Bad Trust

Also by Michael A. Kahn

Rachel Gold Mysteries

The Dead Hand

Face Value

Flinch Factor

Trophy Widow

Bearing Witness

Sheer Gall

Due Diligence

Firm Ambitions

Death Benefits

Grave Designs

Other Novels

Played!

The Sirena Quest

The Mourning Sexton (under the name Michael Baron)

The Art of Conflict (with Alan Kohn)

Copyright © 2020 by Michael A. Kahn

Cover and internal design © 2020 by Sourcebooks

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The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious or are used fictitiously. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.

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Contents

Front Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty-One

Chapter Thirty-Two

Chapter Thirty-Three

Chapter Thirty-Four

Chapter Thirty-Five

Chapter Thirty-Six

Chapter Thirty-Seven

Chapter Thirty-Eight

Chapter Thirty-Nine

Chapter Forty

Chapter Forty-One

Chapter Forty-Two

Chapter Forty-Three

Chapter Forty-Four

Chapter Forty-Five

Chapter Forty-Six

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Back Cover

To Margi—again and always

They were conquerors, and for that you want only brute force—nothing to boast of, when you have it, since your strength is just an accident arising from the weakness of others.

—Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness

If you want to know what God thinks of money, just look at the people he gave it to.

—Dorothy Parker

Chapter One

I have a better idea. Let’s have him killed.

Oh, my God, Megan. Don’t say such things.

Megan turned toward her sister, eyebrows raised, and shook her head. Come on, Holly. Who are you kidding? You know we’d both be better off with him dead.

Holly gave me an embarrassed shrug. That’s my big sister talking. Not me.

Right. Megan grinned. That’s your big sister talking—saying the same damn words you’d be saying if you weren’t little Miss Prim-and-Proper.

That’s not true, Megan.

I raised my hands, palms facing them. Time out, ladies. I’m your lawyer, not your hit man.

Megan laughed. Sorry, Rachel. My bad. It’s just sometimes I get so upset over what that bastard is doing to us—and to our children—that I’d like to kill him.

I understand your anger. I nodded toward the trust documents spread out on my desk. There’s plenty of money here. More than enough for the two of you and for your children.

Absolutely. You have the last brokerage statement there. Shows more than twelve million dollars in that trust fund—money our father put in there for each of us. And that rich self-centered prick won’t give us a goddamn dime.

She’s right, Rachel, Holly said. We’ve both asked our brother. More than once.

This was the initial client meeting. Think of it as the legal profession’s equivalent of a blind date, with each side trying to assess the prospects of entering a genuine relationship. Do I want to represent these people, the lawyer asks? Do I trust them? Do I want to go to war on their behalf? And the potential client asks, Do I want this lawyer to represent me? Do I trust her? Does she seem tough enough to be my advocate?

What makes someone seek out a lawyer? In my experience, it’s either anger or distress, and here I had one of each. Megan Garber and Holly Goodman were sisters in their early forties, both mothers of two teenage daughters. And studies in contrasts.

Megan, forty-three, was a big woman, perhaps twenty pounds north of voluptuous, which in her high heels gave her stride a tottering quality. She had straight black hair cut shoulder-length and parted on the side, which accented her high cheekbones, prominent nose, and sharp chin.

Holly, forty-one, was slimmer and prettier than her older sister, although I’d hesitate to wager money on the original color of her wavy blond hair or the original shape of her cute pug nose, especially when compared to the same two features on her older sister and brother. Holly had a gentler, more vulnerable persona than her sister, best exemplified by their laughs. Megan was a horse laugher, head thrown back, hand slapping her knee. Holly was a giggler, with a hand over her mouth.

Although their stylish outfits, makeup, and jewelry pegged them as a pair of luncheon habitués at The Zodiac at Neiman-Marcus, neither woman was wealthy, both had jobs, and both were no longer married—Megan by choice, Holly by fate.

Megan Garber’s marriage ended in the nasty aftermath of her husband Larry’s affair with his secretary. At the time of the divorce, Larry Garber was a partner in a midsize local law firm. Two years later, a national law firm acquired his firm, and two years after that the national firm laid off six lawyers in the St. Louis office, including Larry, who’s now a struggling solo practitioner. His income had fallen to such an extent that he was able to convince the family court judge to reduce his alimony and child support payments, forcing Megan to seek employment after more than a decade out of the workforce. She is now a sales associate at the Pottery Barn in Plaza Frontenac.

