Executive Privilege

by Brandon, Jay

• ISBN13: 9780312874254
• ISBN10: 0312874251
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2001-10-10
• Publisher: Forge Books

Summary

For years, Edgar-nominee (Fade the Heat) Jay Brandon has enthralled readers with novels set in the legal world of his hometown of San Antonio, Texas. But with Executive Privilege, Brandon chooses a wider stage and brings the reader an all-new thriller set against the backdrop of our nation's capital, the story of a wife's desperate attempt to save herself and her young son from her husband, a man involved with selling our nation's secrets and willing to do whatever he can to ensure that his family doesn't get away. The wife? Myra McPherson, the First Lady of the United States.When San Antonio attorney David Owens wins an important divorce case, he hopes the victory will bring him some new business. But he never imagined that the First Lady, a Texas native, would walk through his office door. Shy and fearful, the First Lady explains that she needs to divorce the President, to get herself and her young son out of the White House. The President is engaged in dangerous dealings . . . and has been unfaithful. But no woman has ever divorced a sitting President, and while every President has secrets, none are like the secrets this President wants to protect: his nefarious dealings with a billionaire businessman willing to use his money and power to manipulate even the leader of our nation.When the news breaks, the publicity is huge, but the threat is even bigger. Orders have been given to kill the First Lady and her son, and all that stands in the way is her divorce lawyer and one Secret Service agent whose oath to protect her charges is more important to her than the power of the President.With all the elements of a great thriller and a great courtroom drama, Jay Brandon delivers a novel sure to keep you up long past your bedtime.

Author Biography

Jay Brandon is a former prosecutor in his home town of San Antonio. His novel Loose Among the Lambs was a Main Selection of the Literary Guild. He was nominated for an Edgar Award for his novel Fade the Heat. He makes his home in San Antonio with his wife and three children.

