One Way to Succeed (Casas de Buen Dia Book 1)

by Marjorie Pinkerton Miller

  “But, I have to ask you why you’re doing this,” Katie said. “Last time we went out, you said you were through with Rick, and you’re getting back with Rob.”

  “Maybe getting back with Rob,” Amy corrected her. “With a big, fat emphasis on ‘maybe.’”

  “So?”

  “So, maybe it has nothing to do with a guy. Maybe it’s about proving to myself that I have some skills that could be useful in this business. Maybe it’s about accomplishing something none of the other developers in town have been able to pull off. Just think how much that might mean when I’m looking for my next job.”

  “So you think you’re going to stay with real estate?”

  “I can’t be sure,” Amy said. “I’ve only been with this company less than a month, but the work really appeals to me. I am pretty certain with a little more experience, I could manage a company like Buen Dia. If I could work at Rick’s a few years, that would help even more, but if I can pull this off, I can truncate the process. I can move up the ladder quicker. At another firm, of course. I’m not crazy enough to think I can move up at Buen Dia.”

  “Maybe you’re giving up too soon,” Katie offered. “Maybe you’ve overestimated his aversion to having women in the business.”

  Amy wanted to dismiss Katie’s optimism, but her friend had shown her quiet wisdom in the past, helping her work through the split with Rob, for example. She decided to sit back and think about Katie’s suggestion. Perhaps the right thing to do was to contact his mother when she got back. They had gotten along well the night of his sister’s birthday party. Maybe Janet would be willing to sit down and help Amy understand Rick better.

  But first things first, she thought. Before they got to San Miguel the next morning, she had to figure out a strategy for approaching Marlena. Suddenly, she felt a jolt of fear. How the hell had she decided she knew what she was doing? How did she develop the chutzpah to make this trip? Even if she managed to get Marlena to talk with her, even if she got her to agree to consider selling her property, what would she do next? She’d never negotiated a real estate deal before.

  Amy closed her eyes and leaned her head back on the uncomfortable seat. She was out of her league, but now there was nothing to do but plow ahead.

  ~ Fourteen: Rick ~

  Rick thought it was not only odd but also rude. He came into work on Tuesday morning, and tried to find Amy. It was the first time since she started that she hadn’t beat him into the office, but now her door was locked.

  “She said she had to take a couple of days off,” Sandra told him when he wondered back into the front lobby to see if anyone knew where she was.

  “Why?”

  “She didn’t say. She just said it was urgent and personal.”

  “Well, isn’t that great,” Rick said. “I had planned to interview one of those COO candidates today.”

  “Oh, she already took care of that. You have appointments with three guys over the next three days. She had me check your calendar to make sure you were free,” Sandra said, handing over a stapled package of sheets. “She told me to give this to you.”

  Rick looked over the pages. The first was a simple schedule that showed that each interviewee had been scheduled to talk with the other executives in the office the same day he talked with Rick. He hadn’t asked her do that, but it seemed now like a good idea. Everyone from the marketing guy to the accountant to the mechanic was going to have to work with whomever he chose. Better if they all had a chance to look him over before Rick made his choice.

  Attached to the schedule were the three men’s resumes and a short summary of things that had concerned Amy about their candidacy and some things she had considered their strengths. Armed with that, he wouldn’t have to work too hard to come up with smart questions, he realized.

  The first candidate of the week was the school superintendent, a tall, balding guy that fit the academic stereotype both in his conservative looks and dress, and in his demeanor. He was sober, took his time thinking about each question before giving rather extended responses, and frequently referred to “archetypal profiles” when he talked about the people in the school district and the builders and city officials he worked with when the district built the new auditorium at the high school. He would probably be a good judge of character, which would come in handy for negotiating with landowners or sellers, but Rick wondered if he’d be any fun to work with.

  On Wednesday, he interviewed the golf course GM and worried only that the guy couldn’t articulate why he wanted to leave such a cushy position. Perhaps his references would help flesh that out, Rick thought. And on Thursday, the third day of Amy’s absence, Rick finished up his third interview, the one with the district manager of the fast food chain. It was the worst interview of the three. Rick couldn’t help the fact that the adjective “greasy” kept coming to mind; the man’s slippery way of skirting around questions and giving half answers seemed in keeping with the main product his restaurants served: fried chicken.

  Each candidate also interviewed with at least three of Rick’s executives, and they turned in their impressions by the end of each day. Rick wished he could have had Amy interview them too: she was the person who probably best understood what the job would entail, because, he hated to admit, she was already doing most of it. But she had chosen to skip out on him, which irritated him night and day, all week.

  Also irritating him was not having her around to screen his calls. In her absence, Sandra was answering his phone, and she was far quicker to transfer nearly everyone who called in to his phone. Now he realized how much time Amy had been saving him over the past couple of weeks.

  Sandra’s worst slip up was letting Beau D’Matrio through late Thursday afternoon, after Rick had finished his interview with the greasy fast-food manager.

  “And who did you say you were again?” Rick asked when Beau had been patched through and had introduced himself.

  “I’m a close relative of yours,” Beau said. His gruff voice sounded staged, like he was trying to intimidate Rick.

