Equivocal Death

Prologue

Wednesday, December 23

Ice cold. He pressed his hand to the window and watched the frost dissolve, felt the moisture collect on his palm. He'd switched off the lights, and the interior darkness mirrored the inky void outside. Standing immobile, he could almost imagine that he was alone in the world or better yet that he did not even exist, that he was simply a part of this floating emptiness, transported by waves of black snow.

But his lungs filled with air. He felt the rhythm of his breath, stark and fatal as an accusation.

He was alive.

And there was work to be done.

Moving away from the window, he switched on a Bestlite floor lamp, acquired from a British import company during his last year of school. He liked things to be well made. He surveyed the scene before him. The space where he stood was cavernous, at least thirty feet long and twenty feet wide. Part of a former warehouse, it was isolated enough to meet his needs. His desk faced a sweep of tall windows, while his clothes - Brooks Brothers suits, several shirts, a tux - hung neatly on a portable chrome garment rack. A Bose CD player sat on an antique table.

He was pleased with the space. Everything was just as he liked it. The barren surroundings only underscored the beauty and fineness of his few selected possessions. His eyes traced the narrow confines of his life.

Then, decisively, he made his entrance.

Moving to the CD player, he pushed Play. Instantly, the room filled with the opening chords of Cherubini's Medea. A 1959 recording. Remarkable music. Potent. Full of a terrible rage. He glanced down at the CD cover, at the diva Maria Callas. Arched nose. Raven hair. Hands splayed like claws. What was it he saw there? A passion for vengeance - for justice - that matched his own. The promise of its fulfillment. And with this, an unflagging sense of order, of timeliness, of fate. It was this he needed above all else. For even as the time for action grew closer, his confidence had started to ebb. Why had he waited so long? The plan that had seemed so brilliant when he first conceived it could at times seem almost absurd. Again, he tried to push back these thoughts. It was dangerous to think this way.

Sitting down at his desk, he turned on his laptop computer. The screen flashed bright. From here on, it was almost too easy. The most profitable law firm in the country. Thirty-seven partners who counted themselves among the most respected lawyers in the world. Power brokers and advisers, they counseled governments, corporations, and the rare private individual with sufficient wealth to pay their fees. And yet cracking their computer safeguards had been child's play.

Strange, the unerring detection of their clients' vulnerabilities and the utter disregard of their own. Samson's computer network had just been overhauled at huge expense. The mere fact of this investment had seemed to assuage their concerns. There was something touching in this naïveté, the almost childlike belief in money. Their computer network was top of the line. Nothing more need be said.

Besides, the elder statesmen of Samson disdained technology, the proliferation of desktop computers. They yearned for the days of dictation. Of pretty secretaries, heads bowed, recording their every word. But in the end, even Samson had been forced to submit. The firm's quaint refusal to communicate by e-mail, once seen as a charming relic of its patrician past, had begun to interfere with business. And Samson was, first and foremost, a business. Bowing to the inevitable, the firm edged its way into cyberspace, a territory as alien to its rulers as the planet Mars. E-mail. The Internet. Standard issue for more than a decade in the modern business world but still suspect intruders at Samson.

And so he found himself in the happy position of breaking and entering an unlocked house. The attorneys' "secret" passwords gave the illusion of privacy but none of its substance. Remarkable, really, the faith placed by these brilliant men and women in a technology they didn't understand. Hubris. The fatal flaw.

He typed in her user ID, mwaters. Then came the password prompt. He grinned as he typed in the response: password. That was it. The same word for everyone. Something easy to remember. She could have changed the defaults, of course. It would have taken only a minute. But she hadn't taken the time. Like the others, she couldn't be bothered.

A few more clicks, and he was scrolling through a list of her files. Luckily for him, she was one of the new breed, treating her hard drive like a filing cabinet. He'd dipped into these files in the past, not out of any real interest, but for the thrill he took in the fact that he could. Confidential memos outlining trial strategies for lawsuits worth tens of millions of dollars. Clinical dissections of the odds of success. Privileged information that, if leaked, would mean the loss of fortune and career. If blackmail were the goal, he'd have had it made.

But he had other things on his mind.

Exiting WordPerfect, he clicked on the Calendar icon. In an instant, it appeared before him, everything crystal clear. The perfect map. Madeleine Waters's anticipated movements for the next twelve months. He felt an adrenaline surge, stiff heat in his shoulders and neck. The room was growing colder as the night chill deepened, but he barely noticed. He had work to do, decisions to make.

