These last three days Leary has also deposed my experts, who I admit are not as good as hers. Two of my experts went to medical school with my client and one is a golfing buddy, so there’s bias there. My other expert is from Oregon, and it’s hard to match up an out-of-state doctor with her experts from Duke and Carolina.
If this case boils down to a battle of the experts, Leary will most likely win, and the odd thing about that is I don’t care if she wins. I mean, I want to win because I’m competitive, but when all things are considered, I have to admit to myself I believe in Leary’s case more than my own.
Some would think this would create an ethical dilemma, but it doesn’t. I don’t have to believe in my cases. I only have to use the evidence I have and do my best to present and argue them to convince a jury to see my way of thinking. I get paid a good salary to do this, and I have no qualms about keeping my emotions and personal feelings out of it, because ultimately I wasn’t hired to protect Dr. Summerland. My actual client is his insurance company, TransBenefit Insurance, which makes billions of dollars every year and hires people like me to fight against claims like this so they can preserve their billions of dollars.
Leary and the type of law she practices are a bit different. She represents people, not corporations. She not only invests her time and effort into the actual evidence, but she has an emotional connection to the people she represents. Put money aside, and the stakes are higher for her than for me.
Now, back to Summerland being a schmuck.
Leary saved his deposition for last. After three solid days of being immersed in complex medical testimony, we’re both exhausted. My brain is fuzzy, and luckily all I have to do this afternoon is listen to Leary’s questions and object if necessary.
Summerland walked into the conference room, chest puffed out, chin raised, and condescension in his eyes. I prepared him last night via phone and highly encouraged him to come in humble, but I could tell right away that was a concept so foreign to him that he’d never be able to pull it off.
The first thing he did was refuse to shake Leary’s hand when she stood up from the table to welcome him. The next thing he did was run his gaze up and down her body a few times, and even lick his bottom lip.
I get it. I really do. Leary is a phenomenal beauty and sexy as hell. What man wouldn’t do that?
I wanted to punch the motherfucker.
Leary handled it like a pro. She grilled him for three hours straight, refusing to take a break when he asked to go to the bathroom. Every answer he gave her was short and clipped, and she had to fight with him the entire time to get him to answer her questions in a straightforward manner. She did it with an absolutely professional demeanor.
Total fucking schmuck, and I’m glad this deposition is almost over. I can tell when Leary starts winding down.
“Just a few more questions, Dr. Summerland,” she says, flipping through her notes. “I want to talk to you about the finances of your practice, Summerland General Surgery.”
“I don’t think that’s relevant,” he sneers. “What I make has nothing to do with this case.”
“Maybe, maybe not,” she says calmly. “But I’m allowed to ask any questions that may lead to the discovery of admissible evidence. So I’m going to ask them, you’re going to answer them, and it’s up to your attorney—Mr. Holloway there—to keep anything inappropriate out of evidence. Okay?”
He just glares at Leary and that’s enough for her. She presses on.
“Now, Dr. Summerland, I understand the majority of your practice relates to abdominal and gastrointestinal surgeries, is that correct?”
“Yes,” he says.
“But you do other types of surgeries?”
“Yes.” Glare.
“Minor surgeries like hernia repairs and appendectomies?”
“Yes.” Eyes flick to her breasts.
“Surgical oncology, removal of tumors?”
“Yes.” Eyes stay pinned on her breasts. My fists clench.
“And if I’m correct, the majority of your income earned comes from weight-loss surgeries like gastric bypass, right?”
“Yes.” Lick of his lips. My nails dig into my palms.
“What percentage of your overall income is from the weight-loss surgeries?”
Summerland’s eyes now snap up to Leary’s. His lip curls up in a sneer. “I’m not answering that. It’s none of your business.”
“I have to wonder what you’re so afraid of, Dr. Summerland. What could you possibly be trying to hide from the jury?” Leary says with wide-eyed innocence.
Summerland’s face flames red and he stutters, realizing this will make him look like a fool to the trial jury. He is well aware of the camera Leary has rolling to later play to the jury—she’s probably zoomed in now on his face. “I am not hiding anything. It’s just that without my financial records in front of me, I can’t honestly answer that question.”
“And I assume you didn’t bring those records with you today?” she asks politely.
“No, I didn’t,” he says confidently, giving her a smarmy smile, and his gaze goes back to her breasts.
“And may I also assume that if you did have those records here with you, you’d gladly disclose that information to the jury, who will later see this video?”
He gives a magnanimous incline of his head to her and says, “Of course I would.”
“Then I’d like to go ahead and hand this to you,” she says as she pulls a white form out from underneath her notepad.
Dr. Summerland blinks in surprise and reaches a tentative hand out to accept the document. She’s been handing him various medical records all afternoon and going through his notes with painstaking detail, so he thinks nothing of taking this document from her now.
His gaze goes down to skim the paper in his hand and then jolts back to hers. I have no clue what she just handed him, and ordinarily I’d ask to see it, but damn . . . I’m kind of enjoying watching her hand him his ass.
“That’s a subpoena, Dr. Summerland, demanding you turn over your tax returns for the last five years, as well as your accounting books, specifically asking your income to be broken down by the various types of surgeries you conduct each year.”
Summerland starts to shake and I see him getting ready to explode. I want to cover my face with my hand to laugh at him. I want to shoot a smirk and a wink across the table to Leary, never having enjoyed one of my clients getting sandbagged before.
Instead, I remember my duty and say quickly, “Let’s go off the record.”
I half expect Leary to refuse, just like she did in Jenna’s deposition a few weeks ago. Instead, she gives me an accommodating smile and says, “Sure.”
“We’re off the record,” the court reporter says, and the assistant working the camera turns it off.
“This is fucking preposterous,” Summerland bellows as he throws the subpoena back at Leary. It veers sharply and then floats harmlessly to the floor beside her chair.
“Dr. Summerland,” I chastise firmly, “you need to calm down.”
Leary simply leans over in her chair, giving me a quick peek at her luscious ass that I’m hoping to tap one day, and picks the paper back up. She does nothing more than hand it across the table to me.
“I’m sure you’ll agree, Mr. Holloway, that your client was duly served with this subpoena.”
I nod at her because she’s right. As an officer of the court, she had him properly served the minute she handed the document to him.
“I’m not doing it,” Dr. Summerland barks as he pushes back from the table and stands up. “I’m not turning over my financial records to some ambulance chaser who represents a whore trying to scam the system.”