Fiona Charteris
[email protected]
to Noah Miller
Noah
One further addition to the terms and conditions discussed in our phone conversation of yesterday afternoon. Our mutual client requires that all the Wheelz software code be kept in escrow.
Fiona
She read it aloud. “Any idea what that means?”
“Yeah. It means that the client has gotten a look at the financials and knows the company is in deep shit. So if they go out of business, the company’s software, the engine that makes everything run, is held separately, and it belongs to them.”
“I see. And who’s this Fiona Charteris?”
“I didn’t get around to her. I know that Linklaters is a law firm—a member of what’s called the ‘Magic Circle,’ one of the big five law firms in the UK. So she’s probably a lawyer.”
“I’m guessing she represents Harrogate Capital Partners.”
“Right. Let me do a quick search.”
She went back to reading the thread of e-mails between Noah and Fiona Charteris, mostly boring stuff concerning the Wheelz deal, and then one e-mail caught her attention.
We’re finishing our work on the Wheelz round, and I have some serious concerns.
I am concerned that our co-investor, Antilles Windward Insurance, is not actually the investor. Based on my read of their financial statements, Antilles does not have the funds. The money is coming from ‘an affiliate’ of theirs, Mayfair Paragon Ltd., via a Russian subsidiary bank in Cyprus which is under US sanctions. Based on United States law, this transaction is illegal. I am confused and concerned.
Fiona
“She’s discovering that there’s Russian money behind the Harrogate firm. Russian money that came in from a Russian-owned bank in Cyprus. Which is illegal.”
“Exactly.”
She turned the page.
“Oh wow,” she said.
“What?”
“Noah forwards her e-mail to her contact at Harrogate, and listen to this.”
She read the next exchange aloud:
Noah Miller
to Charles Finch
We have a problem regarding a lawyer in this deal. I need to talk to you soonest. Please call me on my cell.
She looked up. “Something the two lawyers couldn’t talk about over e-mail?” she said. “Something about this woman Fiona.”
Hersh was no longer listening. He was staring at his screen, reading something.
“What is it?”
“What’s the date of that e-mail?”
“November 28, 2015.”
He let out his breath slowly.
“Mother of God,” he said. “I’m reading an article in the Daily Mail. A British tabloid.”
“What?”
“Fiona Charteris, City solicitor, twenty-seven . . .” He fell silent. His eyes were moving back and forth, rapt on the screen. “Killed in gruesome bus accident near Moorgate Station . . . crossing the street . . . Charteris, a third-year associate at posh law firm Linklaters, was going home to shower and change after staying up all night at her law firm. . . . A witness says she was probably pushed. . . .”
He looked at her.
Juliana felt light-headed. She felt droplets of sweat breaking out along her hairline. “Oh, my God,” she said. “Who knows I’m your client?”
He nodded. “Nobody. I never reveal the names of my clients.”
“Philip, listen to me.” Her stare burned into Hersh’s sad eyes. She leaned forward and put a hand on his forearm. “I have a family. I have kids.”
“Of course. I understand. As I was saying—”
“I want you to do everything you can to make sure my name is not connected with this investigation. That nobody knows what I . . . know.”
He looked miserable. “You know what I’m going to say. I will take every precaution—”
“No!” she exploded. “You make goddamned sure of it. Make a hundred percent certain.”
Now he looked away, toyed with a stapler on his desk. “Okay,” he said. “I’ll do everything in my power. But I think we’re in agreement: we’ve gone as far as we safely can.”
She nodded, not sure what to think. It felt like an insoluble problem, a terrible dilemma. Keep digging, keep peeling back the layers of the onion, and maybe you’ll figure out a way to keep your family safe. But—to shift clichés—the more they poked at the hornets’ nest, the greater the chance of being stung. “I don’t know what the hell to do,” she said.
“And what do you plan to do about this new deadline, that legal decision you mentioned?”
“The motion for summary judgment. Yes. It would end the case.”
“How are you going to rule, or am I not allowed to ask that of a judge?”
“I haven’t ruled on it yet.”
“You going to meet their demand?”
“I can’t. I’m going to deny the motion,” she said. She kept thinking of the plaintiff, Rachel Meyers, and the harassment she’d faced at Wheelz. The ugliness. The young woman wouldn’t settle, wouldn’t take a multimillion-dollar payment from Wheelz. She wanted justice to be done. There was something heroic about that. “But I’m terrified about what’s going to happen when I deny it.”
“Honestly?” Hersh said with a sad little smile. “I don’t think it makes any difference what you decide.”
“What the hell does that mean?”
“Let’s say you grant the motion. Once you give them what they need—well, they’ll probably bide their time, but they’ll get to you.”
“Get to me,” she said. “What are you saying?”
“You’re probably safe as long as they need you around to make a decision. Which means you’re okay until you make that decision, thumbs up or thumbs down. Because once you do—they don’t need you anymore.”
She shook her head, not wanting to hear this.
“It’ll be you and your family, skiing in Aspen on winter break, and maybe none of you come back.”
“Hersh.”