He reviewed the recent additions. December 23. With Christmas approaching, the week had been slow: the usual assortment of professional engagements, lunches, meetings, the occasional benefit or awards banquet in support of a worthy cause.

And then a single entry struck his eye.

Dinner with Chuck Thorpe. At Ormond. January 5. He knew the restaurant. Had in fact eaten there when it opened last year, unable to absent himself discreetly from the Civil Rights Forum's annual dinner. Such occasions always left him aching with hatred for the world he'd been forced to inhabit. The smug corporate sponsors. The self-satisfied attorneys who came to be feted, confident that their brief forays into pro bono work conferred a sort of secular sainthood.

But this miserable dinner had finally proved a gift in disguise. He remembered the restaurant clearly, the low lights, the widely spaced tables. Yes, it was almost ideal, better than he could have hoped. A sense of euphoria swept through him.

Then, without warning, it was gone, and he was spinning, spinning down a cold black chute.

No. Make it stop.

He pressed his teeth together, already knowing what would come. Dizzy, he grasped the table's edge. A sour sweat leaked through his pores. The smell of fear. The smell of death.

I'm moving as fast as I can.

He tried to fight back, to win a reprieve. But it was no use. He was already tumbling back. Back to where it all began.

A dark room. And everywhere the scent of fear.

She's sprawled across the floor. He looks down at her from above. It feels strange to look down. He's always looked up at her face, her beautiful, smiling face.

It's so dark. For a long time, now. Why is she lying so still?

He sleeps.

And then it's light. She's still there, sprawled and broken in ways that he can't comprehend. She's floating in a sea of red.

He wants to get up, to go to her. But he can't stand up, can't seem to move at all.

He cries out, but there's something in his mouth.

At first, he thinks she's asleep. But not really. Really, he knows that she's dead.

He's hungry. He's thirsty.

And, even then, he knows that she's dead.

She's dead, and it's all his fault.

And then it was over. Slowly, the vision faded. Still trembling, he stared at the wall. He felt weak, depleted, as if he could sleep for days. But he couldn't give in to these feelings. Not with success so close. He had to think of the plan. He had to think of the plan. Soon, it would all be over.

And he was finally ready to begin.

Monday, January 4

Monday morning. 7:05 a.m. A gray fog hung over the ice-glazed spires of Manhattan. Pulling her red cashmere cape tight against the winter air, twenty-six-year-old Kate Paine walked purposefully across Fifth Avenue. The snow-dusted sidewalks were still sparsely populated. A good two hours remained until the explosion of rush hour, with its shrieking horns and screeching tires. In the relative quiet of the morning, lulled by the city's dull roar, Kate clutched her cape close and smiled.

The holidays were behind her. She was home.

Approaching the plate-glass doors of Samson & Mills, Kate felt a swell of excitement. After more than a year at Samson, she still could hardly believe that she'd been hired as an attorney at this legendary firm. That of all the thousands of law school graduates who poured into the workforce each year, she'd been one of the chosen few. Just out of Harvard Law, and she'd already worked on cases that most lawyers only dreamed about, cases that routinely figured on the front pages of the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times. Fascinating cases of first impression that stretched the limits of the law. And even more important, she had the chance to hone her skills with the nation's most formidable attorneys.

Kate passed through the revolving doors and into an enormous lobby. Tossing off greetings to the security guards, she slipped her card key through an electronic scanner. Then she moved toward the elevator, high heels clicking on the marble floor.

Four days into the new year, the lobby was already stripped of holiday decoration. The scarlet poinsettias, with their incongruous shock of color, had been whisked away. As had the majestic Douglas fir and the electric menorah. Once again, the stately entry stood sober and unadorned. Kate relaxed into the familiar space, felt its timeless weight enfold her.

Thank God, the holidays were over.

The elevator was already waiting. Kate stepped on, and the doors slid shut. Twenty. Thirty. The floors flashed by. As she'd hoped, Kate was the first person to arrive on fifty-one. Making her way down the deeply carpeted hall, past a row of identical doors, she flipped on lights as she passed. Her own closed door was the next to last. As she rummaged in her purse for the key, she studied a small brass plate. Katharine T. Paine. The T stood for Trace, her mother's maiden name. On impulse, she ran a finger across the engraving, the metal cold to her touch. Then she turned the key and pushed open the door.