Holly Goodman became a widow five years ago. Her husband, Marc, like most men and women in their midthirties, assumed he had a long life ahead of him, and thus made no transition plans for Goodman Jewelry, the business he’d inherited from his father. Nor had he worried about the significant debt his company took on for the construction of a new store on Clayton Road in upscale Ladue, instead assuming he’d pay it down over the years. But two weeks after his thirty-sixth birthday, he was diagnosed with bone sarcoma. Five months later he was dead. Within a year of his death, Goodman Jewelry had imploded, with most of its inventory auctioned off in a liquidation sale. Holly, who’d earned a master’s in social work at the University of Missouri, now worked as a school social worker in the Lindbergh school district.

He’s a nasty bastard, Rachel, Megan said. "Here’s the latest example. My daughter Lauren starts college in the fall. At Northwestern. Do you have any idea how much a year of college costs these days?"

Actually, I do. I have a stepdaughter at Johns Hopkins. So you asked your brother for a distribution from the trust?

Yep.

And?

Megan shook her head. First off, I never get to talk to him. My own brother—my only goddamn brother—and yet I have to talk to either his witch or his weasel. This time it was the weasel.

The Weasel. I smiled. That would be Arnold Bell?

Yep. So I gave that conniving little brown-nose a copy of the bill for tuition, room, and board. For the first semester. More than thirty grand. I told him to remind his boss that my daughter also happens to be his niece.

And?

Unbelievable. She opened her purse, sorted through the contents, and held up a folded sheet of paper. This arrived two days later.

She slid it across the desk to me. It was a printout of an email from Arnold Bell to Megan Garber. The subject line read:

Re: Request for Disbursement from Peggy R. Blumenthal Trust.

The text consisted of two sentences:

After conscientious and solemn consideration and contemplation by the Trustee, your above-referenced disbursement request has been deemed premature and is thus declined. In the interim, the Trustee instructs me to wish you sholom aleichem.

I looked up, struggling to hide my emotions. I try my best in these initial client meetings to be neutral—to gather the facts, to explore the issues, to gauge the prospective clients, and, at the conclusion, to explain that I will take it all under advisement and get back to them in a few days. But whatever lingering misgivings I might have had about leading this battle vanished upon reading that passive-aggressive email from their brother’s lackey.

Holly pointed toward the email printout. Can I see?

I handed it to her. She read the message. That’s just not right.

She looked down again at the message and looked up at me with a frown. What does that mean at the end, Rachel? Those two words.

It’s a Yiddish blessing. It means ‘peace be with you.’

Peace be with us? Megan snorted. More like piece of shit be with us. Like I said, we’d both be better off with him dead.

Chapter Two

Oy. Benny shook his head. What was that douchebag’s name before he changed it?

Alan Blumenthal.

And now?

You ready? Isaiah ben Moishe.

Moishe? Who the fuck is Moishe?

I’m only guessing, Benny. His dad’s name was Milton. Maybe Moishe was his Hebrew name.

And Isaiah?

I shrugged. No idea. Maybe the prophet?

Really? I’d say that’s a bit delusional.

Or maybe the basketball player?

Isaiah Thomas? That’s even more delusional.

True.

So, is this guy a real frummie?

You mean an Orthodox Jew? I suppose, but I did a little calling around, trying to find out which synagogue he belongs to.

And?

I came up empty.

Benny rubbed his chin as he thought it over. Maybe he just likes that Prophet Isaiah vibe.

What do you mean?

Your guy sounds like a real prick. Think back to all those Yom Kippur services. Specifically, the reading of the Haftorah. Isaiah is the Darth Vader of the High Holidays, right? He is one dark, brooding motherfucker, issuing condemnations of the people and predictions of doom.

Benny leaned back in his chair and squinted at the ceiling. I can still recall one of those screeds about all the sinners. How they lie and cheat and give birth to evil. Something about hatching the eggs of vipers. Right?

Vaguely.

Benny chuckled. Isaiah ain’t exactly the Mister Rogers of the Yom Kippur.

A pair of young servers arrived—a woman and a man, both of Asian descent. We were having lunch at Pho Grand, our favorite Vietnamese restaurant—a stylish bistro with Asian string instruments mounted in glass along pastel yellow walls.

"Pho Tai?" the young woman asked.

I raised my hand. That’s me.

I watched, my mouth watering, as she set down a large steaming bowl of rice noodle soup with sliced beef. Next to the bowl she placed a platter heaped with bean sprouts, Thai basil leaves, cilantro, lime wedges, and chili peppers.

