Dirty Little Murder: A Plain Jane Mystery (The Plain Jane Mysteries Book 2)

by Traci Tyne Hilton

  Jane finished the floors and moved on to her bathroom cleaning. Today, she’d start in the basement and take a peek in the hot tub room while she was in the vicinity. Maybe seeing it again would trigger a memory.

  It would be her second trip back to the room since she found the body, but that didn’t seem to make the trip easier. Jane finished cleaning the unused and hardly even dusty bathroom, and stood outside the door to the room where Douglas had died.

  She had to push the door open if she wanted to see the room again. But did she really want to? A herd of question marks thundered across her brain. She had to see that room again.

  She popped the door open fast so she couldn’t change her mind.

  The black light was the only one on in the room and the white stripes of the zebra rug, the white veins of the black marble steps, and the bleached streaks in Caramel’s hair glowed.

  Caramel sat slumped in the hot tub, her head lolled to the side and her mouth gaping. Her arms stretched across the back of the hot tub seat, holding her body up.

  Jane ran to her. She grabbed her wrist and pressed it, searching for a pulse. “Caramel? Caramel?” She was loud, but not screaming, surprised at her own lack of panic.

  There it was, faint but real: a live pulse.

  Jane dipped her hand in the water and splashed Caramel’s face lightly.

  Caramel flinched.

  “Caramel?” Jane said again.

  Caramel blinked her eyes open. “Mmm.” She made a sound half way between a hum and clearing her throat.

  “Caramel? Are you all right?”

  Caramel wiped the water off her face. “I must have fallen asleep.” She stretched her arms and looked around her. She locked eyes on Jane. “The maid?”

  “I saw you in here, and I admit, it scared me.” Jane rocked back on her heels.

  “What are you doing in here?”

  Jane lowered her eyes and noticed for the first time that Caramel wasn’t wearing a bathing suit. “I’m so sorry. Let me get you a towel.”

  “Don’t bother.” Caramel stood up.

  Jane averted her eyes almost in time. But not quite.

  Caramel apparently used the hot tub and the tanning bed without her swimsuit on.

  Jane kept her eyes glued to her feet, expecting to be reamed out for straying from her instructions.

  Instead, Caramel padded down the marble steps, leaving behind a trail of wet foot prints.

  “We liked to sit in the tub together after… in the morning. Douglas and I.” Caramel paused at the door. “I miss him so much.”

  Jane managed to nod her head without looking up.

  “Is there any coffee yet?” Caramel asked.

  “Yes.” Jane couldn’t manage anything else.

  Caramel left without another word. Her feet made soft but echoey noises as she went up the staircase. When the noise ended, Jane wished she had remembered to tell Caramel that she had already opened all of the curtains.

  Jane wrapped her arms around her stomach and squeezed tight in a vain effort to suppress the nervous laughter that welled up inside. Was it hysteria or relief? Jane wasn’t sure, but she had to pull herself together. Her very naked boss was upstairs having coffee, and Jane still had four bathrooms to clean.

  Jane took the stairs two at a time. No use trying to hide from her work (or her boss). It was better to just get the rest of it over with as fast as she could.

  She ducked around the kitchen—sneaky avoidance being an instinct after all—and hit the hall half-bath. She did the other two guest bathrooms in record time, too, but no matter how fast she finished those, she still had to contend with the master bath. But she would face it like a professional adult—with her eyes closed if she had to.

  She rapped the master bedroom door with her knuckles. There was no reply so she pushed it open. “Caramel?” She attempted to sound relaxed and normal, but her nerves made her voice crack. Still no reply, so she made her way to the en suite. The door stood open. The room was empty.

  A giddy wave of relief washed over Jane. Finding both the bedroom and bathroom empty was a bit of luck she hadn’t counted on having. Just from her own sense of gratitude, she gave the bathroom an extra close clean.

  Jane straightened the hundreds of make-up bottles and compacts and the mountain of hair stuff piled on Caramel’s side of the vanity. Even the mirror was filthy on one side. The other side—Douglas’s—was spotless.

