Page 165 - Too Much and Never Enough - Mary L. Trump

stopped by, I was flushed and soaking wet. He reminded me that I couldn’t take any documents out of the room. “They belong to your brother, too, and I need his permission,” which wasn’t at all true.
When he turned to leave, I called after him, “Jack, wait a second. Can you remind me why we decided to settle the lawsuit?”
“Well, you were getting concerned about the costs, and, as you know, we don’t take cases on contingency. Although we knew they were lying to us, it was ‘He said, she said.’ Besides, your grandfather’s estate was only worth thirty million dollars.” It was almost word for word what he’d told me when I had last seen him almost twenty years earlier.
“Ah, okay. Thanks.” I was holding in my hands documents that proved the estate had actually been worth close to a billion dollars when he died; I just didn’t know it yet.
After I was sure he had gone, I grabbed copies of my grandfather’s wills, floppy disks with all of the depositions from the lawsuit, and some of my grandfather’s bank records—all of which I was legally entitled to as part of the lawsuit—and stuffed them into my bags.
Sue came by my house the next day to pick up the documents and drop off a burner phone so we could communicate more securely going forward. We weren’t taking any chances.
On my third trip to Farrell Fritz, I methodically went through every box and discovered that there were two copies of everything. I mentioned the fact to Jack’s secretary and suggested that it obviated the need to get my brother’s permission, which was a relief since I didn’t want to involve him. I would leave a set of documents for him in the unlikely event he ever wanted one.
I was just beginning to look for the list of material the Times wanted when I got a message from Jack: I could take whatever I wanted, as long as I left a copy. I hadn’t been prepared for that. In fact, I had plans to meet Sue and her colleagues Russ Buettner and David Barstow (the other two journalists working on the story) at my house at 1:00 with whatever I’d managed to smuggle out. I texted Sue with the news that I’d be late.
At 3:00, I drove to the loading dock beneath the building, and nineteen boxes were loaded into the back of the borrowed truck I was driving since I couldn’t work the clutch in my own car.
It was just beginning to get dark when I pulled into my driveway. The three reporters were waiting for me in David’s white SUV, which sported a