Equivocal Death

by Amy Gutman

Genres: Hard-Boiled; Crime Fiction; Legal Thrillers

Synopsis

Just out of Harvard Law School, Kate Paine is on the fast track at Samson & Mills, the nation's richest, most powerful law firm. Assigned to assist the charismatic managing partner in a high-profile sexual harassment case, Kate can hardly believe her good luck. But with the brutal murder of Madeline Waters, a beautiful female partner, Kate's carefully constructed world begins to collapse. A mysterious warning from the dead woman just hours before her death leaves Kate terrified and confused -- could she be the killer's next target? Kate finds herself in a race against time to unlock the secrets of Madeline's violent death. Delving far beneath Samson & Mills' smooth veneer, Kate discovers a shocking legacy of abuse and betrayal -- a legacy that may hold the key to solving the murder, as well as to Kate's own survival.

Release date: June 1, 2003

Publisher: Little, Brown and Company

Print pages: 376

Sample

ICE cold. He pressed his hand to the window and watched the frost dissolve, felt the moisture collect on his palm. He’d switched
off the lights, and the interior darkness mirrored the inky void outside. Standing immobile, he could almost imagine that
he was alone in the world or better yet that he did not even exist, that he was simply a part of this floating emptiness,
transported by waves of black snow.


But his lungs filled with air. He felt the rhythm of his breath, stark and fatal as an accusation.

He was alive.

And there was work to be done.

Moving away from the window, he switched on a Bestlite floor lamp, acquired from a British import company during his last
year of school. He liked things to be well made. He surveyed the scene before him. The space where he stood was cavernous,
at least thirty feet long and twenty feet wide. Part of a former warehouse, it was isolated enough to meet his needs. His
desk faced a sweep of tall windows, while his clothes — Brooks Brothers suits, several shirts, a tux — hung neatly on a portable
chrome garment rack. A Bose CD player sat on an antique table.


He was pleased with the space. Everything was just as he liked it. The barren surroundings only underscored the beauty and
fineness of his few selected possessions. His eyes traced the narrow confines of his life.


Then, decisively, he made his entrance.

Moving to the CD player, he pushed Play. Instantly, the room filled with the opening chords of Cherubini’s Medea. A 1959 recording. Remarkable music. Potent. Full of a terrible rage. He glanced down at the CD cover, at the diva Maria Callas.
Arched nose. Raven hair. Hands splayed like claws. What was it he saw there? A passion for vengeance — for justice — that
matched his own. The promise of its fulfillment. And with this, an unflagging sense of order, of timeliness, of fate. It was
this he needed above all else. For even as the time for action grew closer, his confidence had started to ebb. Why had he
waited so long? The plan that had seemed so brilliant when he first conceived it could at times seem almost absurd. Again,
he tried to push back these thoughts. It was dangerous to think this way.


Sitting down at his desk, he turned on his laptop computer. The screen flashed bright. From here on, it was almost too easy.
The most profitable law firm in the country. Thirty-seven partners who counted themselves among the most respected lawyers
in the world. Power brokers and advisers, they counseled governments, corporations, and the rare private individual with sufficient
wealth to pay their fees. And yet cracking their computer safeguards had been child’s play.


Strange, the unerring detection of their clients’ vulnerabilities and the utter disregard of their own. Samson’s computer
network had just been overhauled at huge expense. The mere fact of this investment had seemed to assuage their concerns. There
was something touching in this naïveté, the almost childlike belief in money. Their computer network was top of the line.
Nothing more need be said.


Besides, the elder statesmen of Samson disdained technology, the proliferation of desktop computers. They yearned for the
days of dictation. Of pretty secretaries, heads bowed, recording their every word. But in the end, even Samson had been forced
to submit. The firm’s quaint refusal to communicate by e-mail, once seen as a charming relic of its patrician past, had begun
to interfere with business. And Samson was, first and foremost, a business. Bowing to the inevitable, the firm edged its way
into cyberspace, a territory as alien to its rulers as the planet Mars. E-mail. The Internet. Standard issue for more than
a decade in the modern business world but still suspect intruders at Samson.


