Catharine Bramkamp - Real Estate Diva 03 - In Good Faith

by Catharine Bramkamp

  “These are from Carrie.” I turned over my boxes. “She asked me to deliver them to you personally, because you know what do with them.”

  Cyndi nodded and took both boxes and set them on the floor without looking at them. “More from Beverley?” She asked.

  I acknowledged that they were. Cyndi sighed and kicked one of the boxes.

  “Anything wrong?”

  “I wish I felt more badly about her.” Cyndi confessed.

  That was close to home, I wish I felt more badly about Beverley myself. It was odd to learn about a rival after she was gone. But since Ben was distracted, and not really himself since Beverley’s death, maybe I had been dealing with a rival after all. Her presence in Rivers Bend had kept me off the streets with Ben.

  I was kind of glad she was gone as well. We had that in common, Cyndi and I.

  “Did you see her often?”

  “Only during the time when she was making a play for the president, Steven.” Cyndi snorted.

  “Really?” That’s often all you have to say: an encouraging word.

  “Then again, that didn’t make him all that special. She was always bragging about her men, guys with names like Peter and Rod, Roland. She was always going away with them to some place exotic, like those luxury cruises where they have all you can eat buffets. Her latest thing was to get away from Rivers Bend forever. As if that’s possible.”

  “Apparently it was.”

  Cyndi ignored my comment. “She thought she was marvelous, hot stuff. She had the house in the Villas and the designer bags and shoes and the gifts from men, and I didn’t have any of that, so she acted like she was so much better than me.”

  “You don’t appear to be that badly off,” I ventured.

  Cyndi made a face. All beautiful, thin women can get away with scrunching up their pert little noses, and pushing out their full lips in a pout. It’s meant to convey how horrible their cushy life can really be.

  But, despite the stereotype, and Cyndi certainly played to at least one, there was something more desperate and contrived in her gesture,

  “You haven’t heard about my situation have you?” She asked.

  “You work here as a secretary and own a great vintage Bob Mackie.” And you look like Prom Queen Barbie, what is there to know?

  “I’m homeless.” She said shortly.

  I raised my eyebrows, but not much more than that.

  “Yeah, hard to believe isn’t it?” She countered.

  “You certainly don’t fit that particularly stereotype.” Did she expect me to coo at her and say comforting words: oh, you poor thing what can I do for you? She was confessing to the wrong woman. We started the conversation with Beverley and Cyndi had managed to turn it around to be all about her. I should take lessons, she was really good at making it all about her.

  I glanced at my watch, it was past nine, where was the rest of the staff?

  “I live here.” She made sweeping gesture that encompassed the whole, bleak office. “That’s right, I live here. I don’t have a car. I don’t have a house, not like Beverley. Steven helped me. He felt sorry for me, and let me stay here. And Beverley tried to muscle in, made it seem wrong. She even told Martha Anderson, as if I need her on my ass day and night.”

  “That must have made you pretty angry.” She’d also be frightened, cornered and prone to lash back. Lash out at Beverley?

  “I could have killed her!” Cyndi was vehement; her cute face twisted to become down right ugly. “I would have done anything to make her go away. Marcel, that’s the professor, said to not worry about it, I’ll be fine. But I learned the hard way, that letting things go when people tell you it will all be fine is a bunch of bullshit. It don’t end up fine, and no one will help you, not even the police!”

  Did I want to ask the obvious question? I did not. We were alone, and despite the fact that I was considerably larger than she, sometimes that doesn’t count for much.

  “Her death was kind of a relief?” I asked a more neutral question, trying to diffuse the situation, if I could. God, it was the same as reasoning with a bank employee during a short sale: impossible.

  Cyndi’s posture shrank as if a balloon deflated. “Yes, for me and maybe even for the Steven, he told me not to worry, too.

  “Well, your secret, if it is a secret, is safe with me. I won’t tell anyone.”

  “Better not.” She growled, but, to my relief, she finally focused on the boxes of clothes. I did not bring up Carrie’s name again.