Table of Contents

CHAPTER
 
one
 
 
The Bexar County Courthouse in San Antonio is more than a hundred years old, the oldest working courthouse among the two hundred fifty-four counties of Texas. The red stone building had played host to thousands and thousands of trials over the years, most with little fanfare. On this particular May afternoon, though, the trial going on in the grand courtroom at the south end of the fourth floor drew more attention than any civil trial in a long time. Hearing that the week-long trial was nearing conclusion, courthouse employees, idle lawyers, reporters, and even a few honest citizens had trickled into the audience seats to hear the final arguments.
Usually only a high-profile criminal case, perhaps a capital murder trial, drew this kind of notoriety. But in the old civil district courtroom much more was at stake than a prison sentence. This was a divorce trial.
David Owens stood at the spacious front of the courtroom, facing the jury across an old-fashioned railing supported by carved wooden posts. To his right Judge Louise Shahan sat attentively, her eyes shifting from David to the opposing lawyer to the gallery of spectators. The twelve jurors seemed to be paying careful attention to David, as much attention to his pauses to collect his thoughts as to his arguments themselves.
David Owens looked very young during those pauses. He was thirty-two but didn't look it. His blue suit fit him a bit loosely; he had lost weight lately. David had black hair, intense blue eyes, and too pale skin, given the ample sunshine San Antonio provided in the late springtime. This case had aged him, but finally in the courtroom he had found fresh supplies of energy.
Out in the spectator area the wooden pews were filled with silent watchers, shoulders touching. The spectators, many of them lawyers, also watched David Owens carefully, not only to judge his speech-making ability, but for signs that the young lawyer knew how over his head he'd wandered in taking on this case.
At the other counsel table sat the highest-priced divorce lawyer in San Antonio, Ellen Bonham. Her client had chosen her not just for her experience and her reputation, but for her gender. In divorcing his wife of twenty-two years, the client, Rod Smathers, wanted not only to win but not to look like a bad guy. He wanted every minute of the trial to demonstrate that women shouldn't recoil from him in distaste. He was only doing his best for everyone. Hence the woman lawyer, who sat close to him and conferred with him head to head once in a while.
Smathers was the CEO of the only Fortune 100 corporation in San Antonio, the town's most important employer and corporate citizen. He must also have been one of the two or three richest men in town, and intended to remain so after this divorce became final.
David Owens had never done anything in his life that had drawn this much absorbed attention. But as he presented his case to the jury the weight of those stares didn't disturb him. He felt only one gaze on him, that of his client. He also felt the weight of three people who weren't in the courthouse, and his heart beat heavily.
To the jurors David said, “My opposing counsel has asked you whether Mr. Smathers should be punished for having made such a good life for his family. Should he be punished for his hard work, for providing his wife and children a beautiful home and lifestyle? Should he be punished for that by having his children taken from him now?
“Of course the answer is no.” David saw the jurors' eyes widen, and heard a small gasp from his client. He went quickly on. “Mr. Smathers and my client Mary Smathers came to an agreement years ago, when their first child was born. He would work and provide income. She would take care of the children. That was the deal, and it worked well.
“But somewhere over the years their arrangement became more than a way to share responsibilities. Their roles took them over. Mr. Smathers's business began to consume his life. He became obsessed with rising to the absolute top of his company. He made it. But family life had to give way to his quest.”
“Objection,” Ellen Bonham said loudly. “There was testimony that my client spent lots of time with—”
Judge Shahan quickly cut her off. “The jury will remember the evidence as they heard it,” she instructed, adding quietly. “Pay attention to your own memories, not to what the lawyers say.”
“You heard the testimony,” David said to the jury. “Not just of working long hours during the week, but of spending weekends on business trips or playing golf with important clients. That's what you have to do to get to the top of the business world, and Mr. Smathers did it.”
David turned from the jury toward his client, and walked slowly toward her. “Meanwhile, something similar happened to Mary Smathers. She played her assigned role in the family, she stayed home with the children, but just as with her husband, her role took her over. Mary became a full-time mother in every sense. When a child woke up scared in the middle of the night, he called for Mom. And she came. When a child skinned her knee in the backyard, it was Mom who doctored it. For driving the car pool and chaperoning field trips and attending music recitals, the Smathers children have had only one parent.”
David stood between the counsel tables, letting the jury look at the opponents who had once been lovers. Rod Smathers in his early fifties looked younger. He had kept in good shape, his jawline didn't sag, his dark suit fit him well. He looked authoritative and decisive. His wife across the aisle in her pale peach jacket and skirt didn't seem to belong with him. Mary Smathers had been very pretty when they had married, but frankly nowhere near beautiful enough to be the wife of one of the most important business leaders in Texas. In her mid-forties now, she seemed headed briskly for matronhood. She remained pretty, but in a mature way for which a different word was needed. Mary had become attractive in an almost middle-aged, lightly tended way. Trial had not brought out the best in her appearance. Her cheeks had red splotches and her eyes showed traces of those interrupted nights of motherhood and of tears recently shed. She gazed at her lawyer with obvious fright.
David asked, “Should either of them be punished for the roles they assumed? No. This isn't about punishment. This is about what's best for the children. The judge's instructions and your own good sense tell you that you have to look at your decision from the point of view of the children. If you award primary custody of these three children to their father, they'll have every material thing they could ever want: horses on the family ranch, private schools, cars when they're old enough, trips all over the world with Dad…once a year or so.
“But who's going to doctor their scraped knees every day? The maid. A housekeeper, a nanny. Or nobody.
“Giving this mother primary custody of the children won't hurt Mr. Smathers one bit. You've seen the standard possession order for the noncustodial parent. If Mr. Smathers exercises those times of possession—one evening a week and the entire weekend every other week, plus a month in the summer—it will be more time than he's spent with his children in their lives. He's never wanted that much time with them before. And now he says he wants even more. He wants primary custody. He wants to be the one to tuck his three children in every night.”
David surveyed the jury, eight men and four women. Ellen Bonham had gotten her way there, using nearly all her strikes on women, who would be presumed more sympathetic toward David's client. But looking at the jurors, David had begun to feel a rapport with them. He wondered if trial lawyers always developed that feeling. David wouldn't know. This was only the fifth jury trial of his career, his second as lead counsel.
“It's Rod Smathers who thinks in terms of punishing people. That's what this trial is all about. That's the only reason he's asked for custody: to hurt his wife. To punish her for daring to ask for more of his money than he's—”
“Objection!” the other lawyer almost shouted, rising to her feet. “There is absolutely no evidence to support this argument of counsel's. Furthermore he knows very well that the division of property is no concern of this jury's. The only issue before them is custody.”
Judge Shahan sat in thoughtful silence, casting back her memory over the whole four-day trial. “That's sustained. Move on to another topic, Mr. Owens.”
David didn't. “I think you can figure it out for yourselves,” David said to the jury. “You can see from Mary's testimony, from her very anxiety about this case, why she wants primary custody of these children. Because that's what's best for them, that they stay with the mother who's raised them. What's Mr. Smathers's reason for asking for primary custody? So that his children can be baby-sat by nannies and maids while he works late and jets around the country.
“Think about those motivations. Then you decide which of these parents has the best interests of these children at heart.”
He didn't realize until he'd said it that that would be his closing sentence, but David at least recognized an end line when he heard one. He turned rather abruptly and resumed his seat beside his client. Under the table she took his hand and squeezed it so tightly the tips of his fingers turned instantly white.
Judge Shahan quickly dismissed the jury to their deliberations, but didn't leave the bench. Leaning casually in her high-backed black chair, she asked, “Ready for my part of the decision?”
Before the jury portion of the trial had begun, the parties had presented evidence concerning the Smatherses' community property to the judge. In Texas, juries have very narrow powers to decide issues in divorce trials, primarily custody of the children. Judges decide how to divide the property.
Ellen Bonham rose quickly to her feet. “If you are, Your Honor. Of course I'd like to present argument on the property division first.”
The judge paused a beat, then said, “Of course, Counsel. Take as long as you like.”
Uh oh. David recognized that the judge's order didn't free Bonham in the way it sounded. It was an offer of ample rope. Judge Shahan had probably already made up her mind, or almost. Overlong or overly intense argument would only raise her hostility. Bonham wouldn't be doing her client any favors by talking too much.
Just on the near side of fifty, Ellen Bonham had been practicing family law in San Antonio for twenty-five years. Always soft-spoken and cordial in negotiation, she changed in appearances before a judge or jury. She focused fiercely, never letting a point pass without putting her own spin on it. She knew the judges intimately and held their respect.
“I just want to remind the court of a couple of points. First, there's Mr. Smathers's personal property that isn't included in the community estate. The house at the coast that he inherited from his aunt, and the block of Travis Investments stock left him by his father, which has appreciated in value but only due to dividends and rise in stock prices, not because Mr. Smathers invested community time in the stock. I'm sure the court is aware—”
“I don't plan to take anything of his from him, Counselor,” the judge said quietly.
Bonham hurried smoothly on. “As for the rest of the community property, we are only asking for an equal division. I do think it's appropriate that Mr. Smathers be awarded the stock options in the company he heads, since those are incentives for his performance as CEO and closely caught up in the company itself. The house should be sold and the proceeds divided equally, after Mr. Smathers is compensated for his separate property that was used for down payment eight years ago. That's all, Your Honor.”
With a slight movement of her head the judge turned her attention to the other lawyer. Ellen Bonham also watched David Owens attentively, hoping he would talk the judge into boredom and his case down the tubes.
From his seat at counsel table David said, “We don't care about the property division, Your Honor.”
This announcement caused a stir among the spectators, but drew no reaction from David's client. Seeming to affirm what her lawyer had said, Mary Smathers sat staring at the closed door through which the jurors had departed.
David rose to his feet. “But for the sake of the children we have to argue about money. Because Mr. Smathers hasn't offered them enough to support those children in the way—”
“Objection, Your Honor! Settlement negotiations are inadmissible, and there's been no evidence—”
“She's right, Mr. Owens. Move on,” the judge ruled.
“Your Honor, I suggest you order that the bulk of the community estate follow the children. The community estate is valued at approximately eighty-two or -three million dollars. If Mary Smathers doesn't get custody of her children, a tenth of that will sustain her comfortably. It won't matter to her how much money she has in the bank if she doesn't have her children with her.
“But if the jury awards her primary custody, she should have the bulk of the community estate. Those four people will be on their own financially, with no hope of the kind of income they've enjoyed as Rod Smathers's family. Mary will need to provide schooling, travel, college educations, everything those children deserve. Everything they'd be assured of having if only their parents had managed to stay together.”
Abruptly David sat down, looking weary. Ellen Bonham stared at him, looking for cunning strategy in the nonsense he'd just spouted.
But Judge Shahan nodded thoughtfully. She too looked appraisingly at the young lawyer. “So you want to roll the dice with your client's money, eh, Counselor? I find that an excellent suggestion.”
“What?!” Bonham said, echoed by so many lawyers in the audience who thought they were speaking quietly that they made a ghostly chorus from all parts of the courtroom.
“Yes,” the judge said. “It's the children who should have the money. Mr. Smathers, if you are given custody of the children I'm going to award a disproportionate share of the community estate to you. But I'm going to award it to you as trustee for your children. If this happens, within sixty days of the date of my ruling I want you to show me proof that the money has gone into irrevocable trusts with your three children as the beneficiaries.”
Rod Smathers had looked momentarily pleased, then puzzled. He recovered quickly, half rose, and said, “Uh, that's fine, Your Honor.”
“I'm not asking for your approval. On the other hand, if Mrs. Smathers is awarded primary custody, I'm going to award her ninety percent of the community estate.”
“What?!!” This time it was Rod Smathers who shouted the question.
“Sit down. Yes, of the community estate of eighty-three million dollars—a figure I find remarkably low, by the way, for an executive as well compensated as you are—”
“I've only been CEO for two years, Your Honor. Before that I was simply an employee with a salary.”
