Legal Heat (14 page)

She finally reached the Jetta and jumped inside, giving it a pat of encouragement when it wheezed to life. If Mr. S didn’t pay bi-weekly as agreed, she would have a hard time seeing the case through. Her poor Jetta needed a major overhaul.

She pulled out onto the road and headed for home. She had been ecstatic when Mr. S had agreed to pay in cash. Cash meant no tax. No tax meant more cash. In return she had agreed to his terms of strict anonymity. He had sent her a postal box key and a box number. She had to deposit her reports and photos on Mondays and Thursdays, and he had agreed to leave the cash after pickup. No real name. No contact details except a cell number. The warning bells had gone off right away, but she wasn’t about to turn away a paying client. She had a Jetta needing brakes and a belly needing donuts. Mr. S was her ticket to paradise.

Chapter Eight

“I won’t consider settlement.” Steele thumped his briefcase on the coffee table in Seattle’s Four Seasons Hotel lounge and snapped open the clasps.

Mark leaned back in his dark leather chair and folded his arms. A group of tourists filed into the lobby, complaining about the rain in Seattle.
They should visit Vancouver.

“We’re on the back foot in this case,” Mark said. “Saunders’s exemplary work record, together with the timing of the dismissal following right on the heels of her failed attempt at whistle-blowing, will do you in even if they can’t establish a solid connection.”

“I said no settlement.” Steele removed a bundle of files from his briefcase and handed them to Mark. “I thought after years of working with me, you would understand the politics of the pharmaceutical industry. We routinely ferret out each other’s spies and use the legal system to make an example of them as a deterrent to other competitors. Although we never caught her with her hand in the proverbial cookie jar, I know she was up to something that went beyond the whistle-blowing. Call it gut instinct. I want to see her squirm. I want the competitor who dared send her into my company to be unmasked.”

Mark sighed and flipped through the files. Steele’s hard-nosed attitude had just cost Hi-Tech a valuable settlement with an American pharmaceutical company this morning and landed Mark with yet another lucrative piece of litigation. He should be thanking Steele, but he knew, at some point, Steele’s intractable nature would be his downfall. And when Steele went down, Richards & Moretti would fall too.

“What are you saying?” Mark raised his voice to be heard above the excited chatter of the tourists. “You want to come down heavy on Saunders? David and Goliath? You’ll be slaughtered in the press.”

Steele laughed. “I have friends in the press. I have friends in the regulator’s office. I golf with most of the judges. I’m not worried about bad publicity, or adverse judgments. I am worried about unpredictable, secretly funded spies. I’ve read the memo you prepared on Saunders and the investigator’s report you obtained. Her sketchy background makes it clear she isn’t who she claims to be. What can we do to get the upper hand?”

Mark gritted his teeth. The last thing he wanted was to complicate the legal proceedings and drag the case out for years in court, but he had a professional responsibility to give Steele the best advice he could. “We could counter-claim. I believe you said she took samples of the drug and gave them to the regulators. We could also claim for libel and for possible disruption to your business.”

Steele grinned. “That’s what I want to hear. Make it happen and do it quickly. I don’t want this case affecting our new product launch. I’ve got enough on my plate trying to contain the security breach.”

“What about the current state of affairs?” Mark was loath to mention Katy given Steele’s determination to bring her down to assuage his wounded pride, but he could not ignore his legal obligation. “Ms. Sinclair filed a motion for production of documents far exceeding the scope of the dismissal case. I wouldn’t be surprised if she has something up her sleeve.”

“Nor would I.” Steele narrowed his eyes. “She’s already sticking her nose where it doesn’t belong, but I’m taking care of it.”

Mark froze. “What does that mean?”

“It means, I asked you to deal with her and you refused, so I’m handling it myself.” He turned away and stared into the crowd of excited tourists.

Mark followed Steele’s gaze to a pretty young woman with big blue eyes, long chestnut hair and a very tight T-shirt. He stifled a growl. “You know you can’t speak to her directly about the case unless I’m present.”

“I don’t need to speak to her…now.” Steele leaned back and folded his hands behind his head. “But after she drops the case, all bets are off.”

Mark clenched his teeth. “Do you mind telling me how you know she’s going to drop the case?”

Steele looked at Mark, his piercing gaze missing nothing. “Do you really want to know?”

“Yes.”

“If I tell you, I’ll put you in a compromising position and I don’t want to do that. I need you doing what you do best, and doing it for me.”

Sweat trickled down Mark’s back. He should have seen this coming. If he had agreed to investigate Katy, he would have been in control of the flow of information to Steele. But now Steele knew something he didn’t, and he couldn’t ignore the threat.

“You understand if you harm her in any way, I will be legally bound to disclose this conversation.” He tried to keep his voice steady.

Steele laughed. “I want to bend her, not break her.” His smile disappeared. “And I want her curious kitty nose out of my business.”

He nodded to the documents in Mark’s hand. “Speaking of business, I have another agreement for you to draft. Same as the last one. Same accident. Same circumstances. Last name of Cunningham.”

Mark frowned. “What kind of accident was it? The guy I saw is totally disfigured. The wife said it had to do with some chemical spill.”

“I told you before, it’s better if you don’t know all the details. Is that going to be a problem?”

“You’ve given me enough to satisfy my duty as an officer of the court but if you’re trying to involve me in something illegal…”

Steele snorted a laugh. “I wouldn’t dream of it.”

“I’m starved. What’s for dinner?”

Steven sat down at the kitchen table and Katy sighed. Wednesday. Double-shift night. Every week Steven showed up for dinner between shifts with a few hours to kill. He claimed it was for the children, but it totally disrupted their weekly routine. Instead of doing their homework, the kids played video games with him, watched movies and ate popcorn. Then he sauntered out of the house, leaving her with the mess and meltdowns, overdue projects and tests. She hated Wednesdays but the kids always had fun, and if she couldn’t give them a two-parent family, at least she could ensure they had a solid relationship with their father.

