The Substitution Order, page 2
He drops his hands. He smiles, but it’s stern, mostly a scold. “Today, right now, my last name is Opportunity. I’m from elsewhere.”
“So listen, Caleb Opportunity, I’m on probation, with a felony conviction waiting for me if I screw up. I’m already feeling a con or scam. Or some kind of test from the state, though this seems too sophisticated for the apparatchiks in Richmond. They’d still be having meetings and filing memos on the color of your flower and which billing code to use with the florist.”
“The loss of your attorney’s income would have to be a real blow. I want to correct that.”
“Well,” I tell him, “I’m planning to play by the rules for a year, keep my nose clean and hope for the best.”
“Let me give you an overview. You can just listen. No crime or probation violation there.” I start to speak, but he waves an open hand in my direction. “My partners and I search for various professionals who have complications. You fit the bill. We also strive to discover people who’ve recovered from their problems and are once again reliable citizens. We do not want to partner with junkies, flakes or layabouts.”
“A speaking gig?” I ask sarcastically. “Self-help, motivation kind of deal? Bringing my inspirational story and unique brand of encouragement to hotel conference rooms throughout the South?”
“Self-help for sure,” he says.
The door chimes, and we both watch a lady head to the counter, where Blaine greets her. It’s difficult to hear their conversation from our corner, especially with the radio noise.
“I’m not interested,” I tell him and slide to my left, ready to stand. “Good luck, sir.”
“Do you recall a client from a while ago, a Miss Melanie Culp?”
I stop where I am, still sitting, but at the end of the bench, my trunk twisted away from Caleb, my palm flat on the table’s edge, ready to push off. “I couldn’t say,” I answer.
“She visited you for legal advice at your Roanoke office during, uh…your troubles.”
“If she did, that would be confidential.” I do remember her. I have a remarkable memory. A routine appointment about a real-estate purchase on the parkway. “I won’t be discussing any of my legal business with you. It would be unethical.”
He nods at me. “Understood. That kind of judgment and professionalism is why we want you on our team. I wouldn’t expect you to break a client’s confidence.”
“I’m already on the SUBstitution team. I’m the manager here, king of the condiments and cold cuts. And I’m also a member of the commonwealth’s probation team. I can’t imagine me signing up for any other teams.” I stand but stay close to the table. “Sorry. If you’re from the state bar or the justice system, I hope you’ll report that I’m walking the straight and narrow. And if you’re a real hustler, you need to hit the bricks.”
Caleb doesn’t seem upset or rattled. “It’s not so simple.” He sounds calm, amicable. “We’ve already invested in you and this project. We have limited resources, and we’d hate to see this come to naught.”
“What the hell is it that you want?”
“Well, as much as it pains Miss Culp to press the issue, you committed malpractice when you handled her case. Because of your negligence, she lost millions of dollars.”
“Bullshit.” I glare at Caleb. “Are you a lawyer floating some bogus claim? Because—”
“Oh, no,” he interrupts, leaning toward me. “But we can and will make this a profitable situation for us all. We’re allies, not adversaries.”
“If I’ve truly wronged a client, I want to address it and make it right. But I haven’t.”
“Miss Culp scheduled an appointment with you in July of 2015,” Caleb notes. “The morning of the thirtieth.” His voice stays measured, his features and posture relaxed. “I’m sure there’s a file in your former office. She has a receipt signed by your secretary proving her payment to you on that day. One hundred dollars for a basic consultation. A very fair charge.”
“So what?”
“She had an option contract to buy 173 acres in Meadows of Dan, adjacent to the Blue Ridge Parkway. Also near the much-celebrated, five-star Primland resort.”
“Okay.” I’m still standing. I’m tapping my foot.
“You were to evaluate the option, contact the seller and execute the deal. Those were her clear instructions to you.”
“You’re making up crap as you go.” I raise my voice. “I can’t get into the specifics with you, but that never happened.” I sit again, balanced on the edge of the bench seat. “Are you this lady’s relative? Husband, maybe? Brother?”