“Save it, Mr. Smathers. I'm only saying that if it turns out in the next few years that you receive a hefty deferred compensation package, I'd be willing to entertain a bill of review for fraud on the community.” That comment was directed at David Owens, who caught it. The judge continued. “I will award Mrs. Smathers the house, and award you the mortgage debt on it. You wouldn't want to put your children out of their home, would you? Also I will award Mrs. Smathers ninety percent of the remaining assets. I can do that, Mr. Smathers, because I find that you are at fault in the breakup of this marriage. There was no testimony that your wife did anything wrong except devote too much of her time to the children. You're the one who changed, working longer and longer hours and being gone from home more and more frequently. I wouldn't be surprised if your emotional life had left your family behind as well.
“The community should be reimbursed for that lost time, and all I can award them is money.”
Smathers looked confused and short of breath. “You'll be awarding it to her in trust, Your Honor, like with me?”
“No. I trust her to use the money for the benefit of the children. That's been the whole pattern of her life. And of course I'll also be ordering child support and spousal support. But we'll get to those after we hear from the jury.
“Funny, Mr. Smathers,” Judge Shahan concluded ironically, “for the first time you look concerned about the jury's verdict. Your wife has looked pretty anxious about it all along.”
The judge rose casually and strolled down the courtroom aisle, waving a hand to tell the spectators not to rise on her behalf. But the audience members stood up anyway, some walking out into the hall, others standing in clumps discussing the interesting spectacle they'd just witnessed. A newspaper reporter circulated, asking lawyers if the proceeding had been as unorthodox as it seemed. Most assured him that it had indeed been unusual, starting with the fact that David Owens had presented at least as good a final argument as Ellen Bonham and concluding with the judge's odd ruling on the community property division. All in all it had been a highly entertaining morning in court.
As the courtroom emptied out Mary Smathers slumped in her chair. Her head close to her lawyer's, she said quietly but in a heartfelt tone, “If that jury gives him custody I'll kill myself. Or him.”
Her words chilled the air, not just because of the threat itself, but because Mary Smathers sounded so downcast that she must have thought about this idea very seriously.
But David Owens didn't sound worried. “No you won't,” he said firmly, not an order but a prediction. “Because your children will still need you no matter what happens. You couldn't do that to them.”
Mrs. Smathers raised her head. Her features grew more serene as she thought about her children, and David knew she was remembering something one of them had done or said.
An hour passed. Ellen Bonham and her glowering client returned to her office a few blocks away. David suggested that he and Mrs. Smathers do the same, but she wanted to stay. At three-thirty she called to make sure her children were safely home from school. She talked to each of them in turn, and that was the first time that day she smiled, though her eyes glistened. After the call she went off to the ladies' room for some time.
David phoned his office. There had been no calls of consequence. His secretary sounded bored. With the preparations for this trial done, David's office produced very little activity. Since he'd gone into private practice this had been his only case.
At four-fifteen, after two hours and a quarter of deliberations, the jurors rang their buzzer. Judge Shahan emerged from her chambers saying, “So soon?” and shot a glance at David as if she wanted to tell him something, but refrained.
It hadn't seemed like a short time to Mary Smathers. They had to wait another twenty minutes for Mr. Smathers and his lawyer to return, and Mrs. Smathers vibrated like crystal the whole time. Her life's fate rested on a piece of paper behind that closed jury-room door. That twenty-minute delay was one of the cruelest things her husband had ever done to her.
The room gradually filled as word that the verdict was in spread through the courthouse. Even the judge took the unusual step of sitting behind the bench waiting, along with everyone else.
At least when he arrived Smathers looked grim. David would have wanted to punch him if the executive had looked unconcerned about this verdict. It wasn't about money. The judge could award Mary Smathers the whole community estate, and Rod Smathers would make it back in a couple of years. What bothered him was the judge's public ruling that he hadn't been a good husband. Smathers treasured his public image, serving on charitable boards and making enough corporate donations to have his name on public projects all over town. It was good for business, good for his ego. The only way to redeem himself in this trial was for the jury to find him a good father by awarding him custody of his children. Smathers didn't look at his soon-to-be ex-wife at all. But he glared at David Owens, the lawyer who had cost him part of his good name.
The jurors filed into the jury box. A few of them looked sheepish and shy as jurors often do during their time in the public spotlight. But most of them held their heads high, looking directly at the two parties. Two women and one man smiled reassuringly at Mrs. Smathers. David's heart began to unclench, but sometimes jurors gave those sympathetic looks to the losing party, to say, We don't think you're a bad person even though we just screwed you with our verdict.
“Have you reached a decision?” the judge asked.
A juror on the front row stood up, a man with a bland expression but alert eyes. He wore a checked shirt and solid blue tie, which made him look like a professor or engineer. His quiet manner had marked him as a follower in the eyes of the lawyers who'd left him on the jury, but now he displayed a quiet authority. “Yes, Your Honor.”
The judge nodded and the foreman continued, “We find that the best interests of the children would be served by awarding primary custody to their mother, Mary Smathers.”
Mrs. Smathers gave a long, shuddering sigh, sinking back into her chair as if suddenly boneless. David squeezed her hand, got no response, and turned toward her, afraid she'd had a heart attack. But his client sat with eyes uplifted and an enormous smile beginning to shape her mouth.
Past Mrs. Smathers David saw her husband. Mary hadn't glanced at him at all. This wasn't a triumphant moment for her, it was just a relief. But Rod Smathers watched his wife questioningly, as if asking himself if he'd been wrong to oppose her for custody at all. Then the executive's eyes lifted to David and his expression changed to one of pure hatred.
There had been a rather noisy reaction from the audience, but it died down quickly as the jury foreman remained standing. In a voice that carried, the man said to the judge, “We also have a request to make of you, Your Honor. That's what took so long, composing what we wanted to ask. Is it possible for you to order that Mr. Smathers must exercise all his visitation times, or be fined or sanctioned or otherwise punished if he doesn't? We think that would be in the best interests of the children.”
Judge Shahan smiled at him serenely, and didn't answer the question. “Thank you for that advice, Mr. Foreman. I'll take it under consideration. Now the jury is dismissed with the heartfelt thanks of the court, and of the parties too, I'm sure. Thank you for resolving this difficult question.”
“It was easy, Your Honor,” the foreman said, and several jurors nodded as they made their way out of the jury box.
“Now on to my issues,” Judge Shahan said, with relish in her voice. “Mr. Smathers, as promised, I'm awarding ninety percent of the community estate to Mrs. Shahan. I'm also ordering you to pay four thousand dollars a month in child support, because I find that the children have special needs of that amount. Counseling, for one thing, to get over the trauma of this breakup. I also order you to pay spousal support to Mary Smathers of two thousand five hundred dollars a month for a period of three years.”
Rod Smathers looked as if he'd been struck a body blow and then slapped in the face. That amount of monthly support would mean very little to him. But the judge had just ordered the maximum of everything from him to his wife and children. He looked at his lawyer in surprise beginning to turn to anger.
“Anything else? Oh, yes, attorney's fees. Mr. Smathers, I also order you to pay your wife's attorney's fees of—what was the amount you testified to, Mr. Owens?”
“One hundred and twelve thousand dollars and change, Your Honor.” David felt embarrassed at saying the amount aloud, but it was accurate: he had worked on nothing else but this case for months.
“I'm surprised your fees didn't run higher,” said the judge. “But I order you to pay that amount, Mr. Smathers, directly to your wife's attorney Mr. Owens. David, will you draw up the final decree?”
“Of course, Your Honor.”
“I'm sure we'll be back together on other issues, but that's all for today. Oh, except for the most important thing. I grant the divorce on the grounds that the marriage has grown insupportable. Also on the grounds of fault. Good luck to you both.”
The judge left the bench quickly and disappeared into her office, not catching anyone's eye. Abruptly court was no longer in session. They all just stood in a big public room, like children finding themselves on a playground. David breathed his own sigh of relief. It seemed he'd been holding his breath for a long time.
Suddenly what little breath remained in his body whooshed out as his client clutched him tightly. Tears flowed down her cheeks onto his collar. “Thank you,” she said softly, but so fervently that David felt warmed all over.
“I'm so glad,” he answered.
Mary Smathers pulled back suddenly and said, “I'm going to call them.”
“Don't say—” David began, but she stopped him. “I'm not going to brag to them, David, I just want to tell them I'm coming home.”
Then she beamed the brightest smile he'd ever seen and left quickly, not answering or even seeming to hear the reporters who called questions at her. The bailiff let her disappear into a court office that, David knew, had a rear exit.
He lifted his own face, more in relief than joy, glad the trial was over, glad he'd won, glad mainly to have the enormous responsibility of his client's hopes off him.
“Congratulations,” said a quiet voice. Ellen Bonham stood before him, holding out her hand. Her client had stalked away, talking angrily into his cell phone. A man in a black suit hurried after him.
“Thank you,” David said, meaning more than thanks for her congratulations. Bonham had been a tough but fair opponent, keeping him so alert that there had been nights when he'd awakened sweating, thinking he'd missed something Bonham had put past him.
“You did a good job.”
“You were awesome,” David answered, then lowered his voice. “Although it seemed to me you laid back a little bit in your final argument.”
She shook her head, making her brown hair swing. “Never. Once I take on a client I do my absolute best for him.” She glanced across the courtroom at the noisy Rod Smathers. “No matter what,” she sighed. To David she added, “I hope this case does you some good. But you've made some powerful people very unhappy. Watch your back, kid.”
David thought that a figure of speech, until seconds later when a hand grabbed his shoulder fiercely and spun him around. David found himself staring into the face of Roger Ainesworth, inches from his own. Until that moment David had also thought the phrase “breathing fire” was only an expression, but Ainesworth seemed to be doing just that. He glared so fiercely and breathed so hard that bits of the red and white peppermint he habitually sucked sprayed out of his mouth, looking like flame. A year ago, Ainesworth had been David's boss, the managing partner of Reynolds McCrory, one of the most prestigious law firms in the city. He dressed conservatively always, today in a black suit, white shirt, and crested tie. Ainesworth's dark hair had receded respectably from his forehead, leaving an arrowhead of hair pointing forward. His small dark eyes glared past his sharp nose, so that Ainesworth's whole face seemed aimed at his former colleague.
“Don't think you've won anything here today,” he said angrily.
“Gosh, Roger, I think I have. Seventy-something million dollars, custody of the children, my attorney's fees …”
David's carefee tone calmed the angry lawyer. Ainesworth snorted a laugh and said, “You don't think you're going to see a penny of that money, do you? First it will take you months to get a decree entered. Then post-judgment discovery. Then we'll give notice of appeal. You remember how long one of our appeals can last, don't you, David? You'll be a little old lawyer before this case ends. That's right, Reynolds McCrory is taking over Rod Smathers's divorce case now. Where we should have been all along. Ellen Bonham was just for show.”
David suddenly lost much of his joy, because he knew the truth of Ainesworth's claims. But he answered, “Roger, I don't think your client will be able to post a big enough bond to avoid paying that judgment. Mrs. Smathers will get her money no matter what you—”
“We don't care about that. It's your money we'll put a hold on, David. And your business. Solo practice!” Ainesworth laughed sneeringly. “Has it been fun on your own, David? You don't even have a paralegal, do you? Have you noticed how little the phone rings?”
Roger Ainesworth stopped abruptly, no doubt realizing he might be opening himself up to a lawsuit. He'd said enough to get his point across, without actually admitting anything that could be construed as evidence of retaliation.
With a confidence he didn't feel, David said, “I think this case might bring me in a little business, don't you, Roger? There's been a certain amount of publicity, or hadn't you noticed? And after this verdict—”
“Sure. Divorce clients. Housewives who want you to take on their cases for no money up front in hopes that their husbands will be ordered to pay your fees somewhere way down the line. Think that'll keep you going for a year?”
Ainesworth lowered his voice. David knew he was about to say something that he would later deny. “Rod Smathers should have been our client all along, with all his corporate business. He would've been if you hadn't insisted on representing his wife instead. But we'll get him back. Right this minute he only wants one thing in the world, and that's to see you ruined. And you remember us, don't you, David?”
Meaning Reynolds McCrory was just the firm to ruin someone. They'd had lots of practice. The brief conversation had cheered Roger Ainesworth enormously. He smiled as if offering congratulations, clapped David on the upper arm, and turned away, then hurried after his prospective client.
Meeting his former boss had had exactly the opposite effect on David. He felt hollow. He had to force himself to put on a triumphant air to accept lawyers' congratulations and answer the questions of reporters. After all, David would need the publicity.
* * *
Three weeks later David Owens sat in his small office as the workday drew to an end. David wore a suit rumpled from a day of sitting, but might as well have been in jeans. He hadn't been back in a courtroom since the end of the Smathers trial.
