Chapter 1

Bismarck, North Dakota, is not the place I would select as a travel destination for anyone in early December. Still, as an arbitrator, you go to the site the parties have chosen.

I had been on the National Arbitration Panel for fourteen years, almost from the day I graduated from law school. I started filling in for a prominent NYC firm of arbitrators doing consumer auto repair cases. I worked my way up to major corporate contract disputes.

Thankfully, Bismarck was enjoying clear, sunny weather at this point in the season. The arbitration was for two of the nation’s largest manufacturers, neither of which did business in North Dakota. The site selection was almost certainly due to the desire to litigate post-arbitration in the North Dakota courts. The leading states for these major corporate arbitrations are New York, the commercial US capital, and Delaware, the state that has the most incorporations. Either state would provide a swift resolution of any post-arbitration litigation. However, at least one party was depending on my making the kind of mistakes that would require review and had chosen the place with less experience in handling these cases. It was not my place to criticize, but to make no appealable errors. I was paid exceptionally well to travel to North Dakota in winter and let the parties put forward their cases. I didn’t worry about which court would be looking over my shoulder.

Things went extraordinarily well the first day, but as I went to open my hearing the following day, the parties informed me they had settled the matter overnight.

“So, we’re done?” I asked.

“Yes,” came the response from a group of smiling lawyers. I thought it was a bit of a waste of time, but nothing I could complain about since they handed me a large check for services I had barely provided.

I then had the opportunity to get home early. This was a real boon since I had left my seventeen-year-old daughter in charge of the house and her thirteen-year-old brother. Constance – Connie, as we called her – was a very mature girl for her age, but her brother, Thomas, was your average teen male, full of himself and a bit of mischief. Shifting the parental duties onto Connie was unfair, and I rarely did so. Still, the Bismarck arbitration was a rare bit of work, and my wife, Catherine – Kate – was traveling for work as usual. She worked as a model in an agency she ran with her mother.

I never complained about Kate being out of town for work, even during the holidays. Our seventeen years of marriage had been filled with many hardships. From the first, my wife never complained, and was out chasing employment to pay the rent and put food on the table while I made my way through law school. Only recently did my income reach a point where it could support us. And it was still not close to the high six figures that Kate brought in from her career as a model.

Now I know you are doing the math. Yes, Connie was born only two months after the wedding. My wife was very pregnant on our wedding day. She had, in fact, turned me down when I first proposed. It was only later that she reluctantly relented.

That wasn’t because we didn’t love each other. We started as friends. It was the only relationship a shy, awkward guy like me could have with the hottest girl at New York University.

NYU is the largest private university in the nation and is home to a renowned drama and film school. Kate’s undisputed designation as the most beautiful and sexiest co-ed made her out of my reach as anything but a friend.

Catherine Devroe was a Drama/Film major. She had the talent to go with her beauty. Still, in hindsight, she lacked the killer determination for success at any cost that seemed required for a successful film career. I believe Kate had the loving heart that made for a great mother and wife, but not a film star. Still, if you saw her perform, you would agree that her talent was outstanding.

People said I followed Kate around NYU – and New York in general – like her puppy dog. Perhaps they were right. But the puppy was a pit bull. I was Kate’s friend, but I saw myself as more her protector in many ways. If we were at a party and a fellow came off as too aggressive, I was there to show him the value of gentlemanly manners.

I was a good student, but poor in the cash department. I earned my pocket money working in the local Gold’s Gym, giving instruction on boxing (my sport) and judo (my passion). At six feet plus and broad of shoulder, few challenged me outside a refereed match in the gym.

Kate and I met in a student dramatic performance of My Sister Eileen. I was the director’s friend, and he dragooned me into playing the athlete neighbor part. Kate had the title role of Eileen. A friendship blossomed, and Kate (maybe out of sympathy for the raggedy, shy gym rat) would take me along to the parties and social events she attended.

Walking beside Kate into a gathering is an experience you could not forget. Every head turned her way. Every male – and far too many females – lusted for her. Everyone wanted to interact with her, even if it was just a word in passing or an exchange of smiles.

She was constantly pursued and had numerous boyfriends, including a football star. I was more envious than jealous, and I ached for Kate to recognize me as more than just a friend. Finally, two years of seeing each other led to a relationship based more on being soul mates than bedmates. That did not stop us from eventually becoming friends with benefits and, thus, a married couple with a child.

Kate’s reluctance to wed came more from a fear that I might not be the natural father of Connie than a lack of love. Since Kate had a line of boyfriends and was often pursued by more than one at a time, paternity was in question.

“It wouldn’t be fair,” she told me. “You could have regrets later.”

“What isn’t fair, Kate, is for you not to believe I will always love you and our child. No matter what. If you love me, you will trust in me.”

In marrying me and settling down into marriage and motherhood, Kate gave up a lifestyle that very much suited her. She was, at heart, an exhibitionist and a party girl. I knew she regretted our more sedate life, but she threw herself into being a great mother and wife.

Being married to a woman as attractive as Kate had its problems. I am not, by nature, a jealous man, but when we were out together, she was often the target of attention from other men. Most of this was unwanted, and I am large enough and formidable enough to protect my wife from pushy lotharios who don’t seem to understand the words no, I’m married. However, Kate had a way of drawing the attention of men far more attractive and successful than I, and they were often subtle, charming, and not that easy to discourage.

Nevertheless, here we were over seventeen years later, with a house in Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn, two great kids, and what I believed was a bright future and a happy-ever-after ending.

I hit the hotel in Bismarck at a run and was at the airport by 10:00 a.m., only to be told there were no flights east due to the weather.