“Despite her precise instructions,” he continues, “you, because of personal distractions, failed to timely exercise the option, and she lost her opportunity to purchase this valuable piece of land. It was soon sold to another buyer for millions of dollars.”
Caleb sounds so confident that I run through Melanie Culp’s visit in my mind: She was a scheduled appointment, she asked me to review an option to buy a piece of property, I read the document while she waited and told her it was legal and valid. I’d done cocaine—a lot—the night before but was steady enough to interpret a basic three-page option. End of story. There was absolutely no mention of closing the deal or notifying the seller. “Untrue,” I say forcefully. “At least the part about my being instructed to contact the seller and set a closing.”
“Miss Culp had an option to buy the land for $975,000. You didn’t do your job, Mr. Moore. You let the purchase deadline pass. Thereafter, the local owner, a Mr. Eugene Harris, sold to a company named MAB Incorporated, for the same $975,000. A few months later, MAB was approached by a development company, FirstRate LLC, which bought the tract for six million. In sum, your negligence cost Miss Culp five million dollars and change.”
“And let me guess, Caleb, you want me to admit my error and not contest the claim when she sues me.”
“Exactly,” he says, fiddling with the flower for a second. “Exactly, my friend.”
“Let’s do the math. No doubt you control both companies, this MAB and FirstRate, though your ownership’s hidden behind layers of perfectly legal and impenetrable paperwork. You are MAB and FirstRate.”
“Correct,” he notes.
“You’ve got a $975,000 investment in the land. You—or your FirstRate LLC—actually still have the land, so your $975,000 is safely parked. The six-million-dollar sale to FirstRate is, in reality, nothing but an illusion, your taking money from your FirstRate pocket and transferring it to your MAB pocket so it appears the land’s marketplace value is six million. Certainly FirstRate would’ve offered the aggrieved Miss Culp the same six million—and there you go, see what Kevin’s negligence caused her to lose? Had I done my job and closed the deal for her, she would’ve received the six million from FirstRate. If I roll over now, she’s due a big, fat, round-number check for roughly five million—the six million minus her original option price of $975,000. A number that just coincidentally happens to be the limit of my—and most lawyers’—liability policy. She’ll no doubt forgive the other twenty-five thousand in the interest of a quick settlement.”
“Yes. Simple and foolproof, isn’t it?”
“And the two front companies involved, your MAB and FirstRate, are owned by a series of other LLCs and corporations, so figuring out what’s what and who’s who would be next to impossible even after a tour of Caribbean holding companies and a slog through ten different courthouses in ten different states. You assume we’ll never tie them to you or to her or to anybody else.”
“We don’t do all the multiple-shell-companies razzmatazz, which tends to make courts and insurance investigators suspicious. We generally use only a single holding company, preferably offshore—the key is to make sure there’s no overlap or connection between the companies in the transaction, no common people or owners, and also to have other deals, bona fide deals, on the books. There’s money to be made in traditional transactions, and we do that as well. Hell, we pay taxes.”
“Good for you.”
“Better yet, Kevin, we’re not greedy. Pigs get fat, hogs get slaughtered. While five million’s nice money, it’s not so off-the-charts that the insurance company will employ its finest-tooth comb to inspect the case. Three or four smaller projects a year is the prudent choice. You stick a bank or burn the government or involve more than ten mil, the other side becomes very determined. No big flashy bombs for us, no direct hacks of cash, and as an added precaution, we attempt to engineer our projects in sleepier burgs like Roanoke, Virginia.”
“Well, you can sue me until the cows come home, but I’m not going to lie. Not going to help you. Not going to defraud my malpractice carrier.”
