr. Wakefield?”

  “His home was searched yesterday in the early-morning hours,” Dietz said. “He was present at that time. On NSA’s affidavit and pursuant to court order.”

  “I haven’t spoken with him about that,” Nina said.

  “No? Well, he didn’t resist. He didn’t ask to talk to his lawyer, if that’s what you want to know.”

  “And the notebook?”

  “Still wherever he hid it,” Dietz said. He gave his red silk tie an angry yank.

  “The worst thing is that he won’t show anyone his results,” Professor Braun said. “There is probably a mistake somewhere. It could all be a mistake, which would explain why it’s taking him so long to provide a proof. But we have to proceed as though he has found a way to break the XYC encryption system. What have you seen of his work, Ms. Reilly?”

  He had asked nicely. “Oh, nothing, really,” Nina said. “We talked about it a little. I’m no mathematician. Generally, he shows that the primes are strictly analogous to eigenvalues of a Hermitian quantum operator associated with a classical Hamiltonian.”

  Braun’s face paled. He gripped the table. “What Hamiltonian is that? Is he using Alain Connes’s p-adelic Hermitians?”

  “I’m sorry, Professor. You understand.” Nina smoothed her skirt, had a sip of water.

  The men looked at one another. Braun muttered, “Connes. Incredible.” Foster nodded at Branson and the atmosphere in the room electrified.

  Nina straightened her back and prepared herself.

  “Ten million and a confidentiality agreement for Wakefield, two million for you, properly sheltered from income tax, and a million for your client Mr. Hanna,” Branson said. “And Mr. Flint’s ass, encased in a sling and delivered in a white limo.”

  Nina wrote down those lovely round numbers. It gave her a second to think.

  “And in e
xchange?”

  “Confidentiality agreements all around. The notebook. Mr. Wakefield’s cooperation. Dismissal of your causes of action against XYC.”

  “Is this severable?” Nina asked. “Because Mr. Hanna and Mr. Wakefield don’t have the same interests. In fact, there’s a conflict. For example, what if Mr. Hanna agreed to drop the suit against XYC in exchange for a million dollars and Flint?”

  “And Wakefield?”

  “Let’s say his side of things would have to be negotiated independently.”

  Branson said, “You already know the answer to that one. Nobody gives a shit about Hanna’s lawsuit. You want Flint, you bring Wakefield to the table. You want to handle the Wakefield part without Hanna, that’s fine with us, though we’d like to take care of everything at once. Am I being nice enough?”

  “I’m afraid not,” Nina said. “I want to talk to Carleen Flint before any decisions are made.” There was a stir around the table. They were all looking at Elias again. “Mr. Elias?” Nina said. “Is she available?”

  Tom Elias scratched his cheek. “Mr. Branson?”

  “What do we get in return?” Branson said.

  Nina said evenly, “Mr. Elias? She’s here, isn’t she?”

  Elias shrugged and said, “Five minutes.”

  Branson brought Carleen Flint in and made a place for her. Nina barely had time to reflect that her loyalty to the company was crucial to them. Carleen was small and slight, wearing a nice gray suit. She wasn’t a pretty woman, and she was very nervous right now, trembling like a greyhound.

  “This lady has a few questions for you,” Branson told her. “As we discussed.”

  “May I?” Nina asked Branson.

  “Five minutes,” he reminded her.

  “You know who I am?” she asked Carleen.

  “They told me.”

  “You are Leland Flint’s sister?”

  “Yes.”

  “You are willing to talk to me today? No one is forcing you to talk to me?”

  “No.”

  “It’s all right, Carleen,” Tom Elias said. “Be frank.”