"Of course I brought a lawyer, Gino. Your lawyer is here." Max gestures to the man sitting next to the other guy.
"My lawyer is my brother-in-law. And he's part of this deal."
"All the more reason why I want independent legal advice."
"So why are we just meeting"—he glances over at me—"Ms. Jones now?"
"I didn't need her in our negotiations. I wasn't planning to involve her until we worked out all the details. Then I'll have her review the documents and make sure they accomplish what we want. The last thing I want to do is get tripped up by the IRS when we could have made a few changes."
Gino looks over at me. "You're a tax lawyer?"
"I'm familiar with the tax code. But I'm a criminal lawyer," I say, and for some reason they all laugh. All except Max, whose face when he turns toward me still looks like it's carved in stone.
I see something in his eyes that makes my stomach go weak.
I'm in trouble. Not from the men sitting around the table—although I haven't discounted that possibility either—but with Max. And what he'll say to me after they all leave. It could all be over between us. Just because I forgot my stupid phone.
Gino looks at me, his eyes making an open appraisal of the shimmery cocktail dress with the plunging neckline that almost reveals my breasts, the short skirt, the high strappy sandals. He nods like he approves of what he sees, then gives Max an even stare.
"I guess fucking your lawyer is one way to ensure loyalty," Gino says, and suddenly my heart is in my throat.
I expect Max to react to this, to get angry. But he just looks back at Gino and nods. "Either that or have them marry your sister."
There's a silence, then Gino snorts and slaps Max on the back.
"I always liked your style, even when you were a little kid in the room while I made deals with your father. Always quiet, always taking it all in. I'm sure he's proud of you now."
"I'm sure he is."
Max gives me a dismissive glance. "You can leave now Hadley. Go back to the casino."
I turn, wanting nothing more than to walk out of this room and never come back.
"No," Gino says. "Have her join us. She can take a look at the contracts Mal put together." He jerks his head toward his brother-in-law.
Gino looks across the table at one of the men who has been silent until now. "You okay with that, Joey D?"
"I'm okay with it." Then he looks directly at Max. "You're vouching for her."
Max nods. "That's understood."
The man sitting next to Joey D says nothing, and I'm getting the idea from the body language that maybe he's a bodyguard or something. He looks like he lifts weights, and I'm pretty sure his nose has been broken in two places and didn't heal properly.
"Come in, Hadley," Max says, his voice completely without emotion. There's an empty chair to his right, and he inclines his head toward it.
I sit down, heart racing, wishing I was anyplace else but here.
The door to suite opens and Gabe walks in. They all turn their heads and look at him, but no one acknowledges him.
Gabe's eyes widen for a moment when he sees me sitting at the table, then he joins us, but sits back from the table, observing. I realize that if I weren't here in Vegas, Gabe probably would have been in these meetings all along, a silent observer sending pretty much the same message as the man sitting next to Joey D. Instead, he was babysitting me.
The guy sitting next to Gino introduces himself to me as Malcolm and pushes his laptop over for me to take a look at the document open on the screen. Apparently he's been in his room writing things up while the others were in the high stakes poker room, and he completed it a little faster than expected.
He tells me there are four documents open and I should review them all.
I focus on the screen. I don't have a clue what this deal is even about, but I can't say that because I don't know how much Max wants them to think I know. What I am sure about is that he did not bring me here as his lawyer, and he had no intention of showing me any of this until I screwed things up by coming back to the suite when I wasn't supposed to be here.
I don't want you anywhere near the people I'm meeting with. That's what Max said to me when he instructed me to have Gabe check with him before coming back to the suite. Which is exactly what I didn't do.
Now I have to read through these documents and try to figure out what's going on. If what I say doesn't make sense, I'm just making more problems for Max.
My heart is pounding. Yes, I took tax classes in law school. But what if I read these documents and I still don't have a clue what's going on? Can I pull this off well enough to fool not only Gino and Joey D, but Malcolm, who apparently is a tax lawyer himself?
I glance up. "I'll need a few minutes to read through all this."
"Take your time, sweetheart," Gino says. "I could use a drink."
Apparently, that's Gabe's cue to go over to the tray that's sitting discreetly on a side table, and bring fresh glasses and a bottle of expensive whiskey over to the conference table. There's also a large bowl of some kind of fancy nuts, and Gino takes a handful and puts them all in his mouth, while Gabe pours him about three fingers of whiskey in a short glass.
Then he sets a bottle of scotch and a glass with two ice cubes in it in front of Joey D, and fills a tall glass half full of water from a bottle was on the tray.
"How about you get me a beer," the man sitting next to Joey D says to Gabe, with a smirk. Gabe reaches into the mini fridge under the side table, and sets a bottle down in front of him.
"You can serve me when we're in your house," Gabe says.
"It's not open," the guy says, like he expects Gabe to go get a bottle opener and open it for him.
"Try using your teeth, Bull," Gabe says.
It sounds like a boxing nickname, which would explain the nose.
"Quit pissing at each other," Gino says around another handful of nuts. "You're giving me a headache."
Bull looks like he's going to say something, but I see Joey D give a slight shake of his head, and Bull keeps his mouth shut. He takes the cap off with a clean jerk, although I don't think it's a twist top.
Gabe puts a fresh glass in front of Max, and Gino slides the bottle of whiskey over. Max tilts his head at Gabe, and he returns to his seat.
Joey D starts talking about some sports gambling odds, and the tension in the room visibly relaxes.
I wish I could go someplace quiet to focus on these documents, but I know there's no chance of me walking out of this room with Malcolm's laptop, so I just try to blot out everything and focus.
This reminds me of a law school final exam, but worse. If you fail a test there, they don't kill you and dump your body where no one will ever find it. And I'm halfway serious about that thought.