Caleb tugs at his tie knot. He adjusts his sleeve so that a silver cuff link is more visible. “We don’t need you to lie, my friend. It’s accurate that Miss Culp visited with you and asked you to review a purchase option. It’s also accurate that during the time she consulted you, you were plagued by personal problems and not at your professional best. An ‘I don’t recall’ answer will ring the bell for us on the money question, especially given her certainty about what she asked you to do.” He monkeys with the cuff link. “Not any serious dishonesty there. Just kinda how you spin your version.”
“Here’s my spin, and it’s the damn truth: She never told me to exercise the option or contact the seller or anything close to that. I didn’t do anything wrong. We’re finished, Caleb. Count me out.” I point at the flower. “If I’m being recorded, let me say this emphatically: Hell no.”
“Well, the bad news is that we’re thoroughly invested already, and I can guarantee the wronged Miss Culp will sue you. The worst case we have is her word against yours. She was clean and sober during the time of your meeting. You were not. Cocaine and booze and other temptations led the state bar to suspend your license. The train, Kevin, is coming. You want to ride on it or have it run over you? Make money or make things worse?”
“How could you possibly have known about my circumstances last July?” I ask. “My arrest wasn’t in the paper until August, and the bar didn’t act until December.”
“We monitor the information received by hundreds of state regulatory agencies and governing boards—doctors, lawyers, nurses, dentists, architects, pharmacists and realtors, virtually every group with a disciplinary board. We learn about addictions and failings long before the general public. In the right hands, it’s valuable data.”
“How is it that you monitor confidential information?”
“It’s a walk in the park. Who cares about these obscure, underfunded departments run by bureaucrats and paper-pushers, as the politicians are so fond of saying? And, even better, these very same elected hacks and sin piñatas are in charge of our government. Politicians are eager to be bought, and they can often supplement our efforts. Here in Virginia, your former governor took a Rolex and dirty cash from a patent-medicine grifter and helped him peddle his snake oil. State capitols are high-end bordellos where greedy legislators pimp out favors and dry-hump the public every chance they get.”
“How, exactly, did you discover my situation? Or is that proprietary information?”
“Most of our efforts take place in the ether. There’s no effective online security at state regulatory agencies—why bother? We have the best computer artists on the planet—and I include myself in this category—though most of what we accomplish is child’s play. Your Judge David Carson contacted the state bar via e-mail on July sixth to alert them about a potential problem and asked them to look into your erratic behavior. He mentioned the very strong possibility of drugs and alcohol. We know this thanks to our unique version of the Dyre Trojan, which we used to gain access to—”
“So,” I interrupt, “artist or not, you’re still a common thief. You steal information as well as money. From my experience, thieves aren’t trustworthy partners.”
Caleb doesn’t react to the insult. “My colleague, Miss Culp, confirmed you looked like death warmed over when she met with you, so we knew you were in fact struggling with substance abuse, as the judge had predicted. That’s everything we needed for this project to take shape—a single easily hacked e-mail and an in-person confirmation of your addiction. Our position became a complete winner when you were later arrested for drug possession and disbarred—we don’t always luck into that kind of bonus.”
He’s so blithe and cocksure that it grates on me. “Fuck you and your bonus.”
He ignores the profanity, doesn’t flinch or miss a beat or apologize. “Once we obtain sad tales about a lawyer or doctor or realtor or dentist or whomever, then my group meets to see if we can put together a scenario that will earn us some money. Obviously, we can make only so many plays and invest in so many situations, which returns us to my earlier point. There’s significant front-end prep for us here. We’re not of a mind to simply punt and waste all the effort and resources burned so far. Not to mention the millions in the honeypot. I truly wish you’d volunteer to help us and yourself. There’s absolutely no victim, no one’s harmed. A deserving man will be rescued—I haven’t even gotten around to your benefits yet. We don’t expect you to help us for free.”
“Or I could report this to the state police. You’re pretty bold to show up here and give me all your schemes and illegal blueprints.” I glare at him the whole time I’m talking.
