CHAPTER ONE
Mick
“When you interview her, make sure she has pictures,” I said on the phone to my new paralegal. “The gorier the better. If her kid has burns all over his face, the case is a sure winner. If she doesn’t have pictures, we can’t take her as a client.” I hung up.
“You’re a ghoul, Mick,” my best friend Jim said. He’d stopped by my office for our usual Monday lunch.
“What? You know as well as I do that the only way to get a big verdict is to get the jury worked up.”
“I’m just glad patent attorneys don’t have to look at pictures of burned-up kids. Let’s get out of here. Gym or lunch?”
“Let’s do both today. I’m just waiting for an email and then we can go,” I said.
“Why would you wait here for an email? Use your phone.”
“I need to tell the paralegal what do before I go.”
Jim walked over to where my walls of glass met and looked down at the river. “I don’t get why you even work at all. Buy a tropical island somewhere and retire from all this law bullshit.”
“I did buy an island. It was boring.”
“You should quit, Mick. Or at least slow down so you don’t have a heart attack in your thirties. You don’t need the money!”
Nobody gets it about the money. Even Jim, whom I’d known since law school. I said, “The money is not money. The money is the score in the game.”
“But dude, you won the game!” he laughed. “The game’s over.”
“No, it’s not. A new game starts every morning the second I open my eyes.”
He turned away from my view and gave me a weird look. For a minute I thought it looked like pity. But it couldn’t be that.
I changed the subject. “What did you do over the weekend?”
“Saturday we bought all the plants for the yard at the new house. Shannon is so cute in garden centers—she was bouncing up and down like a little kid. Sunday we spent all day in bed watching the playoffs.” He grinned. “Some of the time. The usual newlywed bliss. How was your weekend?”
“Went out with yet another chick who had only two topics of conversation: shopping and how much money I had. I took her home right after dinner. Just worked the rest of the time.”
“Was she hot?”
“At first she was. Until she asked the dollar amounts of my biggest verdicts.”
“You need to date a better class of girls,” Jim said.
“Where the fuck are they? I look online, they seem normal, but I can tell they’ve Googled me. I can see them calculating how much alimony they’ll get in the divorce before we even order the wine.”
“You pick them up in a Lamborghini. What do you expect?”
I sighed. When you’re striving to make the big money, you never think it’s going to mess up your chances to find somebody. “What am I supposed to do?” I said. “Hang out in libraries? Work in a soup kitchen? There are no women in my world who don’t care that I made billions suing the tobacco companies.”
“Oh you poor thing. This isn’t even a first world problem, it’s like beyond first world. Negative-one world.”
“Shut up. You don’t know anybody I could ask out, do you?”
“Huh. Let me think about it. Shannon has a lot of single friends. I’ll ask her.”
“But listen,” I said. “Don’t tell her it’s for me. Just say Michael instead of Mick. I don’t want the girl to know about my money.”
He frowned. “I don’t know. I don’t much like the idea of lying to Shannon, you know?”
“Yeah.” What was I thinking? That I could just pretend to be some average joe when I was dating somebody new? But what was the alternative? Keep dating girls who only cared about my bottom line? “But man,” I said, “I just want what you have. You know Shannon wants to be with the real you—which makes her certifiably insane of course. I just want the chance to find a girl who likes me, not my stock portfolio. I’m asking you, man.”
He nodded and said, “Yeah, okay. I can see that. So, what should I tell her?”
“Just say I’m a lawyer, I don’t want to be someone else. But say something like an environmental lawyer. Those guys don’t make that much.” I said.
“Environmental lawyer? Yeah, that might even make a girl think you have a heart. But wait a minute, though. You’re just going to drive up in the Lambo and try to pass as an environmental lawyer?”
“Good point, I need to buy a car.”
“I love how you talk about buying a car like I buy a pair of socks.”
“Maybe a Tesla. That’s what an environmentalist would drive, right?”
“Are you out of your fucking mind? They cost about a hundred grand and you have to wait months to get one. Get a Prius, dude. A used Prius. I think you’ve been rich too long.”
Just then my email chimed, and I read the incoming message. I said to Jim, “The pacemaker manufacturer offered to settle as soon as they heard I was the attorney of record. I fucking love when that happens.”
“Pacemaker?”
“Yeah. Faulty pacemaker exploded in the guy’s chest.”
Jim winced. “That’s all I need to know!”
I got on the phone to my paralegal. “The pacemaker company wants to settle—I’m forwarding you the email. Draw up the paperwork, but quadruple the amount. I want their general counsel to need a pacemaker of his own when he sees it. I’ll look at it later. Don’t send it yet, though. Wait til tomorrow. Make them sweat a little.”
“Jesus, you are a ghoul.”
“How it’s done,” I said. “Let’s go. I have a feeling I can beat my speed record on the treadmill today.”
CHAPTER TWO
Casey
I was almost ready for my blind date when my friend Shannon arrived to give me a ride.
“Whew, I made it inside alive!” she said, clutching the wine she’d brought to her chest theatrically.
I hugged her. “I’m so glad to see you!”
“Same here. My god. You look fantastic,” she said, handing me the wine bottle. “When are you meeting him?”
“In about half an hour.” I was starting to feel nervous. I hadn’t been on a blind date—any date, really—for a long time. “Should we open this? I could use a glass.”
“Of course. Listen. I don’t want to sound like a mom or anything, but please get back here before dark. This is the worst neighborhood in town, and I worry about you.”
“You do sound like a mom. I’ll be fine.” I opened the wine and got us two juice glasses. I didn’t have wine glasses yet.
“Well—”
“Is this dress okay?” I knew I could distract Shannon with talk of fashion. Though it was hardly a high-fashion dress.
“It’s hot. Turn around.” I twirled for her. “Well, if he’s a normal man, he’ll want to rip it off you.”
“Oh, don’t be ridiculous,” I said, and took my first calming sip of wine.
“No, seriously. You look absolutely amazing. Like I said last week, if I saw you on the street, I’d never recognize you. You look like a completely different person than you did before the Peace Corps.”
“Well, that makes sense. I feel like a different person.”
“Just, everything—your hair, the way you walk, and…how much did you lose?”
“About sixty pounds.”
“Amazing.”