The distractions fade into the background as I get caught up in the documents. At first I'm puzzled. It looks like a standard investment deal for the construction of two commercial projects, one in Miami and one in New Jersey. There is a consortium of investor entities, a construction company, and a management company.
What is it I'm missing? I better figure it out, because I have to have some kind of intelligent comment to make. Otherwise, Gino and Joey D are never going to believe Max brought me here as his lawyer. Not only would that be dangerous for me, but possibly for Max as well.
I read through more carefully a second time and all of a sudden, there it is. It's the penalty section. There is a set schedule of deadlines and the penalties for missing them are outrageous. There's a lease agreement woven in here too that I assume is to mitigate the tax consequences.
It isn't about construction. I'm thinking these projects will likely never be completed. There will be delays and missed deadlines and penalties and forfeitures and tax losses.
It's about money laundering.
I know that historically the federal government has used the IRS to trip up organized crime bosses when they couldn't pin other charges on them, so I focus in closely on any of the deal terms that have tax consequences. I'm silently congratulating myself on having taken those three specialized tax courses my last year of law school since I knew that with a career in criminal law I'd be coming up against tax fraud issues at some point.
I didn't expect it to be this soon.
It looks like Malcolm has played it pretty carefully with the Internal Revenue Code—I just see one minor tweak in that area. I look up to find that he is studying me. The two of us—plus Gabe —are the only ones at the table not drinking.
If I make this document stronger, I'll prove my value and they'll believe I really am here as Max's lawyer, just like he said. But I'll also be crossing a line.
I'll be actively participating in a criminal enterprise.
I can feel Max's eyes burning through me while everyone waits to hear what I have to say. The fact that I'm already in so much trouble with Max is taking a backseat in my brain right now to even more distressing worries.
Can I let myself be part of a conspiracy to commit tax fraud? This goes way beyond my own personal distaste for anything that's unethical, much less illegal. I could be in serious trouble if I do this. Not only could it cost me my license to practice law, I could also be convicted of a crime.
I could go to jail for this.
The maybe not so joking comment Max made earlier about people who cross these guys ending up at the bottom of a river comes into my mind, and I feel suddenly sick inside.
I realize I don't have a choice.
"May I?" I ask Malcolm, gesturing for permission to move around the table and sit beside him.
"Yeah, sure," Malcolm says. There's an empty chair next to him around the corner at the end of the table.
I know I have to tread lightly here. He's not the one with power, but he's the one I have to impress by making a suggestion, while at the same time not being critical of the work he did drafting these documents. His ego is definitely involved, even more so with all the testosterone hanging like a cloud over the room.
I come around the table and sit down next to him, angling the open laptop so we can both look at the screen. I can feel Max watching me.
"If you put this together in a few hours today, it's really impressive," I start, but Malcolm cuts me off.
"Just get to the point."
I knew it. He's worried about me pointing out some error in his work. He's not about to be upstaged by a young woman who has clearly been practicing law a lot less time than he has.
"Okay," I say, and scroll down the screen. "I think you've got all the bases covered as far as any tax issues, but maybe just a little tweak here." I move the cursor and add a sentence to one of the clauses. "I think this will help if there's any issue with—"
"—with the McDowell decision," he completes my sentence.
It's a case that had just been decided when I took the my last tax class in law school, and we had long discussions about its ramifications.
"That's a good catch," he says, looking at me with grudging respect. "Anything else?"
"Just one suggestion in the penalty section here," I say, switching to the construction contract. "Although the penalties are unusually high, I think we can mitigate that if we build a few more layers into the notice procedure."
I glance over at him. "May I?"
"Go ahead."
I type in what I'm thinking, and he nods.
"Yeah, that works."
I lean back in my chair. "That's all I have. Like I said, this is really well drafted." I lay it on a little thicker. "I think I could learn a lot from the way you put this deal together."
And he eats it up. Now that I don't appear to be a threat and have shown him respect, he doesn't mind having my suggestions. I feel like I just dodged a bullet. Maybe literally.
"Give me your card and I'll email you the final version."
Oh shit. Max is not going to like that.
"I don't have one on me right now," I say, smiling tightly and gesturing to how I'm dressed, "but Max can get you my info later."
I go back to my seat beside Max.
"Thank you, Hadley," Max says, still in that even calm voice that scares the crap out of me. Because I know cold anger when I see it. And it's often more deadly than a hot temper.
Max is going to have plenty to say to me when these guys leave.
Gino knocks back another whiskey, and then says, "Well, gentlemen, I think we're done here. Malcolm will get the documents finalized for execution."
I know execution means signature, but even in this context that word coming from Gino makes my mouth go dry.
Gino looks over at Max. "You up for another round of poker?"
"I'm sorry, not this evening. I need to . . . confer with counsel about a few matters."
Gino lets out a deep laugh, and his eyes rake over me again. "Yeah, I bet you do. You don't often find brains like that in such an"—he catches the look in Max's eye and even Gino apparently realizes he might be going too far—"attractive young woman," he finishes, and I'm sure that's much politer than what he was going to say.
"Until next time, Max." Gino sticks out his hand, and the implication is clear that there will definitely be a next time.
Joey D just gives a nod in Max's direction, and he and Bull follow Gino and Malcolm out the door and into the elevator.
As soon as they leave, Gabe turns back, a contrite expression on his face.
"Max, I'm sorry," Gabe starts, "I had no idea—"
"It's not your fault, Gabe," Max says, stepping back into the suite. He turns his gaze to me, his eyes steely and his face set. My stomach drops.
"If you'll leave us now, I believe Hadley and I have something to discuss."