The verdict for Mary Smathers had generated a good deal of local publicity, even a mention in a national newsmagazine story about the empowering of traditional women. In the first couple of days after the trial David had spent more time being interviewed than lawyering. But that soon died away, other events became newer news, and David settled down to a law practice that did not bloom spectacularly as a result of his one win. In fact, his career seemed in imminent danger of withering away.
Rod Smathers and Reynolds McCrory between them wielded an enormous amount of influence in San Antonio. If they were trying to strangle David's law practice, as Roger Ainesworth had almost announced, they were doing a good job. Most divorce cases came as referrals from lawyers who practiced other kinds of law. Those had stopped altogether, like a faucet being tightly turned off. There had been a flurry of phone calls and prospective new clients after David's triumph in court, but Ainesworth had accurately predicted the type of those clients: women who had spent their lives as homemakers and mothers, and so had no money to pay a retainer. David had taken on a few of these cases, but they'd brought in very little cash.
David felt as if he were living someone else's life, or a bad dream. This had not been his destiny: sitting lonely in a shabby little office in an old downtown building. Eight years ago he had graduated near the top of his class from the University of Texas law school, already with a job at the topdollar, prestigious law firm of Reynolds McCrory. He'd started in litigation, where the tough guys practiced law, and proven himself a quick learner and clever strategist.
The detour in his career had come without David's realizing that there had been a fork in the road, let alone that he'd taken the turnoff. A business client had asked him to represent his son in a divorce. There were no children, little property to divide, just the formalities of paperwork. David had done it as the kind of good deed one does to hang on to good clients.
But then somehow he became known as the family lawyer at Reynolds McCrory. He handled a few other divorces for other good clients. Family law didn't become a significant part of his practice, but he gained experience at it. So when Mary Smathers called wanting to talk about a divorce matter—for a friend, she said—the firm had steered her to David. As it happened, they knew each other slightly already, from serving on a charitable foundation board together. At that first meeting in David's office Mrs. Smathers had been coy, saying she just wanted general information to pass on to her friend. David had been sympathetic and informative, not trying to prove his expertise at family law. He wasn't angling to acquire the case of her “friend.”
But when Mrs. Smathers had left after that first visit, Roger Ainesworth stopped David in the hall and almost licked his lips at the thought of who David had had in his office. “Be good to her. We'd love to get her husband as a client.”
“Yes, sir.”
David saw Mrs. Smathers again only a few days later, at a board meeting at the downtown public library, a few blocks from David's office. During the meeting he noticed her anxious, distracted air, but he wouldn't have intruded except that she turned to him quite suddenly as the meeting broke up and began talking to him. Her conversation was inconsequential until they walked out of the library, alone by that time.
“It wasn't for a friend,” Mary Smathers said. She started talking about her husband, of his drifting away not only from her but from their children as well. About her loneliness, her fears for the children, uncertainty about what to do. Within minutes she'd completely won David's sympathy. She made it sound as if her children had lost their father to a tragedy. Then she'd pulled out the divorce petition.
“This is why I came to see you.”
David looked over the simple form quickly. He flipped to the last page to see the lawyer's name, whistled a low whistle at seeing the petition had been signed by Ellen Bonham, then looked again at the attached first page, which showed when the petition had been served on Mrs. Smathers. He grew a little alarmed. “How long have you been hanging on to this? You know you have to file an answer. If you don't he can get a decree entered that says whatever he wants. He can take all the money, the children…”
“I haven't been able to think what to do,” Mary Smathers moaned.
“The answer's due to be filed today.”
“I thought so. Can you—?”
Thinking quickly, David said, “I can recommend someone. Your husband has one of the best divorce lawyers in town, you need a good one too. Let's go to my office, it's right over here, I can make some phone calls.”
“Can you do it?” Mary Smathers asked, with a shy, earnest expression that would have looked at home on a much younger face. “Can you represent me?”
David meant to say no. He knew he should decline for a variety of reasons, including the good of the law firm. But when Mrs. Smathers added, “I trust you,” David couldn't refuse. They hurried back to his office, and David drew up the simple answer, having it filed before the courthouse closed that afternoon.
If he had known how he was changing his own future, he would certainly have hesitated longer.
Roger Ainesworth went nuclear when he heard the news. A short impromptu conference convened in David's office, the young lawyer sitting bemused behind his desk, older and more important lawyers crowding in to discuss his blunder. “Get rid of her!” Ainesworth screamed shrilly. “We can't get her husband for a client if you're representing her against him!”
“It's probably already too late,” another partner pointed out. “David's already entered an appearance on her behalf. We could never—”
“No, we couldn't represent the husband in this case, the divorce case. Who cares? But we do manage to let him know that our boy David withdrew out of respect for him.” Ainesworth began to smile. “This could work out well, in fact. Good thinking, David. You withdraw, we quietly help Rod Smathers with the business aspects of this case, he gets comfortable with us…and of course we let him meet you. This can be great. But you've got to withdraw, David. Today. We're into damage control now, we have to move quickly.”
That clenched it. Because when David Owens received a direct order, he naturally resisted. When he looked into Roger Ainesworth's shiny face, the beginning of a smile stretching the managing partner's mouth unattractively, and thought of the contrast between that face and Mary Smathers's, David's decision seemed easy.
David withdrew, all right. From the firm of Reynolds McCrory. That day.
* * *
That decision landed him here, in this small office in a nondescript medium-sized old office building, a few blocks and millions of miles from the gleaming tower that housed Reynolds McCrory. It had been heady to be on his own, caught up in the intensity of the Smathers divorce case. Now, having ended that case in triumph, David's life had settled down to the reality of small-time law practice. Every day found him pondering just where his life had changed, and whether he would make the same decisions if he had the chance again. Pointless speculation. This was the life he had: locally famous divorce lawyer, headed relentlessly for bankruptcy.
He felt a shift in the building's current, or the day. Dusk growing quietly. He should let his secretary Janice go home. She just killed time during the day anyway. But just as David was about to buzz her, he heard the small chiming sound the front door of his office made when it opened. He waited expectantly, and a minute later Janice entered. His secretary was a few years older than David, slender with nervousness, given to staring at him sometimes as if she disapproved of him. But on occasion, such as now, her brown eyes grew large with anticipation or curiosity. “Someone new,” she said. “She just says she wants to see you, it won't take long. Her name is Helen Wills. That's all she'll tell me.”
Janice made it seem very mysterious, but David's curiosity barely stirred. Divorce clients often appeared furtive after making that decision to seek out a lawyer. For many of them it was the first time in their lives they needed a lawyer, and they didn't like the idea. David made his way down the short hallway into his reception room, which held Janice's metal desk, three straight-backed chairs for clients, and a small spindly-legged table. If a whole family came to see David, the reception room grew crowded.
The waiting woman didn't take up much space, though. A slimly elegant blonde, Helen Wills was younger than David had expected, around his own age. In a dark suit, she looked more like a businesswoman than a housewife. She wore no wedding ring or any other jewelry. As soon as David entered the reception room the woman's eyes attached to him, studying him critically. This appraising stare also set her apart from the average first-time client, who would usually spend half the time looking at the floor, embarrassed to be there. But Helen Wills looked David over quite frankly.
“Ms. Wills? Would you like to come in?”
She did. As she passed him she said, “I'm not interrupting something important, am I? I'm sorry I couldn't call for an appointment.” David thought he detected irony in her voice, and wondered what she knew about him. He exchanged a glance with Janice.
Helen Wills strode ahead of David to his office, and looked around while he closed the door and circled to his desk chair. She gave his office the same knowing looks she'd given him, glancing quickly at his framed diplomas and law license on the wall, giving a little more study to his furniture: the large oak desk he'd bought secondhand, the much more modern black computer desk and bookcase, which David had put together himself after buying them at Target. In his old office the furniture had belonged to the firm. He'd had to furnish this one quickly and efficiently, and his previous client Mary Smathers hadn't paid attention to the office furnishings. Helen Wills did.
But she didn't say anything, caustic or otherwise. Nor did she take a seat, even when David waved her toward one of the client chairs. Oddly, she didn't pace or fidget, either. It's a hard trick to pull off, just standing straight. Helen did it unself-consciously.
“What can I do for you, Ms. Wills?”
“Not a thing, Mr. Owens. I think I should tell you that this isn't my idea, and I don't think it's a good one.”
“You mean your husband has forced this decision on you?”
“I'm not married.”
Now she had baffled him. If she didn't need a family lawyer, what was she doing here? David suddenly wondered if Roger Ainesworth from his old firm had sent her. Was she an emissary here to offer him peace, or was her job just to report back on David's circumstances? That would account for her watchfulness, as if she had to give a report on this meeting.
He tried her own approach, just sitting silently until she felt like talking. That suited Ms. Wills fine. She continued to stand and to look around, now out one of David's two windows. He had a nice view from the fourteenth floor here, although bigger windows would have done the hills in the distance more justice.
“Ms. Wills, I took it you wanted to talk to me about something. A legal situation, I presume. Are you uncomfortable? Would you like something to drink?”
“I'm fine. It is getting to the end of the workday, though. Why don't you let your secretary go for the day?”
“She works until five-thirty.”
Helen Wills didn't answer. Her silence and her posture made it clear that she wouldn't say anything about the purpose of her visit until she and David were completely alone. David knew what a bad idea that was. For a variety of reasons one often wanted a witness close by in a law office. Vulnerable, emotional clients opening up about their personal lives: who knew where that might lead?
“I'm not going to hurt you,” his visitor said wryly. It was the first time she'd sounded less than perfectly serious. David liked her better for it, but that didn't mean he trusted her.
Nevertheless, he picked up his phone, pressed the intercom button, and said, “Janice, you can take off now. Have a good evening.”
“Yes, sir,” Janice answered, a phrase she never used, the suspicion in her voice so obvious that he could feel it entering his own office. He hung up and he and Ms. Wills looked at each other for a minute or two until they heard the chime of the front door. She opened David's office door and disappeared, apparently making sure that Janice had gone. Was this the part where his visitor reentered his office suddenly naked? David pictured that, with a certain enjoyment, in fact.
Ms. Wills came back in briskly, fully clothed and still moving quickly. “Does that door open into the hall?” she asked, indicating the other door in David's office. She crossed to it before he could answer. She opened the door, looked out into the hall, and seemed satisfied. “Just a minute,” she said over her shoulder, found the button that unlocked the door so it could be opened from the outside, and disappeared again.
David thought about relocking the door. He also thought he should call someone, have the phone line open as a kind of witness line. But he couldn't think whom to call. Just as he picked up his phone his hall door opened again and Helen Wills returned. She held the door open for someone coming in after her, a woman who acted much more like a typical divorce client. She ducked her head, averted her eyes, and left in place a scarf that acted almost as a veil.
David began to resent the mysteriousness. Helen Wills quickly relocked and closed the door, then gave David her most penetrating stare yet, but one with a hint of pleading in it. “This never happened,” she said forcefully.
“You're right about that,” David answered with equal firmness. He put down his phone and came around his desk to confront her. “Nothing has and nothing will if you don't stop behaving in this childish—”
“I'm sorry, Mr. Owens,” the other lady said. She had a higher but more mature voice than Helen Wills. And her voice sounded oddly familiar, though David felt sure he'd never met the lady. “The childishness is my fault. I have to be very careful.”
She removed her hat and pulled the scarf down around her neck, and turned to face David fully for the first time. He stopped dead, his jaw hanging. That was a good thing, because if he had spoken at that moment he would probably have said something foolish. Of course, this lady had probably grown accustomed to people stammering when first meeting her. Her weeks were filled with such meetings, as a matter of fact.
“I'm Myra McPherson,” the lady said, extending her hand.
He knew that. Anyone would recognize McPherson, the wife of the President of the United States.
* * *
Ten minutes later the scene had gained a semblance of ordinariness. The First Lady sat in one of the client chairs, a glass of diet soda on the desk in front of her. David had resumed his normal seat at the desk, and had regained some composure as well. “I didn't even know you were in town,” he said lamely.
“It's a quiet visit. We had an event in Houston, then I always try to stop by home.”
