A Cutthroat Business

by Jenna Bennett

  Chapter 9.

  Alexandra hung around until about 8, drinking Coke and eating nachos, and then said she had to leave. With what had happened to Brenda, Steven wanted to keep his kids extra close, and he had imposed a nine o’clock curfew. I walked Alexandra to her car, which was an almost new, candy apple red Mazda Miata. “My mom gave it to me when I turned sixteen,” Alexandra explained. She looked at the car for a second, and I swear I saw tears in her eyes, before she turned away and opened the car door. “See you, Savannah.”

  I nodded. “You take care. Call me if you want to talk more.”

  I watched her drive away, and then I headed down the street toward Walker Lamont Realty and toward my car, thinking hard thoughts.

  Alexandra must have had some kind of reason for contacting me, but I was darned if I could figure out what it was. It didn’t seem as if wanting to talk about her mother with someone sympathetic and not too far removed from her own age had been it. She hadn’t asked me any tough questions, none I hadn’t been prepared for, anyway. On the other hand, she’d been remarkably forthcoming with answers to the questions I asked her, even going so far as to tell me about Brenda’s ways of getting around Walker’s professional supervision.

  If Brenda had opted to handle the contract for 101 Potsdam Street at Beckett’s Bar instead of at the office, that must mean that there was something about it she didn’t want Walker to know. Brenda was dead and couldn’t object to my going through her stuff, but I was pretty sure I knew what Clarice’s reaction would be if I walked into the office tomorrow and told her I wanted to see the file for 101 Potsdam. I could go over her head and ask Walker for it, but then I’d have to explain why I wanted it, and I didn’t want to do that until I was sure I wasn’t making a fuss about nothing. Walker was already reeling from the shock of Brenda’s murder, and then the story in the Voice had hit him again. His appointment to the real estate commission might already be in jeopardy, and I didn’t want to do anything to mess it up.

  But there was no one in the office right now, to object to anything I did. Clarice was compulsively neat, so it shouldn’t take much more than a minute to find the file. I’d be in and out in no time, without anyone realizing that I’d ever been there. And then I’d know once and for all whether Tondalia Jenkins had signed the papers herself, or whether she had had an attorney-in-fact — Tyrell, for instance — who had done it for her.

  It was the work of a few seconds to unlock the back door and turn off the alarm, and I made sure that Brenda’s office door was latched securely behind me before I turned on the ceiling light. The small strip of light under the door wouldn’t be noticeable to anyone outside the building, and the chances that someone else would show up at this time of night were surely pretty slim. I ought to be safe for the short time it would take me to find what I was looking for and get out.

  I was helped by Clarice’s devotion to Brenda and her compulsive attention to detail. Everything was obsessively neat. The piles of paper on the desk were stacked by size, with the largest piece on the bottom, and the smallest on top. Every corner was aligned perfectly. Every paperclip was in the paperclip holder, every rubber band in its place, and every last blank on every last form in every last file was filled in appropriately.

  The files were arranged alphabetically, each file drawer clearly marked. A-E, F-K, L-O, etc. The filing cabinets were locked up tight, but there was a set of keys in the desk, where I had found the extra key for the house on Potsdam earlier in the week. In the Active Listings drawer, everything was sorted by number, chronologically. I flipped through the manila folders. 16 Sunflower Lane and 19 Orchard Place gave way to 1023 Landsdowne Court and 1141 Tyne Boulevard. I frowned and went back to the beginning. The folder for 101 Potsdam Street wasn’t there.

  There were a couple of different explanations for something like that. The first, that Clarice had made a mistake and neglected to make a file, I discarded as extremely unlikely. Clarice would never make a mistake like that.

  The second, that the folder had been misfiled in all the hoopla, was easy enough to check. After rifling through all the Active Listings folders, I could say with certainty that the file I was looking for wasn’t among them.

