Sal Gabrini: His House of Cards by Mallory Monroe Page B

in that jury room
and throw the book at our client.”
    “I say an
acquittal,” said a second attorney.   “I
saw their faces too.”
    But Mark
couldn’t believe it.   “Not guilty?   Are you joking?”
    “Where’s the
evidence, Mark?   The prosecutor didn’t
present any evidence.   Just a lot of
innuendo.”
    Mark ignored
the second attorney.   “What do you think,
Gem?” he asked instead.   “Guilty or not
guilty?”
    They were
walking out of the courthouse after a trial that had just wrapped, and they
were now on verdict watch.   All three had
been appointed by the judge to work the case, with Gemma being appointed chief
counsel.   But although she privately
agreed with Mark’s assessment, she never speculated publicly.   “We’ll see what the jurors say,” she
said.   “No sense in guessing now.”
    “I’ll be
shocked if they find that boy not guilty,” Mark said.   “We didn’t have a good enough explanation for
that gold chain evidence.   But stranger things
have happened.”
    “Yeah,” the
second attorney said, “like the three of us winning a case.”
    All three of
them laughed.   They handled a lot of
criminal cases.   Which meant there was a
lot of plea bargains and predetermined punishments.   But their current client refused to cop a
plea.   Now they were in recess, waiting
for the verdict to come in, and were walking to their cars.   The judge promised to give them an hour’s
notice when the verdict came in, which would give them plenty of time to get
back provided they were no more than a half hour away.   Gemma’s law firm was ten minutes away.   She would rather wait there.
    But as she
and her colleagues stood in the parking lot and continued to talk about the
case, and what went wrong and what went right, she saw something odd in her
periphery.   Although they were in a sea
of cars, in a parking lot, one car stood out.   It seemed to stop at the far end of the lane, directly in front of them.   Sal had taught her how to be observant, so
she turned her head and looked.   As soon
as she did, she saw what appeared to be a shotgun come out of the car’s
window.   And she didn’t hesitate.
    “Get down!”
she screamed frantically to her colleagues, and all three of them dropped to
the ground as bullets whizzed past them.   Then they heard the car burn rubber speeding away.
    Gemma looked
up.   Both of her colleagues were
fine.   But she suddenly heard cries of
pain behind her.   When she looked back
she quickly realized that another colleague, who had been walking behind them,
wasn’t so fortunate.   At least one of the
bullets whizzed past them, but struck her.   Gemma rushed to her aid.

 
    The
conference room was packed with Sal’s senior management staff.   His all-white, all-male senior management
staff.   They were all department heads
and there were twelve departments.   Sal
sat at the head of the table.   He did not
beat around the bush.   It had been four
days since those discrimination allegations.   Although the lawsuit was ultimately dropped, the corporation, at least
the Vegas headquarters that he was responsible for, was still reeling.   Because that lawsuit, trumped up though it
had been, exposed an unsettling truth.   Diversity was non-existent in the Vegas office.   And it was all Sal’s fault.
    “There will
be more expansion, as you already know,” he said to his senior staff.   “That plan has been in the works since we
opened this location.   So there’s going
to be room to hire new faces in that respect.   But there’s going to be a reorganization of our current structure
too.   Some of you will retain your
positions, some will be reassigned, and some will be demoted.   It all depends on how well your respective
departments have fared under your stewardship.   And I’ll be honest with you.   I
wasn’t going to make this review until the end of the year.   But that lawsuit, even though it was nothing
but a