The male server had set his large tray of entrees on a stand and was now frowning as he looked at our table and then at the tray and then back at our table. "The Bun Bi Cha Gio?"

Benny gave a him a thumbs-up. Me.

The server set down the large plate of vermicelli noodles with eggrolls, shredded pork skin, and vegetables.

He straightened, looked back at his tray, and turned to us. "The Banh Cuon Thit Nuong?"

Me, again, dude.

And the server set down, next to Benny’s other entrée, a platter of rice flour crepes filled with ground pork, mushrooms, and onions, and topped with charbroiled pork and fried onions.

And that beef stir-fry, Benny said to him. Mine, too.

With raised eyebrows, the server set down the third entrée in front of Benny. Then he backed up, smiled, and said, Enjoy.

Among his many unique qualities, Benny Goldberg has capacity.

And girth.

And brains to match.

We met more than a decade ago as first-year associates in the Chicago offices of Abbott & Windsor. A few years later, we both escaped that LaSalle Street sweatshop—Benny to teach law at DePaul, me to go solo as Rachel Gold, Attorney at Law. Different reasons brought us to St. Louis. For me, it was a yearning to live closer to my mother after my father died. For Benny, a year later, it was an offer he couldn’t refuse from the Washington University School of Law.

Although in the years since then, Professor Benjamin Goldberg has earned a national reputation in the field of trade-regulation law—you may have seen him quoted in the Wall Street Journal or interviewed on CNBC—he remains my beloved Benny: vulgar, fat, gluttonous, and rowdy. But also ferociously loyal and wonderfully funny and my very best friend in the whole world. I love him like the brother I never had.

No class today? I asked.

Actually, have one this afternoon. My advanced antitrust seminar.

Really? And you’re going to class dressed like that?

"Moi?He leaned back in his chair and gestured at his outfit. What’s wrong with this, Miss Fashion Cop?"

Benny had on a New York Rangers hockey jersey, faded olive cargo pants, and red Converse Chuck Taylor All Star low tops. His shaggy Jew-fro had reached Jimi Hendrix proportions, and he apparently hadn’t shaved that morning. Not quite the prevailing image for an esteemed legal scholar.

I shook my head. All I can say is thank God for tenure.

Hear, hear. He grinned and raised his bottle of Tsingtao.

When Benny had finished his first plate and signaled the waiter for another beer, he turned to me with a puzzled smile. Isaiah, eh? When did that happen?

A few years ago. I’m not sure of the exact date.

So it was after he destroyed his old man?

That’s my understanding. A couple years later.

Isaiah (né Alan) is the eldest of three siblings—Megan and Holly being the other two—and thus the only son of Milton and Peggy Blumenthal. A few years before Alan’s birth their father had founded a little scrap-iron company under the name MP Enterprises—the M for Milton and the P for Peggy. The business had grown exponentially over the years. By the time Alan joined the company, after earning his law degree from Washington University, MP Enterprises owned a diverse portfolio of companies in various industries around the country.

When did the company go public? Benny asked.

About ten years ago, on the thirtieth anniversary of its founding.

At the time, Milton was CEO and chairman of the board, and Alan was vice president and general counsel. The public offering made both men multimillionaires.

In the story that ran in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch the day after MP Enterprises went public, Milton told the reporter, I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of this earth. He may not have realized that he was quoting baseball great Lou Gehrig, who died less than two years after delivering that poignant farewell speech in Yankee Stadium on July 4, 1939. Nor did he realize that you don’t tempt the gods with that kind of talk. Milton’s wife Peggy died of lung cancer two years to the day after the public offering. Eighteen months later, Alan pulled off a coup, ousting his father from the business he’d founded. Humiliated, alone, and depressed, Milton died a few months later.

What about that trust? Benny asked.

There’s a sad irony to that timing.

How so?

A month after his wife’s death but before his son’s coup, Milton set up the Peggy R. Blumenthal Trust. He created that trust for the benefit of all three of his children and he designated himself as the trustee. All well and good.

But?

But he named his son, Alan, as the successor trustee upon his death.

I explained that the trust invested the son, as successor trustee, with just enough discretion to give him grounds, albeit shaky, to refuse to make any distributions to his two sisters.

We ate for a while in silence, and then I said, He took more than just his father’s company.

What else?

"Not what, but who. His father’s trusted secretary. Her name was Jennifer O’Keefe back then. Apparently, Alan was having a secret affair with her while she was still working for his father