“Or a scuba-diving accident in Costa Rica. Or there’s a car accident.”
“Enough.”
“Don’t think I’m just speculating. I’m trying to warn you away. I mean, there are so many ways this thing could go down. Do you really think they can tolerate your presence on this planet? If they find out you know what you know? There’s always going to be crosshairs on your forehead. A dancing red dot, wherever you go. The marksman’s bindi dot.”
She felt sick, dull, and headachy. The court provided judges with additional security when needed. The State Police. There were lunatics out there, tempers flared in the courtroom, and a lot was at stake. A judge always had to be careful. “Maybe I should ask for extra protection.”
Her phone chirred. Duncan. She let it go to voice mail.
“Yeah, I suppose a squad car parked in front of your house might work for a while. But does that mean that you and your family are going to have to live like that—bodyguards and police escorts, maybe private security—the rest of your life? Being terrified all the time about some minor security glitch? That’s no way to live.”
Tears had come to her eyes. She whispered, “So what the hell am I supposed to do?”
Hersh was quiet for a very long time. Finally he said, “I may have an idea.”
50
At a minute before nine o’clock the next morning, just as she was about to walk into the courtroom, her phone buzzed. A text. She was on edge, with everything that was going on, and anything could be urgent. She grabbed her phone.
From Duncan. Call me immediately.
He picked up the phone after less than one ring.
“Duncan,” she said, her heart pounding. “Everything okay?”
“You’ve got to get over to J
ake’s school. Now.”
“What?” she cried. “Is he all right? Did he get hurt?”
“No—no, he’s fine. I mean, he’s not fine at all. He is in serious trouble here.”
“Oh, God. What’d he do?”
“He’s being expelled. For drugs.”
“Drugs? For weed? Shit. What—?”
“Can you get over here now? I know you’re in court.”
“I’ll be there,” she said.
She hated to cancel court. Especially when she had a jury in the box. Sixteen average citizens had disrupted their lives for this. The jury was deliberating in the medical malpractice case, and the stakes were sky-high. An obstetrician was fighting for his reputation, for his livelihood. And a young couple had lost a baby because of his failure to detect distress, they believed.
But she had no choice.
She called Kaitlyn into her lobby. “Can you call the lawyers, advise them that I’m unavailable, and reschedule?”
Then she got her car from the parking garage across the street. As soon as she was on her way, she called Duncan over speakerphone and talked as she drove. A bad habit, and something she would ordinarily never do. But she was worried, and she wanted to arrive at Jake’s school with a plan.
It was good to have something else to worry about for the moment, she thought. Was she being a bad mom, she asked herself, to think of her son’s situation as a diversion, a distraction from far more consequential things? She felt protective of Jake and concerned about him, about how lost he seemed to be. It was actually strange the way she was feeling. The blank, helpless terror seemed to have abated and given way to a kind of ferocious focus. She was a lioness protecting her brood.
“What did he do?” she asked.
“They found a vape pen and a couple of pen tops in his backpack.”
“Pen tops are . . . ?”
“Cartridges of marijuana extract. THC oil. Cannabis concentrate.”
“Shit, Dunc. So he didn’t give it up, as promised.”
“Did he promise us? I don’t think so. We didn’t exactly tell him to quit the stuff. It was kind of left hanging.”
“Great.”
“They’re saying he was dealing.”
“What? Was he?”
“He says he wasn’t.”
“You believe him?”
“Yes. I do.”
“They’re expelling him?”
“Right.”
“I want to talk to Dr. Cole.” Dr. Cole was Pamela Cole, the head of the school. She was always “Dr.” Cole, though she wasn’t a medical doctor. Juliana had met her, talked to her at school events, but didn’t really know her. Dr. Cole sort of floated above things. “If they intend to expel our son, at least we can hear it directly from the head of the school.”
“I’m on it.”
“Tell them Judge Brody wants to talk with her right away.”
“I know,” he said. She could hear the smile in his voice. “I know how it works.”
“Okay.”
“He brought THC concentrate into school,” Duncan said. “That was not bright. But I’m more pissed off at the school.”
“Because?”
“Because if they’re going to expel a kid for something as minor as this, they should let you know.”
“They probably do in the student handbook, and we just haven’t read it.”
“Okay. Maybe you’re right. But let me take the lead in there, with Dr. Cole.”
“Why?”
“I don’t want you doing your Judge Judy routine in there, tangling with her. Being the pit bull.”
“It’ll be Judge Juliana, and I will be the velvet hammer.”
“Maybe better if you don’t. Let me handle it. Let me do the talking.”
She let out a huff. “Okay,” she said.
She met Duncan in the school parking lot. When they arrived at the headmistress’s outer office, they found Jake slumped in a chair. His face was red, and his hair was wild. He looked as though he’d been crying. He eyed Juliana warily as they entered.
“I’m really sorry,” he said.
Juliana felt warring impulses. She wanted to hug him, console him, tell him everything was going to be okay. He was her baby. She was also angry, wanted to tell him off. But she wasn’t a yeller, and this wasn’t the place anyway. So she gave him a hug and murmured to him, “You are in such trouble.”