And so he found himself in the happy position of breaking and entering an unlocked house. The attorneys’ “secret” passwords
gave the illusion of privacy but none of its substance. Remarkable, really, the faith placed by these brilliant men and women
in a technology they didn’t understand. Hubris. The fatal flaw.


He typed in her user ID, MWATERS. Then came the password prompt. He grinned as he typed in the response: PASSWORD. That was it. The same word for everyone. Something easy to remember. She could have changed the defaults, of course. It would
have taken only a minute. But she hadn’t taken the time. Like the others, she couldn’t be bothered.


A few more clicks, and he was scrolling through a list of her files. Luckily for him, she was one of the new breed, treating
her hard drive like a filing cabinet. He’d dipped into these files in the past, not out of any real interest, but for the
thrill he took in the fact that he could. Confidential memos outlining trial strategies for lawsuits worth tens of millions
of dollars. Clinical dissections of the odds of success. Privileged information that, if leaked, would mean the loss of fortune
and career. If blackmail were the goal, he’d have had it made.


But he had other things on his mind.

Exiting WordPerfect, he clicked on the Calendar icon. In an instant, it appeared before him, everything crystal clear. The
perfect map. Madeleine Waters’s anticipated movements for the next twelve months. He felt an adrenaline surge, stiff heat
in his shoulders and neck. The room was growing colder as the night chill deepened, but he barely noticed. He had work to
do, decisions to make.


He reviewed the recent additions. December 23. With Christmas approaching, the week had been slow: the usual assortment of
professional engagements, lunches, meetings, the occasional benefit or awards banquet in support of a worthy cause.


And then a single entry struck his eye.

Dinner with Chuck Thorpe. At Ormond. January 5. He knew the restaurant. Had in fact eaten there when it opened last year,
unable to absent himself discreetly from the Civil Rights Forum’s annual dinner. Such occasions always left him aching with
hatred for the world he’d been forced to inhabit. The smug corporate sponsors. The self-satisfied attorneys who came to be
feted, confident that their brief forays into pro bono work conferred a sort of secular sainthood.


But this miserable dinner had finally proved a gift in disguise. He remembered the restaurant clearly, the low lights, the
widely spaced tables. Yes, it was almost ideal, better than he could have hoped. A sense of euphoria swept through him.


Then, without warning, it was gone, and he was spinning, spinning down a cold black chute.

No. Make it stop.

He pressed his teeth together, already knowing what would come. Dizzy, he grasped the table’s edge. A sour sweat leaked through
his pores. The smell of fear. The smell of death.


I’m moving as fast as I can.

He tried to fight back, to win a reprieve. But it was no use. He was already tumbling back. Back to where it all began.

A dark room. And everywhere the scent of fear.

She’s sprawled across the floor. He looks down at her from above. It feels strange to look down. He’s always looked up at
her face, her beautiful, smiling face.

It’s so dark. For a long time, now. Why is she lying so still?

He sleeps.

And then it’s light. She’s still there, sprawled and broken in ways that he can’t comprehend. She’s floating in a sea of red.

He wants to get up, to go to her. But he can’t stand up, can’t seem to move at all.

He cries out, but there’s something in his mouth.

At first, he thinks she’s asleep. But not really. Really, he knows that she’s dead.

He’s hungry. He’s thirsty.

And, even then, he knows that she’s dead.

She’s dead, and it’s all his fault.

And then it was over. Slowly, the vision faded. Still trembling, he stared at the wall. He felt weak, depleted, as if he could
sleep for days. But he couldn’t give in to these feelings. Not with success so close. He had to think of the plan. He had to think of the plan. Soon, it would all be over.


And he was finally ready to begin.

MONDAY morning. 7:05 A.M. A gray fog hung over the ice-glazed spires of Manhattan. Pulling her red cashmere cape tight against the winter air, twenty-six-year-old
Kate Paine walked purposefully across Fifth Avenue. The snow-dusted sidewalks were still sparsely populated. A good two hours
remained until the explosion of rush hour, with its shrieking horns and screeching tires. In the relative quiet of the morning,
lulled by the city’s dull roar, Kate clutched her cape close and smiled.


The holidays were behind her. She was home.