Stepping into the office, Kate inhaled its familiar smells, furniture wax mingled with Chanel No. 19, a fragrance she sometimes wore. She cast an approving eye around her ordered domain, with its panoramic views of the Hudson River and beyond. Even in the morning haze, she could make out the Statue of Liberty in the distance, a tiny, brave figure engulfed in mist. The room was just as she'd left it. Neat stacks of paper lined her desk. Cartons of documents were stacked against the wall. The preholiday cleanup. She'd try to enjoy it while it lasted.

Kate pulled off her cape and hung it in her office closet. Before closing the door, she paused to take stock in a mirror affixed to its back. She looked healthy and rested, her skin lightly browned from a week of sun. She quickly ran a comb through her dark brown hair, cut in the jaw-length bob favored by Samson's female lawyers, then straightened her horn-rimmed glasses. The glasses were a recent addition, acquired when she started work. Studying her face in the mirror, Kate decided that she liked the effect. Professional. In control. A woman to be reckoned with.

How different she looked now from two years ago, when she'd roamed the Harvard campus in ratty jeans and a backpack. Yet one thing remained the same. Her reflected image inspired the same sense of dislocation that it had since she was a child. Who is that woman? Me but not me. She didn't dislike what she saw. To the contrary, she knew she was pretty. Clear skin, high cheekbones, a fine straight nose. Her eyes were a deep shade of blue. "Stormy," her mother used to call them. A full-length mirror would have gone on to show the strong but delicate form: shoulders broad enough that she always cut the pads out of her suit jackets, a sweep of breast not entirely concealed by her black-and-gray Tahari suit, narrow hips tapering to long, slim legs.

So why couldn't she see this person as herself?

It was an old question, one that she'd long tired of considering. She shut the closet door and turned toward her desk.

I'm proud of myself, Kate thought, surveying the well-appointed office. I did this all on my own. I could have fallen apart. But I didn't. In the end, Michael did me a favor....

But Michael belonged to the past; he had nothing to do with her new life. Pushing the memories aside, Kate sat down and turned on her computer. The screen flashed on. Responding to computer prompts, Kate quickly typed in her user ID followed by the word password. Then it was on to e-mail. Among the usual clutter of junk e-mails - a paralegal looking for a downtown sublet, a secretary with free kittens, an associate seeking a financial planner - she culled the few messages that demanded immediate attention. From Justin Daniels, her old friend and Harvard classmate: "Welcome back! We missed you and we know you missed us. Let's shoot for drinks later this week. Cheers. J. D." From Andrea Lee, her friend and comrade on countless late nights: "Can't wait to catch up. Call me ASAP." There was also a plaintive note from Jonathan Kurtz, a Harvard classmate who'd occupied the office two doors down until a few months back, when he'd been shipped off to Kansas for a trial. "I fully believe that I will be here in Wichita from now until the end of time. I will never perform any task other than the preparation of cross-examination books that will never be used at trial or anywhere else. I will never see any of my friends or family again. On the upside, I will never have to pay for another meal as long as I live."

Kate laughed. Again, she felt a glow of pleasure, happy to be precisely where she was. But the sense of satisfaction was short-lived. Soon, she sat staring at an e-mail from Peyton Winslow, a senior associate at the firm. "Greetings. I hope that you enjoyed your vacation. Please prepare for a meeting this morning at 10 a.m. with Carter Mills regarding a new matter. The Complaint (which we believe will be served on January 13) and related papers are in distribution. Please review and be ready to discuss."

Kate glanced at her watch. Already after eight. Quickly, she thumbed through the mountain of mail that had piled up during her vacation. "Will someone just shoot me?" she muttered. Still, beneath the anxiety, she felt a burgeoning excitement. A new case. And a matter significant enough to involve the illustrious Carter Mills. To get in on a case like this at the very start - what a coup! So many of Samson's massive cases had been gathering dust for decades. There would be nothing for years and then a brief flurry of activity when the current crop of Samson underlings would try to make sense of what their predecessors had done. The work often seemed more archaeological than legal. Now she'd be in on things from the start, positioned to watch the strategies unfold.

The phone rang, but Kate let voice mail pick up as she continued to search through the mail. She finally found what she was looking for. The complaint, stamped "Draft" across every page, was captioned for the Southern District of New York, the federal trial court of Manhattan. The plaintiff's attorneys must have sent over a draft in hopes of an early settlement. It was often done, the draft complaint serving as leverage, proof of the seriousness of plaintiffs' intent and the prima facie strength of their case.

