The Reform Artists: A Legal Suspense, Spy Thriller (The Reform Artists Series Book 1) (10 page)

At twenty past five, Martin left work in a state of near panic. Just hours earlier, he had been ready to fight the domestic violence charges in court. Now, he cowered at the thought. He hoped there might still be time in which to reach a settlement with Katie.

The covert group remained the one unknown. Did they really have the power, and the capabilities, to level the playing field? Were they a serious option? If so, their involvement could change everything, provided they did not expect too much in return.

But where were they? Nearly two days had passed—forty-five hours of the allotted forty-eight-hour follow-up period—and, still, no one from the group had reached out to him. For all practical purposes, the organization had gone dark. Had it given up on him for some reason and discarded his case in favor of another? As Martin left his office building, he scanned the street in both directions, looking for operatives. He was constantly on the lookout now and permanently on edge.

It had taken a great deal of mental energy for him to maintain this perpetually heightened state of alert for the previous two days, and at this point, he felt beaten and emotionally drained. That’s why, when he saw the Sign of the Dolphin pub, Martin veered off course. He opened the door, drawn in by the promise of alcohol-induced escape that lay just a few feet beyond. The thought of killing off a few million over-active brain cells suddenly seemed irresistible.

The Sign of the Dolphin was a rare cross between an urban pickup bar and a serious drinking hole. A long, wooden, saloon-style bar ran the length of the establishment, from just inside the front door to the small kitchen in the rear. Some of the stools along the bar were reserved for the pub’s regulars. You could find these men and women at their designated perches at virtually any hour of the day. But most nights, they preferred to drink alone, at home. The bar’s primary concession to the singles crowd was a considerable amount of permanent, open mingling space between the stools to the left and a single row of dining booths on the far right.

To enhance the Pub’s appeal, the owners had recently added several dartboards, a snooker table and two card tables in back. As usual, The Dolphin also promoted more than a dozen microbrews that were always cold and always on tap.

At this time of day, the Pub was nearly empty. Most of the daytime crowd had gone, and the city’s young, urban professionals, still hard at work at their desks, would not put in appearances for at least another hour. Martin grabbed an empty bar stool and flagged a bartender who was standing near the cash register, drying off freshly washed shot glasses. He ordered an extremely dry vodka martini and began drumming his fingers on the edge of the bar, as he waited for his drink to arrive.

The first sip was cold, wet and tangy. Martin closed his eyes to savor its full effect, as the liquor slowly slid down his throat. Sometime between consuming the olive and completing the final gulp, he failed to notice the new figure stepping behind the counter and donning an apron.

“Just about given up on us, I bet?” she asked as she laid a cloth towel down on the bar to Martin’s right.

Martin looked up and saw a young, attractive African-American woman smiling at him. She was in her late twenties and wore a black leotard that showed off her sleek, classic figure, rich, brown skin tones and fresh, girl-next-door looks. Her long, brown hair hung loosely in a ponytail that draped over one shoulder. Martin wondered if she were a theatre major or a dancer, working part-time to pay the rent.

“Are you referring to the service here?” he asked.

“No, I’m talking about the video disk you received the other night.”

“What?!” Martin bolted up in his seat. He leaned forward. “Are you with the—?”

The woman quickly raised a finger to her lips and feigned a frown. “Don’t shake my hand!” she added a second later, as she shooed away Martin’s suddenly outstretched arm. He immediately withdrew it.

She looked at him quizzically, and smiled. “You’re surprised I’m a woman, aren’t you?”

“No,” Martin said, shaking his head. “Well, maybe a little. I think I’m just relieved that I’m finally talking to
someone
.”

“Martin,” she said, “let me explain how this works. We are going to have a quick chat together while I clean up the bar for the evening trade. OK?”

“Sure,” Martin said. “But please, call me Marty.”

“OK, Marty.”

“And your name is…?”

“Teresa.”

“Great. So, Teresa, I’m curious, how did you know to look for me in here?”

“That’s easy,” she said. “Hand me your brief case.” Martin lifted it up onto the counter and Teresa ran the palm of her hand over its surface. Suddenly, she stopped and peeled away a small black plastic bar that was about a half-inch long and a quarter inch thick. Then, she slipped it in her apron pocket. “We’ve had you under surveillance for quite some time now, Marty, but since last Monday night, this small transmitter has been keeping tabs on your movements. Its battery is about to expire.”