Approaching the plate-glass doors of Samson & Mills, Kate felt a swell of excitement. After more than a year at Samson, she
still could hardly believe that she’d been hired as an attorney at this legendary firm. That of all the thousands of law school
graduates who poured into the workforce each year, she’d been one of the chosen few. Just out of Harvard Law, and she’d already
worked on cases that most lawyers only dreamed about, cases that routinely figured on the front pages of the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times. Fascinating cases of first impression that stretched the limits of the law. And even more important, she had the chance to
hone her skills with the nation’s most formidable attorneys.


Kate passed through the revolving doors and into an enormous lobby. Tossing off greetings to the security guards, she slipped
her card key through an electronic scanner. Then she moved toward the elevator, high heels clicking on the marble floor.


Four days into the new year, the lobby was already stripped of holiday decoration. The scarlet poinsettias, with their incongruous
shock of color, had been whisked away. As had the majestic Douglas fir and the electric menorah. Once again, the stately entry
stood sober and unadorned. Kate relaxed into the familiar space, felt its timeless weight enfold her.


Thank God, the holidays were over.

The elevator was already waiting. Kate stepped on, and the doors slid shut. Twenty. Thirty. The floors flashed by. As she’d
hoped, Kate was the first person to arrive on fifty-one. Making her way down the deeply carpeted hall, past a row of identical
doors, she flipped on lights as she passed. Her own closed door was the next to last. As she rummaged in her purse for the
key, she studied a small brass plate. Katharine T. Paine. The T stood for Trace, her mother’s maiden name. On impulse, she ran a finger across the engraving, the metal cold to her touch.
Then she turned the key and pushed open the door.


Stepping into the office, Kate inhaled its familiar smells, furniture wax mingled with Chanel No. 19, a fragrance she sometimes
wore. She cast an approving eye around her ordered domain, with its panoramic views of the Hudson River and beyond. Even in
the morning haze, she could make out the Statue of Liberty in the distance, a tiny, brave figure engulfed in mist. The room
was just as she’d left it. Neat stacks of paper lined her desk. Cartons of documents were stacked against the wall. The preholiday
cleanup. She’d try to enjoy it while it lasted.


Kate pulled off her cape and hung it in her office closet. Before closing the door, she paused to take stock in a mirror affixed
to its back. She looked healthy and rested, her skin lightly browned from a week of sun. She quickly ran a comb through her
dark brown hair, cut in the jaw-length bob favored by Samson’s female lawyers, then straightened her horn-rimmed glasses.
The glasses were a recent addition, acquired when she started work. Studying her face in the mirror, Kate decided that she
liked the effect. Professional. In control. A woman to be reckoned with.


How different she looked now from two years ago, when she’d roamed the Harvard campus in ratty jeans and a backpack. Yet one
thing remained the same. Her reflected image inspired the same sense of dislocation that it had since she was a child. Who is that woman? Me but not me. She didn’t dislike what she saw. To the contrary, she knew she was pretty. Clear skin, high cheekbones, a fine straight nose.
Her eyes were a deep shade of blue. “Stormy,” her mother used to call them. A full-length mirror would have gone on to show
the strong but delicate form: shoulders broad enough that she always cut the pads out of her suit jackets, a sweep of breast
not entirely concealed by her black-and-gray Tahari suit, narrow hips tapering to long, slim legs.


So why couldn’t she see this person as herself?

It was an old question, one that she’d long tired of considering. She shut the closet door and turned toward her desk.

I’m proud of myself, Kate thought, surveying the well-appointed office. I did this all on my own. I could have fallen apart. But I didn’t. In the end, Michael did me a favor….

But Michael belonged to the past; he had nothing to do with her new life. Pushing the memories aside, Kate sat down and turned
on her computer. The screen flashed on. Responding to computer prompts, Kate quickly typed in her user ID followed by the
word PASSWORD. Then it was on to e-mail. Among the usual clutter of junk e-mails — a paralegal looking for a downtown sublet, a secretary
with free kittens, an associate seeking a financial planner — she culled the few messages that demanded immediate attention.
From Justin Daniels, her old friend and Harvard classmate: “Welcome back! We missed you and we know you missed us. Let’s shoot for drinks later this week. Cheers. J. D.” From Andrea Lee, her friend and comrade on countless
late nights: “Can’t wait to catch up. Call me ASAP.” There was also a plaintive note from Jonathan Kurtz, a Harvard classmate
who’d occupied the office two doors down until a few months back, when he’d been shipped off to Kansas for a trial. “I fully
believe that I will be here in Wichita from now until the end of time. I will never perform any task other than the preparation
of cross-examination books that will never be used at trial or anywhere else. I will never see any of my friends or family
again. On the upside, I will never have to pay for another meal as long as I live.”


