"Sounds like padding the price is a way to make a sale that shouldn't be made," I observed.
Wide-eyed, he stared at me.
I knitted my brows, trying to look puzzled. "I ask because my friend is working with Amelia Hutchinson to buy a home. She's having problems with the contract."
"Oh, tell me." He put his hands on his knees and leaned forward.
I explained about Barry Hutchinson calling Vanessa's offer a contract when the sellers hadn't signed, then described the details of Vanessa's home buying fiasco. I elaborated on the distress to the buyer and added a few creative details for effect.
"That's not how we do business." He made a note on the form and folded it. "We refer to the mortgage broker after both parties sign the contract. We review changes with both the buyer and the seller to be certain they understand. Also, we never have open-ended time frames. That's asking for trouble."
I thought Hutchinson had significant cash flow problems and pushed sales, or, maybe, he had been inept. I poked deeper. "Amelia pressed the sellers to sign and left my friend stuck."
He tilted his head. "Now really? Amelia? I'm surprised."
His eyes darted to the doorway.
I glanced over my shoulder at Art Meyer.
Wiley said, "Come on in and join us. I completed Miss Burgess' file. She's ready to go."
All pre-qualified, I thought, masking my surprise with a cough. First, he tells me I won't quality, and, now, I'm set to look at homes. I stood to leave.
14
Art Meyer wore light yellow pants, a matching golf shirt, white loafers, white socks, and a stretchy white belt. His narrow shoulders accentuated his round belly.
"Mr. Meyer," I said. "Nice to see you again."
"Please, call me Art." He stepped back and waved his arm toward the front door. "Ready to go?"
"My pleasure." The quintessential, semi-retired, Jewish Floridian was taking me to look at houses.
As we walked, he said, "I picked a number of homes to visit. Some are more expensive, some town homes, a condo. It's a broad sampling so you'll know the market and can decide where you want to go from here."
"Are you sure you want to spend that much time with me? From what Mike Wiley said, I won't qualify for much of a mortgage."
"Sophia, let's take first things first. You said you wanted to look around. That's what we'll do."
This was going to be interesting, I predicted, walking to his car.
I felt like I was climbing into a Cadillac with one of my patients. "Nice car. You sure you need to work for a living?"
"I don't want to stay home with my wife. She's a k'vetsh. When we retired to Florida, ten years ago this month, I pursued a real estate license for something to do. I don't golf or play cards. This fills the time."
"A man with a plan. I like that." I settled back into supple leather seats. "Educate me on the real estate business."
Art talked while he drove, but he kept his eyes on the road, a careful driver.
Soon I felt safe and relaxed and gave my full attention to his running dialogue.
As we traveled from one property to another, he explained the real estate market. He responded to my questions about the business, contracts, and mortgages, convincing me Vanessa got a raw deal.
Next, I needed to steer the conversation to the Hutchinsons. I decided to be direct. "Can you tell me anything about Hutchinson Realty?"
"Why do you want to know?" He scowled, looking skeptical.
"My friend Vanessa is buying a home through them. She's having problems."
He pulled to a stop at the light on Pine Island and McNab Roads, tapping his fingers on the leather-covered steering wheel.
For a moment, I believed I'd had lost him, knowing he'd be justified in dumping me in the parking lot.
"Okay," he said, drawing out the word. "I suspect that's the real reason for your shopping expedition. I heard you talking to Mike about your friend." He paused and peered at me over his wire-framed glasses. "I should be angry with you for wasting my time. Truth is I'd be stuck home with my wife, and I'd rather be driving around with an attractive young woman. What is it you want to know?"
"I'm sorry. I should have bought you a cup of coffee and asked my questions."
"You wouldn't have gotten the answers. Too direct. Would have put me on the defensive. I'd have wondered why you singled me out, maybe looking to sue me or something."
"You're not mad?"
"No, like I said," he muttered something in Yiddish.
