“Married and CEO of one of the biggest goddamn real-estate companies in Dallas, he’s a member of the business council, the chamber of commerce, and every other important civic organization in this city, and he forces himself on a naive twenty-two-year-old young woman-”
“ Forces himself? Give me a break, Frank. Knowing the girls Tom hires, she probably went down faster than Monica Lewinsky.”
He chuckled and checked his backswing at the halfway point.
“It’s not a goddamn joke, Scott! Nadine was irreparably harmed!”
“But two million bucks would make the hurt go away, right?”
“No, but it would make her go away.”
There was a soft knock on the door. Scott turned from the window to see Sue poking her head in. She said in a low voice: “Mr. Fenney, your daughter’s on the phone. She says it’s an emergency.”
An emergency? A jolt of fatherly fear ricocheted through Scott’s central nervous system like a pinball setting off alarms. Four long strides and he was at his desk. He said to the phone: “Frank, hang on the line, okay?”
Scott didn’t wait for a response. He leaned the 9-iron against the desk, picked up the receiver, and punched the blinking light on the phone, putting Frank Turner on hold and his nine-year-old daughter on the line.
“Hi, baby, what’s wrong?”
A tiny voice: “Mother’s gone and Consuela’s crying.”
“Why?”
“They arrested Esteban.”
“ Who? The INS?”
“He said ‘ inmigracion. ’”
“You talked to him?”
“Consuela talked to him first, but she started crying so I talked to him. He said they arrested him where he was building a home, said they’re sending him back to Mexico. Can you help him?”
“Honey, there’s nothing I can do. Esteban’s a tough kid, he’ll be all right. They’ll bus him down to Matamoros, he’ll cross back over the next day, and he’ll be back up here in a few weeks, just like the last time.”
“Yeah, that’s what he said.”
“So why’s Consuela so upset?”
“She’s scared they’re gonna come for her, send her back to Mexico, too. She says she has no one in Mexico, that this is the only home she’s ever had.”
Consuela had come with the house. When the prior owner had filed bankruptcy and could no longer afford the mansion or his Mexican maid, the Fenney family had acquired Consuela de la Rosa like an appurtenance to the property.
“A. Scott, I told her you were fixing things so she can always live with us…you are, aren’t you?”
“Uh, yeah, I’m working on that.” He’d been meaning to hire an immigration lawyer to get Consuela’s green card. “Look, tell her not to worry. INS knows better than to conduct raids in Highland Park. Heads would roll.”
“Huh?”
“They’d get fired if they took Highland Park maids away.”
“Oh. But she’s really scared. She shut the front drapes, she won’t even go outside in the backyard, and she’s saying the rosary. It’s just us here and…well, it’s kind of scaring me, too. No one’s gonna come to our house, are they, and bust in the door like on TV?”
“No, baby, no one’s coming to our house.”
“You promise?”
“I promise. Let me talk to her.”
Consuela was an emotional girl, given to sudden bouts of tears over fears real or imagined, which she warded off by wearing three crucifixes, saying daily prayers to various saints, and keeping enough candles lit on the windowsill above the kitchen sink to light a convenience store. But the fear that never left her was being sent back to Mexico. Esteban was her boyfriend; they had met at the Catholic church in the Little Mexico section of Dallas. Scott drove her over every Sunday morning and picked her up every Sunday afternoon, their weekly visit. Esteban worked construction in other parts of Dallas and faced the risk of INS raids, but Consuela was protected by the unwritten rule that the INS did not enter the Town of Highland Park, home to the richest and most politically powerful men in Texas-and their illegal Mexican maids. Scott’s illegal Mexican maid was as sweet as she was round, and after three years of tending to the Fenney household, she was like a member of the family, albeit one who reverted to her native tongue when distraught. Consuela’s sobbing voice came over the line.
“Senor Fenney, tengo miedo de inmigracion.”
“Don’t be afraid, Consuela. It’s okay. Esta bien. No one’s gonna take you away. You’ll always live with us.”
Scott had picked up some Spanish skills from his Mexican maid, who sniffled and said, “?Para siempre?”
“Yes. Forever.”
“Senor Fenney, you make the, uh… promesa a Consuela?”
“ Si, Consuela, I promise.”
A sniffle. “O-kay. Adios, senor. ”
His daughter came back on. “She stopped crying.”
“Good.”
“A. Scott, you’re not gonna let them take her away, are you?”
“No, baby, that won’t happen.”
“Okay.”
“Look, honey, I’m kind of busy, so if everything’s under control there, I need to get back to work.”
“We’re good. See you later, alligator.”
“After while, crocodile.”
Scott hung up and made a mental note to call Rudy Gutierrez, an immigration lawyer he had met years ago. He’d been meaning to do that for six months now, or maybe a year, almost two come to think of it, but something had always come up and…the blinking light on the phone caught Scott’s eye and he remembered Frank Turner holding-not that Scott minded making a plaintiffs’ lawyer wait for his contingency fee. The image of his daughter huddled behind closed drapes in their Highland Park home with their Mexican maid faded from his mind and was replaced by the image of a smug-faced Frank Turner, famous plaintiffs’ lawyer, leaning back in his chair in his fancy office convinced he was about to win this game and beat Scott Fenney out of two million dollars to buy off sweet Nadine. Not today, Frank. Scott grabbed the 9-iron, punched Frank’s button, engaged the speakerphone, and picked up right where he had left off.
“ Two million? That’s an expensive piece of ass, Frank. What, she was a virgin?”
“Her sexual history is irrelevant.”
“Yeah, like it was for Kobe.” Scott pointed the 9-iron at the speakerphone. “Chances are, Frank, she’s been screwing since she was fourteen, so you damn well better advise your client that if she wants to go to trial, we’re gonna track down every swinging dick she’s ever met up close and personal, we’re gonna put their owners on the stand to tell the world about Nadine’s many virtues, and by the time we’re through with her sweet little ass, she’ll make those hookers on Harry Hines look like a bunch of goddamn nuns!”
“Oh, yeah? Well, you’d better advise Tom Dibrell that by the time I’m through with him he’ll wish to God he’d stayed faithful to wife number one!”
Scott laughed boisterously, as if that was the funniest thing he had ever heard.
“You wouldn’t say that if you’d seen her.” He again faced the window and checked his position at the top of his backswing. “Listen to us, Frank, a couple of good ol’ SMU boys going at each other like an Aggie and a Longhorn. Look, bottom line, both our clients got some downside here. So to make this go away for both of them, Tom will pay sweet little ol’ Nadine half a million bucks, and that’s a hell of a lot more money than she was making at Hooters.”
“Tips are pretty good there, Scott. One-point-five.”
“They ain’t that good, Frank. One million.”
“Done.”
He checked his downswing. “I’ll have the release and confidentiality agreement to you first thing in the morning. You get it signed and back to me, I’ll have a check waiting.”
