Just Add Water (Hetta Coffey Mystery Series (Book 1))
Page 13
After he left, I walked to a window and looked down on Sea Cock, doing a mental tour, not as a guest, but as her owner. Okay, so there was a lot of blue and white, but I could work in peach and ashes of roses. Sea Cock was carpeted throughout in a rich marine blue, the furniture—real furniture, not built-ins like I’d seen on so many boats—was ivory. She had a large aft master’s suite with a queen-sized bed, tons of closet space, a separate office area in the main cabin, and a drop dead stainless steel galley. She even sported a verandah. Oops, sundeck. Sea Cock, sans the name, was everything I wanted in a boat.
But could I really afford her, even at two hundred grand? Then I remembered that, when considering a change of locale a few years back, I’d qualified for a big enough loan to buy a two hundred and fifty thousand dollar condo. Finally, something was going my way!
Ecstatic, I jumped up on the bar and did a tap dance. Or as much of my Downtown Strutter’s Ball routine as I remembered from Miss Rita’s School of Dance, circa 1968. After several decades, I was a little sloppy, and my tennis shoes kept sticking, but the bar patrons evidently found my act a nice change from Jackie’s twin screws, for they applauded. Or maybe they were relieved that I, unlike Jackie, didn’t drop my drawers.
I concluded my impromptu shuffle-ball-change, took a bow, and was climbing off the bar when I spotted that Bob Jenkins person watching from the doorway. Gawking, is more like it.
Jenks waist-steered a tall curvy blonde to my end of the bar, gave me a nod, and ordered two drinks. I was in such good spirits, I opened my mouth to say something clever, but the fading blonde—who, I noticed with glee, was older than I—picked up on his nod and practically crawled into his lap to divert his attention. And he called me flighty?
While his date clung to him and spouted inanities, I finished off my champagne and decided to leave before Jenks and Beldame Barbie clouded up my parade. Screw him and the ship he rode in on, so to speak. My ship just came in and I ain’t gonna let his chronic standoffishness spoil it for me.
I overcame my desire to tell him he ought to do something about that static cling, slid from my stool, threw my sweater over my shoulder, and sashayed away in my best Bette Davis bumpy ride imitation. It was one of my finer moments for, in the foyer mirror, I saw Mr. Jenkins looking past the blonde, watching me leave. He was actually smiling. Hey, maybe we did have something in common after all. I consorted with the criminally insane and he dated the criminally inane.
22
The next day I made a beeline for the bank, and my new future.
Aline Watson, my good friend, was a loan officer at Wells Fargo. She listened to what I wanted, raised a finely tweezed, decidedly un-bankerly brow, fixed me with skeptical green eyes, and shook her curly platinum locks.
“Let me see if I understand this, Hetta. You want to sell your three thousand square foot home, buy a forty-five foot boat, and then live on it.” It wasn’t a question, but a statement delivered in a monotone that sounded as if she had said, “So, you recently stepped off a space ship and you want me to give you money?”
“Yep, you’ve got it, Aline. I’ve made out a financial statement.” I shoved a folder across her desk. “My house is on the market, and I’ve entered the asking price, which my real estate lady says I’m sure to get, and the price of the boat. There’s also a copy of my last three IRS tax returns. What else will I need?”
She did a quick perusal of my paperwork, leaned across her desk and whispered, “A fuckin’ miracle.”
“What? You prequalified me for a two hundred and fifty thousand dollar condo a couple of years ago.”
“That was before you lost your mind,” she said, then remembered we weren’t sitting in my hot tub and put on her professional face. “Hetta, I don’t want to rain on your parade, but let’s go over this point by point. A boat is not a house. Nor is it a condo. The rules are different.”
“How different?”
“First and foremost, boats, unlike houses, can sink.”
“Ha! You haven’t been to my house lately, have you?”
She ignored me and continued. “Boats are considered a bigger financial risk. Also, the maximum period I can finance one for you would probably be fifteen years. They don’t appreciate like real estate, you know.”
I whipped out the handy payment spread sheet furnished by my handy realtor. “Okay, so if I want to finance a hundred grand at eight percent for twenty years, that’s nine fifty six a month. That’s two hundred bucks less than my present house payment.”
“Not exactly. You can’t get a boat loan for eight percent. More like ten. And you have to rent or buy a dock.”
“Okay, at the yacht club I can get a deal, two hundred a month,” I said smugly. “We’re still up to only a little over twelve hundred. And there’s no property tax.”
“True, but you have to pay personal property tax, insurance, and then you have to pay for the water you displace.”
“Excuse me?”
“In the Bay Area some brain-challenged bureaucrat at the BCDC—that’s the Bay Conservation and Development Commission—came up with the idea that a boat is landfill and you have to pay accordingly. Now,” she punched numbers into her computer at the speed of light, “with insurance, we’re already up around thirteen hundred a month.”
