by David Liss
That was exactly how Pete had operated his entire career. Except once. He’d been inspecting a McMansion in Olmos Park, not five years old, and found some significant structural damage with the roof. Nothing was about to cave in, but the house was going to need work in the next year or two, which was outrageous for a structure so new. The realtor, Candi Watson, had obviously known about it, because she’d stood on the lawn watching him while he climbed around up there, and she cornered him as soon as he’d come down. Candi was one of the big movers in these old San Antonio neighborhoods, and she sent a lot of business Pete’s way. A brittle woman in her early sixties, bleach blonde, impeccably dressed, and affluently gaunt, Candi treated Pete with the same condescending reserve she probably used on her maid and valet parkers, but she was a lucrative contact, and he’d always been content to kiss her ass.
“Listen,” she’d said to him, resting her fingertips momentarily against his upper arm. Pete was pretty sure it was the first time in their ten years of business that she’d ever touched him. “These people are impossible. I’ve shown them two dozen places, and they’ve turned everything down for the most absurd reasons. They like this one, and they’re leaning toward it, but I know them, and if your report spooks them, they’ll walk. All homes are going to need some work. You know that. And they can afford it.” All the while she spoke, she was reaching into her purse, but the look on her face said she had no idea what her hand could possibly be up to. Finally she pulled out an envelope and tucked it into the creases of Pete’s folded arms. “The roof is just fine.”
Pete grabbed the envelope with his fingertips, uncrossed his arms, and peeked inside just long enough to see that it was thick with $50s. The look on Candi’s face suggested that looking had been disturbingly crass.
Pete tried to hand the envelope back to her. “Candi, I appreciate your position, but you know I can’t—”
She refused to take it, taking a step back and holding up her hands like Pete was about to do something unsavory. “How much business have I sent your way over the years?”
“And I appreciate that, but this could ruin me.”
“It won’t ruin you,” she said, laughing like he’d suggested she could get pregnant from a toilet seat. “You’ll never hear a squeak about this, and if you do, I promise to make it go away. Your reputation will be protected, and you won’t be out one cent in legal fees. If this blows up in our faces, I can take care of it and still come out ahead. Everyone wins, Pete, including the client. You’re in a service industry. So, serve.”
When he didn’t say anything, she said, “That’s five thousand dollars in there. Don’t tell me you can’t use it.”
Pete had taken the money, less, he would later think, because he wanted it than because there was nothing else to do with it other than drop it on the ground or shove it inside Candi’s silk blouse. He had known at that moment that he could either walk away with some extra cash or walk away without one of his best business generators. There had been no third choice.
Six months later, when the buyers sued him, Pete had immediately tried to contact Candi, but she refused to take his calls. More than that, she began to talk about him to other realtors and inspectors. She’d been worried about him for a long time. Pete was sloppy, she said. He was lazy. Was it incompetence or negligence, she wondered? Had that been beer she’d smelled on his breath during that inspection a few weeks back? Even so, with all her doubts about him, she was scandalized that he could botch an inspection so badly.
Pete’s work began to dry up. Now he was lucky to get one or two inspections a week, and he had a deposition coming up in which he had no choice but to lie or condemn himself. But lying, he knew, was only delaying the inevitable since he’d signed his name to a bad inspection, and the homeowners could prove it. They were asking for $50,000 to replace the roof and cover water damages. The amount was outrageous unless they were planning on using gold tiles, but his lawyer said they wouldn’t get more than $25,000. Even so, a settlement like that would mean bankruptcy and the end of Pete’s livelihood. He owned his house, but he’d be unable to pay his property taxes. He was pretty much looking at his life blowing up in his face.
On Monday morning, with nothing else to do with his time, Pete drove over to the Home Depot parking lot and checked his phone which, typical for these days, had no messages. He made some phone calls he suspected would be pointless. Only the most marginal and poorly connected realtors hadn’t heard that Pete was bad news. Still, he kept trying because what the hell else was he going to do.