“Did the guy on the subway plant that on me?” Martin asked.

Teresa nodded,
yes
.

“So tell me, how does this organization of yours work?”

“Sorry,” she said. “That’s ‘top secret’ information, available strictly on a ‘need to know’ basis, and you, quite simply, don’t need to know. But you do need this.” She slid the bill across the bar to Martin. “You’ll find your instructions handwritten on the back of the tear-off slip. Just do what it says.”

“Since you brought it up, Teresa, how did a nice girl like you get involved in this business?”

“You really want to know?”

“Yeah.”

“I do it to honor the memory of my big brother, Brian,” she said. “He died in a car crash a few years back, after he lost his business and his ex- suddenly pulled up stakes and moved across country with their three kids.

“Brian was a devoted dad—and like a second father to me,” she said. “He deserved better.”

“I’m sorry,” Martin said.

“Thanks. That’s very sweet.”

“Can I ask you another question?” Martin asked, as he paid the bill and slipped the receipt into his pocket.

“Sure.”

“Am I buying trouble, here?”

“Not from us. We are strictly in the trouble-mitigation business. Whether you realize it or not, Marty, our involvement means you’re a very lucky guy.”

“I’m sorry, Teresa,” Martin said, smiling. “But did you just say that I’m going to get ‘lucky’?”

“Not that kind of ‘lucky,’” she laughed, “but, for someone in your situation, lucky enough.”

Just then, a customer passed by. Teresa lowered her voice. “Just follow the instructions!” she whispered. Then louder, “Come back again, soon, sir—and thanks for the tip!”

“Sure thing,” Martin said, getting up. He left the bar feeling soothed, elated and more hopeful than he’d been in days.

Once seated on the metro, Martin took the receipt out of his pocket and examined it. On its back, he found the following message: “Harkins Tours, Suite #221, 3745 Diamond Court Center, Gaithersburg, MD." Appoint-ment: 8:00 p.m., tonight.”

“How’s production going?” Dave Clancy, CEO of Quadratic Sound Studios, in Bethesda, MD, asked his chief programming engineer, Jay Liu, during a rare evening coffee break.

“Awesome, man,” Liu said excitedly. “I’ve been toying, for some time, with the idea of building multiple subliminal redundancies into the audio feeds, to enhance the recording’s suggestive power and to help the brain make more vivid images during REM.”

“And,” his boss asked, “any progress?”

“Oh yeah,” Liu continued. “I’ve actually got programs now to automate sublim production. I’ve even used them to lay down tracks for the current job.”

“Have you tested it?”

“Oh, it works great! We applied it to the last series of audies we ran for Hypno Health Associates, and Brimmer, the head guy over there, man, loves it. He said it’s more than doubled the depth of trance states. (Did you know he runs biofeedback on every one of his subjects...just to avoid lawsuits?) Anyway, he told me it will probably prolong the effectiveness of a routine hypno session by twenty percent.”

“I like where you’re going with this,” Clancy said. “It’s got possibilities.”

“Oh, you have no idea, man!”

Clancy could see Liu was now ready to burst. He started a mental countdown, ‘three, two—.’

“You see,” Liu began, jumping the gun, “my theory was that if the mind heard the audie in a hypnotic state, then every detail would be remembered—even those subliminal messages that we do not take conscious notice of. No two people are alike, you know, so each of us responds better to different thought suggestions. Therefore, the more suggestions we provide, the more universally powerful the experience. And now, with this layering effect, I’ve found a way to add limitless bandwidth and power to the audies."

Clancy was all smiles.

“Oh, and that new head juice is awesome, too, boss,” Liu added. “I stuck myself once before listening to the hypno audie, “You’re The Stud Your Momma Said You Never Could Be,” and then I went home and made love to Melinda for two solid hours—and I mean
solid
.”

“Well, I guess that’s conclusive proof of efficacy,” Clancy said, laughing. “By the way, have you got a copy of the sublim script?”

“Sure.”

“Good. Email me one when you get back to your desk. I want to check the quality of the selections. Nice work, Jay.”

