44

CONNOR SAT IN A WINDOW SEAT IN THE FIRST CLASS SECTION OF A U.S. Airways Airbus A319, watching Lynden Pindling International Airport slip away beneath him. For a moment they were over the sun-drenched suburbs of Nassau. The beach flashed past and then the light blue coastal waters, dotted with pleasure boats. Then the blue darkened as the water deepened, and a featureless navy carpet stretched to the horizon.

He turned away from the window as the flight attendant walked by. He stopped her and asked for a glass of cabernet sauvignon. She returned with it a moment later, smiling the entire time.

He took a sip. Cheap stuff and too warm, but he wasn’t in a discriminating mood. He drained the glass in three large swallows and ordered another. The smiling attendant refilled his glass and he downed that as well.

He hadn’t eaten anything since a croissant at breakfast, and he felt the wine in a hot pool in his stomach. The alcohol reached his brain after a few minutes. He started on a third glass and drank it more slowly.

He usually didn’t drink when he was flying. No point in pouring mediocre booze down his throat just to make the trip go faster. He could do that by working or watching a movie. But he needed a drink today. He needed to wash away the taste of what he had said to Allie.

She deserved it, of course. And more. What she had done to him and the firm was bad enough, but that was nothing compared to what she told him today. He could hardly believe it. Looking the other way when her boyfriend sold drugs was bad, but looking the other way when he sold to children? And then not even turning him in when one of those children died? He shook his head and made a mental note to have Julian look into it. That kid deserved justice. As for Allie—well, whatever happened to her, she had it coming. And to think she’d tried to pin some of the blame on him, claiming she couldn’t trust him to help her. That was as low as it got.

And yet…

He remembered his last image of her, glimpsed as he looked back before walking out the door. Her scuba tank was still ridiculously strapped to her back. Seawater dripped from her lank wet hair, forming little puddles around her feet on the tile floor. Her head was bowed, her face in her hands, her bare shoulders shaking.

He took another sip of his wine. She had made her choices, and those choices had painful consequences. It was hard for him to see her like that, but she had brought it on herself.

He thought back over their conversation again. Had he really said that thing about everyone who commits any crime going to jail every single time? It sounded a little like him. It also sounded a little like a fascist Pharisee, if there was such a thing. He shifted uncomfortably in his seat.

Best not to dwell on it. He would keep Allie in his prayers, of course, but otherwise do what he could to put her out of his mind.

It was time to look to the future, to think of the road ahead. The first step on that road was obvious: formally withdraw from representing Devil to Pay. He already had a draft motion ready to file. It recited the applicable ethics rules prohibiting lawyers from representing clients who bring lawsuits “without probable cause and for the purpose of harassing or maliciously injuring any person.” It stated in general terms that he had just discovered that his client was doing exactly that. The court probably wouldn’t insist on details, so Connor hadn’t included them.

The whole humiliating story would come out soon enough, though. He’d get deposed in Deep Seven’s lawsuit against the firm, and then he’d have to testify at trial if the case got that far. Tom Concannon and ExComm had already decided what their defense would be: he and the firm were innocent because they had acted reasonably and were pursuing what they thought was a legitimate lawsuit. “Improper motive,” an essential element of a lawsuit for abuse of process, simply didn’t exist. If they could prove that Connor had thought Deep Seven really had violated the California False Claims Act, that would be a complete defense. So Connor would have to testify about how he had worked closely with Allie for years, how he had come to trust her, how she had lied to him this time, and how he had believed her.

It would probably work. The firm would beat Deep Seven’s lawsuit. Connor’s career would survive. Sure, he’d take some punches along the way. Deep Seven would ask insinuating questions about his relationship with his pretty client and he’d have to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. The truth wasn’t that bad: one evening together, one kiss, their corny tradition of telephonic victory dinners, a dozen or so meetings, and hundreds of basically professional e-mails and calls. Talking about it would be awkward, and the legal newspapers might even take an interest. But then it would be over. He’d be embarrassed, but undamaged—or at least that’s how he hoped it would turn out.

He took another sip from his glass and pushed his thoughts beyond the unpleasant aftermath of his entanglement with Allie. Tom had a big case going to trial next spring, and he had talked about possibly bringing on Connor as colead. That would be fun. The two of them hadn’t handled a case together since Connor was a junior associate, and he relished the idea of working with his mentor as an equal. It sounded like a fun case too—interesting legal issues, high stakes, a client who cared more about good work than low bills, and most important, he would get to wear the white hat. No everyone-is-entitled-to-a-defense rationalizations.

Even if that didn’t work out, there would be other options, other ways to cleanse his mental palate. He might even join Max at DOJ. He imagined what it would be like to work next door to Max and then found himself wondering how thick the office walls in the State building are. He also remembered Max complaining because he couldn’t get reimbursed for an $89 room at a Holiday Inn Express, which the accounting office thought was too expensive. Connor had difficulty picturing himself lasting long in a world where a night in a Holiday Inn Express was a forbidden luxury.

Okay, maybe the California Department of Justice wouldn’t be such a good fit. The U.S. Attorney’s Office might be fun. Or maybe the SEC. Even if they all had Dilbertesque accounting trolls, they had one big advantage over private practice: no clients. He could choose his own cases, do the investigations himself, and only sue the defendants who deserved suing. He’d only have to trust himself.

He held his wine glass in the shaft of fading sunlight that slanted in through his window. Sullen reds glinted in its depths like coals of a dying fire. He drained his glass and closed his eyes.