Read Catharine Bramkamp - Real Estate Diva 04 - Trash Out Online

Authors: Catharine Bramkamp

Tags: #Mystery: Cozy - Humor - Real Estate Agent - California

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BOOK: Catharine Bramkamp - Real Estate Diva 04 - Trash Out
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“Sure it is, but all this big mission furniture makes your downstairs rooms look too full. And you need to get rid of the books.”

I suppressed a sigh. I knew she was right, but I loved my books, down t
o the last ratty paperback. 
But I asked for
the
advice.
So, after my meeting with Stacey, I began
dutifully pack
ing
away hundreds of
book
copies and moved the boxes to the garage, ready for my next trip up to Claim Jump. I found five
novels
I could part
with and set them on top of the la
st box. I would donate those to
Scott’s lending library. 
Scott and Sarah
had turned the old library into
a part
used bookstore, part lending program. He and Sarah ran
F
acebook pages, websites and
created
a way to check
out
the books on
-
line.  It was pretty magnificent. I don’t know what the former occupants of the space, the ladies of the Brotherhood of Cornish Men thought
, nevertheless,
my grandmother Prue, member in good standing, thought the idea was lovely.

“Clean up Claim Jump.”  Debbie stood by my gate and blandished her sign like a blunt instrument.

“Get it?  Up and Jump rhyme.”  She waved the sign at me but had the decency to stay on her side of the fence.

I nodded and tried to look encouraging. I’m not good at encouraging idiocy.

“And what are we cleaning up Debbie?”  I
could feel the new, good vibrations in my house and felt pretty secure.  Shouts echoed from the back.  Ben yelled something
I couldn’t make out. 

“Everything!

Debbie bellowed.
“The pot growing,
the pot smoking,
the sidewalks, the government,
the loitering,
the only thing that is working at all is our co
-
housing
unit
and that too may be under siege.”

“The co-housing
units
under siege?  By whom?”  Now that Lucky Masters was no l
onger the villain and no longer
capable of clear cutting
long swaths of
National Forest because the trees blocked his view
(what with being dead
, Lucky as well as the trees
)
, I didn’t think there were any problems left in good old Claim Jump.  Except for dry rot
in master bathrooms
.

“Someone found
out
we didn’t follow some obscure ordinance and they want us to fix it or they
’ll
shut us down. Can you believe someone would be that petty?”  She glared at me,
strands of her gray
hair waved in the breeze as if it had a medusa-like life of its own.

I opened my eyes wide and shook my head.  “No, who would be such a stickler for the law and details like that?” I knew perfectly well who, it had my grandmother written all over it.
She probably created
carbon copies and filed
each
into three different
county
departments just to make sure the redundancy protected the filing.

Her best friends, Pat and Mike probably didn’t stand aside and let her do all the work either.

Summer, head of the theater, walked around the corner from the parking lot. 

“Hey Allison, did your friend find you?” 

I looked at my phone.  “Not yet.”  I called back.  

Debbie glanced over her shoulder at
Summer
but did not rush over to commiserate with her.  Ah, Donna had been right.

I did not relish Debbie hovering around looking for a mistakes in our construction, our sub contractors, any of that. 

A lone motorcycle, a Harley, roared by and drowned out what Debbie said next.

I cupped my hand to my ear and walked down the porch stairs to hear her.

“Sometimes I think I’m being watched.”  Her voice was quieter than I thought possible.

“You are,
Summer
is still standing outside, maybe she wants to talk with you.”  I shooed off Debbie who looked like a kid being pushed back on the playground after a fall.

I heard the roar of a construction truck pulling into the driveway behind the house. Just in time.
I heard another
shout and a crash in the back yard.  The rest of the shingles I presumed.  I wondered if
they’d be finished by the first rains
in November.  I would normally say “of course, they have two months,” but I’m not that confident
in the efficiency of our Claim Jump construction workers
.

