Page 62 of Saltwater Memories
Chapter 22
One of the landscapers that Amanda recommended ended up being a delight to work with; Will spent the week directing his crew on the new estate and was impressed with their progress.
He appreciated that Amanda still sent him the recommendations after their spat, but he wasn’t going to keep trying to be her friend. Clearly she wanted to push him away badly enough to weave this lie about mob activity on the island.
Ridiculous. It was one thing if she disapproved of his efforts to make money off of the properties here. And it was still another thing if she was in a quasi-relationship with her long-lost ex-boyfriend.
Sure, whatever. That was all fine and he was happy leaving her alone.
Yet she still wasn’t satisfied. It wasn’t until she casually told him that he was probably working with the mob that he snapped. Was it her way of signaling that she thought he was sleazy? Or was it just an extension of her self-destructive streak – setting off bombs around anything even resembling a new relationship?
Will wasn’t sure, and he didn’t have much time to think about it. Gordon wanted to get the new estate up and running by the summer. Will spent his days on the property, directing contractors, plumbers, landscapers, electricians – everyone that they needed to get this place out of disarray.
They already had building plans completed from their staff architect, and an engineer had cleared all of the structures. They were paying a premium to get the estate in shape as soon as possible, so it’d be ready for the busy summer season of tourists.
Later that week, Gordon called to check in on the progress. Will gave him a full update and promised to tweak the timeline, and to create a report to share with investors. Gordon was trying to rush him off of the phone when Will stuck in one more question.
“Last thing – have you talked to Lenny recently? I know that we closed on a few of his properties, but I didn’t know when you wanted me to start working on them.”
“Don’t go near those properties. Not for a while.”
Will frowned. “Ah, okay. No problem. It’s just that he’s my biggest client so I want to make sure – ”
“Yeah, yeah. Do me a favor, and stay out of it.”
“Okay.” He paused. “And the properties he’s holding onto? The rentals? Should I start planning renovations for them, or are – ”
“What part of ‘stay out of it’ do you not get, Will?”
“Uh...” Will cleared his throat. “I just want to make sure that our biggest client is happy.”
“He’s happy. He’s fine. You’re killing me, though. Get back to work Will.”
After they ended the phone call, Will told himself to focus on the work at the estate. He told himself that the way his boss acted about Lenny wasn’t weird, and that it couldn’t possibly have anything to do with what Amanda had said.
He also told himself that he was misremembering that framed mugshot that Amanda had in her house. At the time he thought it looked vaguely like Lenny, and since then he could only remember itasLenny. But it must’ve been his imagination warping an unfortunate doppelganger – Lenny wasn’t a unique looking guy. He was so average that he was almost a caricature. It just so happened that he looked like the caricature of…a criminal.
He repeated these things to himself over and over again, but didn’t get any closer to believing them. That Saturday, he decided to take a break from the estate to go and look at one of the apartment buildings that they were supposed to eventually manage for Lenny.
No, he wasn’t supposed to and he felt silly doing it, but he couldn’t stop thinking about it. He reasoned that DGG would soon be getting a cut of the rent and he needed to see what work needed to be done; it had nothing to do with suppressing the uneasy feeling in his chest.
The complex was on the edge of Friday Harbor. It was a bit off the beaten track, but still walkable from town. When Will pulled up, he was impressed by the size of the place – it was a five story high brick building, its horseshoe-shaped walls wrapping around much of the block. Granted, it wasn’t a huge block, but it was the only building like it that he’d seen on the island.
There was a garden and common area out front. There wasn’t much foliage – he noticed these things now – but the grass looked healthy enough. Will pulled around the back of the building and was surprised to see that there weren’t any cars parked in the expansive lot – except for one broken down Buick that looked like it’d been there for ages. The tires were flat and one of the windows was taped up.
“That’s odd…”
He pulled out the file he had on this property. It had originally been built in 1982 and had over thirty luxury apartments, according to his records. There were a range of sizes – from studios and one bedrooms, to multi-level apartments and lofts. All told, the building had a gross revenue of three million dollars in rent per year.
Will paused. The math there didn’t add up. How much were they charging for the apartments every month? Certainly they weren’t getting an average of eightthousanddollars a month for each of these apartments?
He leaned forward and peered around. And if they were, who were these people? How much was a parking spot? Were they paying a few thousand a month to park here or something? That would be an oddity for the island.
The company Lenny represented, Sun Kissing Holdings, claimed that this apartment building was worth thirtymilliondollars, citing that there was an expected growth in rent.
Will ran through the numbers again. None of this made any sense. How could this apartment building, even with wealthy clients, be worththatmuch more than even the extravagant estate?
Will ignored the squeezing in his stomach – it must’ve been something he’d eaten. Yeah, maybe that questionable cheese from yesterday. And not the fear that he was about to walk into a drug trafficking den.