  “What kind of relative? Cousin? Just how are we related?”

  “I’d rather tell you that in person.”

  “Well, I’d need to have a reason to allow that,” Rick said. “What is it you want?”

  Beau paused, and Rick guessed it was for effect, not because he didn’t know.

  “I believe that, too, will have to wait until we meet face to face.”

  “I’m afraid, Beau, that you have failed to convince me to put you on my calendar. If you want to call back with a specific request, please ask for Amy Prentiss. She will set up a meeting if she feels that your interruption is warranted.” He knew that sounded officious, but the last impression he wanted to give this “Beau” was that he was either easy-going or vulnerable.

  Beau didn’t seem to expect the brushoff; he had no pithy come-back. Rick said “Goodbye” and hung up without waiting for one.

  ~

  “Oh, hi Rick,” Kent answered the phone. Apparently his desk phone had caller-ID. “Are you calling about those candidates you had me look at?”

  “Yes, and then I have another assignment.”

  “Wow, man!” Kent laughed. “You are one snoopy guy! Who is it this time?”

  “Some guy named Beau D’Matrio—or at least that what he says his name is,” Rick said, and then filled him in on the mysterious man’s phone call. “He called a few days ago, but Amy didn’t let him through.”

  “Smart girl,” Kent said. “I’ll dig around for you. And how is it going with Amy, anyway? Have you given her the boot yet?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Why not?”

  Rick wondered how truthful he wanted to be. He had the opportunity on Monday to dismiss her, but he’d put it off, still hoping that he could figure out what had gone wrong between them and fix it before he had to let her go. Yes, he would have to let her go even if he was able to patch things up with her, but then, perhaps she wouldn’t leave angry. They coul
d still have a relationship.

  “She just took off for three days, spur of the moment,” Rick said. “I saw her dropping off her boyfriend at the airport on Sunday, so maybe it has something to do with him.”

  “She has a boyfriend?”

  “Don’t you remember? You reported on him when you investigated her for me.”

  “Yeah, that’s possible,” Kent said. “But I usually don’t remember those kinds of details unless I think they’re going to come in handy later. That’s too much personal stuff to carry around in my head. But, do you want me to find out where she went?”

  “You can do that?”

  “Sure,” Kent sounded like he took Rick’s doubt as an insult.

  Rick thought a moment. “No, I don’t think so,” he said. “I think that is just too much of an invasion of her privacy. I’ll just have to see if she tells me when she gets back. If not, it probably doesn’t matter anyway. But let me know what you find out about this Beau guy.”

  ~

  Summers in Palm Springs could be brutally hot, but the good thing about them, in Rick’s opinion, was the three-or-four-month break in the charity event schedule. Now with the advent of fall, Rick knew it wouldn’t be long before his mother would call and demand he attend some dinner, ball, or other fundraiser with her. She had never remarried after his father left, and that meant that from the time Rick was old enough to serve as her escort, he had been called upon to accompany her to several excruciating events a year. He knew the logic of putting on outrageously expensive events to raise a few thousand dollars for charity—even when the events cost as much as they raised for the charity. It’s how it worked; if the events weren’t over-the-top, no one would show up; and if no one showed up, no money would be raised. Most people didn’t send in anonymous checks to organizations; they wanted to be seen contributing to them.

  “What do you mean ‘smelly?’” his mother asked. She had called two weeks before to tell him about the annual dinner and dance put on by the food bank she contributed to down valley, and he had mumbled his distaste for her “boring and smelly” events, the extravagant food, and the costume contest that broke out as everyone arrived in their newest Versace or Valentino.

  “Smelly because some of those old ladies seem to bathe in their perfume,” he said. “It makes me gag.”

  “Well, how is everyone going to know they can afford Notorious if everyone can’t smell it?” His mother laughed. “Just put some Vaseline under your nose when you leave the house and it won’t bother you so much.”

  “Why don’t you ask Howard to take you?” Rick continued to try to find a way out of going with her.

  “I’d rather be drowned in a bottle of Notorious than spend an entire night with Howard,” his mother responded quickly. “Not only is he dull as shit, he also looks like an iguana. I won’t be caught dead getting pictured in Palm Springs Life standing next to him.” It was Rick’s turn to laugh.

  “But do you have to have a male escort? Can’t Elaine go with you? Or how about Amy? You seemed to like her.”

  “She’d be a great second choice, but my first choice is you, dear son,” his mother said. “I only ask you to do these things about six times a year. Some men get dragged along to something every week. And this one is a little less extravagant than most. After all, how fancy can the food be if you’re raising money for people who don’t have any?”

  As he finished dressing in his tux Thursday evening, he talked himself into thinking the event would help distract him from thinking about Amy’s return the next morning. He had missed her calm competence around the office. But, he knew it was more than that. He simply loved watching her as well—watching as she stood, hands on hips, explaining an arcane bookkeeping concept to James, whose strong suit was financing, not accounting; and watching while she sat, straight-backed and yet animated, helping Guy learn how to update their new Facebook page.