David had almost forgotten, as had most people, that San Antonio was theoretically the hometown of the President and First Lady. John McPherson had lived here before being elected to the Senate and then to the presidency. The first family retained the fiction of legal residence in Texas for voting purposes, but in fact had lived in D.C. for years and had little more contact with San Antonio than any other city in America.
“Actually I'm from Baytown, near Houston?” Mrs. McPherson said, in the southern style of speech of making a statement a question. David nodded. “I never really lived here. John was already in the Senate when we married. We've been away from Texas a long time.”
“That's true,” David said, wondering at the purpose for this visit. The enigmatic Helen remained standing, slightly behind the First Lady. Myra McPherson seemed the most comfortable person in the room. She sat quietly, not fidgeting with her hands or crossing and recrossing her legs. But her neck showed a certain tension, and she had trouble keeping her eyes on David.
Myra McPherson was in her late thirties, very young for a First Lady, twelve years younger than her husband. In person she seemed younger still, hesitant and shy in an odd way. She had a slender face framed by straight brown hair, and clear gray eyes that seemed elongated sideways: doe's eyes. When she leaned toward David, he felt the thrill of intimacy with the famous. But Mrs. McPherson had a very human quality.
“You must be wondering why I'm here,” she said suddenly. She had read David's mind—not a difficult trick under the circumstances. “I've read about you recently.”
“Ah. Don't tell me you're here to ask for advice for a friend. You could have had your assistant do that.” He hesitated over the word “assistant,” looking at Helen Wills. She might be a Secret Service agent, a bodyguard. “Did you have some personal interest in the Smathers case? Do you know Mary Smathers?”
Mrs. McPherson glanced up at Helen, who nodded slightly. “We've met at a couple of functions. But no, I didn't have a personal interest in her case.”
Now Helen Wills seemed to be playing the role of social secretary. David wondered again at her precise function in life.
“But I enjoyed reading about the Smathers case. Especially the way you represented her.” The First Lady smiled, but turned quickly serious again. “I understood Mrs. Smathers's position. The way even a woman who's thought of as rich and powerful can feel helpless. It took a special person to convey that to a jury. It took nerve for her to stand up to her husband, but it took you to let her do it in a courtroom.”
Finally her eyes fastened on David, studying him. He felt his face growing warm. Just as he was about to thank her for her praise, the First Lady said quietly, “I need the same kind of help.”
For a moment David didn't understand the words. Then they sank in, and his first reaction was alarm. “No.”
“Yes, Mr. Owens. Trust me, I've given the matter a great deal of thought. I want a divorce.”
The lady looked painfully sincere. For a moment her lip trembled. She understood very well the painful significance of what she'd just said. David cleared his throat and became lawyerlike.
“Mrs. McPherson, if we're going to have an attorney-client conversation, the first thing I have to tell you is that having a third person present voids the attorney-client privilege. Your assistant here wouldn't be bound by the confidentiality of—”
Mrs. McPherson reached back and grasped the younger woman's arm. “No need to worry about that. We can trust Helen implicitly. In fact, she's the only person I do trust. After all, she helped me get here.”
David thought that explained Helen Wills's extremely watchful expression and that note of pleading he'd also seen in her gaze once. She had overstepped the bounds of her job by bringing the First Lady here.
“Do you want details?” Myra McPherson asked.
Of course he did. Hearing the intimate details of people's lives was one of the prime perks of divorce work. At the same time, David wanted to withdraw from the conversation completely. “I don't want to put myself on the Secret Service's hit list.”
Mrs. McPherson reached a hand toward him comfortingly. “Why do you think we did all this silly secret agent stuff to get to you? Helen and I slipped away from my guards. Not just because of what I was coming to see you about, but to protect you. In case you decide you don't want to take the case.”
“Let's make sure you really want a case,” David said smoothly, sounding lawyerly and comforting. “I want to know why, and especially why now. Your husband has been in office three years. He's up for reelection next year. If you tell him that your marriage depends on his not running again …”
The First Lady laughed abruptly and harshly. “Give up the presidency for me? And Randy? You have no idea what an absurd suggestion that is, Mr. Owens. My husband—”
“Then if you could wait—”
“Another five years until he's done?” Mrs. McPherson looked fearful for the first time. “Have you ever been in a bad relationship, Mr. Owens? Do you know how long five years is when you live with that every day? But that's not the reason. My son is eight years old. Five years is a lifetime to him. He's starting to become aware of what's going on around him. I don't want him in that place for even one more year. I don't want him growing up in that atmosphere.”
The presidential son had been hovering in the back of David's mind before his mother mentioned him. David drew a clean yellow legal pad from a drawer and uncapped his pen. “All right. Let's begin. Ms. Wills, will you sit down, please? I can't remain sitting any longer if you're going to keep standing, and if I stand up too I can't write. Thank you. Now, Mrs. McPherson, tell me why you want a divorce. Convince me.”
The First Lady began to betray nervousness. She looked down at her hands. “I should never have married John in the first place. I realized that some time ago. He was already running for the Senate when he proposed to me. I was thrilled, of course. He was twelve years older, smart, energetic. He seemed very strong. I found his wanting to marry me very flattering. Now I realize”—she glanced at Helen, whose face had softened; the younger woman put her hand on the First Lady's clenched ones—“that I was a necessary ornament to John's political life. He needed a wife, and a family, to look like a normal American. Our wedding took place less than a month before the general election, and was like a campaign rally.
“After that, his career took him over.”
“Everyone who holds high public office has to spend a great deal of time performing that job and keeping it. You must have known that,” David said.
“I did. And I was content to be the stay-at-home wife, making a home for John and staying in the background. But I also thought there would be moments of…tenderness, like we had when he was courting me. Some sort of private family life. Especially after Randy was born, I thought we'd have family times at least occasionally. But there's been none of that. Once we had a son it seemed I'd served my purpose for John. He's never seemed to have any feeling for Randy, or for me. John's passions lie elsewhere.”
David sat impassively, pondering her last comment. Was he being asked to out the first gay President?
He put down his pen and looked straight at his visitor. “Mrs. McPherson, I sympathize with you. Believe me, I do. But—I feel stupid even saying this, of course you must have given it a lot of thought—but do you realize the public scandal your filing for divorce would cause? On the other hand, I don't see how you'd be harmed by waiting. I doubt you're the first woman to endure a loveless marriage in the White House.”
“I told you, five years would be too long to wait. Randy would be irreparably damaged by then. Besides, I want the threat of scandal. If I wait until John leaves office, I won't have the leverage I'll have now, to get away from him.”
David didn't quite understand that. His visitor appeared to realize she hadn't made herself clear, but she didn't try to explain further. “Can you cause a scandal?” David asked. “Do you think your husband's having an affair, for example?”
“I know he is. But that's not the problem. Well, it's part of the problem. It's part of what I meant when I said I don't want Randy growing up in that atmosphere. The infidelity, the lies, the whole facade of family life. That's not all. There's something very dangerous going on in the White House, Mr. Owens. I want my son out of it.”
David looked at Helen Wills, hoping for a dash of reality, a roll of the eyes to indicate she understood how crazy this sounded. But Helen looked downcast, as if she didn't want to be present when these things were discussed. Her eyes caught David's just for a second.
The First Lady abruptly stopped talking. Mrs. McPherson's voice and face had grown stonier as she'd talked about her marriage; obviously she had trained herself in emotional defense. But for a moment she almost broke down, looking again very young and confused. On television Myra McPherson appeared completely buttoned-up, a person placid to the point of unemotionalism. In person David saw that wasn't true at all. She had lost her youth to politics, but somehow retained it, as if those years hadn't counted. David pushed a box of tissues toward her. “All right, Mrs. McPherson, you've convinced me. I believe you need to break away. But I have a lot more questions, and more to explain. First of all, I'm not licensed to practice in the District of Columbia.”
“No, I want to file here.”
“I'm not sure—” David began, but Mrs. McPherson leaned toward him with renewed urgency.
“John and I have always claimed San Antonio as our legal residence. Isn't that what counts? We've come here to vote every election day. There's a small condo that's the official residence. Isn't that good enough? Doesn't an elected politician maintain legal residence in his hometown?”
“I'd have to do some research. It makes sense, but it's just a fiction. I doubt any court has ever ruled on the issue. At any rate, why…?”
“I don't want to get divorced in Washington,” she answered quickly. “John would have everything his own way there. The judges are all appointed, they all owe favors. John would find their strings. No. They'd crush me there. He might even be able to take Randy away from me. I want to get away from that world, don't you see? Starting with where the divorce is filed.”
“Yes, I understand.” Though David continued to sound placid and reassuring, his mind raced. Huge excitement grew in him, starting in the pit of his stomach and spreading outward. He felt the center of attention of a great crowd of people. Filing a divorce case against the President of the United States. The idea frightened him, yes. It was also a lawyer's wet dream.
“There are a lot of issues,” he said slowly. “The community estate, separate property, reimbursement claims. The grounds for divorce, first of all. You can either allege insupportability, which is the same as irreconcilable differences, no-fault, or the traditional fault claims such as cruelty—”
“No, that first one would be all right. I don't want to hurt John, I just want to escape him.”
A moment's silence embraced the three people in the small room. They had drawn closer together, like conspirators. David stared across the desk at the First Lady, who sat erect, eyes gleaming, an anxious but determined woman. The First Lady saw a young man who exuded confidence, but whose fingers tapped quickly on his desktop. David smiled briefly.
Helen Wills's expression had warmed up. She too looked at David appraisingly, but no longer hostilely. He glanced at her in a quick moment of understanding, asking her opinion of her employer's sanity. Helen raised one eyebrow and lowered it again, a facial shrug. Their eyes stayed on each other. David understood what Helen had known when she'd entered his office, that this was an historic meeting.
“I'm afraid I don't have that much time now,” Mrs. McPherson said. “I'm expected somewhere. But I want you to be able to file whenever I call you and say so. What do I have to do?”
“There's just one short form you have to sign.” David continued talking while he turned to his computer, called up the document in question, erased the name, typed in a new one, and printed the form. “It's an agreement that you'll go through mediation short of going to trial. I'll explain that if it becomes important, but it's a promise everyone has to make in the first pleading in a lawsuit. It's the only form you'd sign. I sign the petition for divorce itself.”
He handed the sheet of paper to his visitor. She read the paragraph quickly and signed the signature line in a clear, schoolgirlish script. David took a long look at the signature when she handed the page back to him. Her name written in her own handwriting made the scene real for him.
“Now what about your fee?”
“I charge two hundred dollars an hour, and in a case that might involve child custody issues I get a retainer of ten thousand dollars.” David's tongue didn't stumble as he gave himself a quick raise.
“I could raise that much, but right now—”
“It's all right, Mrs. McPherson, I trust you.”
She smiled shyly and suddenly rose. David came around his desk quickly, then stopped as she held out her hand. He realized she was offering a handshake, as if concluding a formal business meeting. But when he took her hand she held his. The First Lady seemed more formidable for a moment, giving him her most penetrating stare yet. “Even without my paying you, are you my lawyer?”
“Yes, ma'am, I am. Don't worry about that.”
“Thank you.” She gave his hand a last tight squeeze and released it. “Then could you please call me Myra?”
David laughed, taken by surprise. “I really doubt I could. But I'd be pleased if you'll call me David. Usually when someone calls me ‘Mister' it means I'm in trouble.”
“All right, David.” She turned away, Helen hurrying around her to the hall door.
“There's just one other thing.” David's voice stopped his client and she looked back at him alertly. “I know you read about how brilliantly I handled Mary Smathers's divorce, but I have to tell you that I haven't been practicing family law all that long. There are much more experienced family lawyers in this city, people who would do a great job for you. I could give you the names of two or three. Ellen Bonham, Mike Garrells…I think anyone would advise you, starting with Ms. Wills there, that you need the absolute best lawyer you can find. I'm very flattered you came to me, but I have an obligation—”
Myra McPherson shook her head decisively. “No, I want you. I thought so before I came here, and now I'm sure.
“Besides, now that you know my plans, if I didn't hire you I'd have to have you killed.”
He had seen the First Lady's smile. Everyone had, on television. Her smile was a demure, gracious expression, extremely suitable for formal occasions. The quick grin Myra McPherson gave him now was an altogether different animal, stretching her cheeks wide and making her eyes shine. For a fleeting moment she looked genuinely happy.
Helen watched David too, and gave him a very small nod in acknowledgment of the end of their first meeting.
Then they both turned and were gone.
 