  Chapter 14

  I didn’t hear from Carrie for the rest of the week. I worked on my own life and only saw Ben briefly, but he wasn’t in the mood to spend the night at my house, and his grandmother still intimidated me, so I didn’t suggest his house. The holidays weren’t shaping up to be very jolly at all.

  I met with Carrie for coffee in the morning, just to check on her.

  “I’ve been getting these phone calls.” Carrie admitted. She sucked on her skinny latte and looked up at me through her lashes.

  “Phone calls?”

  “Telling me to lay off the Homeless Prevention League. Stay at the Senior Center. Keep my nose out of their business. But I’m on the board, it is my business.” She toyed with her paper cup waiting for my admonishment, but I was feeling more concerned than righteous.

  “Shouldn’t you report them?” I suggested, careful not to veer off to the righteous and stay on the concerned side of the conversation.

  “To whom?” She demanded. “Who would believe me? And who would imagine that something bad would happen at a non-profit, especially during the holidays?”

  “Sometimes the holidays bring out the worst in people.” I said. “Maybe the caller knows something about the League. Are they embezzling money? That’s a popular activity and people have killed for less. And if you’re asking questions, maybe someone thinks you’re the problem.” I made the suggestion cautiously.

  “That’s why it was important to get me, as an outsider, on the board,” Carrie said thoughtfully. “Their numbers are dwindling. A couple months ago, they had to ask a volunteer to leave, he was the Financial Committee Chair, helped take in donations. Martha mentioned that some of his work seemed a bit off, the math didn’t always come out as they expected.”

  “What was his name?” I asked, although why I should care was beyond me. But talking with Carrie delayed my return to the office and the loud and cantankerous dieting contest there in.

  “Rod something.” Carrie dove into her battered brief case, something she had picked up at the Just as Good Shop, but she carried as if it was an old favorite she couldn’t bear to part with, not a second hand object she purchased for pennies on the dollar.

  “Here,” she pulled out a spreadsheet. “The Finance Chair was Rod Bixby.”

  The name tugged at my memory. I tried to connect it. I sipped on my own venti hazelnut latte (with non-fat milk, see? I’m trying) but the caffeine was not helping.

  “Was Beverley aware about the irregularities?” I asked, trying to fit things together.

  “Martha said that she didn’t really pay much attention to details.” Carrie drawled out the last word in another excellent mockery of the philanthropist.

  “She apparently showed up for all the parties, did a few deliveries, that kind of thing. Her excuse was that she was always so busy.”

  “Crazy busy.” I repeated absently. Ask any woman in her thirties how she is, and she will reply: busy, crazy busy.

  I assured Carrie it would all be fine, but I encouraged her to call the police about the phone calls. She in turn, dismissed my warnings. She finished her latte and rose to go. “So what are you doing today?”

  “I am going to find a mouthwash that is not minty fresh.” I said.

  She nodded and left for the Senior Center.

  I thought and thought, Rod, Rod.

  I did discover a mouthwash that I hoped would not make me spontaneously gag, then I absently turned my car left and drove up the hill to the
Villas.

  Rod, Rod. I pulled in Beverley’s former home, opened the front door and then it clicked. I raced up the stairs to the master bedroom and dug through the drawer of photos. I pulled out the three matching ones, or at least matching because they were all with the same man. The glass was cracked on one picture. There he was, that bright eyed look and red hair. Where had I seen him? I had seen him in a huge wedding portrait hanging in the dining room of his former home. The bride in that photo was as dead as the woman in these. According to what she thought was worth saving, they had enjoyed exactly one cruise and two fundraising dinners.

  She had been seeing Rod Bixby, and judging from the dress and hair on both of them, most certainly before he left his wife floating face down in a hot tub. No one could prove Rod was responsible for his wife’s demise, it could have been an accident, except the hot tub was closed and locked down from the outside.

