Blackberry Crumble (12 page)

“Mrs. Hoffmiller?” May said into the line after the third ring, sounding excited. “You’re here?”

“I’m here,” Sadie said, rifling through her purse for the notebook where she’d already been jotting down notes. “You can call me Sadie.”

Let the games begin.

Chapter 15

May had suggested they meet at Karri’s Restaurant, a few blocks from the hotel. It was off the main street and tucked between a record store and an old house that had been converted into a law office. Sadie suspected the restaurant had once been a home as well, but it looked as though multiple owners had put their own touch on the building until it looked a little cut-and-pasted together. The front of the bungalow-style house had a wide porch, but the brick had been covered with some kind of metal plating, and the porch covering had been removed so as to facilitate the sign to the restaurant, which looked like it had been painted by a tag artist.

Inside was one big, open room with pillars supporting the high ceilings and what looked like yard-sale furniture arranged in mismatched sets throughout the dining room. Sadie saw May seated on the far side of the room and waved as she made her way across the room. Once at the table, she pulled out a wicker chair with a gingham chair pad; May was already seated on a wooden chair painted with black-and-brown stripes.

Any oddness of the décor was forgiven due to the amazing smells wafting in from the double doors on the far side of the big room—and the fact that the music was playing softly rather than blaring. After the two women exchanged hellos, May handed Sadie a piece of paper that Sadie quickly realized was the menu. It had the day’s date written at the top. Written! The whole menu was in handwriting rather than type, though it looked like a copy. May seemed to notice her inspection. “Karri does a new menu every day,” she explained. “She makes copies before the restaurant opens. She says she never knows what she’s in the mood to make until she comes in.”

“That is just delightful,” Sadie said, scanning the handwritten menu. There were a few salads that sounded interesting, and a corn burrito—whatever that was—as well as gluten-free spring rolls and asparagus soup. Impressive. At the bottom, it said in small letters, “We make every attempt to use locally grown produce. Visit our website for details on the local farms we support!”

“You had a good flight?” May asked once Sadie had finished reading all the items and succeeded in not drooling all over the paper. May’s voice reminded her that eating was not her main reason for being here.

“Yes, thank you,” Sadie said with a smile, focusing on her new employer. May looked very much like she had at their first meeting. Her light red hair had a wave to it, parted on the side, and just brushed her shoulder. Her side-swept bangs framed her big blue eyes really well. Minimal makeup made the most of her natural coloring and gave her a fresh look. She wore a lime-green, buttoned-up shirt that emphasized her eyes and denim capris that still allowed her shape, while full-figured, to be appreciated.

“And I absolutely love the hotel,” Sadie continued, casually sliding the contract she’d printed off the Internet into her lap, waiting for the right moment. Asking May to sign it so soon seemed awkward, like maybe Sadie didn’t trust their verbal agreement, but she was trying to handle herself as professionally as possible, and she was pretty sure professional investigators had their clients sign contracts.

“I’m glad you like it. It’s a bit of a landmark, and I wanted you to have the whole Portland experience while you’re here.”

“It’s lovely,” Sadie said, touched by May’s thoughtfulness. “So many trees—even downtown.”

May looked out the window, partly covered by a Japanese maple. “It is beautiful. There’s no other city in the world like Portland.”

Sadie heard the regret laced in May’s words and saw the wistful look on her face. “Did you grow up here?” she asked.

“In Lake Oswego,” May said, turning her attention back to Sadie and smoothing her expression. “Ten or twelve miles south of the city.”

“Is there really a lake?”

May smiled, a dimple showing on the left side of her chin. “Yes, there’s a lake, but we didn’t live on it—only so many houses will fit on the shore, you know.”

Sadie smiled. “What took you to Ohio?”

May shrugged and looked at the menu, but the movements weren’t casual. “Oh, you know, leaving the nest and all that grown-up stuff. Ohio has lots of trees, too, so it feels a little like home.” She laughed and smoothed her shirt front. Her smile was determined, and Sadie moved on, despite knowing there was more to this story.

“I, um, brought a contract,” Sadie said, sliding the paper across the table. May seemed to want a shift in topic as well, and it made sense to get it signed and taken care of before they discussed more specifics. May barely skimmed the document before pulling a pen from her purse and signing it with a flourish.

That was easy
, Sadie thought as she signed her name as well. “I’ll make copies and get one to you as soon as possible.”

May waved the idea away with a swish of her hand. “I’m not worried.”

“Good,” Sadie said, putting the contract back in her purse. “Then I guess we’re ready to get to work.”

May clasped her hands together and put them on the table between them. “What do you want to know?”

Where to start?
Sadie wondered, skimming the notes she’d made in regard to what May had already told her, which wasn’t much, and what she’d discovered on her own, which also wasn’t much. After a few seconds of deliberation she determined her starting point. “When we spoke on the phone, you mentioned a former business partner of your father’s, Keith Kelly. He’s the one you’re suspicious of.”

May nodded. “I know he had something do to with Dad’s death. I just know it.”

“What else can you tell me about him?” She found a pen in her purse and within moments was primed and ready to write down every bit of information May gave her.

The waitress stopped at their table, setting down a pair of water glasses. “Are you ladies ready?” She nodded toward the photocopied menu Sadie had all but forgotten about.

“We’ll need another minute,” May said. The waitress tapped the table with her hand and said she’d be right back. May nodded and turned to the white shoulder bag she’d brought with her—the same one she’d had when she came to Garrison. She removed a manila folder and handed it to Sadie. “My father and Keith Kelly went into business together in 1985. They’d met in college years before that; my dad was getting his degree in engineering, and Keith was getting his MBA.”

