Page 56 of Pro Bono

“I hope you didn’t wait long enough to get an infection.” She pivoted and he watched her walk off toward the big bed. She sat down on the bed so hard she bounced, then pulled the covers up to her neck and turned to face away from him.

He said, “Do you want to talk?”

“No, Pat. I don’t want to talk. I wanted to talk earlier. Now I want to sleep.”

He turned off the light. He had been anticipating a big explosion that would obliterate the family. He had a sudden urge to tell her everything—or at least more—and end the dread hanging over him. This silent treatment was a one-night stay of execution.

He looked in her direction for a few seconds, wishing. Then he put his pants and coat back on, picked up his shoes, and walked out of the bedroom. He went back down the stairs and sat at the kitchen table to put on his shoes. He took out his phone and texted Ron Talbert the words, “Call me.” Then he went outside and sat in his car.

His phone rang and he answered it. “Hi, Ron.”

“What do you want, Pat?”

“I just talked to Christina for the first time since our little squabble. She went to bed not speaking to me, but she bought the story you told her sister, so we’re not into a deeper discussion of this mess yet. All she seems to be mad about right now is that I dropped off her radar for a day and didn’t call her to tell her the lie you made up before she heard it from Francesca.”

“You’re welcome,” Ron said. “I guess you’re okay, then. You seem to be living a charmed life.”

“I got fired, Ron. They had me escorted off the premises. Their legal hatchet woman told me they know everything. They’re paying off Vesper Ellis and her lawyer Warren to keep it all quiet until they’ve had time to clean up the mess and pay back the others.”

“Are they turning you in to the authorities?”

“She told me they didn’t plan to, but she reminded me that they’re not doing it for me. It’s only for the benefit of Great Oceana. They’re trying to make things look like a chain of honest mistakes, no humans involved.”

“I can’t believe your luck.”

“Not believing it is the point. It won’t work. The time is going to come in a few days when they need to throw me in the fire.”

“I’m already in the fire,” Talbert said. “The only reason I’m free right now is that my boss tipped me off that the company was being sued and her bosses were freaked out and using my name a lot, so I should sneak out. She said she’d pretend I was at the doctor for my face.” He sighed. “I’m really stuck, Pat. The life I’ve been living and working for is over. I’ve been looking at countries that won’t extradite people to America. They’re awful. Some are just giant prisons run by dictators and the others are backwaters. Fran would never go with me and take the kids to live in any of those places. I spent some time this afternoon thinking of killing myself.”

“Come on,” Ollonsun said. “That’s crazy. And how do you even plan to do it?”

“I got a gun today.”

“You did? Just like that, in one day?”

“Do you remember my cousin Tim, the one who died in an accident? He was a gun guy. He had at least a hundred of them when he died. I went and asked his wife, Tina, if I could have one of them to remember him by.”

“Amazing.”

“Why? You have a gun.”

“Yes, I do,” Ollonsun said. “I bought it the legal way.”

There was a long silence.

“What?” said Talbert.

“I just had a thought.”

“What’s your thought?”

“That we’re in terrible trouble, about to lose everything—our families, all the material things we have, our jobs, our pensions, our chances of ever getting a job in financial services again. No, of ever getting any decent job again. Our freedom. But right now, tonight, while we’re sitting here feeling sorry for ourselves, we have one last chance to turn things around. It’s only going to exist until some judge issues a warrant for our arrests. It’s like sitting on a pile of explosives. In the instant when the spark comes, we’re dead.”

“It’s our own fault.”

“It’s our own fault if we sit here waiting for it to happen. But what if we got rid of the spark? What provides the spark is Vesper Ellis and her very bright, greedy young lawyer. Do you think if they weren’t threatening our two companies with exposure, Great Oceana and Founding Fathers would be about to get us arrested? No. They would quietly fire us, but they would never turn us over to the police. Doing that amountsto turning themselves over to the federal regulators, and ultimately getting fired themselves.”

“Are you really—”

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