  The third possibility, that it had been misfiled somewhere else, was more difficult to determine, due to the sheer volume of folders. There were six six-drawer filing cabinets in the room, and that wasn’t even a drop in the ocean of listings that Brenda had handled in her twenty plus years in the business. She had a rented storage unit somewhere, where she kept everything that wasn’t current. The Potsdam Street file was current, and should have been in the office, but there was just the chance that it had been taken to the storage unit by mistake sometime recently. Or on purpose, if Brenda hadn’t wanted it sitting around where someone ― like me, or Walker ― would have access to it. I had no idea where the unit was, but the desk drawer held, in addition to the keys to the file cabinets and the spare key to 101 Potsdam, a key ring with a couple of keys marked ‘storage unit’.

  I stood and looked at them for a moment, biting my lip. There were three of them, all seemingly identical, and chances were that no one would notice if I just borrowed one for a couple of days. I could come back tomorrow night or Saturday morning and put it back. I usually do floor duty on Saturdays anyway, and I’m usually alone.

  If there was the slightest chance that the Potsdam folder was at the storage unit, I should check it out. I owed it to Mrs. Jenkins, not to mention to Walker and the Realtor’s Code of Ethics. If Brenda had been breaking the law, we needed to know. With a key, I wouldn’t even really be breaking in, and since I worked in the same office as Brenda, nobody was likely to question my right to be there. Even so, my heart was beating double-time as I painstakingly twisted one of the keys off the chain.

  Between the blood pounding in my ears and the fact that I’d been in the office for long enough to feel comfortable, I wasn’t keeping an ear peeled for noises anymore. As a result, I had no idea that anyone else had arrived until the connecting door into Clarice’s and Heidi’s shared office swung open. All I had time to do, was drop the storage unit key into my skirt pocket and nudge the drawer shut with my hip before I turned to face the door.

  Clarice stood in the doorway, looking as if all her dreams had come true at once. “Savannah!”

  “Oh,” I said dumbly. “Hi, Clarice.”

  “What are you doing?” She scanned the room suspiciously, but there was nothing to see. Thank God I hadn’t found the 101 Potsdam Street file, or it would be sitting in plain view on the desk right now.

  I thought quickly. The excuse I came up with wasn’t great, but it had the benefit of being unprovable. “I needed a blank buyer representation agreement.”

  “At 9 o’clock at night?” She glanced pointedly at the reproduction filigree clock ticking daintily away on top of one of the filing cabinets.

  “I just had a drink at the FinBar. It was easy to stop by on my way home.” And if she thought the drink had been with a potential client, whom I wanted to sign to an exclusive representation agreement ASAP, so much the better.

  “And you thought you might find one on Brenda’s desk?” It wasn’t so much a question as a comment on the stupidity of my excuse. It was obvious she didn’t believe me. I shrugged, pouting. She added, with unmistakable relish, “I’ll have to tell Walker that you were here, you know.” She smiled in happy anticipation. “And believe me, he isn’t going to be pleased. You may find yourself out on your ear, my fine girl.”

  It sounded as if nothing would please her more.

  “Walker likes me,” I said, with more confidence than I felt. “He won’t fire me for going into Brenda’s office. Even after hours.”

  “Snooping in other agents’ files, to give your own client an added advantage, is illegal. And Walker isn’t the man to let anyone get away with anything illegal.” She tittered.

  It was an unusual sound, not common to the Clarice I knew. I looked more closely at her. Sh
e was dressed the way she always was, in a dowdy skirt and blouse and sensible shoes, with her graying hair in its usual severe bob, but there was something different about her tonight. Her eyes were brighter than usual, and there was an air of suppressed excitement about her. And I didn’t think it had anything to do with catching me red-handed in someone else’s office. That was just an added bonus, like the cherry on the sundae.

  My mother impressed upon me from an early age that one catches more flies with honey than with vinegar. I smiled. “You look nice tonight, Clarice. Are you going on a date? Or coming from one?”

  Flattery works (almost) every time. She preened. “Going, actually. Although it isn’t really a date. More like a business meeting. A late business meeting.”

  “Right,” I said, hiding a smile.