  In fact, there wasn’t an old razor or bottle of aftershave to be seen. Nothing on the counter proved there had ever been a man in the bathroom. And it wasn’t that Douglas had kept his stuff in some other bathroom. Jane had just cleaned them all. There were no razors, tweezers, or Old Spicy man stuff of any kind, anywhere.

  Jane eased open the drawers on the “man” side of the double sink vanity. Empty except for a spare roll of toilet paper.

  Caramel missed her husband so much that she had already cleaned out his bathroom, and his office, and had already resumed hot morning soaks in the tub where he had died.

  Jane shuddered.

  Jane had wanted her morning’s work to be more interesting, but she hadn’t bargained on it being that interesting. And she hadn’t answered any of the questions she had about Douglas’s death.

  For example… how had he died? Heart attack? Overdose? Slipped and drowned? Head held under the water until he died?

  Jane thought she ought to call the detective. She might be able to pump him for a little information.

  She was back at her apartment munching a bagel and sipping a Yo-Heaven smoothie she had grabbed from a drive through. Kaitlyn would hate her drinking it. Jake would love it.

  And Jake would probably be able to schmooze information out of the cops.

  Or not. That cop had been a cute guy. A bit too old for her, but probably more likely to spill investigation secrets to her than to Jake.

  She’d have to give the detective idea some thought. She wasn’t a natural at weaseling information out of people, and she didn’t have a good reason to call him—yet.

  She did have a free hour or so and a nice fast Internet connection, so she began hunting for information on Douglas Swanson’s first wife.

  It took a few pages of digging, but she did find what she was looking for. An old article from the Gresham Report—about fifteen years old, in fact—with a big picture of Mayor Swanson and his wife Alexandra.

  Alexandra was not the woman she had seen in the pictures. The woman in the pictures was a young, athletic-looking blonde. Maybe not natural blonde, but pretty close. The ex Mrs. Mayor Swanson was a petite woman with a frail look about her and dyed, red hair. Not fake looking like Caramel’s blonde hair, but probably not her natural color either.

  So if Alexandra wasn’t in all of those pictures on the desk, who was? And why were they on the desk?

  Jane wished the Swanson house had been a big old mansion with lots of fireplaces. She could have dug through the ashes to see if the pictures had been burnt. Lacking that, what could she do?

  She could keep her eyes open. That was something anyway.

  After cleaning two more clients, Jane went home for lunch.

  She was certain the woman in the pictures with Douglas wasn’t his wife, but it was clearly someone he was close to. A daughter, which wasn’t likely, if she was remembering the body language correctly, or a lover, which seemed pretty icky but reasonable.

  Douglas didn’t seem like the kind of man to go bar-hopping, so his lover would have to come from some other part of his life—work, most likely. She pulled up every site she could find about Gresham politics. Her list of local officials, from the chief of police to school board, was long. Pictures were almost impossible to find for most of the names, so she had resorted to Facebook. One tab with Google results, the other with Facebook search results. So far, no matches, but Jane was sure she was on the right track.

  In the middle of it, her Facebook instant messenger let off its annoying ding. She clicked over to the Facebook page
.

  It was Jake Crawford. His Facebook picture was of him in his Yo-Heaven uniform—complete with the lime green visor and little white nametag. He had embraced the call of healthy fast food, which was nice.

  “Are you ever going to call me?”

  “No.” Jane wasn’t sure why she typed it, besides it’s being honest, and Facebook being the kind of place one wrote first and thought later.

  “Thanks? Whatcha doing? Do you want to go out tonight?”

  “Working. No.”

  “Do people pay you to clean their Facebook now?”

  She lol’d, both in real life and on the private message box. She laughed so hard her side ached. For a moment, she considered what she could charge someone for popping into Facebook and cleaning up their newsfeed. Get rid of spam, ads, people who drink and post, anyone who makes a duck face. Not only could it be profitable, it would be satisfying.

  “Want to go hear some live music?”

  “No thanks.” She tried to keep her eye on the task at hand, but Jake’s messages were coming too fast. The beeps were driving her nuts.

