James Grippando - Blood Money

“That won’t happen,” said Andie. “I’ll make sure of it.”

Jack wanted to believe her, and he knew it was greater assurance than most people got. He was still skeptical, but again, Rene’s death had changed everything.

“Okay. Let’s go with it.”

“Great. We’ll start here in the house. Where do you want the line?”

“My home office, I guess. Down the hall, right next to the bedroom.”

“You got it.”

The techies got up and went to work. Jack’s gaze drifted toward the window. Max was in the yard, digging the Key Biscayne version of the Grand Canyon.

“I guess I’ll need to send Max away,” said Jack.

“He’s still a puppy,” said Andie. “Digging is what they do.”

“I mean send him away for his own protection. It may be a bit of stereotype to think that all sociopaths like to hurt animals, but I already lost one dog to a pissed-off client.”

“Sometimes stereotypes are true,” said Andie. “Jeffrey Dahmer used to love up the neighborhood dogs, lure them into his kitchen-and then send them yelping home with their testicles sliced open. Just for grins.”

It made Jack cringe. “My neighbors spend their summers in Charleston. Their son RJ loves Max. I’m sure they’d take him.” Jack took another gander out the window. Max was covered in dirt, still digging. “Maybe Max can hook up with the Army Corps of Engineers and widen the harbor while he’s up there.”

“What are you going to do with Abuela ?”

“She has a brother in Tampa. She’ll feel safe there. Then there’s my dad and stepmother. I guess they should just extend their vacation, stay in Europe.”

Andie looked at him with concern. “These are all just precautions, you understand. Like I said before, I don’t think the targets would be Max, Abuela , your father, your stepmother. With Rene, he was acting out a sexual fantasy that will lead him to the big moment with Sydney Bennett.”

“I can’t believe this happened to Rene,” Jack said, but the regrets quickly turned into concern. “What about you?” he said. “Aren’t you at risk?”

“I would say yes. But you don’t need to worry about that.”

“What do you mean I don’t need to worry? You’re my fiancee.”

“Your fiancee is an FBI agent. You don’t have to worry about protecting me.”

It was intended to put him at ease, but it didn’t sit entirely well with Jack. He didn’t fully understand why, though deep down he realized that there was still enough of the caveman gene in every male to make it unpleasant to hear that he didn’t need to protect his woman.

Jack’s cell rang. He didn’t recognize the incoming number.

“Is this a test, or should I answer it?” he asked Andie.

Agent Burns shouted from the next room, “Go ahead and answer it.”

Jack took the call.

“Swyteck, this is Ted Gaines.”

It was the first time Jack had heard from opposing counsel since their meeting in New York, and the last thing Jack felt like talking about at the moment was the lawsuit against BNN. “Not really a good time, Ted.”

“This is not a discussion. We’ve seen the postings on Celeste Laramore’s Facebook page. Remove them immediately.”

“What?”

“I fully expected you to claim ignorance.”

There was a beep on the line, and suddenly there was a third voice. “Good evening, gentlemen. Judge Burrows here.”

Judge? Jack didn’t know the voice, but he certainly knew the name: Burrows was the judge in Celeste Laramore v. Breaking News Network.

Gaines took control. “Thank you for agreeing to conduct this emergency hearing telephonically, Your Honor.”

“Mr. Swyteck, it would appear that there has been a violation of my order to keep the allegations of the complaint in this action confidential and under seal.”

“Honestly, I have no idea what this is about,” said Jack.

Gaines said, “It’s about the posting of confidential information on Celeste Laramore’s Facebook page. Judge, if you’re at your computer, I can get you to the proper Web page.”

Jack followed along on his iPhone and pulled up Celeste’s Facebook page.

The judge said, “I’m looking at the page now. What postings are you talking about?”

“Right there on her wall. It’s the only information posted since Celeste Laramore went into a coma.”

Jack scrolled down, knowing that the judge was doing the same. Sure enough, there were a series of status updates from that afternoon, bubbles of information stacked one on top of the other. Jack read the first, the second, the third-then skimmed the rest. Each status update was a few sentences in length. Collectively, the updates-sixty-seven in all-repeated, verbatim, the substantive allegations of the complaint in Celeste Laramore v. Breaking News Network.

“This is very troubling,” said the judge.

Gaines jumped on the sentiment. “Your Honor, this is a blatant violation of a court order to file the complaint under seal and keep the allegations confidential. We demand that Mr. Swyteck remove the posts immediately.”

“Mr. Swyteck, how soon can you make that happen?”

“I’ll look into it as soon as this call is over.”

“Look into it?” said the judge in a reproving tone. “Counsel, you need to remove it.”

“Yes, Your Honor. But I want to be clear that I don’t know how this information even got here. It’s never been my practice to monitor the Facebook pages of my clients, and that’s especially true in this case. Obviously, Celeste didn’t do this.”

“Obviously,” said Gaines. “But it doesn’t take a computer genius to know that these postings could have been made only by someone with account-manager status for Celeste’s Facebook page. Ruling out Celeste doesn’t rule out a single other person in her camp who had access to her username and password.”

“That’s a ridiculous accusation,” said Jack.

The judge intervened. “You’d better hope so, Mr. Swyteck. Because if this violation was willful and done at your direction, the sanctions against you and your client will be severe.”

“Judge, we would like a hearing on the issue of sanctions as quickly as possible,” said Gaines.

“We’ll deal with that in due course,” said the judge. “For now, I’m ordering Mr. Swyteck to remove these postings by midnight tonight. Further, I want a written certification delivered to my chambers no later than nine A.M. stating that the plaintiffs and their counsel are in full compliance with the confidentiality order. Is that understood?”

“Yes,” said Jack.

“That’s all for this evening, gentlemen,” the judge said. A beep confirmed that he had dropped from the conference call.

“I’m checking that page at twelve-oh-one A.M.,” said Gaines. “It had better be clean.”

Gaines hung up. Jack took a deep breath and tucked his phone away. Andie came to him and massaged his neck.

“That didn’t sound good,” she said.

It would have been easy to unload on the spot and tell Andie what he would have liked to have told the judge-that the five horrendous days between Sydney’s release on Sunday and Rene’s murder on Thursday had been the personal and professional equivalent of a tsunami, and that the last thing any human being in his position should be held accountable for was the Facebook page of a client in a coma.

“Nothing I can’t handle,” said Jack.

“Really? Isn’t there anything I can help with?”

Jack appreciated the sentiment, then actually considered it. “Well, maybe there is.”

“Tell me.”

“What do your tech agents know about Facebook?”