I mustered a matter-of-fact expression. "What can you tell me about them? Mike answered my questions about the contract, and you filled in the blanks."
He pulled into a strip shopping center, swung into an empty space, and backed out. We headed back north on Pine Island, which became Coral Springs Drive when we crossed into the next town.
The names of the streets in South Florida change at the whim of a politician. It's okay for residents. We know our way around. Tourists get lost.
Art glanced in my direction. "Hutchinson has been in the strip mall for as long as I've worked for Mike."
"How long?"
"I've been in Florida for ten years, with Mike for eight." He braked and turned left on McNab.
I realized he wasn't headed to the office yet.
"Hutchinson Realty was my first choice when I was peddling my brand-new license. I wanted an active agency close to my condo. Hutchinson wasn't interested. He catered to black clients. Didn't think I'd fit in."
I smiled.
"He referred me to Mike. At the time, Hutchinson had the bigger agency. He released half of his space two years ago to the dress shop."
"Interesting." I paused to digest the information while Art swung north on University Drive. "Where are we going?"
"You wanted to see houses?"
"But you know it's a ruse." I flashed him a quizzical look.
He didn't respond to my comment. "Mike decided to grow his small agency into something bigger about the time Hutchinson downsized. 'Getting ready for retirement,' he said. Most of the agents moved to the other end of the strip. Many of them had a following and their client referrals went with them. Mike's book of business grew, and Hutchinson struggled."
"Did that affect their personal relationship?"
He looked at me over his lenses. "Of course it did, my dear." He turned north onto Coral Ridge Drive. For a few minutes, he drove in silence. When we passed King's Point, a retirement community for adults, he pointed and informed me he and his wife lived there.
I decided to probe since he'd stopped talking. "Tell me more about the relationship between Mike and Hutchinson."
He let out a big sigh. "At first Hutchinson was standoffish, then he got rude to agents, clients, and even to Mike. I heard he sold his house and moved into a smaller one."
Art pulled into Eagle Trace's entrance and stopped. It's an upscale, gated community. Lush shrubbery and palm trees filled both sides of the divided entry and the median strip, which led to a red brick guardhouse.
"They lived in here when the agency was making money," he said.
On elaborate homes off to the right, I saw beige and white walls under expansive red tile roofs. I lived close by, not in a gated community of course, but I knew enough about the market to know the houses weren't touchable for much under half a fortune. There were some nice apartments toward the neighborhood's rear entrance.
"Where did they move to?" I said.
He pointed across the street, indicating a community of modest townhouses. "To those townhouses."
"Quite a come down. They must have lived on the edge to lose so much that fast."
"Maybe. I don't know. I remember overhearing Hutchinson tell Mike they bought the townhouse free and clear from their equity. Part of their retirement plan, he said."
The answer puzzled me. I pushed for more information. What could he do, throw me out of his car? "Art, is there more to this?"
"I'm not sure what came first, but their
kid got in trouble and went to jail. Then Jamel came around again. Mike said Hutchinson spent most of his reserve and some clients' escrow bailing him out. The kid repaid him by getting into trouble again."
"Sometimes it's better not to rescue them."
"My opinion, as well. I have good kids though. One's finishing med school, and the other's teaching history at NYU."
"You obviously did a fine job raising your children. I'm impressed."
"Thanks. Having a decent income certainly helped."
"Back to Mike and Hutchinson."
"They were friends and competitors for years, but they worked different markets, Mike catering to the middle class whites and Hutchinson to the upper middle class blacks. Changes in the community made them direct competitors. The neighborhoods blended, and Mike was top dog."
"Hard to take."
"Hutchinson seemed a changed man. I overhead him and Mike arguing a couple of times, but they were polite. I also know Hutchinson was trying to get Mike to hire his wife. She's a nice lady, but she isn't a sharp salesperson."
"Oh?"
