One month and thirteen days earlier…
He checked his inbox as soon as he woke up that morning, Bennet had not answered him. It was 9:03, come on, it was a workday, why hadn't the guy checked his email yet?
10:03: nothing.
11:43: nothing.
12:02: Mike received Spam from an email dress that read: PrinceOfPersia11.
Mike deleted that message.
14:45: Mike was growing hopeless, what if his message had been redirected to Bennet's spam box?
16:35: again; nothing.
17:05: nothing.
Mike closed his laptop, (which had been funded by Harvey), clearly, the guy wouldn't answer. He needed to come up with another strategy, but what? He had hoped on a conversation where Bennet would ask him: What or why, or who are you, and then Mike could get some dirt on him. Mike picked up a book a nurse had gotten him and started reading one of Hemmingway's classics.
20:13 was the time Harvey knocked on the door.
"Hey Mike, how are you?" Mike smiled in return,
"Hi, yeah no, it's great." Harvey raised a brow, his arm leaning on the doorway.
"So, did you stay away from trouble as I asked you?" was Mike allowed to lie? He decided to reply the question with another question.
"If you would refer staying away from trouble as not doing drugs or god forbid anything else…"
"Yes."
"Then yeah," Mike placed down his book on the counter, and then he reached his computer, hoping that the guy had answered.
"What are you doing?" he asked as soon as Mike logged into the computer.
"Uh, you know, just checking the mail."
"What did you do?"
"-I don't follow."
"Right, you lack of severe brain-damage, just so the two of us stay clear: I read people. I know the second you're lying; I know the moment you're telling the truth and right now you're hiding something, so I will ask the question again: What did you do?" Damn, Mike didn't like this guy knowing about Mike's not so thought-out plan.
"I—" that's when he saw that Bennet had answered him, his heart started pounding a little faster as he opened it.
Mike: I know what you did.
Bennet Jackson: I don't know who you are or think you are, but let me be clear about one thing: I do not tolerate idiots terrorizing my private email. Message me again and I will let the law enforcement take care of you.
This was a very odd reaction; normal people would just ignore this kind of message, Bennet, on the other hand seemed ready to throw the most expensive lawyers at this idiot to eat him alive, over what, one "idiot" message saying "I know what you did"? No. Something was wrong; the guy was hiding something and was clearly guilty.
Mike felt someone's breath on the side of his neck, so he turned around to see Harvey's face a bit too close to his own.
"Is he the one that did this to you?" he emphasized the word as he gestured at Mike.
"Yes," Mike wanted to type him back, but Harvey closed his laptop.
"What the hell do you think you're doing? You can't be seen, or hell, have been emailing each other like pen-pals before the trial! Since you're our only witness, they will dismiss our case on bullshit causes like witness-tampering."
"Harvey, I'm not stupid, I used an alias email."
"Mike, it's 2015, they can track you easily, if Lola could hack into the system and make you into a Harvard graduate, then-" his voice faltered as he realized what he had just said.
"A Harvard what?" Again, how could the timeframe of him going to law school, especially Harvard, fit? Harvey had told him that he had posed as a candidate to be Harvey's new associate, but their conversation had drifted into something else, which made Mike forget.
"Harvey, what do you mean? How could I candidate to become your associate, who is Lola, how could I possibly have gone to Harvard and been hired at your firm?"
"Mike…"
"No, answer me." Harvey sunk deeper in to the chair and his nostrils widened as he took a deep breath.
"Mike. Once you know, you can't un-know. Are you sure that you want me to tell you?" Mike could feel his veins in his head tightening, when he closed his eyes it felt as if the room was slightly spinning.
"I want you to tell me everything. I'm ready." Harvey's mouth widened to a small smile.
"I'm sure you are, question is, if I am." Silence filled the air, and Mike bit the back of his lip, he closed his eyes, the pain in his head was growing stronger, the room started spinning.
"You never went to Harvard, or any other law school for the matter. Yet you worked as a lawyer in the major leagues. Mike, you worked as my associate, a lawyer, but you never went to law school."
1 out of 10, Mike rated the headache as a eleven.
Mike what were you thinking?
Mike what have you done?
Mike you shouldn't have done that.
Mike, now we are screwed.
It was as if Harvey was the parent and Mike was the troubled teenager that had abused drugs or something. Bennet had answered that he would sue Mike or whatever if he sent him one more email. Only question was, should he do what he wanted to do next? Harvey had basically scolded at him, daring him that if he emailed Jackson a simple hi, Mike would regret it. He had threatened him. But Mike didn't want to listen, so he opened the laptop. He was going to do this on his own. All he could do after the "accident" was to assume a lot of things the people told him. And then some things were still incomprehensible to him. For example, some of his favorite TV shows had ended. He opened a new message; he decided to write back to Jackson.
I know what happened over a month ago in that dark ally, I collected evidence of the incident before you got rid of the car. Mike tried to be mysterious, but not too cryptic. He reconsidered his further actions, and then he hit send; he did have a plan after all.
One month and twelve days earlier…
He checked on his inbox regularly and thought about how Harvey hadn't checked in on him yesterday, he hadn't even texted him. Maybe he was still mad about the mail he had sent to Bennet. But what's done can't be undone. He checked his mail and couldn't help his heart that suddenly felt like ice, but pumping in a rapid speed. But Jackson didn't threaten him this time, he didn't bring in the law enforcement into light, he didn't even call him an idiot or any other acronym, the only thing he wrote was: How much do you require to keep you quiet? The guy was guilty, and he had even admitted it. But in court this wouldn't be enough. He needed solid evidence to put a guy like him away. And once he had settled for a plan, he was planning on following it right through.