Kate laughed. Again, she felt a glow of pleasure, happy to be precisely where she was. But the sense of satisfaction was shortlived.
Soon, she sat staring at an e-mail from Peyton Winslow, a senior associate at the firm. “Greetings. I hope that you enjoyed
your vacation. Please prepare for a meeting this morning at 10 A.M. with Carter Mills regarding a new matter. The Complaint (which we believe will be served on January 13) and related papers
are in distribution. Please review and be ready to discuss.”


Kate glanced at her watch. Already after eight. Quickly, she thumbed through the mountain of mail that had piled up during
her vacation. “Will someone just shoot me?” she muttered. Still, beneath the anxiety, she felt a burgeoning excitement. A new case. And a matter significant enough to involve the illustrious Carter Mills. To get in on a case like this at the very start
— what a coup! So many of Samson’s massive cases had been gathering dust for decades. There would be nothing for years and
then a brief flurry of activity when the current crop of Samson underlings would try to make sense of what their predecessors
had done. The work often seemed more archaeological than legal. Now she’d be in on things from the start, positioned to watch
the strategies unfold.


The phone rang, but Kate let voice mail pick up as she continued to search through the mail. She finally found what she was
looking for. The complaint, stamped “Draft” across every page, was captioned for the Southern District of New York, the federal
trial court of Manhattan. The plaintiff’s attorneys must have sent over a draft in hopes of an early settlement. It was often
done, the draft complaint serving as leverage, proof of the seriousness of plaintiffs’ intent and the prima facie strength
of their case.


The draft complaint was twenty-three pages. Kate quickly skimmed its contents, trying to get the gist of the claims.

And then paused to let it all sink in.

This was, in no uncertain terms, a sexual harassment suit charging Chuck Thorpe and WideWorld Media with violations of both
state and federal law.


Chuck Thorpe.

WideWorld Media.

Kate grappled with the implications.

WideWorld was one of Samson’s largest clients, a sprawling communications behemoth with a seemingly insatiable appetite for
new acquisitions. Its recent purchase of Catch — a “relentlessly provocative” men’s magazine edited by Thorpe — had sparked a firestorm of protest among stockholders. If
they had been upset before, this would send them over the edge. While the controversy might be good for circulation — further
enhancing Thorpe’s status as publishing’s reigning enfant terrible — it would not play well with the board of directors.


A tentative knock on the door broke into her thoughts.

“Come in!”

“Hi, Kate. Welcome back!” In the doorway stood Jennifer Torricelli, her unflappable nineteen-year-old secretary. Jennifer’s
dark fantasia of a hairstyle gave new meaning to the phrase “big hair,” but there the stereotype ended. She typed ninety words
a minute, kept flawless tabs on Kate’s ever-changing calendar, and managed to be nice as well. In theory, Kate was supposed
to share her services with a first-year associate named Terry Creighton. But for the past six months, Creighton had been in
Nebraska, where he spent his days in an unheated warehouse, poring through corporate files. Kate could barely remember what
he looked like.


“You must’ve had a good vacation,” Jennifer said. “You look great!”

Kate gave her a distracted smile. “It was fine. Relaxing. But it’s good to be back.”

Jennifer looked at her, incredulous. “I don’t believe you guys. The hours that you put in here. And then you don’t even like
vacations. Boy, if I ever went to the Caribbean, I don’t think I’d ever come back.”


Kate glanced anxiously back at the papers on her desk. “I’ll tell you about it later. Right now, I have to get ready for a
ten o’clock meeting with Carter Mills.”


Jennifer’s eyes widened at the mention of Samson’s presiding partner. “Wow. Good luck. Listen, I just wanted to say that there’s
a message from Tara on your voice mail.”