I
w
atched Debbie and
Summer
.  They certainly did not act like friends any more.  There was tension in their gestures and
the more
Summer
talked, the unhappier Debbie looked.

What had happened?  I waited for Debbie to stalk off.  Summer pushed back her black bob and glared at me.

I smiled and waved.  She pointedly looked at her watch.  The banging and clanking increased as the workers
slide down the roof and began to swarm through the kitchen. In any
moment they would burst into the front rooms, intent on finishing the finishing touches. I escaped by crossing the street to join
Summer
.

“What do you want? Aren’t you part of the Lucky suit too?”  She placed her rough hands on her ample hips.

“Me?  Not me,” I proclaimed piously.
I usually get a nicer greeting from
Summer
;
Grandma
donates thousands of dollars to the theater
.
“I bought Lucky’s house and I’m selling one of Lucky’s houses, in the Lucky tradition, but I’m not part of the class action suit. I don’t believe in them.”

She snorted
.
“Sure you don’t.  Everyone of those people who bought houses from Lucky are suing the estate courtesy of Miss Busy Body.”

A few short months ago, Miss Busy Body
herself
was
very
busy helping Summer transfer choice pieces of furniture out of Lucky’s house and into Summer’s office
,
so I wasn’t sure that people who performed in glass venues should be hurling stones that hard.

“I get my cash the old fashion way, I earn it.” I said.

“You’d be the first,” Summer admitted grudgingly.  She smoothed her black bob and gently wiped a finger under her heavy eyeliner. “Do you have any idea what will happen if Debbie’s lawsuit goes through?”

I did indeed know what would happen.  I had been part of what I considered a
sanctioned
cover
-
up.  Lucky’s daughter, Penny accidentally killed her father, well, mostly accidentally, but the
semantics
didn’t matter since the poor woman met with her own accident; death by shoes.  She had tottered backwards over the railing on her cantilevered porch. No one could have survived the fall.  It made me think twice before donning my favorite high heel pumps by Jimmy Choo. 
But only twice.
I was determined to keep my addiction and just vowed to avoid high places and slippery balconies.

Anyway. What would happen if hundreds of residents, burned out of their homes due to negligence and willful use of known flammable material could prove their case and win their suit?  
All
the money in the estate would be gone,
which wasn’t a problem in of itself, but
the money would
leave the city and go to outsiders.
Most
long-term
residents would have never purchased a home built by Lucky, not, I was discovering, even
a
home he built
for himself. Although the insulation used in
Penny’s former residence was from a different manufacturer than
the cheap, and, as it turns out, flammable insulation pumped into hundreds of
tract
homes
built
above my grandmother
’s house
on upper Red Dog
R
oad.

“No more theater
,
” I said out loud.

She nodded.  “No shit.”

“What are you going to do about it?

“Stop her.
”  Summer said darkly or like the gathering of a
summer storm if I wanted to extend and torture the metaphor.

 

Chapter 2

 

 

After yet another idyllic weekend filled with permit negotiation, sanding, dust, refinishing fluid and an ever growing parade of sub contractors who
routinely
forg
o
t their own tools but helpfully pos
ted
drink requests on the refrigerator door, I was ready for work, but apparently, not that ready.

I was barely in the door
of New Century Realty
Monday morning
when I was accosted by the two most powerful and profitable agents in our office, even the county
,
if you ask them.


T
hey took the toilet and the water heater.”  Rosemary flung down
a stack of
flyers with disgust. “Can you
believe
that?”


That’s nothing,
” Katherine billowed in shaking her head.  “
the
holier than thou
Christophe
r
s
are on the war path again.”

“For what?”
 

“Do you still have
a
sign in front of your house?”  Katherine raised one thin eyebrow.

“I drove by it this morning.”  I remembered I needed to
replenish
the flyer box as well.  Lord, were we
tangling with
the Sign Nazis again?  I didn’t think I had the strength.
I reached over the high reception counter and grabbed a yellow sticky note.  I scribbled “more flyers” and stuck it onto my phone.  

