3

CONNOR SAT BACK IN A CREAKY OLD WOOD AND LEATHER CHAIR AND looked out over the view from the back porch of what his family called “the California beach cabin.” In fact, it was a 3,100-square-foot structure that had a part-time maid and was bigger than most nearby homes. It was only a cabin in comparison to “the California house” east of San Francisco, which was about twice as large.

Waves crashed on the stony shore, and a cool Pacific breeze riffled the sea grass and whispered over his head in the majestic redwoods dotting the lawn surrounding the “cabin.” Two pelicans rode the breeze and watched the water just offshore for anchovies.

Connor’s Blackberry buzzed intermittently on the table beside him, sounding like a dyspeptic bumblebee. He reached over and switched it to silent. He’d check his voicemail and e-mail when he felt like it, and he didn’t feel like it right now.

The firm wouldn’t mind his absence—the clique of senior partners who ran Doyle & Brown cared a lot more about seeing his contribution to the bottom line than about seeing his face in the office. Last year he’d brought in more money than any other partner under 40 and he was on track to do it again, so he could safely play hooky for a couple of days if he wanted. It was the prerogative of profitability.

Plus, he had an excuse for ignoring the outside world. There was a mediation scheduled for next week in the Hamilton Construction case, and he was here to get ready for it. That meant no distractions.

He leaned over and rummaged through his trial bag—a boxy, wheeled briefcase designed for carting large volumes of paper between office and courtroom. He pulled out Hamilton Construction’s opening mediation brief and started to read.

Two months of intense scrutiny from Max Volusca and his team of auditors would be painful for any executive. And if the executive in question happened to run a company as corrupt as Hamilton Construction, his suffering would be severe. So Connor was not surprised when Hiram Hamilton and his lawyers requested mediation.

Even so, Connor was a little surprised by how weak the company’s brief was. It did not include even a token protestation of innocence. It conceded up front that “a certain amount of accidental overbilling may have occurred” and then launched into a string of complaints about the methodology that the government’s forensic accountants used to calculate the amount of the overbilling.

Connor finished the brief, smiled, and dropped it back into his bag. Any day his opponent’s main argument was “well, we didn’t steal that much” was a good day. Even though he was fifty yards from the ocean, he could smell the blood in the water.

Now that he thought about it a little more, the company’s lawyers had probably done the best they could. During the two months since Hiram Hamilton’s witness interview, the company had grudgingly coughed up a steady stream of damaging documents. They had to turn over the real invoices for the Oakland DMV contract, of course. But they didn’t know what other projects DOJ might have dirt on, so they couldn’t stop there without risking a few years wearing the orange jumpsuits Max Volusca had promised.

By the time they were done, it was clear that the company had ripped off the state of California to the tune of at least $1.5 million—maybe as much as $5 million depending on what kind of accounting assumptions were used.

And they had bragged about it. Some of their executives apparently hadn’t learned the Enron Rule: e-mail is forever. So when Max managed to pry the e-mail archive tapes out of the company, he and Connor found choice quotes like, “Those morons in Sacramento don’t audit, so you’re fine as long as you don’t do anything obvious. No $400 hammers.” Connor imagined how that would play to a Sacramento jury and sat back with a contented sigh.

He relaxed and watched the breakers crash. Hamilton Construction clearly was willing to be reasonable at the mediation. The real problem would be managing Max, but Connor had plenty of experience at that.