After he’d exhausted all his follow-ups, Pete tried Candi’s office one more time. Why not? Maybe she’d had a chance to reflect. Maybe he could catch her in a good mood. But no luck. Her receptionist was very apologetic. Candi was not in right now. Would he care to leave a voicemail? Pete would not, and there was no point trying her cell phone. She rejected all his calls. Once, when he’d tried to call from a different phone, she’d disconnected the second she heard his voice.
Maybe he should go get a beer.Why the hell not? Sitting in a bar and watching ESPN all day sure sounded a whole lot better than sitting in his truck. If he was going to do nothing, it might as well be enjoyable.
He was on the verge of having talked himself into it. His fingers were on the keys, and he was ready to twist, but then he stopped himself. What the hell was he doing? Was he really going to turn into a drunk because life had knocked him down and was repeatedly kicking him in the balls? How had he allowed this to happen? Everyone walked all over him, and he did nothing to stop it. Well, fuck that, he decided. He’d turn into a drunk if he ran out of options. The barstool would always be waiting for him. For now, it was time to push back a little.
He hated to say it, but he needed to take a page from Douchebag William’s book of douchebaggery. He couldn’t make himself younger or have more hair, and while getting back into shape was a good idea, he couldn’t take care of that at this exact moment. None of that mattered, though. Douchebag William didn’t shoulder his way through life because of his looks. They helped, sure, but it was his attitude. Maybe his looks were why he had the attitude in the first place, but to be a first class dick like the Douche, all you really needed was to act like the world was going to bend to your will whether it wanted to or not.
It was time for Pete to take action instead of waiting for everyone to stop walking all over him. He had to deal with Jenny’s crummy attitude, and he had to get Candi to step up and do what she’d said she would, but first things first. He had an idea, a way to push back, and it was going to make him feel good, so that’s where he was going to start.
Pete picked up the phone and called his old high school friend, Grant McNabb. Grant was a private investigator, which was apparently a lot less exciting than it appeared on TV. Mostly he sat in an office and conducted interviews and looked things up on the computer. He had some guys who worked for him who would sit in cars and try to snap pictures of assholes cheating on their wives, but Grant said that work was boring as hell. He preferred to hang out at his desk, eating potato chips, and occasionally watching porn.
Grant listened to a sanitized version of Pete’s story. There was a neighbor across the street who was giving Pete attitude. It would be helpful to know something about the guy before pushing back.
“That’s not a problem,” Grant said. “No charge, but next time we hang, beers are on you.”
“Deal.” It felt good. You ask for something, and you get it. That’s all it takes.
“It shouldn’t be too hard,” Grant said. “Let me hit you up in a few hours.”
Feeling like he was being forceful, getting stuff done, Pete turned on the truck and drove over to Candi Watson’s office on Broadway. As a realtor, she was obviously out much of the day, but the office was still her home base, and Pete knew she had to check in once in a while.
Since she had first refused to honor her promise, Pete had thought about going to confront her. Just about every day he’d imagined what
it would be like to go to her office, lean over her while she cringed and promised to make good. He hadn’t done it because it was the nuclear option. If she didn’t give in, he would never be able to back track and hope for a resolution, so he kept putting it off. The encounter with Douchebag William had made it clear, however, that no one was going to treat him with respect or take him seriously if he didn’t demand it.
Pete parked his truck outside her office, right next to Candi’s BMW. He took two spaces, just to show he knew how to be as much of a dick as the next guy, and then he walked into the reception area, just in time to see the door to Candi’s office close. Behind the front desk, a plump redheaded woman was working the phones.
“Can I help you?” she asked. Her nervous expression suggested she knew exactly who he was and what he wanted. Candi was hiding in her office and had thrown the receptionist to the wolves.
That’s what Pete was now, he told himself. The wolves.