Pamela Cole emerged from her office. She was a short, stocky woman, a Sherman tank with platinum blond hair, cut short in a modified pixie. She wore oversize round blue-framed eyeglasses.
She had an unnervingly deep voice. She had been the head of the school for seven years and was said to be a master fundraiser. She favored knit pantsuits. Today she was wearing a navy suit with white piping.
She took each of their hands and said sadly, “Judge Brody, Professor Esposito.” She was a very formal woman, dignified, remote. Not a natural people person, Juliana had always thought. But somehow great at fundraising. “Let’s sit over here,” Dr. Cole said, walking them into her book-lined, high-ceilinged office, flooded with light, and over to a long oak library table. Jake was left in the outer office.
Dr. Cole sat at one end, the head of the table. Next to her, Juliana and Duncan sat on opposite sides from each other.
She folded her arms across her chest. “This is very difficult for all of us,” she began. “We’re never happy to expel a student, particularly one as bright and well liked as Jake.” She gave them a long, disappointed look. “As you know, we have a zero-tolerance policy on drugs.” She seemed to be directing her attention to Duncan, who, with his head of long curly hair, probably looked like a hippie to her. Which wasn’t far from the truth. “Now, I realize I’m talking to two lawyers here, and I’m of course aware that possession of small amounts of marijuana has been decriminalized in this state. But it is still illegal for anyone under the age of twenty-one to possess or use marijuana. And more to the point, it’s against school rules.”
Duncan was nodding, attentive.
“A search of Jake’s backpack yielded several electronic vaporizer pens as well as a number of vials of what appears to be a highly concentrated form of marijuana. These vaporizer devices look like thumb drives, easily disguised. It seems that Jake has been selling this equipment to his fellow students. And the school’s policy on this is quite clear. The penalty is expulsion.”
There was a long silence. Dr. Cole looked at each of them, one after the other.
Duncan was shaking his head. He sighed. “Look, I get it. In my day you were technologically advanced if you had a roach clip.”
Dr. Cole chuckled, and some of the tension in the room seeped out. He had the ability to do that, to connect with people, put them at ease. Dr. Cole didn’t look like someone who might have gotten high when she was young. In fact, she didn’t look as though she had ever been young.
Duncan went on. “All these—what did you call them, ‘electronic vaporizer devices’?—freak me out a little too. So here we are, the grown-ups, with our rules, and here’s this kid who, you know, thinks rules mean ‘strongly consider.’”
Dr. Cole smiled and nodded.
“I totally get the frustration,” he said. “Jake hears his old man going after the ‘rules’ of neoliberal patriarchy and—I gotta own this part—he gets mixed messages. So you, you’re stuck in a situation where you’ve got an institution to protect. School kids to protect. Rules to lay down. That’s heavy. That’s your truth. But can we talk for a moment, parent to parent?”
Juliana thought: That’s where Jake gets it. The art of blarney. She kind of admired it.
Dr. Cole said, “Of course.”
“One thing all of us here know is, Jake’s a kid with a good heart. So let’s figure this out together. God bless the rules. But he really belongs here. How
do we get to that truth?”
Dr. Cole looked at Duncan for a long while and kept nodding. She seemed to be mulling something over.
Duncan said, “I think this is a teachable moment for Jake.”
“I hope so.” Dr. Cole smiled.
Juliana remembered all those times when Dunc talked his way out of a traffic ticket, or into the head of a line, or into possession of Toys R Us’s last Marvel Legion action figure, which Jake had once desperately wanted.
He’d even coaxed a smile out of Dr. Cole.
Dr. Cole cleared her throat. “Alas, we’re not able to make an exception for one student, as much as we might like him. That’s why we have a zero-tolerance policy. This . . . vaping or dabbing, or sometimes it’s called Juuling—these e-cigarettes, the marijuana use—it’s an epidemic at this school, and the only way for us to stop it is to be firm in our response. Challenging us only makes us the best we can be.”
Duncan nodded again, looked thoughtful, and Juliana could see he was trying to figure out another approach, another way to Dr. Cole’s cold heart. But she could also see that it was useless. Dr. Cole would not be swayed. Duncan’s approach was falling flat.
Juliana spoke up.
“This drug use at the school, you said it’s ‘epidemic’?”
“There’s a high baseline incidence of drug use, an increasing use of this sort of equipment, yes. So Jake’s recent academic troubles all begin to make sense.”
“A ‘high baseline incidence,’ is that right?”
“Yes, quite disturbing. Quite widespread.”
Duncan glanced at Juliana, alarmed at whatever she was doing.
He knew she was a shark smelling the chum in the water. Or a pit bull.
“Huh,” she said. “So essentially you’ve just confessed to me that this institution has utterly failed in its responsibility to—how do you put it in the student handbook?—‘create and maintain a safe and optimal educational environment.’ I’m pretty sure I’ve quoted that accurately.”
Dr. Cole sat up straight in her chair. Her eyes were angry. “Judge Brody—”
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