Final Exam: A Legal Thriller (4 page)

Of the four, only Bowden Flynn knew exactly what he wanted when he entered law school and never for a moment wavered from his planned career path.
 
Every course he took, every job he accepted and every book he read in his spare time was designed to prepare him to become a public interest lawyer.
 
During the years following graduation, Bowden Flynn was largely responsible for the closing of incinerators that polluted neighborhoods, for the funding of programs to help the underprivileged and for numerous downtrodden finally getting their day in Court.
 
Homeless families found food and a place to sleep because of him, and the forgotten masses of the urban poor found a tireless voice to tell their stories of silent suffering.
 
In short, he made the system work just a little better for those for whom it had never worked before.

Dinner began with the four devouring two plates of fried calamari and a basket of warm bread.
 
By the time they finished their salads, a second bottle of Chianti arrived.
 
Ben ordered chicken and Bowden chose fish, while the women veered toward pasta - linguini with clam sauce for Fran and cheese ravioli with marinara for Meg.
 
As they waited for the main course, they turned their attention to the obligatory discussion of what had been going on in their lives since they last met for dinner a couple of months before.
 
Nothing really spectacular was going on with any of them, save for the occasional new case worth noting or a funny story or two about one of their kids.
 
They talked about classmates they had run into and vacations they were planning.
 

Finally, half way through the main course, Ben got down to business.
 
“So,” he said putting his fork down and looking directly into Meg’s eyes. “What’s up with the asshole?”
 

The question, made almost matter-of-factly in a tone that suggested not answering was not an option, came with the glare.
 
Meg finished a bite of ravioli, took a sip of wine and looked first at Fran, then at Bowden, both of whom looked back in her direction.
 
She did not want to meet the glare.
 
While Benjamin
Lohmeier
was not a physically imposing man, he stood only five-feet-eight- inches tall and weighed barely one hundred forty-five pounds, he possessed a magnetic, dynamic and sometimes hypnotic personality.
 
He learned at an early age the effect he had on those around him, and used it to his advantage.
 

Although capable of great warmth, he could also burn ferociously with frightening intensity and then suddenly cause chills with his sudden coldness.
 
He could be friendly and inviting and intimidating all at the same time.
 
Once you were out, you never got back in again.
 
Meg slowly raised her head to meet the glare, as his friends called it.
 
“He’s fine,” she said hesitantly.
 

“Hmmm, he’s fine,” Ben replied slowly.
 
“I’m glad to hear it.”
 

Both Fran and Bowden glanced back at Ben seeking to determine whether a follow-up was in the offing.
 
It was.
 
As Meg looked away, Ben met their gaze and raised his eyebrows with a slight smile.
 

“When you say fine,” Ben continued, “do you mean the divorce is moving along?”
 

“It’s moving along.”
 

“How’s his health?” Ben asked with a wicked smile.
 

Meg shot him a dirty look.
 
Her husband, a prominent personal injury attorney in town, was much older than she, almost seventy.
 
They met when Meg was in her early-twenties and working as a clerk in his small Chicago law office.
 
Soon the relationship was more than professional, and Meg eventually moved into his brownstone on the near north side.
 
Eventually, they got married and even had an unexpected child, a son born shortly after Meg graduated law school.
 
As time passed, they slowly grew apart, their age difference serving as an anchor helping force the marriage under.
 
Things hadn’t really been right with them since law school.
 
He really wanted a trophy, not a partner, and Meg’s willingness to seek a place of her own in the legal world challenged and threatened him.
 

Truth be told, the divorce wasn’t really going anywhere.
 
Meg more or less dropped it under his pressure.
 
Ben learned this from Fran long ago.
 
Nevertheless, Meg and Joe lived separately, Meg in a high-rise condominium near downtown and her husband in his Gold Coast brownstone.
 
They shared custody of their son.

Ben leaned back in his chair and glanced over at Fran who shook her head no.
 
He decided to back off.
 
His heart really wasn’t in it tonight anyway.
 
“So,” he continued after a lengthy pause, “how’s Anthony handling all of this?”
 
Anthony Joseph
Cavallaro
, or A.J. as his parents often called him, was Meg’s nine-and-a-half-year old son.
   

“He’s good, he really is,” Meg answered looking relieved for even the slightest change of subject.
 
“He seems very comfortable with the way things are right now.
 
I mean, he sees both of us all the time, just like before.”
 

Fran steered the conversation away from Meg’s marriage and toward children and families and parents and work.
 
Ben let the conversation drift in that direction and poured another glass of wine.
 
This was already his fourth or fifth glass, and he had a pretty good buzz on.
 
He had handled enough DUI’s as a prosecutor to know that he had better shut it down pretty soon or driving home could be an adventure he did not want.
 
Unlike some lawyers, he did not want to use himself as a test case to argue the merits or lack of same in Illinois’
drunk
driving laws.

For the next half hour or so, they talked about their families, the holidays and even a little current events and whatever tension hung over the table melted away.
 
Meg seemed pretty quiet during this time, apparently content to listen to her three friends tell stories of their lives.
 
Finally, during a lull in the conversation, she turned back to Ben and said, “You said before that you are doing more criminal work now.
 
How’s that going?”
 

“Oh, I don’t know,” Ben said shaking his head.
 
“Pretty well, I guess.
 
We seem to be doing a little bit more of it and even bigger cases too.
 