“Thanks, man.”

Clancy returned to his office and fired off a quick email to his ‘silent partners’ to let them know the status of the current project and to share Jay Liu’s latest stroke of genius.

He told them, based on the enhancements Jay had outlined, that the ten-minute dream narrative sequence they had ordered probably would occupy about one-half a gigabyte of data storage space compressed rather than the standard one-hundred-megabyte file. He also mentioned Jay’s personal experience with the ‘head juice’ that they had sent along for testing. He concluded by saying the new audie would be ready for transmission to them within the hour.

Clancy knew they would be extremely pleased. Initially, five years earlier, when he was short on cash and they offered to become his financial “angels”—for a piece of the action, of course—he had been concerned that they might be a front for organized crime. But, gradually, ‘little things’ had convinced him that they were somehow hooked into the intelligence community. That’s when any remaining qualms he might have had completely disappeared.

Martin pulled up to 3745 Diamond Court Center at 7:50 p.m., his heart pounding. The building, which was dark, except for its lobby, appeared to be the typical, nondescript suburban office complex. It had lots of glass, lots of steel, fake polished-onyx flooring, and a generous assortment of tall indoor trees and ubiquitous potted plants.

At this time of day, the building and its parking lot were nearly empty. Martin entered the lobby and took the elevator up to the second floor. When he stepped off, he saw a law firm to his left and a mixed-use executive office suite to his right. Its glass door read, “Suites 201 to 235.” The door was locked, and only a few security lights lit up the reception area behind it.

Martin walked over and pressed the bell. Moments later a buzzer sounded, and he entered. Lights illuminated only one of the two hallways opening onto the reception area, so Martin headed in that direction. Toward the end of the hall, past several offices and conference rooms, he found Suite 221. The door was slightly ajar. He could see lights shining inside, so he entered.

Harkins Tours’ reception area contained all the obligatory destination posters for a regional bus tour company. These included: A composite poster of Washington, D.C. destinations; a fiery, mid-autumn shot of Skyline Drive as well as scenes of historic Williamsburg; wild ponies at dusk on Assateague Island; Marlin fishing off Maryland’s Atlantic coast; a composite photo of historic Annapolis, MD; and a breathtaking view of the Greenbrier Resort, once the favored retreat of presidents and railroad tycoons.

The company had tastefully decorated the room with Persian rugs, black leather sofas and chairs and sparkling chrome-and-glass tables. Harkins’ Tours brochures beckoned from acrylic display holders on each end table, and several of the day’s finest travel, dining and lifestyle magazines sat neatly on the coffee table. Martin also noticed the tiny red power light glowing on the small security camera perched in the far corner of the room.

Just then, a strikingly attractive young woman appeared in the doorway leading to the back offices. She was dressed, professionally, in a navy pinstripe jacket, white blouse and skirt. Her pocket book hung down from her left shoulder, and she carried a soft, black leather satchel in her right hand. She stopped abruptly upon seeing Martin. “Oh, hello,” she said, looking somewhat surprised. “Have you been waiting long?”

“Just got here,” Martin said, returning her smile.

She came forward and shook his hand. “Hi, I’m Lacey.”

“Martin Silkwood.”

“I was just on my way out,” she said, brushing her sandy, brown bangs away from her hazel eyes. Martin looked at her and smiled. She was dazzling, he thought, with her butterscotch complexion and her understated makeup.

“You must be here to see Robert,” she said. “He’s the only one of us who routinely works eighteen-hour days. I’ll just buzz him to say you’re here.”

“That won’t be necessary, Lacey,” said a man, emerging from the doorway where she had been moments before.

“Oh,” she said, smiling and putting down the phone. She quickly gathered up her bags. “You’re in good hands, Mr. Silkwood,” she said, giving Martin a final smile. “I’m sure Robert will help your group put together a fantastic tour!” And with that, she left.

“Mr. Silkwood,” Robert said, stepping forward and extending his hand. He was a tall, lean, clean-shaven man in his late thirties, conservatively dressed in a blue and white pinstripe oxford shirt, a red and blue striped tie and charcoal gray slacks. “I’ve been expecting you,” he said, shaking Martin’s hand. “I’m Robert Brooks.”

“Nice to meet you.”

