Issue #0

The Firm

Plot

"Mitchell Y. McDeere has worked hard to get where he is: third in his class at Harvard Law. Aggressively recruited by all the top firms, Mitch surprises everyone by joining Bendini, Lambert & Locke, a very private, very rich tax firm in Memphis. Mitch and his wife Abby move to Tennessee and quickly settle into their new life. Soon, though, Mitch senses trouble: two of the partners die in a suspicious diving accident off Grand Cayman; the firm's management is overly proud of the fact that no one has ever resigned; and security measures at the firm are more than a little stringent. Then, while eating alone at a nearby diner, he is approached by a man named Tarrance who claims to be with the FBI. Tarrance tells Mitch that the firm's "security" people have bugged his phone, his house, and probably his car; and that the FBI will contact him again soon. In subsequent meetings with Tarrance, Mitch is told that the FBI has been studying Bendini, Lambert & Locke for years, and that while they have a few legitimate clients, they are most assuredly not a law firm. When Mitch learns what they really are, he is at first shocked, then frightened; when he learns what they really do, and how they do it, he is terrified. And when the FBI needs an informant inside the firm, he realizes he's trapped: the FBI will bust him if he doesn't cooperate, and the firm will kill him if he does. There's no way out. Or is there?" -- From the cover.