Dead Certain

whose broad shoulders I’d been heaping the grunt work of the transaction. “Hurt phoned from the plane and said he wasn’t coming. We asked, but I don’t think he gave his lawyers a reason. They just packed up and left.”
    “So We don’t know whether the deal is off or on,” I complained. I resented the lawyers’ blind obedience to Gabriel Hurt less than the fact that they were probably back at their hotel by now, dialing room service and turning the hot water taps to full. I also reminded myself that it was too early to tell what it meant. Gabriel Hurt had a reputation for driving a hard bargain, and he was powerful enough to not have to play by the rules.
    “I don’t give a shit why they left,” snapped Millman, furiously staring me in the face. “What I want to know is what you plan on doing to get them to come back.”
     
    When I got back to my office, I asked Cheryl to bring me a cup of coffee and a bag of M&M’s. Then I started working the phones. The first thing I did was call and leave messages for the Icon people at the Four Seasons, where I knew they were all staying. According to the newspaper, Hurt and his retinue had taken the top three floors of the hotel, including the penthouse. Then I called everyone I could think of who’d had dealings with Gabriel Hurt. Of course, this wasn’t the first round of calls I’d made to get the skinny on the famous software mogul, but now I had a better idea of what I needed to know. It wasn’t until I dialed the third number on my list that I hit pay dirt.
    Computer geeks, in general, make terrible liars. To them, the truth is too absolute to bend, and the one on the other end of the line was no exception. He was the computer guru for Stephen’s company, Azor Pharmaceuticals, but he also did some independent consulting for me on the side.
    “I told you that Hurt can be unpredictable,” he observed as soon as I finished telling him what had just happened. “Who knows why he pulls this kind of shit? When you’re Gabriel Hurt, you don’t need a reason. However, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but I just heard a rumor that there’s a group out of Seattle that’s developed this new input device that’s twice as fast as Delirium’s and is easier to configure with network applications.”
    “And that would mean in English?” I inquired.
    “You’re fucked. Somebody’s built a better mousetrap than Delirium, and they’re probably selling it to Icon even as we speak.”
     
    Cheryl stuck her head in the door to say good-bye. I’d forgotten that she told me that she had to leave early for an interview. I wished her luck and told her to switch roe over to voice mail and shut the door behind her. I couldn’t believe that in two more months she would be gone. Mrs. Goodlow, the firm’s iron-backed office manager, had already begun sending me potential replacements to interview, but so far I found that I had little stomach for the task. Even though I’d always known that one day Cheryl would be leaving, somehow it didn’t make it any easier. Cheryl had started in the night law school program at Loyola the same year that I’d joined the firm. Don’t worry, I was told, with her working fulltime, it’ll take her forever to finish. Now suddenly forever was here.
    The strange part was that her experience with me, doing the kind of deal-driven corporate work that characterized my practice, had made her one of the most sought-after candidates in her graduating class—a development I viewed with a kind of bittersweet pride. It was only a matter of time before the two of us found ourselves squared off against each other on opposite sides of some transaction.
    For the rest of the afternoon I fretted like a lovesick teenager, waiting for the phone to ring, the roller coaster of my anxiety fueled by lack of sleep and a steady stream of irate phone calls from the two principals of Delirium. It was hardly remarkable that my clients were furious and looking for someone to blame. However, the fact that that someone should be me was the first thing they’d agreed on in a very long time.
    But when I still hadn’t heard from Icon by seven o’clock, I abandoned hope and decided to go home. I was so wrapped up in self-pity about Delirium tanking that I completely forgot about Prescott Memorial and my mother’s visit. It wasn’t until I had my coat on to leave for the night that I tripped over a box of files that my mother had apparently sent over.