It’s always different being a defense attorney rather than a prosecutor, but really, being in a criminal courtroom is a lot like it always was.
 
If you’ve never done it, it’s kind of hard to explain.
 
There’s a different feeling in the air, a different tension and, obviously, a different clientele than you usually see in a civil courtroom.
 
I kind of like it actually.”
 

A little while later, everyone was ready to hit the road and go home.
 
They grabbed their coats from the coat check room and gathered outside the front door on the sidewalk.
 
Ben pulled his overcoat closed at the neck and looked up at the sky.
 
It had cleared, but the temperature was dropping steadily.
 
They stood there shivering.
 
Ben looked at his watch - ten forty-five.
 
“Shit,” he said to himself.
 
He hadn’t planned on being out nearly this late.
 
“I’ve got to get going.”

“Well, Fran,” Meg said, “we should get going too.
 
It is kind of late.”
 

Bowden and Ben waited for the women to reach their car and then turned toward the parking lot.
 
They reached Bowden’s car first.
 
“Say,” Bowden said, “Meg sure wasn’t in any kind of a mood to talk about the asshole, was she?”
 

“No, she sure wasn’t,” Ben agreed.
 
“But then, she never really is, now is she?”
 

“No, she’s not, but it seems to me she was even stranger than usual about it tonight.
 
Or maybe it’s just that she seemed quieter in general,” Bowden said.
 

“Yeah, maybe,” Ben said.
 
“Fortunately, with Fran at the table, you don’t need much help keeping the conversation going.”
 

Bowden laughed. “Well,
gotta
go.
 
See you next time,” he said.
 

“Yeah, you too,” Ben said.

Ten minutes later, Ben accelerated down the ramp onto the Eisenhower Expressway heading west, waiting for the heat to kick in.
 
He turned on his book on tape, but clicked it off again after about two minutes.
 
He just wasn’t in the mood.
 
He tried sports radio, nothing good there, and
cruised
the radio stations looking for a good song.
 
Nothing doing there either.
 
So he spent the rest of the ride home in silence thinking about the evening and wondering what was really going on with his three friends.
 
It was always good to see everybody, he thought as traffic slowed around Austin as it always did.
 
Pretty soon it picked up again and at the split, he veered toward the entrance ramp to southbound 294 going eighty.
 
Before he knew it, he pulled into his driveway on Walker Avenue in Clarendon Hills just as he realized the car was finally warm.
 

He pulled the car into the garage, walked across the driveway, up the steps to the deck and unlocked the door to the kitchen.
 
He found his wife, Libby, asleep under a blanket on the couch in front of the TV.
 

“Hey Lib,” he whispered, kissing her on the head, “wake up, I’m home.”
 

Startled, she jumped slightly and opened her eyes with a confused look on her face.
 
A few seconds later, she regained her senses and slowly sat up rubbing her eyes.
 
“I must have fallen asleep,” she mumbled.
 
She looked up at him.
 
“Did you have a little garlic with dinner?”
 

“Just a little,” he answered.
 

“A little or not, you stink,” she replied with a mock frown.
 
“Make sure you take a shower before you crawl into my bed tonight.”
 

“Oh, it’s your bed tonight, is it?” he said leaning over the couch and putting his arms around her while nibbling on one ear.
 

“It’s my bed every night,” she said.
 
“You’re just a guest.
 
And sometimes an unwelcome one when you smell like that,” she said wriggling herself free from his grasp.
 

“Just as long as I’m the only guest.”
 

“How was everybody?” she asked.
 

“Pretty good, I guess.
 
Meg seemed a little weird though.”
 

“Well,” Libby said clicking off the TV and standing up to stretch her back, “you’re the lawyer.
 
I’m sure you’ll get to the bottom of it.
 
While you do that, I’m going to bed.
 
You
coming?”
 

“Yeah, I’ll be up in a few minutes.”
 

She walked around him and back through the kitchen toward the front stairs as he admired her from behind.
 
Looking over her shoulder with a smile she said, “Don’t forget about that shower.
 
And brush your teeth while you’re at it.”
 

He laughed.
 
“I wasn’t counting on getting anything anyway.”
 

She kept walking.
 
Without looking back she added, “Maybe not, but you know you’ll have no chance unless you do what you’re told.”
 

5

Ben pulled into the parking lot of the office after completing the long drive back from the Lake County Courthouse up near the Wisconsin border.
 
Once inside, he stopped in the kitchen to see who was around.
 
There he found Brian Davenport, one of the other associates in the office, glancing at the
Chicago Sun-Times
.
 
“Hey, what’s up?” Ben said as he walked in and grabbed the sports section of the
Chicago Tribune
.
 

Brian looked up.
 
“Court today?”
 

“Yeah, Waukegan.”
 

“Ha,” Brian laughed, “lucky you.”
 

Ben liked Brian.
 
On his surface, he seemed to be a smart guy, quiet and unassuming.
 
He had the reputation in the office as a guy who always flew under the radar.
 
He never seemed to get noticed much except in a positive way and rarely did anything that appeared to make him stand out.
 
Everyone respected him as a good lawyer, but not everybody realized that he possessed a wicked sense of humor.
 
He could be cutting and humorously opinionated when he wanted to be.
 
With short, brown hair, an Irish complexion and a stoic public persona, he sort of reminded Ben of an airline pilot.