Brooks walked over to the front door, closed it quietly and then carefully turned the lock. “Lacey is new,” he said. “She’s a real go-getter, in addition to being easy on the eyes.

“Normally, this place clears out at six, but now I may have to start moving my evening hours back a bit. Come in,” he said, taking Martin by the elbow and leading him out of the reception area. “We’ve got a lot of ground to cover in a very short time.”

Brook’s office was located at the back of the suite and was considerably larger than the others they passed along the way. Once inside, he led Martin past his formal desk and sitting area and over to a small round table by the window. Brooks then poured two mugs of hot coffee and fetched a laptop computer, which was already running. He sat down and pushed his Harkins Tours business card over to Martin. “This is for you,” he said. It listed him as ‘Senior Vice President, Sales.’

Brooks got right to the point. “Martin, tonight, you’re going to learn some highly sensitive information about our little enterprise. For starters, you already know my real name and my place of business. That, however, is about as far as your knowledge of our personnel will go. I have been chosen to be your primary contact, the only operative you will work with directly. From now on, I will be your sole link to the organization. And it will stay that way unless something happens to me. That’s how we operate. We maintain everyone’s anonymity, and safety, by keeping contact points to a minimum.

“Martin,” he continued, “everything we discuss here tonight must remain strictly confidential, understand?”

“Yes.”

“I want to be clear about this. You are agreeing never to mention this to anyone, not even to your closest friends and relations.”

“I understand.”

“OK, then. When I’m done, it will be your turn to make some decisions.”

“Such as?”

“Well, first, you will need to decide if you really want our help.”

“Why wouldn’t I?” Martin asked. “You aren't about to spring some kind of outrageous fee on me, are you?”

“No,” Brooks said, with a chuckle. “Believe me, Martin, we neither want, nor need, your money. But we do operate within strict parameters, and we have certain expectations.”

“Expectations? I’m not sure I like the sound of that.”

“You may not. That just underscores my point. It’s also why we’ve instituted the following rule: You must formally request our help in order to get it. Now, what do you say we get started?”

“Sure.”

Brooks opened the laptop computer and turned it so Martin would have a clear view of the screen. “Let’s begin by reviewing your case.”

Martin nodded as the computer screen sprang to life. He could immediately tell, by its rapid operating speed, that Brooks’ laptop was not something you could buy on the street. Moreover, it appeared linked to a remote computer platform of extraordinary size and power. Brooks rapidly keyed in some numbers and, instantly, up came Martin’s case file. He clicked a link and the screen filled up with the image of a woman Martin had never seen before.

“That’s Beverly West,” Brooks said. “She’s the reason we became aware of your case.”

“That’s my wife’s attorney?” Martin asked.

“Correct.”

West appeared to be in her early fifties. The photograph captured her from the waist up. She sat with her body facing away from the camera, but she had rotated her upper torso so that she was staring down, imperially, into the lens, challenging it with defiant gray-green eyes.

Fit and trim for someone her age, she appeared to pay meticulous attention to every aspect of her physical appearance. Nothing looked haphazard or out of place.

She was wearing a custom-tailored gray, herringbone suit jacket over a beige silk top. A short necklace of cultured pearls hung around her neck, complemented by a matching pair of pearl-and-diamond stud earrings. West’s dirty blonde hair, heavily frosted and worn in a pageboy, framed an attractive, but determined, face that seemed disturbingly lifeless, and cold, as if its taut skin and delicate, refined features were chiseled in stone. A layer of concealer, which West had used to hide her endless freckles, added to the illusion, by lending her skin, the subtle, mottled appearance of granite. Only her thin, frosted lips, which projected the tiniest hint of a smile, suggested otherwise.

Brooks continued, “West is a high-powered divorce attorney, from Rockville, MD, who is known to push the ethical envelope to extremes. She will do whatever it takes to give her clients the upper hand in divorce cases.

“Her practice generates ex-parte domestic violence petitions the way most law firms crank out subpoenas and document requests. She’s her own cottage industry! That behavior brought her to our attention long ago. Now, she heads a nationwide list of 3,521 unethical attorneys whom we monitor constantly.

“Every time a new client retains her for a divorce proceeding, our system flags us,” Brooks said, proudly. “Your wife hired her nine months ago, in late August.”