  While his wife, Debbie, had been discovered (not by me, thank god), Rod never reappeared. My hands shook as I held the picture, willing his smiling expression to give me more motive and reason.

  He was seeing Beverley Weiss. Had he risked returning to the states to kill her? Had Beverley heard about how Rod had dispensed with his little wife (that murder had made it in the papers, but everyone involved was labeled “alleged”). Or was that part of the attraction: the danger, the excitement, running away from everything regardless of the facts, all for love?

  Escaping to an exotic island is all well and good except when the money runs out and you need to find work. At that crucial moment, you realize you don’t speak the native language as well as you thought, you discover the romantic cottage made of bamboo and banana leaves leaks, and the new love of your life snores like a 747 engine.

  Was Beverley leaving with Rod? And if so, why wasn’t he worried? Has she missed their rendezvous time? Why hadn’t he called?

  I didn’t have a clue what to do with this information.

  * * *

  I distracted myself by staying busy drawing up the disclosures for Beverley’s house, trolling for more condos for Owen, and fortunately my friend Joan threw a party to introduce her fiancé Norman to her friends. Since it was my fault that those two were together in the first place, I was a guest of honor.

  I adore Joan, I’m not so sure about her new boyfriend, and live-in partner Norton. He is certainly handsome and employed, two of the top criteria for women of Joan’s age group (she’s a bit older than me). But I still didn’t understand the attraction, especially since Norton was one of my most fastidious sellers. For instance, he had insisted, despite two price reductions, that the pastel purple, pink and lemon yellow of his home’s interior walls were not detracting or even deflecting offers to buy. Desperate, I had asked Joan to pose as a feng shui expert to straighten him out, and convince him to paint the interior of his house a nice beige. And she did. And they fell in love.

  Joan throws a good party. She invites the very intellectual and very bohemian of Rivers Bend (both of them). Joan and Norton now live in a brand new, granite counter topped, white carpeted condo located at the base of the Villas – all the address, none of the price. Which can be considered intelligent, but not bohemian. So, the atmosphere is sort of middle class Bohemian: the Beatnik vibe, but with central air and crown moulding.

  I wandered through the condo’s freshly painted beige rooms (Joan prevailed) and enjoyed olives from Greece, Tambouli from Egypt and fabulous Armenian and Spanish cheeses.

  Joan served wine produced by small boutique wineries that only sell through wine clubs. I did not recognize a single label. I wondered if Ben’s friend, Cassandra made some of the wine. But hers was a new venture I didn’t think she has a label yet.

  The guests around me were dressed in organic cotton slacks and bright colored shawls woven by female co-ops in Peru. Very Fair Trade. The conversations at these parties usually lingered over esoteric world peace kind of subjects that I didn’t understand. But tonight the subject was more pedantic: the recent murders.

  I smiled and struggled not to offer any insights, but it was difficult. For the first time in years of attending Joan’s soiree’s, I could finally sound smart. But I resisted. Instead I ate cheese, admired the beadwork on a woman’s blouse and hunted down my hostess.

  Joan was dressed in a pants suit of red cotton and wore soft black cloth slippers with bright beads on the instep. Her short gray hair was spiked straight up, a good look for her.

  I hugged Joan, and asked my burning question.

  “Oh, honey.” She responded instantly. “The current girlfriend always operates under the shadow of the former wife, and sometimes the dead ones are the most difficult - you can’t compete with perfection frozen in nostalgia.”

  “So, what do I do?” I compulsively tossed squares of cheese in my mouth and drained my wine.

  “Hang a portrait of her in the hallway, and walk by without looking. Even if you burned down the house, you will never get rid of her - don’t try.” Joan patted my arm and considered her work done.

  But I left from that party no wiser, and certainly no more enlightened but I was full of cheese. On my way home, I called to check in on Carrie and confirm where we’d meet for our Friday drinks.

  “Can’t this Friday. I have a meeting with Steven, the president at the Homeless Prevention League, after work. He’s been avoiding me for a week now, Cyndi keeps saying he’s busy, but it’s the holidays, no one busy, unless you’re the food bank. He is finally going to talk with me. Really, there needs to be more transparency in their operations.”

