Blind Man's Alley (17 page)

“Of course,” Duncan said quickly. Blake had never directly raised partnership like this with him before.

“We play a team sport around here, and I need you on the team. Clear?”

Duncan cleared his throat before he trusted himself to speak. “As a bell,” he said.

DUNCAN WAS
trying to figure out just how bad this was. He understood what his marching orders were, but he wasn’t sure he could follow them. He’d been asked to do a couple of ethically questionable things in the course of his legal career (as had every other firm lawyer he knew), but this was the first time he was being asked not to put his client’s interests first. It felt like crossing a different sort of line.

But then again, it wasn’t like Blake was asking him to take a dive on the case. Most criminal cases ended with a guilty plea, after all. Blake was just trying to make sure he kept his eye on the ball, that he should take what he had and go to the DA and see where they were.

Much as he wanted to believe it, Duncan wasn’t sure that was true. He needed a second opinion, somebody who knew Blake but who wasn’t involved in the murder case.

Duncan walked down to Lily’s office. They’d been through the wars together, and he trusted that he could talk to her about such things.

Lily was in her office, some obscure trip-hop playing on her Bose iPod dock as she typed away on her computer. “Can I interrupt?” Duncan asked.

“You just did,” Lily replied, but she leaned back in her chair, giving Duncan permission.

He closed her door and sat down. Duncan knew the broad outline would be enough for Lily to get the picture. It took him only a couple of minutes to get her up to speed. “So what do you think?” Duncan asked once he was finished.

Lily hadn’t looked at him while he was talking, which was typical for her when concentrating. Now she looked over, twisting up one side of her mouth. “You sound pretty fucked,” Lily said.

Not exactly what Duncan wanted to hear, though he wasn’t sure how serious she was being. “I hear what Blake’s telling me. But I have a job to do. I don’t romanticize being a lawyer—God, I hope I don’t—but I do believe in it. I mean, it’s something more than just being a whore in a suit.”

“First I’m hearing of it.”

Duncan ignored Lily’s reflexive sarcasm. “Loyalty. To our clients. That’s the difference. You say you’re somebody’s lawyer, that
means
something. You fight for them, even when you know full fucking well that they don’t deserve to win. That’s the job, right? I don’t do that, I don’t follow through for Rafael because it’s a pro bono case and I’ve got work to do—then what am I?”

“I have no idea what you can live with,” Lily said. “But Blake’s telling you to cut bait. If you really think that goes against your client’s interest, then you’re basically fucked.”

“But if I figure out a way to really win it, don’t you think Blake will come around?”

“Maybe what he’s telling you is it was good for the firm to help this guy out when he first got indicted and his name was in the paper, but it’s not good for the firm to take the case to trial.”

Duncan had wondered if it could be something like that. He hoped that wasn’t it, because that would mean the firm was putting its own interests above those of its client. While he didn’t think himself naive about the fundamentally mercenary nature of his employer, he wasn’t willing to accept that they would take it that far. “You really think the Blake would do that?”

Lily shrugged. “We don’t have a sight line on all the angles here.”

“So what would you do if it was you?”

Lily looked uncomfortable with the question. “Play out the string as long as you can. Get the best possible deal for your guy—it’s obviously up to the client whether to take it or not. At the end of the day he’s a nonpaying client who’s going to be in your life for one case. You and me, the Blake babies—you know what partnership here brings.”

“Don’t question, follow orders, that’s your advice?”

Lily shrugged. “That’s why they call it work.”

18

D
UNCAN TOOK
Leah to Jean Georges, a serious contender for the title of the city’s best restaurant. It wasn’t his normal idea of a first-date place—if this was, in fact, a date. But he figured Leah was used to the finer things, and he felt obligated to take her to the nicest place he could get a table at, although he wasn’t able to get a reservation until nine forty-five.

“Tell me,” Leah said as they were seated, “do you always eat dinner so late?”

“Best I could do,” Duncan replied.

“Did you have trouble getting a reservation? You should have told me; I could’ve taken care of it.”

Duncan didn’t know whether Leah was once again being purposely provocative or simply condescending. He decided that by now he had license to ask. “Was that deliberate?”