  Even if they irritated the hell out of him, his mother’s society friends would demand his attention all evening. There was nothing like a handsome, thirty-something at a charity dinner when it came to attracting attention. He’d be the youngest, most eligible bachelor in the room, especially now that Amy’s boyfriend Rob had left the scene.

  He also intended to use the opportunity to talk with his mother to explore whether she knew anything about Beau D’Matrio. If he was indeed a relative, surely she would have heard of him.

  The limo she had sent to pick him up pulled into her circular drive with Rick in back, and his mother strode out of the house and settled into the seat with him, leaning over so he could give her the obligatory kiss. He decided to ask if she knew who Beau was right up front before he forgot.

  “He’s called my office twice in the past week. Is he a cousin or something?”

  Immediately, his mother opened her purse and removed a tube of lipstick and a compact mirror. It was a trick of hers: laboriously reapplying a layer of lipstick while she figured out how to answer some question. He’d seen it a million times if he’d seen it once, and he knew she was buying time before she had to say anything.

  “Mother, if you know something, you have to tell me,” Rick said. “I’m afraid this guy is a stalker or something, and I need to know what I’m up against.”

  His mother held the mirror up to her lips, raised her chin to catch more of the limousine’s interior light, and slowly traced a perfect streak of lipstick on the bottom lip first, and then on the top. He watched her with a vague sense of repulsion mixed with pride. He thought she was usually the most elegant woman in the room—and that was even back when Beautiful Betty had been accompanying them to these events—but at the same time, he found the bright red lipstick disgusting. Did women really think that thick paste was attractive, or did they use it as a shield against anyone who might consider actually landing one of those society kisses on their lips?

  Finally, she snapped the compact closed, retracted the lipstick into its tube, and replaced them in her tiny clutch.

  “Where’s Amy tonight?” she asked, pretending he had never asked about Beau.

  “Mom, I asked if you had any idea who Beau D’Matrio is,” he repeated. “Don’t change the subject.”

  “I’m not sure if I’ve heard the name,” she said, turning away from him to stare out the window.

  “What do you mean you’re ‘not sure?’?”

  “I can’t remember,” she mumbled at the window.

  “Mom, your memory is better than mine,” Rick protested. “Is there some secret here you’re keeping from me? Who is this guy?”

  “Rick,” she said, turning back and glaring at him with her ‘I’m still your mother’ face. “This is not the time. We can talk about this later. But I don’t want to go into it minutes before we go into this event.”

  “Okay, but I’m not dropping it.”

  “Fine. How’s Amy doing? We should have thought about bringing her along tonight. You two would make a fine-looking couple. I think she is prettier than Beautiful Betty. It goes without saying that’s she smarter. That wasn’t a very high bar.”

  Rick chuckled. Even his mother had started to use his nickname for his ex-wife once his marriage had started to fall apart. He had to give her credit: if she’d had a problem with his marriage to Betty from the start, she’d kept it to herself until it was clear that it was over.

  “I’m not sure Amy would be up for this kind of thing,” Rick said.

  “Did you ask her?”

  “Mom, Amy’s been out of town for three days. And I think she’s getting back together with her old boyfriend.”

  “Really? That pretty-boy TV anchor? I think he’s shown up at every charity event I ever went to,” she said. “Whatever happened to him?”

  “He moved to L.A.”

  “Oh, no! Are you going to lose her now? Here I thought you two had something more than work going on between you. I’ll have to tell you, I’m very disappointed.”

  “So am I, Mom. So am I.”

  ~ Fif
teen: Amy ~

  As she walked down a narrow sidewalk from her hotel in the town square to Marlena’s house early Wednesday morning, Amy still wasn’t sure how she was going to introduce herself. Despite a round of roleplaying with Katie and a sleepless night, she hadn’t settled on anything that sounded right.

  From the street, Marlena’s house was indistinguishable from its neighbors. An unbroken stucco wall ran along the sidewalk the entire length of the block, and the only thing that marked the beginning of one house from the end of another was a change in color. The flat façade gave no indication of the relative plainness, beauty, meagerness, or splendor of what lay beyond it. A simple carriage light hung next to the door of Marlena’s house, the street number—88 San Martin—painted below it.

  The air was sticky with the possibility of rain, and just as she rang the bell at the plain wood door, the cloud above the city burst. With nothing but her small purse to protect herself, Amy was relieved when a thin arm that looked like it belonged to a young Mexican woman reached out the door and pulled her into a narrow entry way lined to the sky with vines and trees.

  Without a word, Amy followed the woman into a covered hallway between the roofless entry and a huge roofless atrium. She swiped the water off her clothes and shook her hair as she looked around. The young woman looked at her expectantly, wiping her wet hands on her apron. Amy thought she was probably a maid.

  “Norte americana?” she asked Amy, pointing at her.

  “Sí. Está Sra—” She started to ask if Senora Benavides was in, but she was quickly interrupted.

  “Un momento,” the maid said. She ran through the atrium to what looked like a central foyer and disappeared around a corner.

  Despite its pedestrian appearance from the outside, the house was grand and huge, Amy realized, peering into the atrium. Rain was collecting on big banana-tree sized leaves, and dripping off huge palms that stood in the atrium. They must have been growing in there for at least a century, Amy thought, marveling at the lush greenery.