  “I’ve never heard you talk that way that before.”

  “Is it sexy?”

  “Absolutely, you go girl.”

  I was at loose ends Friday, so I decided to aggravate my loneliness and drove up to Best Buy to pick up the gift cards for my nephews. Once that was finished, I was done with all my shopping. Except for Ben.

  The store was packed with families pushing carts filled with whining children and large TVs. Lines were long. I flipped open a paperback book while I stood in line to purchase the cards. I didn’t bother with the offered yellow bag, I just dropped the cards into my purse. Bad move. The gift cards set off the door alarm. And I was, as they say, unnecessarily detained.

  I had to explain to the two nice security guards how it was possible to exit Best Buy with only gift cards on my person. What? No movie specials – four for only five dollars? No large screen television? No refrigerator? They’re on sale.

  Not in my purse, no, I explained.

  Once the five security guards and I agreed that my lack of purchase volume was not necessarily aberrant behavior, I was allowed to exit the store, with very little dignity intact.

  I wonder if I could use that in my advertisements? I’ll give you a little dignity? No, too non-profit.

  Before I left, I handed my business card to the closest ten people watching the procedure, wished them Happy Holidays, because I’m nothing if not politically correct and drove straight to KFC for a bucket of conciliatory chicken.

  I didn’t get home until eight o’clock, and ate two pieces of original recipe before it occurred to me that, one, who made the appointment for Carrie and the President of the Homeless Prevention League for a Friday afternoon, and two, why hadn’t I heard from Carrie? Meetings on Friday afternoons don’t go long, that’s why you schedule a meeting on Friday afternoon in the first place.

  I checked my phone, but saw no missed calls. By nine o’clock, I had finished the last of the chicken, and was worried. When Patrick called at 10:00, I was already on the verge of driving down and finding the woman myself. Patrick wasn’t helpful since he was as brittle as I was.

  “Have you heard from Carrie? Is she mad at me?”

  Oh honey, she will never be mad at you, I thought. “Mad at you? No, why?”

  “I think I pressed her too hard to be a responsible board member, and she was pretty upset with me,” he admitted.

  “Patrick, I think she was actually
pretty concerned with the League. She’s still with the Senior Center, one scandal at any local non-profit makes it difficult for everyone else. She told me that.”

  “But I haven’t heard from her, and it’s Friday night,” he whined.

  Oh, for heaven’s sake. “Okay.” I tried to slow him down a bit. “I’ll meet you at the Homeless Prevention League offices, that’s where she was meeting the President (and CEO). She’s not home, because I called a half hour ago.”

  “I already drove by her place. And I already stopped by the restaurant where we were supposed to meet tonight, three times. This isn’t like her; she is never late.”

  I sucked in my breath. He was right; she is never late. And she would never miss a date with Patrick. She’d rather die. Not a good thought. Were those Homeless Prevention offices near the creek?

  We arrived at the HPL parking lot simultaneously. Patrick pulled up in his hellishly expensive BMW convertible, he had the top down and his thick hair was windblown and as wild as his expression.

  “There’s her car. She’s still here.” He looked around the empty parking lot, “where is Steven’s car?”

  I glanced around, but the parking lot was empty, not even a HPL Shelter unit in evidence. I turned to make a suggestion to Patrick, but he was already running to the offices at an impressive clip. I barely caught up to him as he pulled at the HPL office door. The door didn’t move, and front handle came off in his hand.

  “Oh, that’s nice.”

  “That’s lucky.” I pointed out. “It’s not locked.” I reached around him and pushed open the door.

  “Hello!” I called and stepped in, dodging Patrick’s reach. He didn’t need to protect me. I shrugged him off.

  The office was silent. I didn’t even hear movement upstairs, where Cyndi apparently lived. To the right and left were the two tiny, staff offices. CPUs glowed in the dim light.