“Was what deliberate?” Leah said innocently, though Duncan wasn’t buying it.

“Your putting me in my place.”

Leah tilted her head, but with the ghost of a smile. “I did no such thing.”

“So it wasn’t deliberate?”

“My point was simply that you should avail yourself of whatever shortcuts I could provide.”

Duncan smiled, though he knew his patience for this would quickly wear thin. “Hey, I’m a modern man,” he said. “You want to make any future dinner reservations that the two of us may need, by all means be my guest.”

“I’ve offended you again, haven’t I?”

“I’m a lawyer,” Duncan said. “People say mean things to me all the time.”

“And yet here I am, constantly on your wrong side,” Leah said. “Let’s talk about something more pleasant. Do you have siblings?”

“I have a half sister and brother, but nobody full.”

“Are you close to them?”

Duncan was uncomfortable with the topic, but not inclined to lie. “Not really, to be honest.”

“Are they still in Michigan?”

Duncan nodded, a little surprised that Leah remembered where he was from.

“You ever go back?”

“Not really,” Duncan said with a shrug. “Christmas maybe.”

“Never thought of returning to your home state after law school?” Candace asked. “They must need lawyers in Michigan.”

“I’m sure they do,” Duncan said. “But they don’t need me.”

“Too small-time for you?” Leah said with a smile.

“I doubt that surprises you.”

“Some people like where they’re from.”

“Sure,” Duncan said. “Though they don’t tend to be people from Michigan.”

The waiter brought them their first course, fluke with a frozen wasabi sauce that unleashed its flavor as it melted. The restaurant ran like clockwork, the service flawless yet unobtrusive. It’d taken Duncan about five years of living an expensive life in New York to get used to places like this; he assumed Leah took them for granted.

“Family is important, of course,” Leah said. “But there are times when I would love nothing more than to be on the other side of the country from mine. What do you think of my brother?”

“I don’t know him,” Duncan replied, relieved that he didn’t, since it wasn’t a question he would be inclined to answer. “I’ve only met him the one time at your office.”

“Jeremy is very weak,” Leah said gravely. She was looking closely at Duncan. “It gives me no pleasure to admit that, but it’s impossible to deny. The truth is, that’s probably the real reason my father came around on my joining the business. At some point he realized my brother wasn’t going to have what it takes to run it, at least not without a lot of help.”

Duncan was surprised that Leah was confiding in him about this, but tried not to show it. “Weak how?”

“My brother’s a prisoner of his appetites. He’s got no control over them. He’s been that way since we were growing up. Sometimes I think I’m as much his parent as his sister.”

“Does it interfere with his work?” Duncan asked, probing for why Leah was telling him.

“It interferes with everything, unfortunately. But I do what I have to do. As you probably realize, my family
is
Roth Properties. What’s bad for our family is bad for the company, and vice versa. So protecting my brother from himself isn’t just about protecting him; it’s about protecting everything we have.”

Duncan wasn’t sure if this was a personal or professional confession. “I understand.”

“Do you?” Leah asked, and in the look she gave him Duncan realized that he wasn’t at all sure he did.

“I think so,” Duncan said. One waiter removed their empty plates as another poured them more wine. Duncan leaned back, muttering thanks to the waiters while waiting for them to leave. Was Leah saying that her brother needed his help? Was he in some kind of legal jam she was trying to work her way up to discussing? “Is there something specific?” he asked Leah once they were alone again.

“Not just now,” Leah said dismissively. Whatever she’d been getting at, she clearly didn’t want to articulate it more than she already had. “So what’s going on with your murder? You still think it’s going to plead out quickly?”

Duncan was getting used to Leah’s abrupt changes of subject. “I’m not sure,” he said, instinctively not forthcoming when talking about a case with someone other than the client.

“What’s changed?”

“We’re challenging the forensics. It’s not enough to win the case for us, but obviously it could weaken it.”

“Are you challenging the science just to be doing something, or are you challenging it because there’s something wrong with it?”

Duncan was surprised by Leah’s interest in the murder, but then again he supposed everybody found such cases interesting, at least on some level. “It’s for real. It doesn’t exonerate my guy, but it’s something.”