“I wouldn’t do that, Kevin,” he says pleasantly. “What precisely do you plan to reveal? A one-armed man told you about a fantastical syndicate that exploits the state and various professionals? Keyser Soze paid you a visit? You heard a crime report from a white-headed stranger? Maybe they’ll issue a warrant for Ric Flair.”
“I could start by alerting the state bar. Make them aware you’re hacking them with this Trojan virus.” I notice his eyebrows are much darker, a different blanched color, and the few stray hairs at the tail end of his brows are solid black. The hair whorls below his shirt cuffs are also black.
“The Dyre Trojan is old news, my friend. They won’t find a trace of it. We pride ourselves on innovation. And we never linger anywhere for too long.”
“Maybe they’ll discover something else, then,” I say. “Whatever mischief you have in place now.”
“The overwhelmed, underpaid state IT nine-to-fiver whose expertise is hooking the yellow cable to the yellow-rimmed port might indeed bust us. Might just happen. I’ll take my chances. But to save you some time, we’d never be reckless enough to continue a hack at an agency involved in a current project. We don’t nap in the patch after we pick the strawberries.” He pauses to locate the lady and check out the parking lot. “Not being rude, but you’re damaged goods. Once the justice system grabs hold of you—for dope, especially—you’re inferior forever. The wound leaves a scar. The fine people at the Rotary Club will never fully trust you again. You’re suspect and marginal from the instant your name appears in the local court news. We’re not worried about you tattling on us to the teacher—who’ll believe you?”
It’s not easy, but I tamp down my irritation and keep a civil tone. “No offense to you or your Robin Hood plans, but I can’t do it. You signed me up involuntarily. I didn’t come looking for any of this. I’m not your guy.”
Caleb smiles. “Would you at least think about it, please? We’ll discreetly put a quarter million in your pocket and contact a friend in Richmond who can help get your law license restored. He’s a heavyweight. You can return to practicing law, what you really want. Quit the hoagies and hairnets. We both know that even if you complete your probation and your felony charge is dismissed, there’s no guarantee when—or if—you’ll get your license back. The only victim’s an insurance company, which makes a living beating people out of what they’re owed and rolling the dice on risk.”
“Honest risk,” I interject. “Real risk. Not fraud. And we don’t have to wear hairnets.”
“Think about it?” he suggests softly. “Sleep on it? The other option isn’t appealing, let me promise you. We’d have to compromise you, of course, and I hate that. You seem like a quality man. You were a star. A headliner. When the big shots needed the best, they called Kevin Moore. You’re charismatic. Movie-star handsome. ‘The Courtroom’s Clooney,’ according to the puff piece in the Times-Dispatch, correct? Look around this dive. This is wrong. Crazy. Heartbreaking. Unnecessary.”
“Sorry. No can do.”
Caleb sighs and flips his hands around. “Jeez, I’m trying to help you. This is good fortune, and you’re pissing on it.” He sounds exasperated. “Let me at least give you a number if you change your mind. It’s active for the next two days; the phone will be burned after that. We might even be able to sweeten the offer to three hundred thousand and arrange for a Virginia congressman to join our other friend in persuading the state bar. The collaborative deadline passes if we don’t hear from you in those two days, and darn, sorry to have to do it, but then we become adversaries. Unfortunately for you, both plan A and plan B are guaranteed winners for us. This path is just much, much easier for us both. You have something to write with?”
“You can tell me. I have an excellent memory.”
“303-228-7109.” He recites the numbers deliberately.
“Listen,” I say, making an effort to come off as humble and plaintive as possible. “The truth is, I’ve been through hell. I’ve learned a lesson. I’m tired. I’m broke. My wife’s gone. I’m living in exile in Patrick County, Virginia. I’m working in a sandwich shop for one of my former clients.” I stop. I look him square in the face. “Could you simply leave me alone? Let me be? I want to keep my head above water for the foreseeable future, stay clean and sober, get free and clear of the court system and my felony and start all over again. Your suing me or jerking me around is a setback I didn’t invite and don’t need.”