Copyright © 2001 by Jay Brandon

Excerpts

CHAPTER
 
one
 
 
The Bexar County Courthouse in San Antonio is more than a hundred years old, the oldest working courthouse among the two hundred fifty-four counties of Texas. The red stone building had played host to thousands and thousands of trials over the years, most with little fanfare. On this particular May afternoon, though, the trial going on in the grand courtroom at the south end of the fourth floor drew more attention than any civil trial in a long time. Hearing that the week-long trial was nearing conclusion, courthouse employees, idle lawyers, reporters, and even a few honest citizens had trickled into the audience seats to hear the final arguments.
Usually only a high-profile criminal case, perhaps a capital murder trial, drew this kind of notoriety. But in the old civil district courtroom much more was at stake than a prison sentence. This was a divorce trial.
David Owens stood at the spacious front of the courtroom, facing the jury across an old-fashioned railing supported by carved wooden posts. To his right Judge Louise Shahan sat attentively, her eyes shifting from David to the opposing lawyer to the gallery of spectators. The twelve jurors seemed to be paying careful attention to David, as much attention to his pauses to collect his thoughts as to his arguments themselves.
David Owens looked very young during those pauses. He was thirty-two but didn't look it. His blue suit fit him a bit loosely; he had lost weight lately. David had black hair, intense blue eyes, and too pale skin, given the ample sunshine San Antonio provided in the late springtime. This case had aged him, but finally in the courtroom he had found fresh supplies of energy.
Out in the spectator area the wooden pews were filled with silent watchers, shoulders touching. The spectators, many of them lawyers, also watched David Owens carefully, not only to judge his speech-making ability, but for signs that the young lawyer knew how over his head he'd wandered in taking on this case.
At the other counsel table sat the highest-priced divorce lawyer in San Antonio, Ellen Bonham. Her client had chosen her not just for her experience and her reputation, but for her gender. In divorcing his wife of twenty-two years, the client, Rod Smathers, wanted not only to win but not to look like a bad guy. He wanted every minute of the trial to demonstrate that women shouldn't recoil from him in distaste. He was only doing his best for everyone. Hence the woman lawyer, who sat close to him and conferred with him head to head once in a while.
Smathers was the CEO of the only Fortune 100 corporation in San Antonio, the town's most important employer and corporate citizen. He must also have been one of the two or three richest men in town, and intended to remain so after this divorce became final.
David Owens had never done anything in his life that had drawn this much absorbed attention. But as he presented his case to the jury the weight of those stares didn't disturb him. He felt only one gaze on him, that of his client. He also felt the weight of three people who weren't in the courthouse, and his heart beat heavily.
To the jurors David said, "My opposing counsel has asked you whether Mr. Smathers should be punished for having made such a good life for his family. Should he be punished for his hard work, for providing his wife and children a beautiful home and lifestyle? Should he be punished for that by having his children taken from him now?
"Of course the answer is no." David saw the jurors' eyes widen, and heard a small gasp from his client. He went quickly on. "Mr. Smathers and my client Mary Smathers came to an agreement years ago, when their first child was born. He would work and provide income. She would take care of the children. That was the deal, and it worked well.
"But somewhere over the years their arrangement became more than a way to share responsibilities. Their roles took them over. Mr. Smathers's business began to consume his life. He became obsessed with rising to the absolute top of his company. He made it. But family life had to give way to his quest."
"Objection," Ellen Bonham said loudly. "There was testimony that my client spent lots of time with--"
Judge Shahan quickly cut her off. "The jury will remember the evidence as they heard it," she instructed, adding quietly. "Pay attention to your own memories, not to what the lawyers say."
"You heard the testimony," David said to the jury. "Not just of working long hours during the week, but of spending weekends on business trips or playing golf with important clients. That's what you have to do to get to the top of the business world, and Mr. Smathers did it."
David turned from the jury toward his client, and walked slowly toward her. "Meanwhile, something similar happened to Mary Smathers. She played her assigned role in the family, she stayed home with the children, but just as with her husband, her role took her over. Mary became a full-time mother in every sense. When a child woke up scared in the middle of the night, he called for Mom. And she came. When a child skinned her knee in the backyard, it was Mom who doctored it. For driving the car pool and chaperoning field trips and attending music recitals, the Smathers children have had only one parent."
David stood between the counsel tables, letting the jury look at the opponents who had once been lovers. Rod Smathers in his early fifties looked younger. He had kept in good shape, his jawline didn't sag, his dark suit fit him well. He looked authoritative and decisive. His wife across the aisle in her pale peach jacket and skirt didn't seem to belong with him. Mary Smathers had been very pretty when they had married, but frankly nowhere near beautiful enough to be the wife of one of the most important business leaders in Texas. In her mid-forties now, she seemed headed briskly for matronhood. She remained pretty, but in a mature way for which a different word was needed. Mary had become attractive in an almost middle-aged, lightly tended way. Trial had not brought out the best in her appearance. Her cheeks had red splotches and her eyes showed traces of those interrupted nights of motherhood and of tears recently shed. She gazed at her lawyer with obvious fright.
David asked, "Should either of them be punished for the roles they assumed? No. This isn't about punishment. This is about what's best for the children. The judge's instructions and your own good sense tell you that you have to look at your decision from the point of view of the children. If you award primary custody of these three children to their father, they'll have every material thing they could ever want: horses on the family ranch, private schools, cars when they're old enough, trips all over the world with Dad…once a year or so.
"But who's going to doctor their scraped knees every day? The maid. A housekeeper, a nanny. Or nobody.
"Giving this mother primary custody of the children won't hurt Mr. Smathers one bit. You've seen the standard possession order for the noncustodial parent. If Mr. Smathers exercises those times of possession--one evening a week and the entire weekend every other week, plus a month in the summer--it will be more time than he's spent with his children in their lives. He's never wanted that much time with them before. And now he says he wants even more. He wants primary custody. He wants to be the one to tuck his three children in every night."
David surveyed the jury, eight men and four women. Ellen Bonham had gotten her way there, using nearly all her strikes on women, who would be presumed more sympathetic toward David's client. But looking at the jurors, David had begun to feel a rapport with them. He wondered if trial lawyers always developed that feeling. David wouldn't know. This was only the fifth jury trial of his career, his second as lead counsel.
"It's Rod Smathers who thinks in terms of punishing people. That's what this trial is all about. That's the only reason he's asked for custody: to hurt his wife. To punish her for daring to ask for more ofhismoney than he's--"
"Objection!" the other lawyer almost shouted, rising to her feet. "There is absolutely no evidence to support this argument of counsel's. Furthermore he knows very well that the division of property is no concern of this jury's. The only issue before them is custody."
Judge Shahan sat in thoughtful silence, casting back her memory over the whole four-day trial. "That's sustained. Move on to another topic, Mr. Owens."
David didn't. "I think you can figure it out for yourselves," David said to the jury. "You can see from Mary's testimony, from her very anxiety about this case, why she wants primary custody of these children. Because that's what's best for them, that they stay with the mother who's raised them. What's Mr. Smathers's reason for asking for primary custody? So that his children can be baby-sat by nannies and maids while he works late and jets around the country.
"Think about those motivations. Then you decide which of these parents has the best interests of these children at heart."
He didn't realize until he'd said it that that would be his closing sentence, but David at least recognized an end line when he heard one. He turned rather abruptly and resumed his seat beside his client. Under the table she took his hand and squeezed it so tightly the tips of his fingers turned instantly white.
Judge Shahan quickly dismissed the jury to their deliberations, but didn't leave the bench. Leaning casually in her high-backed black chair, she asked, "Ready for my part of the decision?"
Before the jury portion of the trial had begun, the parties had presented evidence concerning the Smatherses' community property to the judge. In Texas, juries have very narrow powers to decide issues in divorce trials, primarily custody of the children. Judges decide how to divide the property.
Ellen Bonham rose quickly to her feet. "If you are, Your Honor. Of course I'd like to present argument on the property division first."
The judge paused a beat, then said, "Of course, Counsel. Take as long as you like."
Uh oh. David recognized that the judge's order didn't free Bonham in the way it sounded. It was an offer of ample rope. Judge Shahan had probably already made up her mind, or almost. Overlong or overly intense argument would only raise her hostility. Bonham wouldn't be doing her client any favors by talking too much.
Just on the near side of fifty, Ellen Bonham had been practicing family law in San Antonio for twenty-five years. Always soft-spoken and cordial in negotiation, she changed in appearances before a judge or jury. She focused fiercely, never letting a point pass without putting her own spin on it. She knew the judges intimately and held their respect.
"I just want to remind the court of a couple of points. First, there's Mr. Smathers's personal property that isn't included in the community estate. The house at the coast that he inherited from his aunt, and the block of Travis Investments stock left him by his father, which has appreciated in value but only due to dividends and rise in stock prices, not because Mr. Smathers invested community time in the stock. I'm sure the court is aware--"
"I don't plan to take anything of his from him, Counselor," the judge said quietly.
Bonham hurried smoothly on. "As for the rest of the community property, we are only asking for an equal division. I do think it's appropriate that Mr. Smathers be awarded the stock options in the company he heads, since those are incentives for his performance as CEO and closely caught up in the company itself. The house should be sold and the proceeds divided equally, after Mr. Smathers is compensated for his separate property that was used for down payment eight years ago. That's all, Your Honor."
With a slight movement of her head the judge turned her attention to the other lawyer. Ellen Bonham also watched David Owens attentively, hoping he would talk the judge into boredom and his case down the tubes.
From his seat at counsel table David said, "We don't care about the property division, Your Honor."
This announcement caused a stir among the spectators, but drew no reaction from David's client. Seeming to affirm what her lawyer had said, Mary Smathers sat staring at the closed door through which the jurors had departed.
David rose to his feet. "But for the sake of the children we have to argue about money. Because Mr. Smathers hasn't offered them enough to support those children in the way--"
"Objection, Your Honor! Settlement negotiations are inadmissible, and there's been no evidence--"
"She's right, Mr. Owens. Move on," the judge ruled.
"Your Honor, I suggest you order that the bulk of the community estate follow the children. The community estate is valued at approximately eighty-two or -three million dollars. If Mary Smathers doesn't get custody of her children, a tenth of that will sustain her comfortably. It won't matter to her how much money she has in the bank if she doesn't have her children with her.
"But if the jury awards her primary custody, she should have the bulk of the community estate. Those four people will be on their own financially, with no hope of the kind of income they've enjoyed as Rod Smathers's family. Mary will need to provide schooling, travel, college educations, everything those children deserve. Everything they'd be assured of having if only their parents had managed to stay together."
Abruptly David sat down, looking weary. Ellen Bonham stared at him, looking for cunning strategy in the nonsense he'd just spouted.
But Judge Shahan nodded thoughtfully. She too looked appraisingly at the young lawyer. "So you want to roll the dice with your client's money, eh, Counselor? I find that an excellent suggestion."
"What?!" Bonham said, echoed by so many lawyers in the audience who thought they were speaking quietly that they made a ghostly chorus from all parts of the courtroom.
"Yes," the judge said. "It's the children who should have the money. Mr. Smathers, if you are given custody of the children I'm going to award a disproportionate share of the community estate to you. But I'm going to award it to you as trustee for your children. If this happens, within sixty days of the date of my ruling I want you to show me proof that the money has gone into irrevocable trusts with your three children as the beneficiaries."
Rod Smathers had looked momentarily pleased, then puzzled. He recovered quickly, half rose, and said, "Uh, that's fine, Your Honor."
"I'm not asking for your approval. On the other hand, if Mrs. Smathers is awarded primary custody, I'm going to award her ninety percent of the community estate."
"What?!!" This time it was Rod Smathers who shouted the question.
"Sit down. Yes, of the community estate of eighty-three million dollars--a figure I find remarkably low, by the way, for an executive as well compensated as you are--"
"I've only been CEO for two years, Your Honor. Before that I was simply an employee with a salary."
"Save it, Mr. Smathers. I'm only saying that if it turns out in the next few years that you receive a hefty deferred compensation package, I'd be willing to entertain a bill of review for fraud on the community." That comment was directed at David Owens, who caught it. The judge continued. "I will award Mrs. Smathers the house, and award you the mortgage debt on it. You wouldn't want to put your children out of their home, would you? Also I will award Mrs. Smathers ninety percent of the remaining assets. I can do that, Mr. Smathers, because I find that you are at fault in the breakup of this marriage. There was no testimony that your wife did anything wrong except devote too much of her time to the children. You're the one who changed, working longer and longer hours and being gone from home more and more frequently. I wouldn't be surprised if your emotional life had left your family behind as well.
"The community should be reimbursed for that lost time, and all I can award them is money."
Smathers looked confused and short of breath. "You'll be awarding it to her in trust, Your Honor, like with me?"
"No. I trust her to use the money for the benefit of the children. That's been the whole pattern of her life. And of course I'll also be ordering child support and spousal support. But we'll get to those after we hear from the jury.
"Funny, Mr. Smathers," Judge Shahan concluded ironically, "for the first time you look concerned about the jury's verdict. Your wife has looked pretty anxious about it all along."
The judge rose casually and strolled down the courtroom aisle, waving a hand to tell the spectators not to rise on her behalf. But the audience members stood up anyway, some walking out into the hall, others standing in clumps discussing the interesting spectacle they'd just witnessed. A newspaper reporter circulated, asking lawyers if the proceeding had been as unorthodox as it seemed. Most assured him that it had indeed been unusual, starting with the fact that David Owens had presented at least as good a final argument as Ellen Bonham and concluding with the judge's odd ruling on the community property division. All in all it had been a highly entertaining morning in court.
As the courtroom emptied out Mary Smathers slumped in her chair. Her head close to her lawyer's, she said quietly but in a heartfelt tone, "If that jury gives him custody I'll kill myself. Or him."
Her words chilled the air, not just because of the threat itself, but because Mary Smathers sounded so downcast that she must have thought about this idea very seriously.
But David Owens didn't sound worried. "No you won't," he said firmly, not an order but a prediction. "Because your children will still need you no matter what happens. You couldn't do that to them."
Mrs. Smathers raised her head. Her features grew more serene as she thought about her children, and David knew she was remembering something one of them had done or said.
An hour passed. Ellen Bonham and her glowering client returned to her office a few blocks away. David suggested that he and Mrs. Smathers do the same, but she wanted to stay. At three-thirty she called to make sure her children were safely home from school. She talked to each of them in turn, and that was the first time that day she smiled, though her eyes glistened. After the call she went off to the ladies' room for some time.
David phoned his office. There had been no calls of consequence. His secretary sounded bored. With the preparations for this trial done, David's office produced very little activity. Since he'd gone into private practice this had been his only case.
At four-fifteen, after two hours and a quarter of deliberations, the jurors rang their buzzer. Judge Shahan emerged from her chambers saying, "So soon?" and shot a glance at David as if she wanted to tell him something, but refrained.
It hadn't seemed like a short time to Mary Smathers. They had to wait another twenty minutes for Mr. Smathers and his lawyer to return, and Mrs. Smathers vibrated like crystal the whole time. Her life's fate rested on a piece of paper behind that closed jury-room door. That twenty-minute delay was one of the cruelest things her husband had ever done to her.
The room gradually filled as word that the verdict was in spread through the courthouse. Even the judge took the unusual step of sitting behind the bench waiting, along with everyone else.
At least when he arrived Smathers looked grim. David would have wanted to punch him if the executive had looked unconcerned about this verdict. It wasn't about money. The judge could award Mary Smathers the whole community estate, and Rod Smathers would make it back in a couple of years. What bothered him was the judge's public ruling that he hadn't been a good husband. Smathers treasured his public image, serving on charitable boards and making enough corporate donations to have his name on public projects all over town. It was good for business, good for his ego. The only way to redeem himself in this trial was for the jury to find him a good father by awarding him custody of his children. Smathers didn't look at his soon-to-be ex-wife at all. But he glared at David Owens, the lawyer who had cost him part of his good name.
