"Ms. Pallida, I presume?" He took my hand but didn't let me shake. Instead he put my knuckles to his lips. Cute, but he wasn't going to charm his way out of my retainer.
His accent was a hybrid. It had a slight southern lilt, but only on a few words. The accent beneath it was more midwestern, even and smooth. The mix was almost jarring. We'd have to work on that before he got in front of a jury. Straight southern was the way to go.
"Please call me Evan." I stopped myself from continuing when I realized Vinnie had left out one important detail-the client's name.
Vinnie jumped in. "This is Conrad Castille."
"Of course it is, Vinnie. Mr. Castille, can Vinnie get you something to drink? We have coffee, tea, anything you want." I smiled.
"Please, call me Connie. All my friends do. And I'll take coffee, black, if that's all right."
Vinnie turned to the serving tray as Drew walked in and took her seat, yellow notepad in hand. She was plump and wore clunky glasses, a perfect foil for me.
"Connie, these are my associates Vincent Lapolla and Drew Epstein. They'll be working with me on your case. If you'd like to have a seat, we'll get started."
Castille settled himself into the chair opposite me, just as I wanted him to. A consultant I'd hired a year or so ago said the sun at my back, flowing through my hair, was my best posture in this room. I leaned back into the tufted black leather office chair and crossed my legs at the knee. Castille followed the movement through the glass tabletop. Good boy.
Vinnie slid the requested coffee across the table. Then he sat and readied to take notes.
Castille watched it all. His dark eyes seemed to miss no detail.
"What sort of trouble brings you to us?" I asked.
He joined his hands in front of him on the table, an earnest look settling into his face. It was practiced and would ring true to the average person. Not to me, of course. He was a natural-born deceiver. I could already see it. Takes one to know one.
"Well, you see, Evan, there's been some misinformation that's made its way to the US Attorney's Office about me. I don't know how or why this happened. And I don't know why I'm being dragged up here to New York to answer some grand jury. As you know, I'm from New Orleans. A financial adviser. In my practice, I've helped countless elderly people invest their money-"
I held up a perfectly manicured hand. "Let me just stop you there. Now, I'm your attorney. From the moment you called me, everything you've said to me has been strictly privileged and confidential. Keeping that in mind"-I leaned forward and kept his attention-"you need to tell me the absolute truth. I can't help you if you don't."
Now that I was really looking at him, I realized his eyes were beady. Like a rat. We'd definitely need him to wear contacts for the trial.
He frowned, the creases around his mouth making unattractive angles on his otherwise decent-looking face. He broke the friendly grip his hands had on each other and took a sip of coffee.
This was the boring part. The part where I convinced my clients to pull out their dirty laundry piece by piece. The fun part was when they finally fessed up and pointed out every rip, tear, bloodstain, cum stain, you name it. None of them ever wanted to do it. Their reticence was understandable. My clients were worse than skid marks on a crusty pair of drawers. They'd spent the better part of their waking hours trying to hide all the dirt from their loved ones, their clients, regulatory agencies, and law enforcement. But their defense depended on my ability to separate the truth from the lies. Or, as my father would have said, "the wheat from the chaff." Amen.
I tended to spend half the consultation just massaging the information out of them, like squeezing a sausage out of a greasy casing. It was tiresome but necessary.
I just watched Castille, letting my stare sink into his black pupils. The silence and the direct look were tools of my trade. It created a pressure out of thin air, crushing the truth out of each client.
The image consultant also told me-while I had his cock in my throat and my eyes locked with his-that my gaze was almost an interrogation technique unto itself.
The dead-eyed stare worked. The fear Castille had been trying to hide started to waft off him like the stink of a days-old body left in the sun. He was rotten. All he had to do now was tell me how deep the decay went.
"Well, I. Okay. Look. I am. Well, I . . . I . . . I am in a bit of trouble."
Ding ding ding. I sat back in my chair and let Drew and Vin do the scribing, writing his dirty deeds on the neat lines of their legal pads. Castille talked for over two hours, the sound of his voice only broken when either I or my associates had a question.
He had, indeed, been very naughty. Dozens, maybe hundreds, of elderly nitwits giving him their life savings, cashing out their annuities, even liquidating their burial policies to give him the surrender value. And the scheme wasn't so much Ponzi as it was straight-up theft. He was sitting on millions. A good thing, because my fee would be astronomical for this doozy of a case.