“I’d like to talk to Candi,” he said, trying to keep his voice somewhere between badass and polite. He was going for resolute.
“I’m afraid she’d not here,” the receptionist attempted.
“Huh,” Pete said. “That’s funny, because her car is right outside, and I just saw her close her door.”
The woman shook her head, looking like she was on the verge of tears. “She’s not here.”
Pete moved to walk toward Candi’s office. “I’ll just have a peek.”
The woman rose up and blocked him. There was no way he was going to be able to open the door to her office without touching her, and Pete understood that would be a mistake. Accidentally brush one of her big tits and she’d be crying rape, so he took a few steps back, palms up to show there was no titty-touching scheduled into his calendar.
“I’ll just wait for her.” Pete lowered himself into one of the chairs lining the wall.
“She won’t be coming in at all today.” The words were ordinary, but the tone suggested she was pleading for her life with a bankrobber.
Pete felt his heart pounding. He was a little nervous himself, but this woman didn’t know that, and she was taking him seriously. He liked that.
“Please,” she said to him. “There’s no point in waiting.”
“You know what,” Pete said. “It turns out that I have nothing else to do, so I don’t mind.”
She sat down at her desk and leveled her gaze at him. After taking a deep breath she said, “I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to leave.”
Pete smiled and shrugged, but did not reply. He picked up a copy of Texas Highways magazine, turned a few pages and looked at the pictures with great interest, as though the magazine had some kind of purpose other than to take up space in waiting rooms. After a few seconds, he peeked up to watch the heavy woman nervously answer the phone, her eyes wide, her hands unsteady as she took messages. She asked people to repeat things. She dropped pens. Pete liked that she was having a hard time concentrating. That, he thought, is what happens when you fuck with me. He would have liked the world’s response to his wrath to be a little more significant than botched phone messages, but it was a start.
After almost an hour, with no sign of Candi emerging from the shelter of her office, Pete saw a police car pull into the parking lot, its lights flashing to signal its seriousness. Pete felt an electric jolt of fear pass through him, but he told himself that he would be fine. He had done nothing wrong. This was a reception area, open to the public, and he was waiting for the person who worked in this office, a person with whom he had legitimate business.
The policeman, a baby-faced guy in his mid-20s, came into the reception area, his radio squawking. He looked at the receptionist, but didn’t say anything to her. Instead, he turned to Pete, and squinted with disdain, as if he already knew everything he needed to know.
“Sir,” he said. “We have a report that you are being disruptive.”
“That’s not true,” Pete said calmly. “I’m waiting to talk to Candi Watson. This is where she works, and I have business with her. I’m just sitting here quietly until she’s free.”
“Sir,” the policeman said with distracted and immensely insincere politeness, “it’s my understanding that you’ve been informed that Miss Watson is not in.”
Pete smiled. “I’m hoping she’ll stop by.”
“Sir, have you been asked to leave?”
“Yes, but for no good reason. I need to speak to Candi Watson, and this is her office. No one has explained to me why I can’t wait here.”
“Sir, this is private business, and if the employees have asked you to leave, you are obligated to do so.”
Pete stood because he didn’t like the cop looking down at him. He rose slowly, however, and kept his hands visible, so there would be no misunderstandings. “Look, officer, I get that, but I want to talk to Candi Watson on a matter of business. Her office is right there, and she’s inside it. She refuses to take my calls. She won’t see me. I haven’t threatened her or anyone else. If you want to hang out here while we talk, that’s just fine with me. You can arrest me if I do anything illegal.”
“Sir,” the policeman said, “please don’t tell me how to exercise my duties.”
“I’m not telling you anything,” Pete said, his voice growing just the tiniest bit louder.
“Sir, please do not raise your voice. I understand that you think you have business here, but that’s not my concern. My concern is that you have been asked to vacate private property, and you are refusing to do so. If you continue to refuse, I’m going to have to detain you.”
“Detain me?” Pete asked. “So, that means… what? I’ll be in detention?”