"Not bright, in my opinion." He lowered his voice, his tone confidential. "Now that Hutchinson is out of the game, I think Mike will buy what's left of the agency."
"What about Amelia?"
"Good question. He promised we wouldn't have to work with her."
"I'd gotten the idea she planned to work for Mike, sell him the agency, give him the outstanding contracts."
"Without a broker of record, the agency isn't worth much. Every client listed with Hutchinson needs to sign a contract with us. In general, the listing contract isn't transferable to another realty. She has to hire a broker of record to complete the scheduled closings. That's my impression, but I'm not a lawyer."
We were sitting in front of the drop gate at Eagle Trace, and the guard was walking over to our car. Art waved him off and made a U-turn. When the traffic cleared, he headed south.
I was certain we were going back to the agency. "Mike's a mean SOB," I said.
"It's business."
I grimaced. "So, you take a woman when she's down—lost her husband, lost her home, kid's a problem—then you take her business, promise her a job, then fire her?"
"I never said it was nice business."
"Touché." We rode in silence.
When Art stopped across the lot from Michael Wiley Realty, my watch said two o'clock. Amelia's car sat in front of her office, and the lights glowed inside. After thanking him for his time and the information, I walked to Hutchinson Realty, intent on verifying the information from Art. After all, Amelia asked me to get involved with the case.
The door to the agency stood open, and I walked in. No one was around, but I heard voices from the back room. I thought it might be a client, so I busied myself minding other people's business. I studied the bullet hole on the wall, then strained to see what was on top of the reception desk. The collection of papers was notes left by a couple of different people, making me suspect Amelia terminated the receptionist.
The voices in the back grew louder.
I recognized Amelia and Jamel's voices. He asked for—no, demanded—money, and she refused. Then the tone changed.
"What are you going to do, hang on until the old man dies?" Jamel said, his voice cracking with emotion.
"Jamel, my son, what else can I do? He needs us."
"Mom, he cheated on you for years. He has a girlfriend. He was going to leave you. Let her take care of him."
"I can't do that. I have my responsibility." Though I heard her clearly, her voice had softened.
"I wish he did die. He should be dead. It wouldn't be hard to hurry it along."
"Oh my God." The pitch of her voice elevated.
"Mom, all I'd have to do is disconnect the breathing tube. I did it for a while the other day. He doesn't breathe when it's off."
"Don't talk that way. He's your father."
"Yeah, right. I'm so proud."
I felt uneasy about the conversation and uneasier still when I contemplated getting caught eavesdropping. They were high on my suspect list, and Jamel was fast approaching top billing. Was he capable of murder, or was he just talking like a big shot?
The doorknob twisted on the back room door.
I stepped back a few feet, pushing the front door open with my back, pretending to be entering the office. "Anybody here?" I called, my voice light.
Jamel stepped out of the office and glared at me. "What are you doing here?"
"I came to talk with your mother. Is she here?"
"She's in the office, but she's leaving to go to the hospital. We're closed. Why don't you come back later? Better yet, talk to her at the hospital." He ambled past me, his upper body swaying on the loose joints in his hips and knees.
I had the urge to grab him by the scruff of the neck and shake sense into him. Then hearing Amelia talking and crying, I started toward the back, intent on eavesdropping.
Jamel came back into the store. "I told you to leave." He leaned up against the receptionist desk and watched until I left the office.
As I drove home, I dialed Ray's number at the station. His answering machine cut in, and I left a long message.
15
Ray returned my call late Saturday afternoon. He thanked me for the message regarding my visit to the realty agencies. Then he said, "I'm involved with another case. We'll keep tabs on the Hutchinson shooting, but it's growing cold. Besides, it's not a homicide yet. If he dies, we'll jump on it."
"Sounds to me like you're growing cold."
He hung up.
I'd decided to spend a quiet evening at home, not having any place to go. I chose a Randy Rawls thriller, made a cup of cappuccino, and settled on the sofa with my Kindle and the dog. The weather had warmed, and the air-conditioner hummed. I relaxed in my own cool, safe cocoon.