“M
y
sign
is gone.  When I called
to find out where it was
they said it was too close to the road!  The road!”  Katherine’s voice rose, and we both hushed her.  We didn’t want our manager Inez to march in and lecture us, not this early in the morning.  I glanced at my watch, I had twenty minutes before the staff meeting,
it
was like recess before math class.

“Wow, another body.” 
Patricia popped off
. A
body would be welcome after missing toilets and missing sales signs.

“Another body?”
I
r
eached around her and rescued a
small fan of flyers and notices
from
my IN box
.
I
sort
ed
through the paucity of mail
.
I liked the
ha
r
d copy
flyers and notices that came
into our IN boxes
, it showed a distinct
perseverance
for the old art
of direct mail, for printing
, for glossy paper stock
, for full bleeds
.
I considered ordering hard copy flyers for my house. 

“You know, sometimes they use new people during crush, some don’t know their ass from their elbow.  Remember the guy last year?  Dead in the stainless steel tank?”

I nodded, I did remember.

“Once the tank was drained, who looked again?” 
She squinted at her monitor and scrolled down for more information.
Inez
,
our manager, never comments on Patricia’s hobbies. Patricia
is not only our administrative assistant, she also
serves as our ad hoc escrow coordinator and she is really good.  You do not interfere with
genius
like hers. She can get blood from rocks and paperwork from banks.  Based on just that talent alone, we both love and fear her.  That she wears black nail polish and matching lipstick is just a bonus.

Who indeed?  I didn’t know what happened to the tanks after the wine was drained and bottled.
  Stored, ignored
, cleaned, wasn’t there something about the fumes from the cleaning agent?

“How could a worker be missed?”  Rosemary demanded, as if Patricia knew.

“He could have been illegal, they wouldn’t write anything down in that case
, no record
.”  I offered.

“It was an accident.” Patricia scanned her generously sized monitor.  “It happened once before last year, and now this new guy.” 

“Crush shouldn’t be taken literary.”  I put in.

“Lord
,
who dies in a winery?”  Rosemary
commented
idly. “I would think all those safety requirements would make it impossible to so much as slip on a grape skin.”

Patricia frowned at the tank photo. She rubbed her eye careful
ly
to not disturb the thick black eyeliner,
then
sighed. She switched to the company email screen.  She was enigmatic.  I admit that I sometimes take her for granted. 
Patricia
works tirelessly
and efficiently.
Her manner with our walk-in, potential clients, was
abrupt, but Rosemary once pointed out that she didn’t want clients who weren’t serious. And if they could get past Patricia, then they were serious. 
The three of us
did not ask why
Patricia
was looking up death in winemaking, her taste
s
were
catholic and if she
were
interested in wine deaths today,
she’d
surely
be distracted by gardening mayhem tomorrow
.
Although I haven’t heard much of people dying in the garden, short of old English mystery novels.

She glanced at her cell
phone
and frowned.  “I have to take this. Go, talk amongst yourselves.”  She took the phone and headed to the ladies room.

The lull in the lobby was short lived.  I opened my mouth to start enticing Rosemary to attend both the broker’s open
where my ho
use was scheduled to be on tour
and my own open house
,
when Paul Christopher
- God
is my Partner - roared into the office, eyes blazing with
self-righteousness
and, since I’m exaggerating,
self-importance
.

“I am shocked that you would ignore all our
notices and laws
!”  He paused in the doorway right in the
path
of the automatic eye for the
doorbell
.  The bell clanged
loudly
accentuating each of
his
evangelical
pronouncements
.  

“We traced four improperly
placed directional
signs directly
to your office.”  He bellowed. I gestured for him to step all the way into the lobby and out of the sensor for the door, but he
stubbornly
held his ground.

Paul Christopher
is undeniably good looking.
The
l
ate fifties
look
ed
good on him. With swept back long hair and soulful eyes, he flaunt
ed
the charisma of a late night evangelist, which is what he was in a former life.  He li
k
es
to say
,
“I’m not really godly,
I
just play godly on TV
.

