The Professor (McMurtrie and Drake Legal Thrillers #1)(34)
He cracked the window and blew cigarette smoke into the cool night air. He knew this complicated things, and he hated complications. He crushed the cigarette out on the dash and flipped the butt onto the floorboard. Then he dialed the number.
“Bone?” the familiar raspy voice answered.
“Yeah, boss.” He paused, dreading what he was about to say. “We’ve got a problem.”
Jack Willistone slammed the phone down on the hook.
“Damnit,” he said out loud, bringing the side of his fist down on the complaint that lay on his desk. It had been served on him just eight hours earlier.
Jack had expected a lawsuit. He just hadn’t expected it so soon. The accident was barely five months old, and the statute of limitations on trucking claims was two years. In his over forty years of hauling freight, Jack had been sued only twice, and both times the lawyers had waited until the bitter end to file the complaint. This lawyer, Richard Drake, had filed in four months.
One month prior to closing the merger with Fleet Atlantic.
An hour after he received the complaint, Jack got the call he was dreading. Out of an abundance of caution, Fleet Atlantic wanted to postpone the closing of the merger until after the disposition of the lawsuit.
“That might take years,” Jack had said, but Fleet Atlantic’s president wouldn’t back down.
“A wrongful death lawsuit with three deaths and a speeding trucker is cause for concern on our end, Jack. I’m sure the case will resolve in your favor or settle, and then we can move forward with the deal.”
The minute Jack hung up the phone, he had dispatched Bone to handle Wilma Newton, Dewey’s widow. Since Buck Bulyard had died in the fire, Willard Carmichael and Dick Morris were bought and paid for and the plant holding all of the documents was ash and rubble, the only possible weak link was Wilma.
But Drake got to her first...
Jack sighed. He would have Bone shadow Drake from here on out, but he would have to fix the Wilma Newton situation. God knows what she might have told them if Dewey talked at home...
Jack shook his head and grabbed the phone off the hook. First things first, he thought. Before he could figure out how to handle Wilma, there was a more pressing priority.
He dialed the number for his insurance agent.
“Hawkins,” the voice on the other end of the line answered.
“Bobby, it’s Jack. We got sued today in Henshaw.”
“Damn, that was fast,” Hawkins said. Jack had reported the accident to Hawkins the day after it happened, so Bobby was already up on all the facts.
“Tell me about it,” Jack said. “Listen, Bobby, no f*cking around with the lawyer on this one, OK?”
“What do you mean?” Hawkins asked, his voice incredulous.
“I mean I know you insurance companies cut costs by hiring lawyers on the cheap, and I won’t tolerate that mess. I’ve paid BamaSure premiums for over three decades, and this is just my third lawsuit.”
“I assure you, Jack, that we will retain a very capable attorney to handle this file.”
“‘Very capable’?” Jack asked, chuckling. “What the f*ck does that mean? Very capable is the way my dick performs after a six-pack of Budweiser, Bobby boy. I don’t want very capable. I want the goddamn best. I want a porn star. Am I clear?”
Several seconds of silence and then Bob’s muffled voice. “Yeah, Jack. I think I get it.”
“You think?” Jack asked. “Well, let me say it another way so there’s no miscommunication. Unless you want me to take my six-figure account somewhere else, Bobby boy–” Jack paused “–I’d suggest you get me the fastest horse in the stable.”
24
At 5 sharp the following evening, Rick and Dawn were escorted into a small conference room at the Ultron plant in Montgomery. Going on four hours sleep, Rick knew he should be tired but he was juiced on adrenaline. Every ten seconds, Wilma Newton’s words from the previous night popped into his head. Dewey Newton’s schedule was “crazy.” Dewey Newton’s schedule forced him to speed. Dewey Newton, at Jack Willistone’s direction, doctored his driver’s logs to fraudulently show compliance with DOT regulations.
I have my star witness, Rick knew, blinking and trying to focus on the task at hand.
The room had yellow cinder-block walls and Rick had the feeling he was in a prison instead of a gasoline plant. Introductions were quickly made. Present were Hank Russell, a tall, heavy-set man with silver hair who was the president of Ultron’s Montgomery plant, Willard Carmichael, a skinny man with a strawberry-blonde mullet and mustache, and Julian Witt, a lawyer from Milhouse & Wright, one of the larger Montgomery firms. Witt wore a navy-blue suit with a red power tie, and, after everyone had shaken hands, he took the lead.
“Rick, we understand that you have filed a lawsuit against Willistone Trucking Company in Tuscaloosa County.”
Rick smiled. “That’s correct.”
“That lawsuit arises out of a trucking accident that happened on September 2, 2009, involving a Willistone rig hauling Ultron Gasoline and a driver named Harold Newton.”
“Yes.” Rick didn’t like being cross examined by another lawyer, but he could understand Witt’s need to set the tone of the meeting and to also grandstand a little in front of his client.