The Living Room (56 page)

She sat at her desk and nibbled on an apple for lunch. Mr. Phillips didn’t bring her any last-minute work, so she was left with nothing to do but fret about what lay ahead. Dr. Kelly and Beverly Jackson were the people who had done something wrong, but Amy was having trouble convincing herself that she wasn’t the one on the hot seat. Five
minutes before the depositions were scheduled to start, Mr. Phillips stuck his head into her office.

“Let’s go. Beverly Jackson is here. Bring a legal pad for notes.”

With a sigh, Amy got up from her desk and followed Mr. Phillips into the largest conference room on the main floor.

thirty-six

A
t one end of the shiny table sat a dark-haired court reporter with a recorder and stenomask in front of her. Beside her and wearing a dark blue outfit was a trim, middle-aged woman with green eyes and auburn hair. Mr. Phillips extended his hand, and the woman stood up.

“Mrs. Jackson, I’m Harold Phillips. I represent William McKay, the executor of Sanford Dominick’s estate, and this is my legal assistant, Amy Clarke. She’s going to join us today.”

Nurse Jackson shook Mr. Phillips’s hand, but her eyes went to Amy and opened wider.

“Are you the writer?” she asked.

“Uh, I’m a novelist.”

“You wrote
A
Great
and
Precious
Promise
, right?”

“Yes.” Amy glanced at Mr. Phillips, who looked caught off guard.

“Our book club read your book and loved it,” Jackson continued. “I saw on your website the other day that a new book is coming out soon. Is it a sequel?”

“No, it’s a stand-alone novel with new characters.”

“I can’t wait to read it. I wish I’d brought my copy of
A
Great
and
Precious
Promise
so you could sign it.”

“We need to get started,” Mr. Phillips interjected.

“What’s the name of the new book?” Jackson asked as she sat down.

“
The
Everlasting
Arms
,” Amy replied.

“I can’t wait to tell my friends that I met you.”

Mr. Phillips cleared his throat. “Mrs. Jackson, you’re here pursuant to a notice of deposition, and it’s my understanding you’ve chosen not to have counsel present.”

“You mean a lawyer?”

“Yes.”

“I called your paralegal, and she told me you were going to ask me questions about Mr. Dominick. I’m not being sued, am I?”

“You’re not currently named as a party in the litigation.”

“Could that change?”

“Possibly.”

“How could I be dragged into a lawsuit?” Jackson asked with a puzzled look on her face. “All I did was help take care of Mr. Dominick for the last two years of his life.”

Amy knew Mr. Phillips hated dealing with people who didn’t have lawyers. He leaned forward and put his hands together on the table.

“Mrs. Jackson, I’m here to talk to you about Mr. Dominick, but I represent Mr. McKay, the executor, which means I can’t give you any legal advice. I won’t know what you’re going to tell me until the court reporter swears you in and I ask you some questions. It’s impossible for me to predict what could happen as a result of your testimony.”

Jackson shifted in her seat. In spite of what she saw in her dream, Amy found herself wishing the nurse would tell Mr. Phillips that she wanted a lawyer to represent her. Jackson looked at Amy, who had no idea what message her face might reveal.

“I hate to spend the money to hire a lawyer,” Jackson said slowly, then paused.

Amy held her breath. She saw Mr. Phillips get ready to speak again.

“Mr. Dominick was very kind to me,” Jackson continued. “I’m sure you know he gave me $150,000 to help with expenses for my son who has cerebral palsy. It was an unbelievably kind thing to do, but
after he met him, I think Kenny’s struggles touched Mr. Dominick’s heart. I don’t have anything to hide, but—”

Mr. Phillips interrupted her. “Mrs. Jackson, we’re here today to take your testimony, so please hold off for a minute. May I ask the court reporter to swear you in?”

Jackson looked again at Amy, who saw a silent plea for help in the woman’s eyes. Amy felt her face flush.

“I want to have a lawyer with me,” the nurse said.

“Are you sure?” Mr. Phillips asked.

“Yes.”

Mr. Phillips pressed his lips together for a moment. “If you’re not going to go forward with the deposition without legal representation, there’s no use in continuing this conversation. I want to hear what you have to say, but it needs to be under oath.”

“Okay.” Jackson glanced at Amy again. “I guess you can’t recommend a lawyer for me, can you?”

“No, we can’t,” Mr. Phillips replied. “How long do you think it will take you to retain counsel?”

“Uh, a couple of weeks, I guess.”

Mr. Phillips turned to Amy. “Prepare a new notice for Mrs. Jackson and set it three weeks out.”

“Please don’t do it on a Wednesday,” Jackson said. “Kenny is in treatment every Wednesday.”

“Check my calendar and avoid Wednesday,” Mr. Phillips said.

Amy left the conference room and walked rapidly toward her office. When she turned a corner past Janelle’s desk, she almost ran into Chris.

“How’s it going?” he asked.

“Nowhere. Beverly Jackson is going to hire a lawyer.”

“Did he get anything out of her at all?”

“She was never sworn in.” Amy looked over her shoulder at the conference room. She lowered her voice. “She read my novel.”

“What are the chances of that? Do you think she was on the level?”

It hadn’t occurred to Amy that someone would lie about reading her book.

“I hope so. Anyway, I have to get out a notice rescheduling the deposition.”

“At least Dr. Kelly will have a lawyer sitting beside him. Mr. Phillips will find out something at three o’clock.”

Amy continued to her office and quickly printed out a new notice for a Thursday morning in three weeks. She returned to the conference room with the original and two copies. Mr. Phillips signed them and slid one across the table to Beverly Jackson.

“Is that date satisfactory?” he asked.

The nurse took out her phone and checked her calendar.

“Yes, I can move a couple of things and be here.”

