"And you? How's life treating you?"
"I'm fine. We love Oregon."
"I'm doing well too. Thanks for asking. I'm clean and sober, Christi, really. I've finally kicked the booze and drugs for good. Looks like I'll be leaving the practice of law, but I'm doing really well."
She'd heard it before. "That's good, Nate." Her words were cautious. She was planning two sentences in advance.
They agreed to have dinner the following night, enough time for her to prepare the kids and fix up the house and allow Theo to decide what his role should be. Enough time to rehearse and plan exits.
"I won't get in the way," Nate promised, before hanging up.
THEO DECIDED to work late and skip the reunion. Nate hugged Angela tightly. Austin just shook hands. The one thing he vowed not to do was gush about how much they'd grown. Christi loitered in her bedroom for an hour as the father was reintroduced to his children.
Nor would he bury them with apologies about things he couldn't change. They sat on the floor of the den and talked about school, ballet, and soccer. Salem was a pretty town, much smaller than D.C., and the kids had adjusted well, with lots of friends, a good school, nice teachers.
Dinner was spaghetti and salad, and it lasted for one hour. Nate told tales from the jungles of Brazil as he took them on his journey to find the missing client. Evidently, Christi had not seen the right newspapers. She knew nothing of the Phelan matter.
At seven sharp, he said he had to go. They had homework, and school came early. "I have a soccer game tomorrow, Dad," Austin said, and Nate's heart almost stopped. He couldn't remember the last time he'd been called Dad.
"It's at the school," Angela said. "Could you come?"
The little ex-family shared an awkward moment as each of them glanced at the other. Nate had no idea what to say.
Christi settled the issue by saying, "I'll be there. We could talk."
"Of course I'll be there," he said. The children hugged him as he left. Driving away, Nate suspected Christi wanted to see him two days in a row to examine his eyes. She knew the signs.
Nate stayed in Salem for three days. He watched the soccer game and was overcome with pride in his son. He got himself invited back to dinner, but agreed to come only if Theo would join them. He had lunch with Angela and her friends at school.
After three days, it was time to leave. The kids needed their normal routines back, without the complications Nate brought. Christi was tired of pretending nothing had ever happened between them. And Nate was getting attached to his children. He promised to call and e-mail and see them soon.
He left Salem with a broken heart. How low could a man sink to lose such a wonderful family? He remembered almost nothing of his kids when they were smaller-no school plays, Halloween costumes, Christmas mornings, trips to the mall. Now they were practically grown, and another man was raising them.
He turned east, and drifted with the traffic.
WHILE NATE was meandering through Montana, thinking of Rachel, Hark Gettys filed a motion to dismiss her answer to the will contest. His reasons were clear and obvious, and he supported his attack with a twenty-page brief he'd worked on for a month. It was March 7, almost three months after the death of Mr. Phelan, not quite two months after the entry of Nate O'Riley into the matter, nearly three weeks into discovery, four months before the trial, and the court still did not have jurisdiction over Rachel Lane. But for the allegations of her attorney, there'd been no sign of her. No document in the official court file had her signature on it.
Hark referred to her as the "phantom party." He and the other contestants were litigating against a shadow. The woman stood to inherit eleven billion dollars. The least she could do was sign a waiver and follow the law. If she'd gone to the trouble to hire a lawyer, she could certainly subject herself to the jurisdiction of the court.
The passage of time was benefiting the heirs greatly, though it was hard for them to be patient while dreaming of such wealth. Each week that passed with no word from Rachel was further proof that she had no interest in the proceedings. At the Friday morning meetings, the Phelan lawyers reviewed discovery, talked about their clients, and plotted trial strategy. But they spent most of their time speculating why Rachel had not made an official appearance. They were enthralled with the ridiculous notion that she might not want the money. It was absurd, yet it somehow managed to surface every Friday morning.
The weeks were turning into months. The lottery winner was not claiming her prize.
There was another significant reason for putting pressure on the defenders of Troy's testament. His name was Snead. Hark, Yancy, Bright, and Langhorne had watched their star witness's deposition until it was memorized, and they were not confident of his ability to sway jurors. Nate O'Riley had made a fool out of him, and that was only in a deposition. Imagine how sharp the daggers would be at trial, in front of a jury made up primarily of middle-class folks struggling to pay their monthly bills. Snead pocketed half a million to tell his story. It would be a hard sell.
The problem with Snead was obvious. He was lying, and liars eventually get caught in court. After Snead stumbled so badly in the deposition, the lawyers were terrified of presenting him to a jury. Another lie or two exposed to the world, and their case was down the toilet.
The birthmark had rendered Nicolette completely useless as a witness.
Their own clients were not particularly sympathetic. With the exception of Ramble, who was the scariest of all, each had been handed five million dollars with which to get a start. None of the jurors would earn that much in a lifetime. Troy's children could whine about being raised by an absent father, but half the jurors would be from broken homes.
The battle of the shrinks would be hard to call, but it was the segment of the trial that worried them the most. Nate O'Riley had been shredding doctors in courtrooms for more than twenty years. Their four substitutes could not withstand his brutal cross-examinations.
To avoid a trial, they had to settle. To settle, they had to find a weakness. Rachel Lane's apparent lack of interest was more than sufficient, and certainly their best shot.
JOSH REVIEWED the Motion to Dismiss with admiration. He loved the legal maneuvering, the ploys and tactics, and when someone, even an opponent, got it right, he silently applauded. Everything about Hark's move was perfect-the timing, the rationale, the superbly argued brief.
The contestants had a weak case, but their problems were small compared to Mate's. Nate had no client. He and Josh had managed to keep this quiet for two months, but the ruse had run its course.
Chapter Forty-Eight
DANIEL, his oldest child, insisted on meeting him in a pub. Nate found the place after dark, two blocks off the campus, on a street lined with bars and clubs. The music, the flashing beer signs, the co-eds yelling across the street-it was all too familiar. It was Georgetown just a few months ago, and none of it appealed to him. A year earlier he would've been yelling back, chasing them from one bar to the other, believing he was still twenty and able to go all night.
Daniel was waiting in a cramped booth, along with a girl. Both were smoking. Each had two longneck bottles sitting on the table in front of them. Father and son shook hands because anything more affectionate would make the son feel uncomfortable.
"This is Stef," Daniel said, introducing the girl. "She's a model," he added quickly, proving to his old man that he was chasing a high caliber woman.
For some reason, Nate had hoped they could spend a few hours alone. It was not going to happen.