The jurors filed into the jury box. A few of them looked sheepish and shy as jurors often do during their time in the public spotlight. But most of them held their heads high, looking directly at the two parties. Two women and one man smiled reassuringly at Mrs. Smathers. David's heart began to unclench, but sometimes jurors gave those sympathetic looks to the losing party, to say,We don't think you're a bad person even though we just screwed you with our verdict.
"Have you reached a decision?" the judge asked.
A juror on the front row stood up, a man with a bland expression but alert eyes. He wore a checked shirt and solid blue tie, which made him look like a professor or engineer. His quiet manner had marked him as a follower in the eyes of the lawyers who'd left him on the jury, but now he displayed a quiet authority. "Yes, Your Honor."
The judge nodded and the foreman continued, "We find that the best interests of the children would be served by awarding primary custody to their mother, Mary Smathers."
Mrs. Smathers gave a long, shuddering sigh, sinking back into her chair as if suddenly boneless. David squeezed her hand, got no response, and turned toward her, afraid she'd had a heart attack. But his client sat with eyes uplifted and an enormous smile beginning to shape her mouth.
Past Mrs. Smathers David saw her husband. Mary hadn't glanced at him at all. This wasn't a triumphant moment for her, it was just a relief. But Rod Smathers watched his wife questioningly, as if asking himself if he'd been wrong to oppose her for custody at all. Then the executive's eyes lifted to David and his expression changed to one of pure hatred.
There had been a rather noisy reaction from the audience, but it died down quickly as the jury foreman remained standing. In a voice that carried, the man said to the judge, "We also have a request to make of you, Your Honor. That's what took so long, composing what we wanted to ask. Is it possible for you to order that Mr. Smathersmustexercise all his visitation times, or be fined or sanctioned or otherwise punished if he doesn't? We think that would be in the best interests of the children."
Judge Shahan smiled at him serenely, and didn't answer the question. "Thank you for that advice, Mr. Foreman. I'll take it under consideration. Now the jury is dismissed with the heartfelt thanks of the court, and of the parties too, I'm sure. Thank you for resolving this difficult question."
"It was easy, Your Honor," the foreman said, and several jurors nodded as they made their way out of the jury box.
"Now on to my issues," Judge Shahan said, with relish in her voice. "Mr. Smathers, as promised, I'm awarding ninety percent of the community estate to Mrs. Shahan. I'm also ordering you to pay four thousand dollars a month in child support, because I find that the children have special needs of that amount. Counseling, for one thing, to get over the trauma of this breakup. I also order you to pay spousal support to Mary Smathers of two thousand five hundred dollars a month for a period of three years."
Rod Smathers looked as if he'd been struck a body blow and then slapped in the face. That amount of monthly support would mean very little to him. But the judge had just ordered the maximum of everything from him to his wife and children. He looked at his lawyer in surprise beginning to turn to anger.
"Anything else? Oh, yes, attorney's fees. Mr. Smathers, I also order you to pay your wife's attorney's fees of--what was the amount you testified to, Mr. Owens?"
"One hundred and twelve thousand dollars and change, Your Honor." David felt embarrassed at saying the amount aloud, but it was accurate: he had worked on nothing else but this case for months.
"I'm surprised your fees didn't run higher," said the judge. "But I order you to pay that amount, Mr. Smathers, directly to your wife's attorney Mr. Owens. David, will you draw up the final decree?"
"Of course, Your Honor."
"I'm sure we'll be back together on other issues, but that's all for today. Oh, except for the most important thing. I grant the divorce on the grounds that the marriage has grown insupportable. Also on the grounds of fault. Good luck to you both."
The judge left the bench quickly and disappeared into her office, not catching anyone's eye. Abruptly court was no longer in session. They all just stood in a big public room, like children finding themselves on a playground. David breathed his own sigh of relief. It seemed he'd been holding his breath for a long time.
Suddenly what little breath remained in his body whooshed out as his client clutched him tightly. Tears flowed down her cheeks onto his collar. "Thank you," she said softly, but so fervently that David felt warmed all over.
"I'm so glad," he answered.
Mary Smathers pulled back suddenly and said, "I'm going to call them."
"Don't say--" David began, but she stopped him. "I'm not going to brag to them, David, I just want to tell them I'm coming home."
Then she beamed the brightest smile he'd ever seen and left quickly, not answering or even seeming to hear the reporters who called questions at her. The bailiff let her disappear into a court office that, David knew, had a rear exit.
He lifted his own face, more in relief than joy, glad the trial was over, glad he'd won, glad mainly to have the enormous responsibility of his client's hopes off him.
"Congratulations," said a quiet voice. Ellen Bonham stood before him, holding out her hand. Her client had stalked away, talking angrily into his cell phone. A man in a black suit hurried after him.
"Thank you," David said, meaning more than thanks for her congratulations. Bonham had been a tough but fair opponent, keeping him so alert that there had been nights when he'd awakened sweating, thinking he'd missed something Bonham had put past him.
"You did a good job."
"You were awesome," David answered, then lowered his voice. "Although it seemed to me you laid back a little bit in your final argument."
She shook her head, making her brown hair swing. "Never. Once I take on a client I do my absolute best for him." She glanced across the courtroom at the noisy Rod Smathers. "No matter what," she sighed. To David she added, "I hope this case does you some good. But you've made some powerful people very unhappy. Watch your back, kid."
David thought that a figure of speech, until seconds later when a hand grabbed his shoulder fiercely and spun him around. David found himself staring into the face of Roger Ainesworth, inches from his own. Until that moment David had also thought the phrase "breathing fire" was only an expression, but Ainesworth seemed to be doing just that. He glared so fiercely and breathed so hard that bits of the red and white peppermint he habitually sucked sprayed out of his mouth, looking like flame. A year ago, Ainesworth had been David's boss, the managing partner of Reynolds McCrory, one of the most prestigious law firms in the city. He dressed conservatively always, today in a black suit, white shirt, and crested tie. Ainesworth's dark hair had receded respectably from his forehead, leaving an arrowhead of hair pointing forward. His small dark eyes glared past his sharp nose, so that Ainesworth's whole face seemed aimed at his former colleague.
"Don't think you've won anything here today," he said angrily.
"Gosh, Roger, I think I have. Seventy-something million dollars, custody of the children, my attorney's fees …"
David's carefee tone calmed the angry lawyer. Ainesworth snorted a laugh and said, "You don't think you're going to see a penny of that money, do you? First it will take you months to get a decree entered. Then post-judgment discovery. Then we'll give notice of appeal. You remember how long one of our appeals can last, don't you, David? You'll be a little old lawyer before this case ends. That's right, Reynolds McCrory is taking over Rod Smathers's divorce case now. Where we should have been all along. Ellen Bonham was just for show."
David suddenly lost much of his joy, because he knew the truth of Ainesworth's claims. But he answered, "Roger, I don't think your client will be able to post a big enough bond to avoid paying that judgment. Mrs. Smathers will get her money no matter what you--"
"We don't care about that. It's your money we'll put a hold on, David. And your business. Solo practice!" Ainesworth laughed sneeringly. "Has it been fun on your own, David? You don't even have a paralegal, do you? Have you noticed how little the phone rings?"
Roger Ainesworth stopped abruptly, no doubt realizing he might be opening himself up to a lawsuit. He'd said enough to get his point across, without actually admitting anything that could be construed as evidence of retaliation.
With a confidence he didn't feel, David said, "I think this case might bring me in a little business, don't you, Roger? There's been a certain amount of publicity, or hadn't you noticed? And after this verdict--"
"Sure. Divorce clients. Housewives who want you to take on their cases for no money up front in hopes that their husbands will be ordered to pay your fees somewhere way down the line. Think that'll keep you going for a year?"
Ainesworth lowered his voice. David knew he was about to say something that he would later deny. "Rod Smathers should have been our client all along, with all his corporate business. He would've been if you hadn't insisted on representing his wife instead. But we'll get him back. Right this minute he only wants one thing in the world, and that's to see you ruined. And you remember us, don't you, David?"
Meaning Reynolds McCrory was just the firm to ruin someone. They'd had lots of practice. The brief conversation had cheered Roger Ainesworth enormously. He smiled as if offering congratulations, clapped David on the upper arm, and turned away, then hurried after his prospective client.
Meeting his former boss had had exactly the opposite effect on David. He felt hollow. He had to force himself to put on a triumphant air to accept lawyers' congratulations and answer the questions of reporters. After all, David would need the publicity.
* * *
Three weeks later David Owens sat in his small office as the workday drew to an end. David wore a suit rumpled from a day of sitting, but might as well have been in jeans. He hadn't been back in a courtroom since the end of the Smathers trial.
The verdict for Mary Smathers had generated a good deal of local publicity, even a mention in a national newsmagazine story about the empowering of traditional women. In the first couple of days after the trial David had spent more time being interviewed than lawyering. But that soon died away, other events became newer news, and David settled down to a law practice that did not bloom spectacularly as a result of his one win. In fact, his career seemed in imminent danger of withering away.
Rod Smathers and Reynolds McCrory between them wielded an enormous amount of influence in San Antonio. If they were trying to strangle David's law practice, as Roger Ainesworth had almost announced, they were doing a good job. Most divorce cases came as referrals from lawyers who practiced other kinds of law. Those had stopped altogether, like a faucet being tightly turned off. There had been a flurry of phone calls and prospective new clients after David's triumph in court, but Ainesworth had accurately predicted the type of those clients: women who had spent their lives as homemakers and mothers, and so had no money to pay a retainer. David had taken on a few of these cases, but they'd brought in very little cash.
David felt as if he were living someone else's life, or a bad dream. This had not been his destiny: sitting lonely in a shabby little office in an old downtown building. Eight years ago he had graduated near the top of his class from the University of Texas law school, already with a job at the topdollar, prestigious law firm of Reynolds McCrory. He'd started in litigation, where the tough guys practiced law, and proven himself a quick learner and clever strategist.
The detour in his career had come without David's realizing that there had been a fork in the road, let alone that he'd taken the turnoff. A business client had asked him to represent his son in a divorce. There were no children, little property to divide, just the formalities of paperwork. David had done it as the kind of good deed one does to hang on to good clients.
But then somehow he became known as the family lawyer at Reynolds McCrory. He handled a few other divorces for other good clients. Family law didn't become a significant part of his practice, but he gained experience at it. So when Mary Smathers called wanting to talk about a divorce matter--for a friend, she said--the firm had steered her to David. As it happened, they knew each other slightly already, from serving on a charitable foundation board together. At that first meeting in David's office Mrs. Smathers had been coy, saying she just wanted general information to pass on to her friend. David had been sympathetic and informative, not trying to prove his expertise at family law. He wasn't angling to acquire the case of her "friend."
But when Mrs. Smathers had left after that first visit, Roger Ainesworth stopped David in the hall and almost licked his lips at the thought of who David had had in his office. "Be good to her. We'd love to get her husband as a client."
"Yes, sir."
David saw Mrs. Smathers again only a few days later, at a board meeting at the downtown public library, a few blocks from David's office. During the meeting he noticed her anxious, distracted air, but he wouldn't have intruded except that she turned to him quite suddenly as the meeting broke up and began talking to him. Her conversation was inconsequential until they walked out of the library, alone by that time.
"It wasn't for a friend," Mary Smathers said. She started talking about her husband, of his drifting away not only from her but from their children as well. About her loneliness, her fears for the children, uncertainty about what to do. Within minutes she'd completely won David's sympathy. She made it sound as if her children had lost their father to a tragedy. Then she'd pulled out the divorce petition.
"This is why I came to see you."
David looked over the simple form quickly. He flipped to the last page to see the lawyer's name, whistled a low whistle at seeing the petition had been signed by Ellen Bonham, then looked again at the attached first page, which showed when the petition had been served on Mrs. Smathers. He grew a little alarmed. "How long have you been hanging on to this? You know you have to file an answer. If you don't he can get a decree entered that says whatever he wants. He can take all the money, the children…"
"I haven't been able to think what to do," Mary Smathers moaned.
"The answer's due to be filed today."
"I thought so. Can you--?"
Thinking quickly, David said, "I can recommend someone. Your husband has one of the best divorce lawyers in town, you need a good one too. Let's go to my office, it's right over here, I can make some phone calls."
"Can you do it?" Mary Smathers asked, with a shy, earnest expression that would have looked at home on a much younger face. "Can you represent me?"
David meant to say no. He knew he should decline for a variety of reasons, including the good of the law firm. But when Mrs. Smathers added, "I trust you," David couldn't refuse. They hurried back to his office, and David drew up the simple answer, having it filed before the courthouse closed that afternoon.
If he had known how he was changing his own future, he would certainly have hesitated longer.
Roger Ainesworth went nuclear when he heard the news. A short impromptu conference convened in David's office, the young lawyer sitting bemused behind his desk, older and more important lawyers crowding in to discuss his blunder. "Get rid of her!" Ainesworth screamed shrilly. "We can't get her husband for a client if you're representing her against him!"
"It's probably already too late," another partner pointed out. "David's already entered an appearance on her behalf. We could never--"
"No, we couldn't represent the husband in this case, the divorce case. Who cares? But we do manage to let him know that our boy David withdrew out of respect for him." Ainesworth began to smile. "This could work out well, in fact. Good thinking, David. You withdraw, we quietly help Rod Smathers with the business aspects of this case, he gets comfortable with us…and of course we let him meet you. This can be great. But you've got to withdraw, David. Today. We're into damage control now, we have to move quickly."
That clenched it. Because when David Owens received a direct order, he naturally resisted. When he looked into Roger Ainesworth's shiny face, the beginning of a smile stretching the managing partner's mouth unattractively, and thought of the contrast between that face and Mary Smathers's, David's decision seemed easy.
David withdrew, all right. From the firm of Reynolds McCrory. That day.
* * *
That decision landed him here, in this small office in a nondescript medium-sized old office building, a few blocks and millions of miles from the gleaming tower that housed Reynolds McCrory. It had been heady to be on his own, caught up in the intensity of the Smathers divorce case. Now, having ended that case in triumph, David's life had settled down to the reality of small-time law practice. Every day found him pondering just where his life had changed, and whether he would make the same decisions if he had the chance again. Pointless speculation. This was the life he had: locally famous divorce lawyer, headed relentlessly for bankruptcy.
He felt a shift in the building's current, or the day. Dusk growing quietly. He should let his secretary Janice go home. She just killed time during the day anyway. But just as David was about to buzz her, he heard the small chiming sound the front door of his office made when it opened. He waited expectantly, and a minute later Janice entered. His secretary was a few years older than David, slender with nervousness, given to staring at him sometimes as if she disapproved of him. But on occasion, such as now, her brown eyes grew large with anticipation or curiosity. "Someone new," she said. "She just says she wants to see you, it won't take long. Her name is Helen Wills. That's all she'll tell me."
Janice made it seem very mysterious, but David's curiosity barely stirred. Divorce clients often appeared furtive after making that decision to seek out a lawyer. For many of them it was the first time in their lives they needed a lawyer, and they didn't like the idea. David made his way down the short hallway into his reception room, which held Janice's metal desk, three straight-backed chairs for clients, and a small spindly-legged table. If a whole family came to see David, the reception room grew crowded.
The waiting woman didn't take up much space, though. A slimly elegant blonde, Helen Wills was younger than David had expected, around his own age. In a dark suit, she looked more like a businesswoman than a housewife. She wore no wedding ring or any other jewelry. As soon as David entered the reception room the woman's eyes attached to him, studying him critically. This appraising stare also set her apart from the average first-time client, who would usually spend half the time looking at the floor, embarrassed to be there. But Helen Wills looked David over quite frankly.
"Ms. Wills? Would you like to come in?"
She did. As she passed him she said, "I'm not interrupting something important, am I? I'm sorry I couldn't call for an appointment." David thought he detected irony in her voice, and wondered what she knew about him. He exchanged a glance with Janice.
Helen Wills strode ahead of David to his office, and looked around while he closed the door and circled to his desk chair. She gave his office the same knowing looks she'd given him, glancing quickly at his framed diplomas and law license on the wall, giving a little more study to his furniture: the large oak desk he'd bought secondhand, the much more modern black computer desk and bookcase, which David had put together himself after buying them at Target. In his old office the furniture had belonged to the firm. He'd had to furnish this one quickly and efficiently, and his previous client Mary Smathers hadn't paid attention to the office furnishings. Helen Wills did.
