Foxholes by Travis Tougaw

Author:Travis Tougaw [Tougaw, Travis]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2024-01-11T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 24

Denver, May 9, 2022

Vince dressed for work on Monday in his standard khakis and polo, but he threw a sports coat on with it. They had client meetings scheduled, and as distracted as he’d been at work lately, he wanted to make sure Mason knew he could still be counted on. That didn’t stop him from checking email on his phone a hundred times while he waited for Judy Stevenson to arrive. Nothing from the insurance company. He decided to just buy a new laptop out of his savings account if he hadn’t heard from them by the end of work. He could stop at the electronics store on his way home and still make it in time to meet Hadley.

“Wake up, Vince,” came Naomi’s inflectionless voice over the intercom. “Ms. Stevenson just arrived. She’s on her way to Kate’s office.”

Show time. Vince grabbed his file on the Dartmouth case, a notebook and pen, and his coffee mug and started across the lobby. He saw Naomi perched at her desk, filing her nails, painted bright orange this time, and he couldn’t shake the image of her as a bird of prey sharpening her talons.

Vince burst into Kate’s office with a broad smile on his face. Ms. Stevenson seemed happy, too. Kate asked them both to sit, and Ms. Stevenson declined coffee.

“I’ll just get everyone up to speed,” Kate said. She recounted what had happened since their last meeting—discovery of the relationship between the builder and the supplier and sending a letter to opposing counsel.

“I understand they sent a reply directly to you,” Kate said to Judy. “I’m sorry that they did that; I was explicit that communications should occur between the lawyers only at this point. Of course, I’m not a judge, so what I say is more suggestion than direction.” She smiled at Judy, a weak, conspiratorial smile as if to say “we’re all just cogs in a big machine.”

Judy nodded, reached into her purse, and withdrew a legal-sized envelope with an impressive looking letterhead embossed on it. She pushed it across the desk to Kate. “There’s a lot of legalese, but I think they’re saying they’re ready to settle.”

Kate opened the envelope and began reading, brow furrowed as she went. She finished and passed the letter to Vince. “That’s exactly what they’re saying. Vince has been researching labor and materials cost and seeing what the courts have awarded in punitive damages in similar cases, and I think we can ask for $150,000 per house. There are 10 houses impacted by this?”

Judy’s eyes grew wider. “You think we can settle for $1.5 million?”

“Probably not,” Kate said. She reached across the desk and put her hand on top of Judy’s, a tender gesture that Vince had not seen from her before. “That’s the best we could hope for if we took it to court. We estimate the actual labor and materials cost is around $75,000 per house, so that’s our low point. We’re looking at settling somewhere between 750K and 1.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.