“Thanks,” Kate said. She’d been right not to pick up the phone. Tara was her best friend and college roommate. It would have
been hard to cut short the conversation.


“Let me know if you need anything,” Jennifer said, closing the door behind her.

Returning to the complaint, Kate glanced back at the caption to find out the plaintiff’s name. Stephanie Friedman. Briefly,
Kate wondered what she looked like, this woman behind the lawsuit. But her thoughts quickly moved on. Where would things go
from here? Of course, everyone knew that sexual harassment cases were notoriously easy to file and hard to get rid of, making
them a frequent weapon of choice for disgruntled employees. In her year of legal practice, Kate had already seen more than
a few such suits filed on tenuous facts in hope of a speedy and substantial settlement, a sort of legal blackmail. Who knew
what had really happened? Still, it didn’t take hours of research to know that Thorpe and WideWorld had a mess on their hands.
There was nothing subtle about the allegations.


Thorpe routinely referred to women as bitches, cunts, whores.

He demanded that the women who worked for him wear short skirts and tight sweaters.

He interrogated female employees about their sex lives, demanding detailed descriptions and subjecting them to elaborate dissections
of his own encounters.


He’d threatened to fire several women if they refused to sleep with his music producer pal Ron Fogarty.

It went on from there.

Kate tried to remember what she knew about Thorpe. With her eighty-hour work weeks, she had scant time to keep up with current
events. But it would have been impossible to miss the media frenzy that broke out several months back when Catch weighed in on sexual harassment. The magazine’s glossy cover featured a parody of Hustler’s famous meat grinder shot, a woman’s legs thrust high in the air as her body disappeared in the utensil’s gears. But on the
Catch cover, the head disgorged by the grinder was that of feminist icon Anita Hill. Smaller photos inside paired head shots of
prominent female activists with bodies from lasciviously positioned porno pix.


By all accounts, the credit for the uproar was entirely due to Thorpe, a flamboyant entrepreneur whose editorship of Catch had made him a household name. A North Carolina native, Thorpe had started Catch straight out of college with money raised from wealthy classmates. Kate recalled him from television interviews, a compact,
powerful figure who pulsed with contained energy. He seemed to take a grim delight in baiting the talking heads who grilled
him. “I respect women,” he said repeatedly, in an exaggerated Southern drawl. “In fact, my mother was one. My sister, too.”


Intriguing legal issues, celebrity scandal — what more could a young lawyer want?

She couldn’t wait to begin.

Rounding the corner outside Carter Mills’s office suite, Kate slammed into the portly figure of Bill McCarty, who was charging
in the opposite direction. Her notebook and pens scattered to the floor.


“Excuse me,” she gasped, bouncing back from the impact.

McCarty, red-faced and breathing hard, responded with a short grunt and continued full-speed down the hall, his short arms
joggling at his sides. As she gazed after the stout, balding figure, Kate rubbed her shoulder and wondered what had him so
upset. While she’d never worked with McCarty, she knew him by reputation as diffident and unassuming. McCarty was a workhorse,
not a show horse. Rumor had it that his election to the Samson partnership stemmed from his willingness to endure crushing
workloads without complaint. Fits of temper seemed entirely out of character.


Kneeling to pick up her things, Kate heard a clipped British accent behind her.

“No need to bow before entering. They did away with that years ago.”


Kate looked up to see Peyton Winslow. Not that she’d had any doubt who was speaking. Despite three years at Yale Law School
and six at Samson & Mills, Peyton’s Oxford intonations only seemed to grow stronger with each passing year. Today, he sported
a large pair of red-framed glasses. The glasses were Petyon’s signature; he had a wardrobe of different styles, all slightly
eccentric by office standards.


“Very funny,” said Kate, clambering back to standing position and smoothing her gray wool skirt. “I was just cut off at the
pass by Bill McCarty, and everything went flying. He seemed furious about something. Any idea what?”


Peyton gave her a skeptical look. “Interesting,” he said. “I thought he was computer-generated. It never occurred to me that
emotions were part of the package.”