“Isn’t this great? It’s like old times, and look how happy the kids are.”

Melissa and Justin grinned on cue and disappeared from the table to set up the Wii.

Steven leaned over and grabbed her hand. The overpowering sickly sweet scent of Drakkar Noir laced with antiseptic assaulted her nose and she stifled a sneeze.

 
“I miss you, Kate. I want you back. It would be the best thing for the kids. They need both their parents…together.” He squeezed her hand hard. Too hard. Katy winced and tried to pull away.

“Steven, let go.”

“You suffered as a child without a father,” he continued. “Don’t put your kids through that.” He punctuated his obviously rehearsed speech with a sad, unconvincing smile.

She tugged again. “You’re hurting me.”

His face flushed and his eyes glittered fever bright. He squeezed harder and her bones grated painfully over each other. Heart pounding, she stared at him in horror. What was wrong him? His callous, demeaning, manipulative behavior during their marriage had bordered on emotional abuse, but he had never once been physical.

She grabbed a dinner knife and held it above his hand. “Last time, Steven.”

With a soft sigh, he released his grip. Katy wrenched her hand away. “What the hell was that?”

“I’m willing to forgive you,” Steven said quietly. “For tearing the family apart.”

“Forgive me? We’re divorced for a reason. In fact, many reasons. Should I list all their names?”

Steven didn’t even flinch. She knew he felt no guilt about his affairs.

“Think about it, Kate. Try to put the happiness of your children before your own. You need a stable influence in your life. After I saw you in that trashy outfit, I realized you need me back. God knows what people thought, seeing you parading around like a—”

“Don’t you dare!” She shoved her chair back and forced herself to walk across the room, away from him. One more word and she would slap him, and not just once. “Did Sally leave too fast for you to find a replacement? Is that why you’re trying to get back together?”

He stood up and walked toward the living room, dismissing her with an absent wave of his hand. “We’ll talk later. I promised Justin another game of Wii bowling.”

Katy threw her napkin at his departing back and stifled her scream.

She tidied the kitchen then headed to her office for a moment of calm before the storm of hyperactive, overtired children descended on her. After the divorce, she had replaced Steven’s dark, oppressive furniture with a glass desk, cream leather chairs and open steel-framed bookshelves, transforming the dark, stuffy space into a light and airy oasis. A sanctuary of sorts.

She pulled out the Saunders file and found the list of names. Despite the threat, Martha had decided to continue with the case. Her boyfriend had encouraged her to forge ahead and leave the threats to him. What would it be like to have such a supportive partner?

Katy sighed and called the number for the third man on Martha’s list, Terry Silver. If Martha had the courage to keep going, she would be with her client every step of the way.

After setting up an appointment to see Silver the following week, Katy closed the file and buried her head in her hands. She couldn’t stop thinking about Mark. If she didn’t find a way to deal with her fierce attraction to him, she might as well kiss her career goodbye. She knew, without a doubt, one day, in the haze of lust that invariably descended on her the moment he drew near, she would go too far.

If she hadn’t already.

At exactly ten o’clock, Mark’s cell rang. He settled himself on the tired hotel bed. Well-worn springs creaked under his weight. He hadn’t expected her to call. Hoped, yes. Expected, no.

He grabbed the phone off the night table and double-checked the caller ID. Why had he even suggested this? He could have just called her office in the morning. But the combination of sexual allure and fierce intelligence turned him on like nothing else. Throw in those luscious curves, the wide, blue eyes and the long, silken hair and she was a recipe for disaster. A recipe he couldn’t wait to taste again.

The phone rang a second time.

His body tensed in delicious anticipation. Who was he kidding? The call had nothing to do with the case, and everything to do with hearing the exotic purr of her throaty voice.

He answered on the third ring.

“Mark?”

His body tensed at the low, sultry, breathless whisper on the other end of the phone.

“Katy.” He stared at the ceiling and breathed slow and deep.
Slow and deep
. God, that’s exactly how he wanted her.

“You said this might be a good time to talk about the case?”

“I’m afraid I have bad news.” Mark rushed his words wanting to get the professional part of the call out of the way. “I didn’t make any progress with your settlement proposal.” He couldn’t tell her the situation had gone from bad to worse, and in the next few days she would discover her client was on the other end of a vicious lawsuit.

“Ah, well. That’s a shame, but not entirely unexpected. I sent the proposal to your client so we could show the judge we made the effort. I guess I’ll see you in court then for the disclosure hearing.”

A tiny fissure of fear opened in his chest. He had expected her to be more…disappointed. At least as disappointed as he had been. The settlement would have been an easy way to resolve the potential conflict.

Scrambling for a hook to keep her on the line, he said, “About your disclosure application…you know I won’t let you get away with such a blatant fishing expedition.”

“How are you going to stop me?” He caught a hint of laughter in her voice.

“Maybe I’ll throw something unexpected your way—tie you up so you can’t attend the hearing.”

“Tie me up?”

Mark closed his eyes as images of Katy, bound and spread out before him like a banquet, flickered through his mind. He imagined licking his way down her body, feasting on the soft bounty of her breasts, sucking her cherry nipples and tasting the nectar between her thighs.

“God, yes,” he rasped.

His shaft rose painfully against his zipper. Damn. He was already losing it. He had better control than this. He took a deep breath and stared at the bland, two-toned painting on the wall in front of him. Typical hotel décor. Mind numbing. Just what he needed.

“How would you tie me up?” Her throaty voice made his balls tighten in an instant.