“You are not paying $28 million to buy my silence. You are paying it as a penalty for your incompetence.” “But there will be no NDA.” Nathaniel continued, his voice hardening. “I will speak about this case to whomever I choose.”
“I will discuss Officer Reynolds. I will discuss the chief's negligence, and I will discuss the check you are about to sign. If you want an NDA, we can tear this agreement up right now and let the jury decide the damages next week. I am quite confident they will find a number north of $50 million.” The room went dead silent.
The city attorney looked at the mayor and gave a barely perceptible shake of his head. “Don't push him.” The mayor swallowed hard. He picked up the heavy pen. His hand trembled slightly as he signed the document that would decimate the city's budget for the next fiscal year.
Nathaniel watched the ink dry. He felt no elation. He felt only the heavy, crushing weight of responsibility. This wasn't lottery money. It was blood money.
It was the price tag of a man's life that Reynolds had tried to steal. “Gentlemen,” Nathaniel said, standing up. “We are done here.” As they walked out into the cool December air, Arthur let out a long breath. “You know, Nate, you could have bought a small island with that NDA money.”
“I don't need an island, Arthur,” Nathaniel said, checking his watch. “I need a weapon.”
Around the same period, in the county jail administrative segregation wing. For Brock Reynolds, time had ceased to be linear. It was a loop of gray concrete fluorescent buzzing and the smell of industrial disinfectant mixed with old sweat. He was currently housed in the administrative segregation unit of the county jail, awaiting transfer to the Federal Bureau of Prisons. He was protected, which meant he was buried alive.
He had 23 hours a day in a cell the size of a parking space. The heavy steel door clanked open. A guard, one Reynolds didn't know, tossed a manila envelope onto the thin cot. “Mail call, Reynolds.” Brock scrambled off the floor.
Mail was rare. He hoped it was O'Connor. Maybe there was an appeal strategy. Maybe the union had found a loophole. He tore open the envelope.
There was no letterhead from a law firm. Instead, it was a petition for dissolution of marriage. He stared at the words. Irreconcilable differences. His eyes scanned the document.
His wife Jessica wasn't just leaving him. She was taking the house, what was left of the equity, and the cars, and she was petitioning for full custody of their two daughters. Petitioner requests that the respondent's visitation rights be suspended indefinitely, citing the respondent's criminal conviction and the potential psychological harm to the minors given the high-profile nature of his crimes. She wasn't just divorcing him. She was erasing him.
Brock sat on the edge of the bed. His hands started to shake, a tremor that traveled up his arms and into his chest. He looked at the photo of his girls he had taped to the wall with toothpaste. They were smiling at a beach trip two years ago. “Jess,” he whispered to the empty room.
Don't do this, he scrambled to the door, pressing his face against the small reinforced glass window. “Guard, hey, I need to make a call. I need to call my wife.” Phone privileges are at 1600 hours. Reynolds, a voice shouted back from the control booth.
Sit down, please. It's an emergency. Sit down or I lose your rec time. Brock slid down the door until he hit the floor. He pulled his knees to his chest.
The reality of his situation crashed down on him with the force of a physical blow. He wasn't just going to prison for 25 years. He was going to prison as a man with nothing waiting for him on the outside. He thought about the Mercedes. He thought about that split-second decision to pull the baggie out of his vest.
Why had he done it? “Because I could.” A voice in his head whispered. “Because I was a god.” Now he was just a number. And the silence of the cell was louder than any scream.
By December 15th, at the Rivers residence. The check lay on the kitchen island. It was a cashier's check from the city of Fairview. The zeros seemed to stretch on forever. $28 million. Eleanor Rivers walked into the kitchen, tying the belt of her silk robe.
She saw Nathaniel staring at the check, a cup of tea untouched beside him. “It looks like a monopoly prop,” she said softly, resting her hand on his shoulder. “It's the budget of a small country,” Nathaniel muttered. “Or the cost of a fighter jet. It's too much power for one piece of paper.”
“It's your reputation, Nate. It's the price they put on your integrity.” Nathaniel turned to her. “If I keep this, Ellie, they win.” “If I buy a villa or a new car or invest it, then Reynolds was right.”
“He was right that everyone has a price. I become just another rich man who benefited from the system's dysfunction.” “So what do you do? Burn it?” “No,” Nathaniel said, his eyes gleaming with a sudden sharp intensity.
“I use it to burn them.” He stood up and walked to the window looking out at the dark street. “I've been thinking about the kids I sentenced when I was on the bench,” he said. “The ones who had public defenders who were overworked and underpaid. The ones who took plea deals because they were scared, not because they were guilty.”
“The system is designed to crush the poor, Eleanor. It's an assembly line of convictions.” “And you want to stop the assembly line?” “I want to break the machine,” Nathaniel corrected. “I want to create a firm, a defense fund, but not just lawyers: investigators, forensics experts, tech specialists.”
“I want to give the kid from the projects the same defense as a CEO. I want to make it so expensive, so difficult, and so painful for the city to prosecute bogus charges that they stop doing it.” Eleanor smiled. It was the first time she had seen him look truly alive since the arrest. “You're going to war?”
“Yes,” Nathaniel said. “But I need a name. Something that sends a message.” “The Rivers Foundation,” she suggested. “No.”
Nathaniel shook his head. “It shouldn't be about me. It should be a reminder, a scar.” He looked back at the check. A dark ironic thought began to form in his mind.