  “Just hang out at home then? Come by and see your old room? You could have a sleepover. Old time’s sake.”

  Jane groaned. Then she typed, “*groan*” She wondered what had spurred Jake’s recent interest in her. Just seeing her at the mall, perhaps? The food court couldn’t be the most intellectually stimulating job ever.

  “I could come by your place.”

  Jane didn’t respond.

  She thought she had a match for the blonde. The only trouble was that she couldn’t remember exactly what the woman in the photo had looked like. This woman hit all the right notes though: trim build, natural look, blonde. She showed up on the Facebook page for the Gresham Mayor’s office, and according to an old copy of the minutes of a meeting she had dug up in the online mayoral office archives, she was on staff back when Douglas had the job.

  Jane squinted at the picture. Could Mary-Grace Hopkins be the mysterious lover? Jane tapped her toes. She had time to drive up to Gresham and pop into the mayor’s office. Maybe chat someone up about their recent loss. A shiver of excitement ran up her spine. Did she have the nerve to do that? It wasn’t any of her business, but it certainly passed the time.

  Another message popped up from Jake. “Earth to Jane. I get the feeling you don’t have time for me anymore…”

  “Not right now, sorry!” The explanation point might have been overkill, but she didn’t want to be rude.

  “I’ll call you.”

  Jane read the message twice.

  It wasn’t flirty, silly, or nonsense. Just a simple sentence. That worried her.

  She didn’t want to worry about Jake. She typed, “TTYL.” She wasn’t saying no, but she was resolutely non-committal. If Jake needed something badly enough, he’d call. She wasn’t going to put herself out for it, though.

  For one thing, she didn’t want to talk to Jake. She wanted to talk to Isaac.

  She stared at her phone, sitting quietly next to her laptop on the table. She thought for a moment it was going to burst into song, and that the call was going to determine her fate: Isaac or Jake.

  But it was silent. Fate didn’t get determined by a phone call, and before Isaac had left the country for his brief stay in Costa Rica, they had been seriously dating, with marriage as the long term goal.

  Jake was just bored.

  And so was Jane, which meant it was time to run to Gresham and have a chat with the staff of the mayor’s office.

  12

  After finding the Gresham city office building, Jane drove around the block to park and to try and come up with a reason for her visit. She’d love to walk in and ask for Mary-Grace, but she didn’t have any reason to. She could go in and say she wanted to interview people about the former mayor for school or something but… that would be a lie. If she could think of something to ask that was both useful and true, she’d feel a lot better about it. But what did a housekeeper from Portland need from the Mayor of Gresham?

  Jane drummed her fingers on her steering wheel. If only Caramel had sent her down for something—anything. Something for the funeral maybe.

  Or something for herself? That wasn’t a bad idea.

  Jane smiled. Her boss was grieving. This could work.

  Jane parked and went straight to the reception desk. Old industrial fluorescent bulbs flickered above the laminate desk, and a smell that reminded Jane of cleaning whiteboards at school hung in the air.

  “Good morning.” The receptionist was an older lady—curly white hair, wire-rim glasses on a chain. She had a sweet smile. The noises coming from her computer sounded a lot like Words with Friends.

  “Good morning.” Jane clenched her hands together to keep them from shaking. If she focused on her plan and just kept her eye out for Mary-Grace, she wouldn’t be a liar. “I’m not entirely sure where to start, but I’m Douglas Swanson’s maid.”

  The receptionist narrowed her eyes. “You are?”

  “Yes, ma’am. Their regular maid is on vacation, and I’m kind of like the substitute.”

  “Ah.” The receptionist relaxed, her smile coming back. “I thought you were a bit young for Doug.”

  “I was just thinking about Caramel and how sad she has been.” A little lie, but maybe that was okay? “And I was thinking that maybe if there was anything here from Mr. Swanson’s days as mayor, like, I don’t know…” Jane froze. Like what? His desk? Newspaper clippings? His red Swingline stapler?

  “You were wanting to bring her something?”