“Which is, with my house insurance and all, about the same as I’m paying now,” I said stubbornly and a bit defensively. “Jesus, this reminds me of what it was like years ago when I bought my first house as a single woman. The bankers went bonkers, but I finally got my loan.”
“Hetta, there’s no discrimination here. Trust me, you’re being treated like any man who came in here with the same problem.”
“A few minutes ago it was a request for a loan and now it’s a problem?”
“You are self-employed. That could be a problem, but let’s sit here and work through it. If we’re even close, I’ll go to bat for you, but we really need to talk about these credit cards.”
* * *
Steam rising from the hot tub almost obscured Jan’s round-eyed reaction. “You are shittin’ me,” she said. “Charge cards are a liability? What are these folks? Communists?”
“Worse. Bankers. And they obviously don’t understand the basic principles of capitalism.”
“Yeah, and we’re certainly superficially shallow and overextended enough to qualify as bona fide capitalists. What’s wrong with those people?” She took a sip of wine and lifted her glass. “Here’s to us, us, us.”
“Hear, hear,” I said, clinking her Waterford with my Waterford. “Anyhow, they say I have to pay off all the plastic, then cancel most of them because the max limit on each card you own is considered a liability.”
“How many do you have?”
“Only twenty.”
Jan almost choked on her wine. “Twenty credit cards? You’re kidding. You owe on all of them?”
“No silly, only on half. You know, two hundred to Macy’s, same to Sears. A grand on a couple on Visas, five hundred to Neiman Mar …”
“Neiman’s? You tell me Neiman’s is overpriced. You call them Needless Markup. What did you buy there?”
“Escargot Helper? Hell, I don’t know. What a wake up call. Aline tried her best, but she told me I should be looking for a cheaper boat. Actually, she said I should be looking for a shrink, but she’s sooo conservative. She finally admitted she could probably push the loan through, mainly because the boat is being purchased way under market value and I actually do have a great credit rating despite the credit cards—if I were not self-employed. I’ll have to fax her a copy of my latest contract with the Seattle folks, then she’ll see what she can do. So, I wait. With any luck, Sea Cock will be mine.”
“That name definitely has to go.”
“First thing I’ll do, trust me. But I’m a long way from changing boat names. I gotta lotta creative financial stuff to pull off and debts to dump. I think I’ll sell the Beemer. It won’t do it any good to sit in a waterfront parking l
ot, and besides, I can use RJ’s car. It’s paid for.”
RJ’s ears perked at hearing his name. He wagged his tail and tried to stand up, but yelped when he put weight on his bad leg. My heart sank as both Jan and I moved quickly to hold and soothe him while he whined in pain.
“It’s okay, boy. Stay still and Mommy will get you a pain pill,” I whimpered.
“You stay with him, Hetta. I’ll get it. What’s he taking?”
“Vicodin,” I said, nuzzling the soft fur behind his ear with my nose. “Shit, bring me one, too.”
23
Other than the bank loan debacle and RJ’s failing health, things settled back to normal. I checked the new padlock on the dog jail daily, making sure my key still worked. Naturally the breather, whom I was sure was Hudson, had stopped calling just as the cops began monitoring the phone. And the fool in Seattle seemed to let up on his barrage of memos accusing me of everything from price-fixing to cronyism.
I threw myself into putting together bid proposals, attempting to snag a new project before this one ran out, all the while dodging lookyloo would-be buyers my real estate agent ran through my house on what seemed to be an hourly basis.
In my spare time, I tried to figure out a way to finance Sea Cock. It wasn’t going to be easy. I called Morris Terry one day when I had to admit to myself that my abilities at financial wizardry were severely lacking. “Morris, this is Hetta Coffey, and I’m afraid I have some bad news. As much as I want her, I’m having a problem getting financing for the other hundred thou on Sea Cock.”
“Credit problems?”
“I didn’t think so. I have a triple A credit rating and could qualify for a comparable condo, but not a boat. At least not your boat. I guess I’ll have to be realistic and start looking at condos.”
“Any bites on your house?”
“Lots. According to my real estate lady, it’s only a matter of days until I receive an offer. I’m about to join the residentially challenged. That’s Sanfran-speak for homeless. I can’t even rent a decent apartment ‘cause I’ve got a dog.” I don’t know why I was telling this poor man my problems. All he wanted to do was sell his damned boat.
“Hey,” Morris said, “don’t give up your dreams. I’m a patient man and you are a clever gal. You’ll get what you want. Meanwhile, don’t worry too much. Things have a way of changing.”
Boy, he wasn’t kidding.
Ten minutes later I lost my job.
* * *
According to the tersely worded, one page fax I found in my office, the services of Hetta Coffey, S.I., were no longer required. I had to laugh in spite of the devastating news. Didn’t anyone pick up on my little joke? I tacked the S.I. title on my card for Civil Engineer, and not one soul had ever asked me what it stood for.