“Different majors,” Sadie said, scribbling notes as quickly as she could. “Were they roommates?”

May shook her head. “Not roommates, but they shared a passion for golf and lager.”

“Beer?” Sadie asked, wanting to make sure she was following. She opened the folder but only glanced at the papers inside, not wanting to divide her attention between what May was telling her, what she needed to write down, and what was printed on pages she could read later.

“A distinctive beer,” May continued. “I know, being a beer connoisseur in college—especially in Oregon—is far from unique, but lager has a cleaner taste and ferments at cooler temperatures, I guess; it’s considered high-end, especially for college kids. Anyway, they became good friends, and after working for awhile after graduation, they came together and started their own fire suppression company; Dad had worked for a company that manufactured system parts.”

Sadie nodded. “So Keith and your dad formed SK Systems in ’85?”

May looked at her in surprise. The name of their company wasn’t a detail Sadie had received from May.

“I did a little poking around after we talked on Sunday,” Sadie explained. “Both Mr. Kelly and your dad mentioned SK Systems in their website bios.”

“You’re on the case already,” May said with an enthusiastic grin. “I love that!”

Sadie shrugged but was pleased to have impressed her. “But they both went on to establish their own suppression companies in 2000. Was there a falling out between them?”

May nodded, her expression sobering. “In the fall of 1999, Keith wanted to make changes to the company.”

Sadie didn’t look up from her notebook, writing fast. “What kind of changes?”

“Well, my brother, Hugh, was working on the manufacturing side of things when Keith suddenly didn’t want him as a supervisor anymore. Hugh didn’t have a degree, and Keith felt they should hire someone who did in order to maximize their growth potential, or something like that.” She huffed slightly. “Hugh had been involved with the company since he was fifteen years old. He grew up in the shop. He knew the business backward and forward—he knew a lot more than any college graduate. My father stood up for Hugh, but Keith was insistent. Over the course of a few months, Dad’s relationship with Keith soured completely. Twenty-plus years of friendship wasn’t as strong as they’d thought. It was a really hard time for my dad—for all of us, really.”

Sadie’s notes consisted of random words:
Beer, Hugh, degree, market potential, hardship.
She hoped she could make sense of it later. Maybe she should have bought a voice recorder.

“You were, what, in your early twenties when this happened?” Sadie asked, pausing to flex her hand in hopes of warding off an impending cramp.

May nodded. “I handled all the customer billing for the company. Jolene, my sister, was doing accounts payable part-time, and Hugh was working full-time in the shop with Dad. We all had a stake in the company, which is what my father had always wanted. Keith had wanted the same things—his kids were involved as well—but for some reason, he wanted to take that away from Hugh.

“After things really started to crumble between them, Keith came to my dad with a proposal to split the business—this was in early 2000—and Dad agreed. They spent a couple months splitting assets and operations. My father had always been more involved in the manufacturing side of things, while Keith had focused on sales and marketing. By the time they had divided things up, I thought they might even preserve their friendship. My father was led to believe that Keith would continue buying from him and that he could focus on manufacturing without Keith’s interference.”

“Led to believe?” Sadie repeated. “I’m assuming that isn’t what happened.”

May’s eyes narrowed slightly. “Weeks after the split—I guess it would have been February 2000—Keith landed a huge contract with one of the largest commercial contractors in northern Oregon: C-Spec Development. His portion of the initial deal was nearly half a million dollars, an amount that he and my dad would have shared if they were still in business together. There’s no way Keith negotiated that contract in so short a time, and we all suddenly realized why Keith had wanted to split in the first place.”

“To cut your dad out?”

“Exactly,” May said with a sharp nod. “They’d been building up this company for fifteen years and only just begun the commercial side of things, which is where the big money is. It had been slow going. The commercial market is competitive, and the contracts are notoriously complicated. Keith had likely worked the C-Spec contract for several months. When Dad confronted him about it, Keith denied it—of course. Whatever relationship they had managed to salvage while splitting the company was gone. Keith didn’t use Dad for the manufacturing; he built himself a new office and began marketing for commercial contracts.”

“And your father? How did he do with his new company?” Sadie asked, even though she knew from the website that S&S Suppression was a much smaller company than the new Kelly Fire Systems.

“Without a sales arm, Dad struggled. I moved to Ohio, and the company shrank down to just him, Hugh, Jolene, and a couple other employees. It was tough, especially when Keith seemed to do better and better every year. Eventually, Dad made some connections to other sales companies and began doing well for himself again. And then he . . . died.”

“Suspiciously,” Sadie added. This is where her attempts to gather information online had come to an end. Public records indicated nothing out of the ordinary about Jim Sanderson’s death. He died of a heart attack a month ago, nothing more.

“I think so,” May said. She opened her mouth, but closed it when the waitress approached the table.

“Are you ladies ready to order?” the young woman asked. Sadie scanned the menu while May gave her order—something called a turquoise salad.

“What’s this salmon and mushroom pasta?” Sadie asked, pointing at the last item on the menu.

“Today’s special. It’s pasta with salmon and mushrooms in a cream sauce.”

“Is it good?”

“If you like pasta, salmon, and mushrooms it is.” The waitress shrugged one shoulder. “Personally, I have fungus issues.”

Sadie held back a smile but threw a look toward the double doors that she assumed led to the kitchen. She wondered what Karri would say about her employee’s issues with fungus.

“Well,” Sadie said, “I’ll eat just about anything as long as it tastes good. I’ll take it.”

The woman shrugged again as if to appear nonjudgmental of Sadie’s liberal eating habits and gathered the menus. Sadie was determined to eat as many new things as possible while on this trip; now would be a perfect start.