  Jane chewed her lip. “Bad idea?”

  “Not at all.” The receptionist stood up and reached a hand out to Jane.

  Jane accepted the warm, grandmotherly handshake. “It’s a kind idea, dear. A memento of an important man. I don’t know what we have around here from his days in office, but someone might. Why don’t you have a seat? I won’t be a minute.”

  Jane sat on the edge of a threadbare, upholstered waiting room chair. She took a deep breath and tried to gather her wits. The receptionist had hinted that she had expected a different kind of woman for the Swanson maid. It might be interesting to learn something more about the woman she was substituting for. But for the moment, she’d have to concentrate on phrasing her sentences for the most impact. Bring up Douglas’s social life if she could. Mention Alexandra and the kids. See what kind of reaction she could surprise out of the staffers, if any.

  A thin young man in a golf shirt and khakis came out to the waiting room with the receptionist.

  Jane stood up and offered him her hand. “You don’t look old enough to have worked with Mayor Swanson.”

  The man, who had the slightly pimply jawline of a teenager, laughed. “No, I’m not. I’m an intern. I probably wasn’t even born yet when he was mayor.”

  The receptionist swatted him on the elbow. “Of course you were, Tad. You might have been in kindergarten, but you were born.”

  Tad laughed. “When was he mayor again?”

  “From 1989 to 1995.”

  “Ha! I was right, you were wrong.” Tad squared his shoulders, a grin spread across his face.

  “Youth isn’t something to brag about.” The receptionist chuckled, and then ambled back to her desk.

  Jane smiled a little as well—she had been born in the middle of Douglas’s term as mayor.

  “So, what did you need?”

  “I was just wondering if there was anyone here who had worked with Douglas back then who could, I don’t know…” Jane heard steps coming from the hall behind her. She turned a little. It wasn’t the blonde.

  “Someone who would remember him?”

  “Yeah. Something like that. I really didn’t have a firm idea. I just want to do something nice for his widow.”

  Tad checked his watch. “I wasn’t here—obviously. But I can take you down to the morgue and let you dig a little.”

  Jane cringed. “The morgue?”

  “The file morgue. All the ou
tdated stuff.” Tad shrugged. “I don’t know that we have anything that old. But if we do, that’s where it will be.”

  Jane followed Tad out of the reception room and down a staircase to a basement full of old tan filing cabinets. The same kind of fluorescent lights they still had upstairs flickered and buzzed to life when Tad flipped the switch. The room wasn’t huge, but there were still more drawers than she could look through in a week. She tugged her ponytail and ran her fingers through her hair. How would she lay eyes on the blonde down here in the basement?

  Tad wrenched a drawer open. “This is the kind of stuff interns get to do.” He laughed. “But I don’t mind. I get a little work experience, with very little real work involved.” He began flipping through the file folders.

  Jane looked back up the staircase. The door at the top was shut. She might as well dig, since she was here. She pulled open the drawer labeled “1993,” in a cabinet next to the one Tad was using.

  At the back of the drawer, almost the last file, was a folder labeled “personnel.” She slid to the floor and sat cross legged with the folder open on her lap. She hadn’t come ready to do research—she didn’t have scratch paper or a pen.

  She yawned.

  “No luck?” Tad slid his drawer shut. “I haven’t found anything particularly memorable. Just meeting minutes and stuff.”

  “Me neither.” Jane flipped to the next page in the file, but didn’t look at it. “My idea was probably a dumb one. Thanks for looking anyway.”

  “No such thing as a dumb idea.” Tad pulled open another file drawer.

  “Isn’t that supposed to be no such thing as a dumb question?”

  “An idea is just a question you put to the test.”

  Jane scrunched her mouth up. Tad was clearly headed for political life. She turned back to her folder. This page was just a list of names and dates with no clue as to what the people did or what the dates indicated. She read them. None were familiar.

  The next page was exactly the same. The only name that looked remotely familiar was Danae Monroe. She knew she had seen it somewhere before because the “ae” at the end of Danae and the “oe” at the end of Monroe had stood out.