Anyway, I was off the Seattle project. I could expect, via courier service this very day, a check covering any expenses incurred to date, a prorated percentage of my total contract, and an extra ten grand to offset any inconvenience caused by early termination of the contract. Damn! The bastards followed the terms of the contract exactly as I’d written them.
Some quick numbers crunching told me I was okay for three months if really careful. Because I was self-employed, I always kept “screw you” money in reserve for house payments and bills, but my financial future was looking downright grisly. And it didn’t take a Mensa member to figure out that any Sea Cock deal had to be put on the back burner. No wonder the banks hated me. It was people like me who gave me a bad name.
I called Seattle and got stonewalled. I left messages, but no one returned my calls. I sent faxes. I sent e-mails. Nada. The promised courier arrived with a check and a sheaf of legalese stipulating when I endorsed and cashed the check I was, in effect, agreeing to the terms of my dismissal. Don’t call us, we’ll call you. No further explanation as to why, but I smelled a rat named Dale.
“Well shit, RJ, we’ve been fired!” I’d never been fired, not even when I got in hot misu with Baxter Brothers, my former employers who-em I’d royally pissed off in Japan.
It was time to call in the Trob.
Fidel Wontrobski—his dad was a Polish communist, thus the name—still worked for Baxter Brothers Engineering and remained my friend despite my lousy track record there. A few years my junior, Fidel was skinny and topped six-five if he’d unfold his horrible posture. With a hooked nose, a black scruffy topknot of frizzy hair, and an entire wardrobe of baggy black clothing, he looks like a buzzard. A buzzard savant.
The Trob, engineering genius, headed up a think tank from the exclusive top floor of the Baxter Building. Only the elite, such as the brothers Baxter and a couple of former high-ranking politicos, shared his lofty location. Which was amazing, in light of the fact that Fidel possessed not a single social or political skill. But corporate heads, former Secretaries of State, and their minions all deferred to Fidel Wontrobski’s brilliance.
Of course they rarely encouraged the Trob to interact with other employees and certainly never let him talk to clients. Fidel was a prisoner of his own intelligence. A thirty-three-year-old wunderkind. Lunch was delivered to his office and, most nights, dinner. He lived in a nearby hotel, slept only four hours a night—midnight to four—and was the first one in the Baxter employees’ cafeteria for breakfast each morning. I was usually second.
For weeks after I first joined the firm, the Trob and I sat at opposite ends of the mostly empty cafeteria, studiously ignoring one another. Then one morning as I was passing his table, we experienced a power failure. Hearing a frightened whimper, I reached in my purse, pulled out a flashlight, and sat with him until an emergency generator kicked in and the lights came back on. We ate breakfast together that day and every workday until I was shipped out to Japan.
We also fell into the habit of, after breakfast, taking a very private elevator car to his tower of wisdom, where we’d play dominoes until I had to join the lesser grunts at eight. I never won a single game.
After I left for Tokyo, we called each other regularly on the company’s dime and if I had a work problem, he’d help me out. And when I had my big problem, Wontrobski saved my ass. Maybe he could do it again. Or at least find out what the hell was going on.
“Yo, Trob,” I said when he picked up the phone, “wanna play some dominoes?”
“Right now?”
“No, dear, I’m in Oakland and you’re in San Francisco right now. I was thinking of meeting you for breakfast tomorrow morning and we could play then.”
“Oh.”
“Do you want to or not?” Talking to the Trob was often times like conversing with a four-year-old.”
“Okay.”
“Fidel, you need to leave a pass with the front desk guard so I can get into the cafeteria. Okay?”
“Oh.”
“Are you gonna do it?”
“Okay.”
“Bye now.”
“Bye.”
I hung up and screamed. You can see why the Trob doesn’t get invited out much. Monosyllabic to the point of appearing simple, yes, but give him a keyboard and a modem and the man can communicate like a Dale Carnegie. Dale Carnegie with unlimited cyber-contacts in the engineering world and computer equipment nonpareil.
The next morning we had breakfast, played dominoes, and then I laid out my problem, writing down the names of all the players. When I left, Fidel was already absorbed by his monitor screen, performing electronic magic. By the time I got home, he had sent me a three page e-mail. Even by Trob standards, this was fast. And, as I suspected, Dale Stevens, the guy I’d burned in Seattle, was the culprit. The son of a bitch was playing by my rules. What a dirt bag.
One of the things I’ve learned over the years is that buttering up chief execs and the like is a waste of time, but their secretaries—most of them called “executive assistants” now—are another matter. A rose here, a little sincere sympathy for their difficult, thankless, underpaid jobs there usually greased the skids when needed. This time was no exception.
“Hetta,” she whispered, “he’s really not in a meeting.”
“Surprise, surprise.”
“You’ve got a problem, Hetta Honey. Check your e-mail. Gotta go.” Deep Throat in Laura Ashley florals hung up.