But she didn't say anything, caustic or otherwise. Nor did she take a seat, even when David waved her toward one of the client chairs. Oddly, she didn't pace or fidget, either. It's a hard trick to pull off, just standing straight. Helen did it unself-consciously.
"What can I do for you, Ms. Wills?"
"Not a thing, Mr. Owens. I think I should tell you that this isn't my idea, and I don't think it's a good one."
"You mean your husband has forced this decision on you?"
"I'm not married."
Now she had baffled him. If she didn't need a family lawyer, what was she doing here? David suddenly wondered if Roger Ainesworth from his old firm had sent her. Was she an emissary here to offer him peace, or was her job just to report back on David's circumstances? That would account for her watchfulness, as if she had to give a report on this meeting.
He tried her own approach, just sitting silently until she felt like talking. That suited Ms. Wills fine. She continued to stand and to look around, now out one of David's two windows. He had a nice view from the fourteenth floor here, although bigger windows would have done the hills in the distance more justice.
"Ms. Wills, I took it you wanted to talk to me about something. A legal situation, I presume. Are you uncomfortable? Would you like something to drink?"
"I'm fine. It is getting to the end of the workday, though. Why don't you let your secretary go for the day?"
"She works until five-thirty."
Helen Wills didn't answer. Her silence and her posture made it clear that she wouldn't say anything about the purpose of her visit until she and David were completely alone. David knew what a bad idea that was. For a variety of reasons one often wanted a witness close by in a law office. Vulnerable, emotional clients opening up about their personal lives: who knew where that might lead?
"I'm not going to hurt you," his visitor said wryly. It was the first time she'd sounded less than perfectly serious. David liked her better for it, but that didn't mean he trusted her.
Nevertheless, he picked up his phone, pressed the intercom button, and said, "Janice, you can take off now. Have a good evening."
"Yes, sir," Janice answered, a phrase she never used, the suspicion in her voice so obvious that he could feel it entering his own office. He hung up and he and Ms. Wills looked at each other for a minute or two until they heard the chime of the front door. She opened David's office door and disappeared, apparently making sure that Janice had gone. Was this the part where his visitor reentered his office suddenly naked? David pictured that, with a certain enjoyment, in fact.
Ms. Wills came back in briskly, fully clothed and still moving quickly. "Does that door open into the hall?" she asked, indicating the other door in David's office. She crossed to it before he could answer. She opened the door, looked out into the hall, and seemed satisfied. "Just a minute," she said over her shoulder, found the button that unlocked the door so it could be opened from the outside, and disappeared again.
David thought about relocking the door. He also thought he should call someone, have the phone line open as a kind of witness line. But he couldn't think whom to call. Just as he picked up his phone his hall door opened again and Helen Wills returned. She held the door open for someone coming in after her, a woman who acted much more like a typical divorce client. She ducked her head, averted her eyes, and left in place a scarf that acted almost as a veil.
David began to resent the mysteriousness. Helen Wills quickly relocked and closed the door, then gave David her most penetrating stare yet, but one with a hint of pleading in it. "This never happened," she said forcefully.
"You're right about that," David answered with equal firmness. He put down his phone and came around his desk to confront her. "Nothing has and nothing will if you don't stop behaving in this childish--"
"I'm sorry, Mr. Owens," the other lady said. She had a higher but more mature voice than Helen Wills. And her voice sounded oddly familiar, though David felt sure he'd never met the lady. "The childishness is my fault. I have to be very careful."
She removed her hat and pulled the scarf down around her neck, and turned to face David fully for the first time. He stopped dead, his jaw hanging. That was a good thing, because if he had spoken at that moment he would probably have said something foolish. Of course, this lady had probably grown accustomed to people stammering when first meeting her. Her weeks were filled with such meetings, as a matter of fact.
"I'm Myra McPherson," the lady said, extending her hand.
He knew that. Anyone would recognize McPherson, the wife of the President of the United States.
* * *
Ten minutes later the scene had gained a semblance of ordinariness. The First Lady sat in one of the client chairs, a glass of diet soda on the desk in front of her. David had resumed his normal seat at the desk, and had regained some composure as well. "I didn't even know you were in town," he said lamely.
"It's a quiet visit. We had an event in Houston, then I always try to stop by home."
David had almost forgotten, as had most people, that San Antonio was theoretically the hometown of the President and First Lady. John McPherson had lived here before being elected to the Senate and then to the presidency. The first family retained the fiction of legal residence in Texas for voting purposes, but in fact had lived in D.C. for years and had little more contact with San Antonio than any other city in America.
"Actually I'm from Baytown, near Houston?" Mrs. McPherson said, in the southern style of speech of making a statement a question. David nodded. "I never really lived here. John was already in the Senate when we married. We've been away from Texas a long time."
"That's true," David said, wondering at the purpose for this visit. The enigmatic Helen remained standing, slightly behind the First Lady. Myra McPherson seemed the most comfortable person in the room. She sat quietly, not fidgeting with her hands or crossing and recrossing her legs. But her neck showed a certain tension, and she had trouble keeping her eyes on David.
Myra McPherson was in her late thirties, very young for a First Lady, twelve years younger than her husband. In person she seemed younger still, hesitant and shy in an odd way. She had a slender face framed by straight brown hair, and clear gray eyes that seemed elongated sideways: doe's eyes. When she leaned toward David, he felt the thrill of intimacy with the famous. But Mrs. McPherson had a very human quality.
"You must be wondering why I'm here," she said suddenly. She had read David's mind--not a difficult trick under the circumstances. "I've read about you recently."
"Ah. Don't tell me you're here to ask for advice for a friend. You could have had your assistant do that." He hesitated over the word "assistant," looking at Helen Wills. She might be a Secret Service agent, a bodyguard. "Did you have some personal interest in the Smathers case? Do you know Mary Smathers?"
Mrs. McPherson glanced up at Helen, who nodded slightly. "We've met at a couple of functions. But no, I didn't have a personal interest in her case."
Now Helen Wills seemed to be playing the role of social secretary. David wondered again at her precise function in life.
"But I enjoyed reading about the Smathers case. Especially the way you represented her." The First Lady smiled, but turned quickly serious again. "I understood Mrs. Smathers's position. The way even a woman who's thought of as rich and powerful can feel helpless. It took a special person to convey that to a jury. It took nerve for her to stand up to her husband, but it took you to let her do it in a courtroom."
Finally her eyes fastened on David, studying him. He felt his face growing warm. Just as he was about to thank her for her praise, the First Lady said quietly, "I need the same kind of help."
For a moment David didn't understand the words. Then they sank in, and his first reaction was alarm. "No."
"Yes, Mr. Owens. Trust me, I've given the matter a great deal of thought. I want a divorce."
The lady looked painfully sincere. For a moment her lip trembled. She understood very well the painful significance of what she'd just said. David cleared his throat and became lawyerlike.
"Mrs. McPherson, if we're going to have an attorney-client conversation, the first thing I have to tell you is that having a third person present voids the attorney-client privilege. Your assistant here wouldn't be bound by the confidentiality of--"
Mrs. McPherson reached back and grasped the younger woman's arm. "No need to worry about that. We can trust Helen implicitly. In fact, she's the only person I do trust. After all, she helped me get here."
David thought that explained Helen Wills's extremely watchful expression and that note of pleading he'd also seen in her gaze once. She had overstepped the bounds of her job by bringing the First Lady here.
"Do you want details?" Myra McPherson asked.
Of course he did. Hearing the intimate details of people's lives was one of the prime perks of divorce work. At the same time, David wanted to withdraw from the conversation completely. "I don't want to put myself on the Secret Service's hit list."
Mrs. McPherson reached a hand toward him comfortingly. "Why do you think we did all this silly secret agent stuff to get to you? Helen and I slipped away from my guards. Not just because of what I was coming to see you about, but to protect you. In case you decide you don't want to take the case."
"Let's make sure you really want a case," David said smoothly, sounding lawyerly and comforting. "I want to know why, and especially whynow.Your husband has been in office three years. He's up for reelection next year. If you tell him that your marriage depends on his not running again …"
The First Lady laughed abruptly and harshly. "Give up the presidency for me? And Randy? You have no idea what an absurd suggestion that is, Mr. Owens. My husband--"
"Then if you could wait--"
"Another five years until he's done?" Mrs. McPherson looked fearful for the first time. "Have you ever been in a bad relationship, Mr. Owens? Do you know how long five years is when you live with that every day? But that's not the reason. My son is eight years old. Five years is a lifetime to him. He's starting to become aware of what's going on around him. I don't want him in that place for even one more year. I don't want him growing up in that atmosphere."
The presidential son had been hovering in the back of David's mind before his mother mentioned him. David drew a clean yellow legal pad from a drawer and uncapped his pen. "All right. Let's begin. Ms. Wills, will you sit down, please? I can't remain sitting any longer if you're going to keep standing, and if I stand up too I can't write. Thank you. Now, Mrs. McPherson, tell me why you want a divorce. Convince me."
The First Lady began to betray nervousness. She looked down at her hands. "I should never have married John in the first place. I realized that some time ago. He was already running for the Senate when he proposed to me. I was thrilled, of course. He was twelve years older, smart, energetic. He seemed very strong. I found his wanting to marry me very flattering. Now I realize"--she glanced at Helen, whose face had softened; the younger woman put her hand on the First Lady's clenched ones--"that I was a necessary ornament to John's political life. He needed a wife, and a family, to look like a normal American. Our wedding took place less than a month before the general election, and was like a campaign rally.
"After that, his career took him over."
"Everyone who holds high public office has to spend a great deal of time performing that job and keeping it. You must have known that," David said.
"I did. And I was content to be the stay-at-home wife, making a home for John and staying in the background. But I also thought there would be moments of…tenderness, like we had when he was courting me. Some sort of private family life. Especially after Randy was born, I thought we'd have family times at least occasionally. But there's been none of that. Once we had a son it seemed I'd served my purpose for John. He's never seemed to have any feeling for Randy, or for me. John's passions lie elsewhere."
David sat impassively, pondering her last comment. Was he being asked to out the first gay President?
He put down his pen and looked straight at his visitor. "Mrs. McPherson, I sympathize with you. Believe me, I do. But--I feel stupid even saying this, of course you must have given it a lot of thought--but do you realize the public scandal your filing for divorce would cause? On the other hand, I don't see how you'd be harmed by waiting. I doubt you're the first woman to endure a loveless marriage in the White House."
"I told you, five years would be too long to wait. Randy would be irreparably damaged by then. Besides, Iwantthe threat of scandal. If I wait until John leaves office, I won't have the leverage I'll have now, to get away from him."
David didn't quite understand that. His visitor appeared to realize she hadn't made herself clear, but she didn't try to explain further. "Canyou cause a scandal?" David asked. "Do you think your husband's having an affair, for example?"
"I know he is. But that's not the problem. Well, it's part of the problem. It's part of what I meant when I said I don't want Randy growing up in that atmosphere. The infidelity, the lies, the whole facade of family life. That's not all. There's something very dangerous going on in the White House, Mr. Owens. I want my son out of it."
David looked at Helen Wills, hoping for a dash of reality, a roll of the eyes to indicate she understood how crazy this sounded. But Helen looked downcast, as if she didn't want to be present when these things were discussed. Her eyes caught David's just for a second.
The First Lady abruptly stopped talking. Mrs. McPherson's voice and face had grown stonier as she'd talked about her marriage; obviously she had trained herself in emotional defense. But for a moment she almost broke down, looking again very young and confused. On television Myra McPherson appeared completely buttoned-up, a person placid to the point of unemotionalism. In person David saw that wasn't true at all. She had lost her youth to politics, but somehow retained it, as if those years hadn't counted. David pushed a box of tissues toward her. "All right, Mrs. McPherson, you've convinced me. I believe you need to break away. But I have a lot more questions, and more to explain. First of all, I'm not licensed to practice in the District of Columbia."
"No, I want to file here."
"I'm not sure--" David began, but Mrs. McPherson leaned toward him with renewed urgency.
"John and I have always claimed San Antonio as our legal residence. Isn't that what counts? We've come here to vote every election day. There's a small condo that's the official residence. Isn't that good enough? Doesn't an elected politician maintain legal residence in his hometown?"
"I'd have to do some research. It makes sense, but it's just a fiction. I doubt any court has ever ruled on the issue. At any rate, why…?"
"I don't want to get divorced in Washington," she answered quickly. "John would have everything his own way there. The judges are all appointed, they all owe favors. John would find their strings. No. They'd crush me there. He might even be able to take Randy away from me. I want to get away from that world, don't you see? Starting with where the divorce is filed."
"Yes, I understand." Though David continued to sound placid and reassuring, his mind raced. Huge excitement grew in him, starting in the pit of his stomach and spreading outward. He felt the center of attention of a great crowd of people. Filing a divorce case against the President of the United States. The idea frightened him, yes. It was also a lawyer's wet dream.
"There are a lot of issues," he said slowly. "The community estate, separate property, reimbursement claims. The grounds for divorce, first of all. You can either allege insupportability, which is the same as irreconcilable differences, no-fault, or the traditional fault claims such as cruelty--"
"No, that first one would be all right. I don't want to hurt John, I just want to escape him."
A moment's silence embraced the three people in the small room. They had drawn closer together, like conspirators. David stared across the desk at the First Lady, who sat erect, eyes gleaming, an anxious but determined woman. The First Lady saw a young man who exuded confidence, but whose fingers tapped quickly on his desktop. David smiled briefly.
Helen Wills's expression had warmed up. She too looked at David appraisingly, but no longer hostilely. He glanced at her in a quick moment of understanding, asking her opinion of her employer's sanity. Helen raised one eyebrow and lowered it again, a facial shrug. Their eyes stayed on each other. David understood what Helen had known when she'd entered his office, that this was an historic meeting.
"I'm afraid I don't have that much time now," Mrs. McPherson said. "I'm expected somewhere. But I want you to be able to file whenever I call you and say so. What do I have to do?"
"There's just one short form you have to sign." David continued talking while he turned to his computer, called up the document in question, erased the name, typed in a new one, and printed the form. "It's an agreement that you'll go through mediation short of going to trial. I'll explain that if it becomes important, but it's a promise everyone has to make in the first pleading in a lawsuit. It's the only form you'd sign. I sign the petition for divorce itself."
He handed the sheet of paper to his visitor. She read the paragraph quickly and signed the signature line in a clear, schoolgirlish script. David took a long look at the signature when she handed the page back to him. Her name written in her own handwriting made the scene real for him.
"Now what about your fee?"
"I charge two hundred dollars an hour, and in a case that might involve child custody issues I get a retainer of ten thousand dollars." David's tongue didn't stumble as he gave himself a quick raise.
"I could raise that much, but right now--"
"It's all right, Mrs. McPherson, I trust you."
She smiled shyly and suddenly rose. David came around his desk quickly, then stopped as she held out her hand. He realized she was offering a handshake, as if concluding a formal business meeting. But when he took her hand she held his. The First Lady seemed more formidable for a moment, giving him her most penetrating stare yet. "Even without my paying you, are you my lawyer?"
"Yes, ma'am, I am. Don't worry about that."
"Thank you." She gave his hand a last tight squeeze and released it. "Then could you please call me Myra?"
David laughed, taken by surprise. "I really doubt I could. But I'd be pleased if you'll call me David. Usually when someone calls me 'Mister' it means I'm in trouble."
"All right, David." She turned away, Helen hurrying around her to the hall door.
"There's just one other thing." David's voice stopped his client and she looked back at him alertly. "I know you read about how brilliantly I handled Mary Smathers's divorce, but I have to tell you that I haven't been practicing family law all that long. There are much more experienced family lawyers in this city, people who would do a great job for you. I could give you the names of two or three. Ellen Bonham, Mike Garrells…I think anyone would advise you, starting with Ms. Wills there, that you need the absolute best lawyer you can find. I'm very flattered you came to me, but I have an obligation--"
Myra McPherson shook her head decisively. "No, I want you. I thought so before I came here, and now I'm sure.
"Besides, now that you know my plans, if I didn't hire you I'd have to have you killed."
He had seen the First Lady's smile. Everyone had, on television. Her smile was a demure, gracious expression, extremely suitable for formal occasions. The quick grin Myra McPherson gave him now was an altogether different animal, stretching her cheeks wide and making her eyes shine. For a fleeting moment she looked genuinely happy.
Helen watched David too, and gave him a very small nod in acknowledgment of the end of their first meeting.
Then they both turned and were gone.
 
Copyright © 2001 by Jay Brandon