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agree with you. It's not worth the effort of struggling over this issue any longer, but it does make me angry. FYI, my job market is in the NYC area, and I lost a couple of friends in that disaster. What happened left me in a rather difficult position, and I don't know if I can find replacement work that quickly now. But I am alive.
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Just to show you that all hope in your case is lost, consider the concept of unbargained reliance. If you gave up future work so that you could be available to do this work, and further, if the client knew you did this, you could conceivably recover under a quasi-contract theory. If these facts represent what happened, the argument can be made that you gave up something, that you actually provided some consideration. If the consideration you gave was bargained for, you would have a contract. Since it was unbargained for, it is a quasi-contract theory. Again, the issue is about fairness. People should not string a person along to that person's detriment.

New York was the state that innovated this area of recovery. So with that said, you live in a good jurisdiction to go down that road. Again, if you wanted to go down this road, you would have to litigate the issue and expend money. This just goes to show that just because everything is not in writing, all hope is not lost.

Good luck..