Kate grinned. She was always surprised by Peyton’s bouts of irreverence. A rangy figure in his early thirties, Peyton often
seemed younger than his years, all eager legs and feet. But appearances could be misleading. Everyone knew that Peyton was
a rising star. He was, in the Samson vernacular, “highly regarded.” Affectations aside, he was incisive, hardworking, and
an excellent manager. He’d be up for partner in two years and was widely viewed as a shoo-in.


Together, they proceeded into Carter Mills’s reception area. His secretary, Clara Hurley, was immersed in dictation, her fingers
flying across the computer keyboard. She jumped when Peyton tapped her on the shoulder.


“You scared me,” she said reprovingly, pulling the Dictaphone headset off her tight gray curls.


“Sorry ’bout that,” said Peyton. Clara visibly softened. Peyton had clearly gotten on her good side. Smart move, Kate thought.
When you were trying to get a brief out on time, a good relationship with the person typing it was at least as important as
your legal skills.


“Have a seat, and I’ll see if Mr. Mills is free,” she said. Clara’s use of Mills’s last name sounded quaint to Kate’s ears.
Except for the most inveterate old-timers, everyone at Samson was on a first-name basis. But of course, Clara had been with
Mills for decades.


Waiting outside the closed office door, Kate felt shy and very young. She could feel her heart beating faster. From the corner
of her eye, she saw that Peyton was working. His features were locked in concentration as his pen flew across some junior
associate’s draft. Kate envied him his seeming calm.


For what felt like the fiftieth time, Kate turned back to her notes. If even a fraction of the allegations were true, Thorpe
and WideWorld had a major problem. And even if they weren’t true, the case had all the earmarks of a public relations nightmare. The timing — right on the heels of Thorpe’s splashy
attack on the very laws under which he was sued — couldn’t have been worse.


“Come in, come in.” Carter Mills was standing in the doorway. As she jumped to her feet, Kate felt a subtle change in the
atmosphere, a sort of electric charge. Up close, Mills was even more imposing than she remembered. He was tall, well over
six feet, with penetrating slate-blue eyes. Despite gray streaks in his thick dark hair, he gave an impression of youthful
vigor. Everything about him — his voice, his bearing, the aristocratic cut of his features — seemed to exude authority. Mills’s
grandfather, Silas Mills, was one of the firm’s two founding partners. Yet family connections were the least of Carter Mills’s
credentials. He was widely regarded as one of the nation’s leading trial lawyers, the subject of countless feature stories
and news reports and a perennial fixture on top-ten lists. Mills was, Kate thought, a rare blend — a scholar who could still
woo a jury, a $600-an-hour mega-lawyer who could roll up the sleeves of his $300 shirts and speak directly to the people.


Mills gestured them into his office. Peyton slipped into a chair. Kate sat down beside him. As Mills returned to his desk,
Kate took a quick look around. Several large abstract paintings. A black leather sofa. The decor took Kate by surprise. There
were, to be sure, some traditional touches. Family photographs. Harvard diplomas. An impressive grandfather clock. But it
was not what she would have expected. She was intrigued by the room’s appearance, intrigued and also pleased. It seemed to
affirm Mills’s uniqueness.


“Madeleine Waters will be joining us shortly,” Mills said, after buzzing Clara for water. “If you’ll excuse me for a moment.”
He was already back at work.


The words pulled Kate back to the present. Another intriguing surprise. Madeleine Waters, the acknowledged beauty of the Samson
fold. Madeleine wasn’t the first female partner at Samson & Mills — there was Karen Henderson in the tax department and Michelle
Turner in trusts and estates — but she still stood in a class by herself. The first female partner in the litigation department,
a club within a club at Samson, she was a role model for younger women. She seemed to embody a bright new world, a place where
power and femininity could coexist.


Kate briefly wondered if Madeleine could be working on this case and then rejected the thought out of hand. Madeleine Waters
working with Carter Mills? No way. While Mills had once been Madeleine’s mentor, they were now said to be barely on speaking
terms. Something to do with a failed love affair, if firm gossip was to be believed.


A rustle at the door. Clara Hurley appeared with a crystal water pitcher and glasses. The perfect secretary of the old school.
Carefully setting down the tray, Clara poured water for Mills, her stolid feature