Tomorrow, 14:00, central park, come alone, bring your checkbook, if you bring anyone with you, I will know, and the rest of the world will know too. Same goes if you don't show up.
He felt as if he was in one of those bad mafia movies. Central park wasn't too far away, Mike should be able to sneak out of the hospital and then back before anyone noticed. Central park was usually crowded, but not too crowded around that time, which would make it nearly impossible for the guy to hurt him because of all the witnesses. But then Jackson could always have brought a gun. That's why Mike would have 911 on speed dial. Mike had one goal to fulfill tomorrow: to record Jackson admitting to the hit-and run. There was really no other way out of this mess. Trevor was shit, he was hiding under a stone or had escaped the country, nobody knew. And Harvey... Mike had started to trust the guy, but truth was that when it came to situations like these, the only one he could trust was himself. Tick tock, tomorrow the deed would be done.
One month and eleven days earlier: Mike couldn't walk appropriately yet, but if he had his stick with him, he would be just fine, probably. The nurses checked in on him every third hour or so, so he was going to be alright. So Mike took his stick when the nurses were out on their lunch break, and he leaned heavily on the stick as he tried to stand up. He had trained his muscles to be able to walk again, but he hadn't recovered completely, that's why he halted as he with the help of the stick, went to his locker and changed into grey sweatpants and hoodie. He placed the hoodie's cap over his head and pursued to the exit, looking down at the floor as he passed the lobby. Outside the hospital he felt his heart returning to its former state of beating, and he felt like he could finally breathe again. He looked at the phone's screen, 13:30, plenty of time to reach his destiny. He walked down to the nearest subway, payed for his ticket and then he couldn't believe how he had actually managed to pull this off. As he reached the park, his eyes scanned for the perfect spot to sit down, he targeted a bench, sat down, hid the stick in a dark duffle bag and then he prepared the recording device in his pocket he had gotten from Harvey yesterday.
"Harvey, I was wondering if you could get me a Dictaphone?"
"Wait, are you turning into Louise now?" Harvey stopped, hoping Mike would remember; but he didn't.
"I mean, if it's not too much to ask. I read about this method online. I take notes of these associations I have and then I listen through them, giving me like this red wired-" Mike didn't even get the chance to explain because Harvey interrupted with: "No, okay, I will just borrow Louis's girlfriend, which means his Dictaphone for a couple of days." Mike knew who Louis was, or, he had heard stories of him and Donna had showed him a picture of Louis holding his cat. But of what Mike had heard, Harvey made Louis sound like the first class dick. Mike pressed record, and taped it under the bench, this way, he could hide his phone in his pocket with his thumb resting on the call button without looking too suspicious. The man was punctual, one o'clock he could distinguish his face among the crowd of people, Mike made a small hand movement which caught Jackson's eye and he closed in on Mike and sat down beside him.
"I don't know who you think you are or think you know, but if this's all a joke I'm going to skin you alive." Jackson slid his fingers across the wooden bench, his fingers literally on top of the recorder, which made Mike's heart rate increase dramatically. Mike gave him a crook smile, he was lucky to wear sunglasses, because his eyes twitched of nervousness. "You thought that you could get away with hitting a civilian with your car and then drive away, without any witnesses- but you guessed wrong." Jackson narrowed his eyes, his fingers stopped, and then he smiled. "You got me here, presuming because you wanted to get to my money. But then the first thing you start talking about is me hitting that civilian. Why didn't you go straight to the point? Money?" Jackson licked his lips, and then his lips widened into a devious smile. His fingers now on their way under the bench, Mike's heart stopped and he pressed the call button. "When you are a person like me, you learn to be cautious", his fingers stopped, Jackson's brows arched. "You see, the street cameras around leading to that road at the time when I hit-" he ripped the recorder off the bench. "-You, showed no other people entering that road. It was only you, Ross, and Trevor at that street that specific time. And besides, it's 2015 Ross, it's easier than you think to track down IP addresses." shit, this guy... Was nothing like Mike had expected, he looked at the recorder.
"How did you..." Jackson smiled sympathetically.
"I read people, and especially when you gamble you also need to know body language. When I saw you, you looked down vertically, giving me the sign to pursue you, not until then you waved me to come over. Then you quickly shot a glance at the bench, which made me suspicious, when I slid my hands across the bench, you gave away nervous signals, you weren't in control of this meeting at all, so I suspected that something laid underneath the bench that you tried to hide your obvious attention to. So I decided to check it out and, tada, here we go" he paused Louis's recorder. "Now, I will make sure you don't use this to the opposite of my benefit." he dropped the recorder, and then stomped on it with his heal, the recorder cracked and fell apart. It was nothing than a useless pile of metall. Jackson's eyes wandered to Mike's left hand that rested in his pocket. "During this whole conversation, you haven't moved your left hand a single time, which must mean..." Jackson gripped his wrist and he dropped the phone, the phone remained in his pocket, but clumsy, Jackson retrieved it. HARVEY SPECTER - 2:52
Thank god Harvey had picked up. Jackson licked his lips. "Damn it."
/
TBC
I made short updates recently so I wrote a longer chapter this time :) Please review