The draft complaint was twenty-three pages. Kate quickly skimmed its contents, trying to get the gist of the claims.

And then paused to let it all sink in.

This was, in no uncertain terms, a sexual harassment suit charging Chuck Thorpe and WideWorld Media with violations of both state and federal law.

Chuck Thorpe.

WideWorld Media.

Kate grappled with the implications.

WideWorld was one of Samson's largest clients, a sprawling communications behemoth with a seemingly insatiable appetite for new acquisitions. Its recent purchase of Catch - a "relentlessly provocative" men's magazine edited by Thorpe - had sparked a firestorm of protest among stockholders. If they had been upset before, this would send them over the edge. While the controversy might be good for circulation - further enhancing Thorpe's status as publishing's reigning enfant terrible - it would not play well with the board of directors.

A tentative knock on the door broke into her thoughts.

"Come in!"

"Hi, Kate. Welcome back!" In the doorway stood Jennifer Torricelli, her unflappable nineteen-year-old secretary. Jennifer's dark fantasia of a hairstyle gave new meaning to the phrase "big hair," but there the stereotype ended. She typed ninety words a minute, kept flawless tabs on Kate's ever-changing calendar, and managed to be nice as well. In theory, Kate was supposed to share her services with a first-year associate named Terry Creighton. But for the past six months, Creighton had been in Nebraska, where he spent his days in an unheated warehouse, poring through corporate files. Kate could barely remember what he looked like.

"You must've had a good vacation," Jennifer said. "You look great!"

Kate gave her a distracted smile. "It was fine. Relaxing. But it's good to be back."

Jennifer looked at her, incredulous. "I don't believe you guys. The hours that you put in here. And then you don't even like vacations. Boy, if I ever went to the Caribbean, I don't think I'd ever come back."

Kate glanced anxiously back at the papers on her desk. "I'll tell you about it later. Right now, I have to get ready for a ten o'clock meeting with Carter Mills."

Jennifer's eyes widened at the mention of Samson's presiding partner. "Wow. Good luck. Listen, I just wanted to say that there's a message from Tara on your voice mail."

"Thanks," Kate said. She'd been right not to pick up the phone. Tara was her best friend and college roommate. It would have been hard to cut short the conversation.

"Let me know if you need anything," Jennifer said, closing the door behind her.

Returning to the complaint, Kate glanced back at the caption to find out the plaintiff's name. Stephanie Friedman. Briefly, Kate wondered what she looked like, this woman behind the lawsuit. But her thoughts quickly moved on. Where would things go from here? Of course, everyone knew that sexual harassment cases were notoriously easy to file and hard to get rid of, making them a frequent weapon of choice for disgruntled employees. In her year of legal practice, Kate had already seen more than a few such suits filed on tenuous facts in hope of a speedy and substantial settlement, a sort of legal blackmail. Who knew what had really happened? Still, it didn't take hours of research to know that Thorpe and WideWorld had a mess on their hands. There was nothing subtle about the allegations.

Thorpe routinely referred to women as bitches, cunts, whores.

He demanded that the women who worked for him wear short skirts and tight sweaters.

He interrogated female employees about their sex lives, demanding detailed descriptions and subjecting them to elaborate dissections of his own encounters.

He'd threatened to fire several women if they refused to sleep with his music producer pal Ron Fogarty.

It went on from there.

Kate tried to remember what she knew about Thorpe. With her eighty-hour work weeks, she had scant time to keep up with current events. But it would have been impossible to miss the media frenzy that broke out several months back when Catch weighed in on sexual harassment. The magazine's glossy cover featured a parody of Hustler's famous meat grinder shot, a woman's legs thrust high in the air as her body disappeared in the utensil's gears. But on the Catch cover, the head disgorged by the grinder was that of feminist icon Anita Hill. Smaller photos inside paired head shots of prominent female activists with bodies from lasciviously positioned porno pix.

By all accounts, the credit for the uproar was entirely due to Thorpe, a flamboyant entrepreneur whose editorship of Catch had made him a household name. A North Carolina native, Thorpe had started Catch straight out of college with money raised from wealthy classmates. Kate recalled him from television interviews, a compact, powerful figure who pulsed with contained energy. He seemed to take a grim delight in baiting the talking heads who grilled him. "I respect women," he said repeatedly, in an exaggerated Southern drawl. "In fact, my mother was one. My sister, too."

Intriguing legal issues, celebrity scandal - what more could a young lawyer want?

She couldn't wait to begin.

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