Sunshine wandered in and out of the house as if intent on distracting me. He's not a good watchdog, more of a tail-wagging burglar-assistant. He seemed nervous, so I paid attention.
I peered through the double French doors onto the patio. It was too dark to see into the shadows. I flipped on the light. Just a table and chairs, my seldom-used treadmill, and a set of weights that once belonged to Ray. I didn't see anything in the yard.
Sunshine's unrest wasn't caused by one of the pesky, neighborhood cats. If it were, he would be outside barking, pretending to be brave.
I went into the living room and peeked through the stained glass door panel into the driveway, wavering between wanting to see who was there and wanting to scare them away. I turned on the porch light. The front yard was empty.
The dog sniffed at the door and growled. Odd behavior. Cavaliers don't often growl.
Uneasy, I hurried into the master bedroom and looked outside at the deserted landscape. A rippling crash against the windowpane forced me back several feet. Sunshine yelped and ran from the room, his tail between his legs. I realized someone had thrown a handful of pebbles against the glass. Afraid and shaking, I approached the window from the side, slipped my hand to the latch, and found it secure.
Sunshine, having recovered his bravery, ran from window to door, barking and growling. The hair stood erect along his spine.
Without turning on a light, I checked the windows in the spare room and den. Then not knowing what else to do, I armed myself with a paring knife from the kitchen counter, opened the door into the garage, and turned on the light.
The side door jiggled. Someone was trying to break in. Sunshine rushed at the door—sixteen pounds of jumping, barking fury. The door stopped moving.
Now what? My insides did a flip-flop. I could use a gun but don't own one anymore, and I'd managed to earn a brown belt in karate before taking the slug. All that expertise, coupled with Sunshine the Wonder Dog, left me feeling exposed. I took a deep breath to steady my nerves and hurried to the kitchen in search of a more suitable weapon—the six-inch carving knife.
Then I dialed 9-1-1. "This is Sophia Burgess.
Someone is trying to break into my house." I recited my address, forcing myself not to hurry.
A rattling came from the back of the house. The prowler or prowlers were on my patio, close to the French doors. A man yelled, "Hey, Ho. How you like it, Ho?"
"Please tell them to hurry. I can hear voices on the patio." My voice shook. I hung up the phone before the dispatcher could reply.
A second man said, "Bet she likes it. Yeah man, I'd like to give the bitch a little."
Someone banged on the front door.
Sunshine ran yelping into the spare bedroom, leapt onto the bed in one fluid motion, and stuck his head under the blind, informing them he wasn't a ferocious watchdog in the process.
I lived a couple of miles from the police station, and a few moments later sirens pierced the quiet night.
A male voice yelled, "Po-Po's comin'."
There were a couple other voices, but the words blended into the noise created by my pounding heart. I ran to the front door, stared out the window, and glimpsed three retreating youths—tall, baggy clothes, dark skinned. Jamel and his friends? I wondered while waiting for the police cruiser to arrive.
The officer coming to my rescue was a classmate from the academy. He, along with other officers, visited me several times while I recuperated from my wounds. He also knew Ray. It wasn't a surprise when Ray appeared at my door an hour later.
"Sophi," Ray said when I opened the door. Concern etched his face. "I heard you had a problem. You okay?"
"I think."
Sunshine's greeting distracted him for a moment.
It's a rule in my house—Sunshine's rule—you have to say hello to the dog before you're allowed to conduct business, even if you're a stranger. Ray isn't a stranger so the whole process takes longer.
He knelt and rubbed the dog's ears, then picked him up and rubbed him some more.
I took Sunshine out of Ray's arms and hugged him—the dog, not the man.
Ray walked uninvited into the kitchen and pulled out one of the low stools next to the counter. "Tell me what happened."
Imperfect Contract Page 8