“Sir,” the policeman said, “I am going to have to give you your final warning.”
The policeman leveled his apathetic gaze at him, and Pete knew he was on thin ice now. If he didn’t eat this cop’s shit, like he had to eat everyone else’s shit, he would be cuffed. Pete had to walk out of there, humiliated and helpless, or go to jail, maybe get tased or pepper sprayed or some bullshit like that. Fuck it, he thought. Let them fucking detain me. For what? For sitting in a waiting room? Let’s see how those charges stand up in court. Good luck with that. Make all the threats you want, he decided, I’m standing my ground.
But he walked out. He knew he couldn’t bear to explain all of this to Jenny and Addison. He couldn’t deal with yet one more disaster, so he took the shame of defeat instead. Without looking at the receptionist, he walked out and got into his truck.
He sat behind the wheel and watched while the cop talked to the receptionist. He said something and smiled. The receptionist laughed and twirled her red hair around a finger. Pete pulled out of his parking spot and went back to the Home Depot, where he sat for several hours.
* * *
Later that afternoon, Grant returned his call.
“Your guy’s a lawyer,” Grant said.
“Big surprise.”
“Yeah. Not married, no kids. Works at a firm downtown doing some kind of financial bullshit I can’t understand. No history of legal problems. He looks pretty clean.”
Pete grabbed his clipboard and wrote down the name and address of the firm. “What time does he usually get off work?”
“Hold on,” Grant said, and the sound of fingers on a computer keyboard came over the line. “My behavior prediction algorithm says he’ll leave his office today between 5:15 and 5:21.”
“Really?”
“Fuck, no,” Grant said. “You think life is like a TV show where a guy with a computer can find out what you had for dinner last Wednesday?”
Pete sighed. “Thanks, man. I owe you.”
Okay, so Grant didn’t know what time he got out exactly, but Pete figured it would not be before 5:00, so he put his truck in gear and headed downtown. A guy like that, with no family, wouldn’t necessarily be out the door early, but Pete decided to take a chance. Better to catch him off guard, to see that Pete was not a guy to be fucking with.
&n
bsp; He made it downtown just before five and was lucky enough to find a spot on Commerce just across the street from the Douche’s office. He sat there and waited. Fifteen minutes later, he saw why Grant hired out guys to do the legwork. It was boring as shit. He decided he would give it until six and then call it a day.
Then, there he was, coming out of his office in a fancy suit, with a leather briefcase in his hand, like he was some sort of a big shot. He was walking with a woman, a real looker too. She wore a skirt suit, the sort of thing Pete usually found unattractive, but this one made it work. She had shoulder length dark hair and gigantic brown eyes, and a killer body. Her skin was a very light brown, so she was probably a Mexican – also the sort of thing that Pete didn’t usually go for, but this girl was radiant, and she pulled off the Latina thing no problem.
This is a stupid idea, Pete decided. He had to be out of his mind to even be thinking about this. He pressed himself back into his seat so his neighbor wouldn’t catch a glimpse of him, which was kind of a stupid thing to do since his name and number were on the side of his truck.
In fact, Douchebag William glanced over. Pete realized he’d been spotted. Maybe he could play it off as a coincidence, but probably not. He was going to look like a creepy stalker now. Well, fuck that. Fate wasn’t going to let him chicken out, so he sucked in a big gulp of air, reminded himself that he was king shit, and he wasn’t going to get pushed around by anyone. Then he opened the door, dodged traffic to cross the street, and planted himself directly across from William.
“Hey there, neighbor,” he said in that way he had that sounded sort of friendly but was really meant to be menacing.
William and the woman stopped. The woman actually had a disgusted look on her face, like Pete was a homeless guy or something.
William let the seconds tick by, staring but not saying anything, so Pete decided to pick up the slack. “You and your sister out for a stroll?” He figured if the Douche could accuse him of being a Mexican, Pete could return the favor.