“Fraud, breach of contract, wrongful death. It’s all in here.” The lawyer closed the document and slid it back to Keith and Linda, who sat across from him at the desk. “Pretty good complaint,” the lawyer said. “When did you get it?”
“This morning. The process server came to the house.” Linda was pale and her hands trembled as she reached out and picked up the hefty document.
“Has Porter been served?” the lawyer said.
“I don’t know,” Keith said. “We’ve been trying to reach him, but he’s still out in the middle of the Arizona desert.”
The lawyer sat back in his chair and put his feet up on the desk. “Wow,” he said. “A class action suit by the survivors of all the people who went to Bigwood Springs for the cure and who died instead. Nasty. Juries eat this stuff up.” The lawyer scratched his head. “You charged those poor people a million bucks each?”
Linda nodded. “Porter did, actually.”
“But you’re his partners.”
Linda nodded again.
The lawyer shook his head and whistled. “Police contacted you yet?”
Keith stared blankly at the lawyer. “The police? Why would the police be involved?”
“Think about it. You, Mr. Porter and Ms. Kramer took these poor dying people to the tune of fifty million dollars. That’s against the law. Plus, the prosecution’s going to try to make it look like you knew the cure was phony and caused these people to forego conventional therapies that might have saved their lives. Sounds like second degree murder to me—or at least manslaughter.”
“That’s ridiculous!” Linda was on her feet, pacing in front of the desk. “We had no way of knowing what that woman and Jason were doing!” Keith reached up and tried to grab her arm as she passed by, but she threw his hand back at him.
The lawyer shot Keith a sympathetic glance. “I understand that,” the lawyer said, “but if you’ll forgive my abruptness, that’s not the point.”
Linda wheeled around and planted herself in the lawyer’s face. “What do you mean?”
“You were his partners, Ms. Kramer. Phillip Porter’s partners.”
“We’ve established that,” she said.
The lawyer sighed. “Partners are presumed to share the knowledge of the other partners. The jury will be led to believe Phillip Porter knew what was going on. He owned the company, for heaven’s sake! People were dying all around him, and he let it continue, then he invited more people to come, and took their money, too, and then they died. His knowledge will be imputed to you.”
Keith rubbed his eyes. “At least Porter’s got deep pockets.”
“What?” Linda said.
“Deep pockets. You know, lots of money to pay any judgments against the partnership.”
Linda turned back to the lawyer. “Is that right? Is Porter going to have to pay for all this? Keith and I won’t be hit by all this, will we?”
The lawyer scratched his head. He reached out and grabbed another thick document that sat on his desk. He turned to the last page of the contract and pointed at a section labeled “Partnership Loss Sharing.”
Keith leaned forward and read out loud: “In consideration of Porter having borne all research and development costs to date associated with production of the blood factor, Lawrence and Kramer agree to the same pro rata sharing of any and all liability arising out of or associated with the factor in the same percentages as earlier recited regarding profit sharing.” Keith paled, then frowned. “Hmmm,” he said.
“You read the agreement,” Linda said. “Didn’t you see that?”
Keith shrugged. “Guess I missed it.”
“That’s a pretty big ‘miss.’ So we get stuck with 50 percent of any losses, just like we get 50 percent of the profits?” Linda said.
Keith nodded.
“So that means we’re wiped out.”
“Unless you’ve got a thirteen million dollar nest egg tucked away somewhere,” Keith said.
“Smart ass,” she said. “I don’t need your sarcasm right now.”
The lawyer cleared his throat. “Keith does bring up a good point. Do you have any plans for dealing with the various outcomes? I mean even if there’s no civil liability and the grand jury doesn’t indict you on criminal charges, there will probably be at least a quarter million in attorneys’ fees before this is over. Plus, I think it’s naive to think Porter Pharmaceuticals can survive this. Porter was heavily leveraged to support all its research and development. This much exposure will probably put it under—bankruptcy or receivership, I bet. So don’t plan on staying in business and recovering your losses after the fact.”
Linda and Keith fell silent.
“You’d better start coming up with some ways to raise cash for a war chest,” the lawyer continued. “Second mortgage on the house, liquidating securities, things like that. And you’d better do it fast. You’ve got thirty days to answer this complaint or they’ll get a default judgment against you.” The lawyer paused and then said, “Let me see the complaint again for a second.”
Linda handed him the papers, and the lawyer flipped to the last pages. “Just as I thought. They’ve also asked for punitive damages—extra money on top of the fifty million to punish you for your bad conduct. Punies could be another fifty million. Ouch.”
Linda took a cigarette out of her purse and threw it between her lips, the end waggling as she spoke. “Screw ‘em,” she said. “I’ll just file bankruptcy.”
“That’s fine,” the lawyer said, “but bankruptcy won’t wipe out liability for fraud. A judgment like that will just follow you around for years, mucking up your credit. No VISA, no MasterCard—hope you like paying cash and eating ramen.”
Linda continued smoking, sucking in big lungfuls of smoke and blowing them at the lawyer. “So what do we do?” she said.
The lawyer looked at Keith, then at Linda, and then shrugged. “Hire an experienced criminal defense lawyer and a good civil litigator,” he said. “Prayer is good, too.”
Linda exhaled into the lawyer’s face and stubbed out her cigarette on a legal pad on the desk. “Let’s get out of here,” she said to Keith.
Keith hopped up out of his chair and joined Linda, who was halfway to the door, then turned and held his thumb and pinkie finger up to his mouth and ear and mouthed, “I’ll call you,” to the lawyer, who smiled weakly. Linda was several steps ahead out in the hallway, and Keith ran to catch her. “Linda, wait up!” he called.
Linda kept striding for the elevator, but Keith caught her elbow and pulled her around to face him. “Linda,” he said, “I’m sorry about this. But there’s no reason to act this way. We can work through this.”
Linda pulled away and spun around into the open elevator. “In your dreams, pal,” she said. “I’ll see you in court.” She stuck out her arm just as the doors were closing and bumped them open. “Maybe Mary’ll let you sleep on her couch.”
Keith opened his mouth to speak, but the doors closed in his face.