“Then we’re done for now,” Mr. Phillips said, getting up from the table. “Please ask your attorney to contact me prior to the deposition.”

Mr. Phillips turned toward the door. The court reporter started packing up her gear.

“I’ll be back at three o’clock,” she said to Mr. Phillips.

“Who was your favorite character in
A
Great
and
Precious
Promise
?” Amy asked Nurse Jackson.

“Of course everyone in the book club loved Jasmine, but her great-aunt Lilly stood out to me. When Lilly told Jasmine how she regretted never asking her husband’s forgiveness before his death, I cried buckets.”

In Amy’s mind it was one of the top three scenes in the book.

“That scene moved me emotionally when I wrote it. I’m glad it touched you, too.”

“Amy,” Mr. Phillips said, his voice rising.

“Yes, sir.”

“It was a thrill meeting you,” Jackson said to Amy. “May I bring my book with me the next time I’m here so you can sign it?”

Amy glanced at Mr. Phillips, whose face was getting red.

“Sure.”

Amy silently followed Mr. Phillips out of the conference room.
When she prepared to go around the corner to her office, the senior partner spoke. “Come with me.”

Amy swallowed.

“I had no idea—” she began before Mr. Phillips could speak.

“I know that,” he snapped before she could continue. “But you took it a bit too far. Remember where you are and what you’re doing here.”

“Yes, sir.”

“I wanted to set up Dr. Kelly by going first with Jackson,” Mr. Phillips fumed. “Nailing down her testimony would have been a huge advantage.”

“But you did the right thing notifying her of her right to have a lawyer.”

“Of course I did, but you acted like you were ready to sit down and have a chat with her about your book.”

“I was making sure she’d actually read it.”

“Which had nothing to do with why she was here.”

“No, it didn’t,” Amy admitted.

“At least we got an admission from her off the record about the $150,000 she received from Sonny. She claims he gave it to help her care for her son, but we know at least half of it went to Dr. Kelly.”

In all the commotion in the conference room, Amy had missed the significance of Jackson’s offhand comment. Mr. Phillips checked his watch.

“Since I don’t have to be scrambling around organizing my questioning for Dr. Kelly based on information obtained from Nurse Jackson, I’m going out for a few minutes.”

“Is there anything you want me to do while you’re gone?”

Mr. Phillips gave Amy a look that made her suspect he was about to give her a tongue-lashing.

“There are a few short pieces of dictation you should be able to transcribe,” he said curtly. “That should help keep your mind on the office.”

Relieved to be away from Mr. Phillips, Amy returned to her
office and began working on the dictation. She finished three letters. While she watched the pages come out of the printer, she decided Mr. Phillips had overreacted to Beverly Jackson’s familiarity with Amy as a writer. He’d taken out his frustration that the witness didn’t want to answer questions without a lawyer present on Amy. With Harold Phillips, it was better to overlook an offense than try to address it.

She heard Mr. Phillips return. A few minutes later he buzzed her. His face was still a dark cloud. He reached over to the printer on his credenza and grabbed a sheet of paper and thrust it out to her.

“Read this.”

Amy took the sheet. It was a short news article from the Internet. The subject was the consulting firm Mr. Phillips hired on Amy’s recommendation.

“I’ll save you a few minutes,” Mr. Phillips said. “The consulting firm in Miami you recommended for the Thompson Trust is under investigation for illegal activity with foreign nations that are on the US government’s do not trade list. The feds seized a bunch of their records as part of an ongoing investigation. There’s no way we want to do business with them.”

Amy’s eyes widened. “I never saw anything about that in my dream.”

“It would have been more helpful if you’d had insight into that instead of voicing some vague fears about Dr. Ramsey.”

“As soon as we’re done with Dr. Kelly, I’ll call Ramsey and see if he’ll take us back. I hope it’s not too late to straighten out this mess.”

Amy felt slightly dizzy.

“I’m sorry—”

“We’ll talk later. It’s time to face off with Dr. Kelly.”

“Are you sure you need me?” Amy asked. “Or want me?”

Mr. Phillips clenched his jaw for a moment. “Let’s go,” he said.

“Yes, sir.”

Amy stumbled after Mr. Phillips to the conference room. This time there were two men sitting on the other side of the table; one in
his thirties, and the other looked to be around fifty-five. The older man, a lawyer named Ed Franconi, stood.

“Harold, good to see you.”

“Ed.”

The two lawyers shook hands.

“This is Dr. Kelly,” his attorney said.

The man whose name had invaded Amy’s dream with overwhelming negativity was slightly built with brown hair, brown eyes, and an intelligent face. His only unusual feature was a thin mustache on his upper lip. He stood up and shook Mr. Phillips’s hand.

“This is my legal assistant, Amy Clarke,” Mr. Phillips said.

“Mr. Franconi,” Amy said. “We’ve talked several times on the phone over the years.”

“Yes, it’s nice to finally meet you.”

Amy ignored Dr. Kelly. Thankfully, no one mentioned anything about her book. The court reporter swore in Dr. Kelly, and Mr. Phillips began.

Amy knew there was a rhythm to questioning a witness in a deposition. No attorney asked an important question in the first few minutes. Rather, the lawyer tried to establish a tempo of the witness answering routine questions so that when a disputed matter came up it took energy to break the pattern. Mr. Phillips began with questions about Dr. Kelly’s educational and professional background. He spent much more time than actually necessary because he wanted to create a relaxed, cooperative atmosphere. Dr. Kelly was soft-spoken, and several times Mr. Phillips had to remind the witness to speak up.

“Tell me about your experience providing in-home care for elderly patients,” Mr. Phillips said.

“Like most physicians, I rarely make house calls, but I’ve had several terminally ill patients whom I continued to follow at home after they couldn’t come to the office.”

“How did Sanford Dominick become your patient?”