“No, that’s impossible!” Martin protested. “Katie and I only started having marital problems this winter.”

“Then, your wife must be psychic!” Brooks continued. “Here, look at this.” He clicked on an icon, and immediately, the image of one of Katie’s personal checks filled the screen. The check’s date line read: “August 23, 2018.” It was written for $2,500 and Katie had made it payable to “Beverly West, Esq.” The memo line read, “Retainer for legal services, divorce.”

“How do you explain that?” Brooks asked.

Martin stared at the screen, trying to comprehend what he was seeing. “I-I can’t,” he said, still smarting from the news. “How did you get a copy of this? Have you hacked the banks?”

“I can’t comment on that, Martin. But, I can assure you, the check is real.”

“I don’t doubt it,” Martin said, swallowing hard. “It appears to confirm my worst suspicions—even if my timing was way off.”

“Your suspicions?”

“Yes,” he said. “West called my attorney yesterday to present my wife’s settlement offer. Among other things, it stipulated that we could start dating other people immediately. When I saw that, I realized Katie probably had been having an affair. I guess it’s been going on a lot longer than I ever imagined.”

“Sorry,” Brooks said.

“Hey, what’s done is done,” Martin said dismissively. He continued to study the screen, unable to take his eyes off it. He didn’t want Brooks, a stranger, to see how troubled he was by this news. Only the pained look on his face, and the sudden shakiness in his voice, hinted at the powerful feelings of betrayal and hurt that were welling up inside him.

Oblivious, Brooks plowed ahead. He clicked on another icon and a new screen appeared. This one contained a spreadsheet titled, “Domestic Violence Case Disposition Report: Beverly West.” The document showed stats detailing every time one of West’s clients had sought a Temporary Restraining Order before filing for divorce. This particular chart covered the previous ten-year period, when fifty-two of West’s seventy-eight female clients had obtained at least one TRO as part of a ‘preemptive strike.’ A graph on the following page clearly showed the numbers trending upward.

Brooks hit some keys and highlighted several columns under the general label ‘Disposition.’ They showed that out of West’s clients’ fifty-two domestic violence cases, only three (six percent), ever led to permanent restraining orders. Judges dismissed ten cases at trial (twenty percent of the total). And West managed to settle all of the remaining thirty-six cases (seventy-four percent of the total) while awaiting trial.

“Based on these numbers, it appears that only one-in-ten of West’s petitions have merit,” Brooks said. “But here’s the really sad part, Martin: The legal profession only disciplined West once in all these years, and that action barely amounted to a ‘slap on the wrist.’ Her tactics work. They have helped her clients get the edge eighty percent of the time. And they’ve kept her completely out of trouble ninety-eight percent of the time.”

“How does she get away with it?” Martin asked.

Brooks smiled sympathetically. “You don’t know, do you?”

“Know what?”

“That the legal profession is self-regulated, with enforcement taking place at the local level, where political clout, personal relationships and financial contributions have the most influence. As a result, in most states—Maryland being one—anything goes, because the foxes literally are guarding the hen houses.”

Martin nodded. “I’m beginning to see that. But Robert, with all this information at your disposal, why did your group wait so long to contact me?”

Brooks took a sip of his coffee. “Two reasons.”

“First, we needed to make sure you were not an abusive person, because, as you’ve seen, Martin, at least some of West’s TROs seem to have had merit. If we had concluded you were abusive,” Brooks added, “we never would have offered our help.

“To find out, we checked police records going all the way back to when you were eighteen, and with the exception of a few speeding tickets, your record was clean. Zero arrests and zero violence. And when it comes to violent behavior, past violent acts are often major indicators of future behavior.

“In other words, violent people commit violent acts. Non-violent people, particularly non-violent people without any prior history of drug or alcohol abuse, rarely do.”

While he was talking, Brooks called up all the police report searches the organization had ever run on Martin. The details of every parking ticket and traffic citation he ever received suddenly flashed by on the screen.

“Still,” he said, “timing is everything. We also have learned, from experience, that the best time to approach a husband is shortly—very shortly—before his wife hits him with a TRO. Otherwise, we find most husbands dismiss us as a bunch of lunatics and never seek our help.”