Page 88 of Maddy's Justice

“There are dozens…”

“Paxton!” he yelled. “Stop!”

They both went silent for a moment to cool down. When he finally had, Kane continued.

“Paxton, believe it or not,” he calmly continued. “I like you. I respect you. In fact, I secretly admire your ability. I wish I was as good in court as you are. But you can be an enormous pain-in-the-ass. This has been decided. Arguing with me won’t change that. Great Lakes is an important case.”

“I don’t even know why we’re suing them,” Paxton quietly said.

“Great Lakes Agriculture has been dumping products to drive out competition.”

“Dumping being…, what?”

“Selling below cost to build a monopoly. Or, at least, to drive smaller farmers out of business then buy them out for less than fair value,” Kane said.

“Sounds pretty sexy,” Paxton glumly replied.

“Don’t go there. Disband your investigation and go see John Prober. He’s heading up the Great Lakes case. Do you know him?”

“Yeah. He hit on me at last year’s Christmas party. I mentioned his wife and he claimed he was kidding.”

“We don’t have Christmas parties. We have holiday parties,” Kane said. “Can you work with him?”

“As long as he behaves. I could use that as an excuse, you know,” Paxton replied.

“Did you file a complaint?”

“No, I didn’t.”

“Then go see John. He knows you’re coming. Keep him away from the party punchbowl and he’ll behave,” Kane said.

“Oh, that’s funny,” Paxton said. “When do they go to trial?”

“About a month, I think. Ask John,” Kane said.

“A month? I’ve got a month to learn antitrust law?”

“You’ll be fine. You’ll see.”

Paxton stared at him for several seconds then said, “You owe me one.”

“Okay, I can live with that.”

“And James Labelle is not done.”

“We’ll see.”

Five minutes after Paxton left his office, Alex Kane called his boss, U.S. Attorney Abigail Finster.

“How did she take it?” Finster asked.

“Better than I expected,” Kane answered.

“Really? How so?”

“She didn’t throw anything at me or threaten to geld me. Which, now that I think about it, I wonder why?”

“You think she’s up to something? She won’t let go of Labelle?”

---