I am not sure
whom
he saves in real estate, but some of his methods have not been
exactly;
well, traditionally
Christian,
as I understood it.  Rosemary loathes him; Katherine
thinks he is really the devil and once
during a rather rowdy broker’s dinner
tried to find the three 6

s carved into his skull, but had no luck
.
 
But s
he still believes.

The door chime was
beginning to lose
heart when Patricia finally emerged

“Jesus H Christ who is standing in the fucking door
!
” Patricia smacked open the door of the
l
adies room and stomped into the lobby.  She glared at P
aul
Christopher.  He glared back, but
at that second,
she had more righteousness on her side. 
He
slowly took one step
into the lobby. The
doorbell
uttered one last
exhausted
clang and fell gratefully silent.

 

“Those signs will come down now!”  He glared at Patricia as if she was the devil incarnate.  She was worked up enough to be.

“Don’t you threaten,” Patricia raised her fist.

Inez brushed past me, a ball of fury and energy.  “Go to your office
,

s
he commanded.  Rosemary turned and sauntered to her coveted windowed office while I just dived for any room not in the path of Inez or Paul. I did not
have the
fortitude or
documented virtue
to withstand the
wrath
of
Mr. Christopher
,
especially since
I was one of those people with
for sale
signs
posted too close to the street. 
But he didn’t need to know that yet.

“What do you mean to come into my office and make a scene like that?” 
Inez
may be a foot shorter than Mr. Christopher, but she is much stronger and considerably smarter.  She crossed her arms, displaying her perfect long red talons and eyed him. 

“Sometimes you have to make a scene to get attention.”  He declared with a smirk.  “You know that we self monitor
the
signs we use, we don’t want the
city
–”


Government
,” he spat, “to tell us what to do.”

“And
in the absence of government oversight,
you have
anointed yourself
judge and jury
.

She pointed out archly.

“I’m the head of the
S
ign
Control
River’s Bend
B
eautification
C
ommittee
,
yes
.
” He puffed up his chest.

“Sign Nazis,” Patricia
’s
voice carried down the halls.

“Patricia.”  Inez warned.

The sign Nazis are a reoccurring problem. 
Members
have the honor of
belonging to
the
most obnoxious
self-appointed
committee in town.  They make up their own rules, and change those rules to suit their whims.
If you don’t take their calls
, if
you are late responding to their calls (they give you about ten minutes to respond), if you don’t do as they say, they simply pull out your sign and throw it away.  It can be very costly.  Most agents are forced to listen. Mostly we listen. Mostly.

 

“Why don’t we go into my office and you can tell me exactly which signs are violating your sensibilities?”  Inez offered.

“No, I don’t have time for that.  Here take the list, Marcia phoned me with the information just today.  You must have them down by
10:00 this morning.

It was
almost 9:00.  He knew that.

“Drop everything because you say so?”  Her tone was heavy with sarcasm. But he did not appreciate or
maybe
even understand sarcasm.

“Or we will take them down for you.” He sneered
, his work finished, he jerked the door open. The
bell only beeped one little bleat. The door slammed. The ensuing silence was deafening.

“I know you’re all listening.”  Inez called out like
Gilda
outing the Munchkins.  “Any of these ours?” 

Katherine, Rosemary and I crept
back
to the lobby. Patricia looked at us impassively then turned to her computer, her fingers flew over her keyboard a staccato
rhythm
to accompany Inez. 
Inez
rattled off the addresses where the red arrowed signs were
purportedly
posted.

The challenge was of course, that th
ose handy arrows
often pointed to a street that held a number of homes for sales, offered by multiple offices.  Sure, we ordered
them,
they are often a critical component in marketing a
house.  All three of us sold homes because the buyers followed a
red arrow
sign.

BOOK: Catharine Bramkamp - Real Estate Diva 04 - Trash Out
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