“You seem like you’re enjoying it,” Leah said, leaning back as a waiter put another course, this one some elaborate duck confit, before them, Duncan only half listening as the waiter detailed what he was serving them.

“Honestly?” Duncan said, before digging in. “It’s the scariest thing I’ve ever done as a lawyer. But I suppose I enjoy that aspect of it.”

“Fear’s the great motivator, after all.”

“Indeed,” Duncan said. “It either blankets you like a fog or it charges you up. Me it charges.”

Leah was again giving him her openly evaluating look, though this time it seemed more clearly tinged with approval. “So, Duncan,” she asked, “are you ever going to get comfortable with me?”

Duncan smiled, meeting her calm gaze. “How do you know this isn’t my version of comfortable?”

“Is it because I’m a client, or because I’m rich?”

“Is both an option?” Duncan said.

“I hope it’s not because of my tendency to be blunt.”

“If we’re being serious, it’s mainly about your being a client. I’m not used to socializing with my clients.”

“Blake socializes with my father.”

“That’s not the same.”

“Why?” Leah said, smiling at him, but with some challenge in her look. “Because I’m a girl and you’re a boy?”

The fact that he’d half expected this conversation didn’t make having it any more comfortable. “What do you want me to say?”

“I’m aware that you’re a boy. I assume you’re aware that I’m a girl.”

“Do you want me to be aware that you’re a girl?”

“Now you’re just trying to get me to do your work for you,” Leah said.

Duncan offered a smile and a mock salute; any ambiguity as to whether they were on a date pretty much dissipated. “Blake might not be too happy if he knew we were having dinner,” he said.

“Why would he care?”

“I can think of a few different reasons,” Duncan said. “None of which does it strike me as wise to articulate.”

“I fail to see how our having dinner is going to affect the institutional relationship between my family’s business and your law firm.”

“Me either,” Duncan said. “But that doesn’t mean I’m going to tell Blake about it.”

AFTER DINNER
the two of them stood outside the Trump building where Jean Georges made its home. “It didn’t occur to me that I was taking you to eat inside one of your competitor’s buildings,” Duncan said. “Is that bad form?”

“He’s not our competition,” Leah said dismissively. “The Donald’s a haircut and a franchising plan, not a real developer.”

“I guess that answers that,” Duncan said. “Anyway, I enjoyed having dinner with you.”

“And I you,” Leah said. “So perhaps we shall have to do it again sometime.”

“Perhaps we shall,” Duncan said with a smile. “Should I get you a cab?”

Leah glanced over at a parked Town Car. “I believe that’s my ride,” she said. “Can I drop you?”

Duncan wondered how long the driver had been sitting there. He took Town Cars to go to the airport and such, but he’d never had one pick him up after dinner. “It’s a short walk,” he said.

On his way home Duncan tried to sort out how he felt about Leah, and just what she might be up to. He’d been too on his guard to fully enjoy dinner; her blatant manipulation was equal parts maddening and alluring. It was hard to believe that someone as wealthy and powerful as she was would have any interest in him. While Harvard Law and a job at an elite law firm had given Duncan some access to the corridors of power, he was still very much a minor leaguer compared to the sort of Upper East Side society that Leah had grown up in. And the difference in status between them was only heightened by the fact that his firm did work for her company.

He suspected that these power differentials fed into Leah’s interest, that she liked having the control they gave her. Which in turn heightened Duncan’s being on his guard with her, not trusting her motives. But Duncan also saw the appeal in distrust, felt the seduction of the way that Leah wielded her power, as well as the lure of what being with someone like her could mean for him, both personally and professionally.

But the fact that she was the heir apparent at a major firm client certainly complicated matters. There was no hard-and-fast rule against a lawyer getting involved with a client, other than for divorce lawyers, but it was generally frowned upon, and Duncan had no doubt that Blake would be pissed. Mixing law firm business and personal romantic pleasure was a dangerous game, one that Duncan knew a more cautious lawyer wouldn’t even be contemplating. Perhaps that was why he found himself intrigued.