  “I just came to pick something up.” She turned on her heel and made for her own desk, in the adjoining room. I sauntered to the door and watched as she unlocked a desk drawer and pulled out a plain manila envelope and a piece of paper.

  The key went into her pocket, and then she handed me the piece of paper and smirked. “Are you ready to go, Savannah? Have everything you need?”

  I glanced down at the form in my hand. It was a Buyer Representation Agreement.

  “Yes, thank you.” I snagged my handbag from the corner of Brenda’s desk. We walked out together, and Clarice set the alarm and locked the door behind us quite ostentatiously, as if to ensure that I couldn’t get back inside. It didn’t bother me, since I had no plans to go back.

  “Have a nice night, Savannah.” She smiled, obviously pleased with having ruined what was left of my evening, before trotting briskly across the street toward the parking lot. The envelope bobbed in her hand, and the one-and-a-half inch heels on her sensible shoes went click-click against the pavement. Her late-model, white Cadillac was parked two spaces over from my Volvo, but she didn’t suggest that we walk together. I stayed where I was until she had gotten into her car and pulled out into traffic, and then I crossed the street and got into my own car. My thoughts were rattling around in my head like peas in a tin can the whole way home.

  It was still reasonably early by the time I got to the apartment, so I kicked my shoes off, picked up the phone, and called Sweetwater. “Hiya, Dix. This is your sister Savannah.”

  “What’s this I hear about you and that Collier-guy?” my brother answered, without so much as a how-do first.

  “Yes, it’s nice to talk to you, too,” I said, pulling a half-eaten half gallon of ice cream out of the freezer. Chocolate Mocha Fudge. Yum. “I don’t know. What is it you’ve heard about me and the Collier-guy? And from whom?”

  “Oh, come on, sis!”

  “No, I mean it. How am I supposed to prove or disprove anything, if I don’t know what you’ve heard?” I rooted around in the silverware drawer for a spoon, and finally managed to find one. Stainless steel, part of a set I’d bought for $10.99 at Target two years ago, after having left all my wedding silver for Bradley and the new Mrs. Ferguson.

  This reasoned argument resonated with my legal eagle brother, who admitted, “I had lunch with Todd Satterfield today, and he told me you’ve been seeing Collier.”

  “Todd said that? What’s wrong with him?” I curled up on the couch, spooning ice cream straight out of the cardboard container and into my mouth. All my fancy china was back at the Fergusons’ townhouse, too. Including my crystal ice cream bowls. “I haven’t been seeing Rafe. That is, I’ve seen him, but I haven’t been seeing him. Not as in seeing, seeing.”

  “You’ll never be a lawyer if you can’t express yourself better than that,” Dix said.

  “I don’t want to be a lawyer,” I retorted. “I’m the black sheep, remember? The only Martin-child who didn’t get a law degree.”

  “You could have had a law degree if you wanted. You dropped out and married that jerk Ferguson instead.”

  “That’s exactly my point,” I answered. “I didn’t want a law degree. That’s why I dropped out to marry that jerk Ferguson.”

  “At least you admit it,” Dix said. “There was a time...”

  “He didn’t seem like a jerk when I first met him. Now I know better. And real estate isn’t that different from lawyering. I still deal with privilege and fiduciary responsibility and legal signatures and things like that. My real estate classes were pretty much the same as Property Law 101 back in college. Except now I get to go look at houses every day, and you know how I’ve always enjoyed that.”

  I was one of those little girls who always opened doors when I visited my friends’ houses, to see where they went. And growing up in an antebellum mansion in the middle of a town full of Victorians and foursquares and craftsman bungalows hadn’t hurt, either.

  “But to get back to the point,” I continued, “the real point, which is that I have not been seeing Rafael Collier. I have no idea why Todd would tell you that I have.”

  “He’s probably worried about you,” Dix said. “Like the rest of us when we heard. Collier’s bad news. Stay away from him.”

  “Believe me,” I answered sincerely, “that’s exactly what I plan to do. I just don’t understand how anyone who knows me could think that I’d get involved with someone like him.” I dug a chunk of fudge out of the ice cream container and popped it in my mouth.

