“Same here. You were the only real friend I had back in those days, Lamar. We had some good times together, in spite of the pressure and all. Abby and Kay hit it off nicely. We have fond memories of you guys.”
“Well, we don’t. We lost everything, Mitch, and it was easy to blame it all on you.”
“The firm was going down, Lamar, you know that. The FBI was hot on the trail and closing in. They picked me because I was the new guy and they figured I was the weak link.”
“And they were right.”
“Damned right they were. Since I had done nothing wrong, I made the decision to protect myself. I cooperated and ran like a scared dog. The FBI couldn’t even find me.”
“Where’d you go?”
Mitch smiled and slowly got to his feet. “That, my friend, is a long story. Can I buy lunch?”
“No, but let’s find a table.”
The first café on the square was crowded with “too many lawyers,” according to Lamar. They walked another block and found a table in a sandwich shop in the basement of an old hardware store. Each paid for his own lunch and they sat in a corner, away from the crowd.
“So how’s Kay?” Mitch asked. He assumed they were still married. His cursory internet sleuthing had found no records of a divorce in the past ten years. From time to time, Mitch would recall a face or a name from back then and waste a few minutes online digging for dirt. After fifteen years, though, his curiosity was waning. He took no notes and kept no files.
“She’s fine, selling medical supplies for a nice company. Doing well. And Abby?”
“The same. She’s an editor with a publishing company in the city.”
Lamar took a bite of a turkey roll and nodded along. Epicurean Press, senior editor, a fondness for Italian food and wine. He had found some of her books at a store in Nashville and flipped through the pages. Unlike Mitch, he was keeping a file. Scully partner. International lawyer. The file existed solely for his own curiosity and had no other value.
“Kids?”
“Twin boys, age eight, Carter and Clark. Yours?”
“Wilson is a freshman at Sewanee. Suzanne is in high school. You landed on your feet nicely, didn’t you Mitch? A partner in a major firm, offices around the world and all that. Living the fast life in the big city. The rest of us went to prison while you managed to get out.”
“I didn’t deserve prison, Lamar, and I was lucky to get out alive. Think of the ones who didn’t make it, including your friends. As I recall, there were five mysterious deaths in about ten years. That about right?”
Lamar nodded as he chewed. He swallowed and washed it down with iced tea through a straw. “You vanished into thin air. How’d you do it?”
“You really want the story?”
“Definitely. It’s been a big question for a long time.”
“Okay. I have a brother named Ray who was in prison. I convinced the feds to release him in return for my cooperation. He went to Grand Cayman, met a friend there, and arranged a boat ride. A thirty-foot sloop, real nice. Not that I know much about boats. Abby and I sneaked out of Memphis with the clothes on our backs and went to Florida, near Destin. We rendezvoused with the boat and sailed off into the night. We spent a month on Grand Cayman, then sailed to another island.”
“And you had plenty of money?”
“Well, yes. I compensated myself with some of the firm’s dirty money and the feds let it slide. After a few months we got tired of the islands and began traveling, always looking over our shoulders. Life on the run is not sustainable.”
“But the FBI was helping you?”
“Sure. I gave them all the documents they needed, but I did not agree to testify at trial. I was not going back to Memphis. As you know, there were no trials.”
“Oh no. We fell like dominoes. They offered me three years for cooperation, or go to trial and face at least twenty. We all caved. The key was Oliver Lambert. They squeezed him till he choked. When he flipped we were all sitting ducks.”
“And he died in prison.”
“May he rest in peace, the bastard. Royce McKnight shot himself after he got out. Avery, as you probably know, got himself rubbed out by the Mob. The firm’s final chapter is not pretty. No one returned to Memphis. No one was from there to begin with. Since we were all a bunch of disbarred and convicted felons, we scattered and tried to forget about each other. Bendini is not a popular topic.”
Mitch stabbed an olive at the bottom of his salad and ate it. “No contact with anyone?”
“No, not at all. It was a nightmare. One day you’re a hotshot lawyer with a fancy pedigree and plenty of money, all the toys, then, bam, before you know it the FBI is raiding the place, flashing badges, making threats, grabbing computers, locking the doors. We fled in shock and scrambled to find good criminal lawyers. There were only so many in Memphis. For months we waited for the hammer to fall, and when it did our world came to an end. My first night in jail was horrific. I thought I was about to be attacked. I spent three nights before bonding out. Every day it seemed as if there was more bad news — someone else had flipped and was cooperating. I pled guilty in federal court in downtown Memphis, you know the courtroom, with Kay and my parents in the front row, all crying. I thought about suicide every day. Then I shipped out. First stop was Leavenworth in Kansas. A lawyer in prison gives the guards and other inmates an easy target for abuse. Luckily, it was only verbal.”
He took another bite and seemed tired of talking.
Mitch said, “I didn’t intend to bring up the part about prison, Lamar. Sorry.”
“It’s all right. I survived and I got stronger. I was lucky because Kay stuck with me, though it wasn’t easy. We lost the house and other stuff, but it’s all just stuff. You realize what’s important. She and the kids were tough and held on. Her parents were a big help. But there were so many divorces, so many ruined lives. I hit bottom after a year and made the decision that prison would not destroy me. I worked in the law library and helped a lot of guys. I also began studying for the bar exam, again. I was planning my comeback.”
“How many of our former friends are practicing now?”
Lamar smiled and grunted as if to say none. “I don’t know of anyone. It’s virtually impossible with a felony conviction. But I had a spotless record in prison, waited my time, passed the bar exam, got plenty of recommendations, and so on. I was turned down twice, but the third time worked. Now I’m a small-town ham-and-egg lawyer trying to eke out sixty thousand bucks a year. Thankfully, Kay makes more than that so we can afford tuition.” He took a quick bite and said, “I’m tired of talking. How did you go from a beach bum to a partner at Scully?”
Mitch smiled and drank some tea. “The beach bum part didn’t last very long, got bored with it. It was okay for about a month, but then real life sort of returned. We left the islands and hiked around Europe for several months, living out of our backpacks and taking the trains. One day we found ourselves in this picturesque little town in Tuscany. Cortona, not far from Perugia.”
“Never been to Italy.”
“A beautiful town in the mountains. We walked past a small cottage just off the town square and saw a sign in the window. It was for rent, three hundred euros a month. We thought, What the heck. We had so much fun the first month, we signed up for another. The lady who owned the cottage also ran a bed-and-breakfast not far away, and she kept it filled with American and British tourists who wanted cooking lessons. Abby signed up and quickly became consumed with Italian cooking. Me, I was concentrating on the wines. Three months, then four, then five, and we leased the cottage for a year. Abby worked in the kitchen as a sous chef while I puttered around the countryside, trying to imitate a real Italian. We hired a private tutor for language lessons and went all in. After a year we refused to speak English around the house.”