  “Well, you are the black sheep of the family.”

  “There’s a big difference between dropping out of law-school and becoming romantically involved with a criminal,” I said, around the fudge.

  Dix drew breath. “So you admit he’s a criminal?”

  “Enough of the cross-examination, OK? I have no idea what he is or isn’t. I’ve tried to find out, but I can’t. And that leads me to the reason why I called you.”

  “You want me to look into Collier?”

  I blew out an exasperated sigh. “No, Dix. I don’t. This has nothing to do with Rafael Collier. Or only indirectly. You know a little bit about tracking down people, right? Heirs and such?”

  “A little,” Dix said cautiously, and went on to expound on what he only knew a little about. I cut him off after a couple of minutes.

  “That’s great information, but what I really want to know is how to go about finding someone, if I’ve got nothing to go on but a name and a location where they lived at one point.”

  Dix thought for a moment. “I’m not sure you could, without more. Who are we talking about?”

  “The son of a woman named Tondalia Jenkins.” I told him about the house on Potsdam Street. “It’s just not right, Dix. I haven’t figured out how yet, but Brenda Puckett must have taken advantage of that poor old woman somehow, and now she’s stuck in a nursing home that would turn your stomach if you could see it, let alone smell it, and she’s got Rafe Collier breathing down her neck...”

  “He probably thinks she’s got something worth stealing,” Dix said.

  “If so, he must be crazy. She’s clearly as poor as a church mouse, bless her heart. The only thing of value she owns, is the house, and even that isn’t worth much in its present condition. Nowhere near as much as Brenda listed it for. Or if it is, it’s only because of the land. But that’s beside the point. I’d just like to find out if her son is still around and can help her. There’s nothing I can do about it personally; I’m not a family member, and it would probably be a conflict of interest or something anyway, but she ought to have someone looking out for her.”

  “Fine,” Dix said, “I’ll see if I can get a line on him. I’ve done this kind of thing before. But just to be safe, I think I’ll check out Collier, too. I’ll get back to you tomorrow.”

  I told him I appreciated it, and we both hung up.

  The first thing I did the next morning, after the usual morning ritual of make-up and hair, coffee and cereal, was to pull out the Yellow Pages and look up Storage — Household & Commercial. As I should have expected, there was page after page of storage companies, from A-1 Self Storage to U-Stor-It, and without some idea what I was l
ooking for, there was no way I could find out which of them Brenda had used. I toyed with the idea of calling them all, to ask if Brenda Puckett was a customer, but there were too many. It would take forever, and they probably wouldn’t tell me anyway. There had to be a simpler solution.

  My father always used to say that the easiest way to get something you want, is to ask for it. I decided that his advice made sense, and headed for the office. Someone there would be able to tell me where Brenda kept her stuff. But when I walked in, with a cover story all developed and rehearsed, I was brought up short just inside the door by loud wailing and lamentations. Brittany looked up from the reception desk with red eyes and quivering lips. When she saw that I wasn’t anyone important, like a potential client, she looked down again without a word.

  “Good grief,” I said, “what’s the matter?”

  She didn’t answer, just sniffed and pointed down the hall. I headed in that direction. And I’ll admit that I was, rather self-centeredly, wondering if this had something to do with my late-night search of Brenda’s office and Clarice’s threat to report me to Walker. Was I about to get fired? It seemed incredible that Brittany would expend this much effort and this many tears on my own humble person, but I admit it, the thought crossed my mind.

  The loud wailing came from Clarice’s and Heidi’s shared office, and when I arrived at the door, I saw that it issued from Heidi, who was sitting behind her desk, clutching a sodden tissue and having her hand patted by Walker. Tim was perched on the edge of Clarice’s desk a few feet away, watching the proceedings. His features were unusually solemn, although he couldn’t quite hide the gleam at the bottom of his bright, baby-blue eyes.

  “What on earth is going on?” I said. All three of them turned to me, and Walker opened his mouth. Heidi’s wailing drowned out anything he attempted to say.