Spoiled Rotten Murder: A Plain Jane Mystery (The Plain Jane Mysteries Book 5)

by Traci Tyne Hilton

  If someone from Cascadia Surety had paid into the development of the game device, and had then used that donation to pressure Kyle to buy insurance from him, then that person would be easy to contact.

  It would be the client. The one who had hired SCoRI to investigate fraud.

  Jane picked up her phone and called Flora.

  “The thought had also occurred to me,” Flora said, after Jane had explained her theory. “However, the person who sold them their wedding insurance policy is a sixty year old woman named Hester Paige.”

  Jane paused. Was Flora suggesting a sixty year old woman was too old to be interested in gaming? Could a retired person be age-ist? “I think you might be dismissing her too fast.”

  “It’s a good theory, and I won’t scratch it off the list until we have a final answer. However, the likelihood of a woman my age having an interest in video games, much less an interest that led to murder, is highly unlikely.”

  “Unlikely, but…”

  “I have seen surprising things. However, we are still looking. Before we convict Hester Paige of murder, we need to find out what Brad Carter saw.”

  “Right. Okay.” Jane huffed a sigh, and then hoped that Flora hadn’t heard her. “I’m still trying to get ahold of Ayla. She must know more about the IP address.”

  “Yes. Do that. See what she knows about Hester Paige.” Her tone indicated she thought Ayla would be able to put Jane’s theory to rest.

  “Thanks, Flora. I’ll do everything I can.”

  “Good.”

  As soon as the call ended, her phone rang. It was Jake.

  “Hey, Janey. How’s the spy business?”

  “I’m workin’,” Jane said. She drummed her pencil on her desk. Was she working? Did she get paid for this? She hadn’t sorted all of that out yet. As soon as she had this murder resolved, she could worry about that. She hoped Miranda wasn’t in charge of payroll.

  “I thought you were supposed to be underground right now.”

  “Untraceable cell phone. Plus, you wouldn’t try and trace me.” Jake sounded bored.

  “Are you sure?”

  Jake chuckled. “Maybe I want you to find me.”

  His teasing put a smile on Jane’s face. She knew whatever he was doing was intense, and that was likely why he had called her. “What can I pray for you about?”

  “Wisdom.”

  “Me, too.”

  “Will do. Listen, I just had time for a hello. I’ll let you go.”

  “Love you,” Jane said.

  “Thanks. Love you, too.”

  Jane got a hold of Ayla right after she finished praying for Jake. She convinced Ayla to meet her by getting her to talk about how amazing Devon had been, and leaving her with the assumption that the only thing Jane wanted to do in this world was listen to Ayla talk about him over coffee. Ayla was free that evening, but not before.

  They met at Nonessential Trivia, for the food, and for the chance to run into Maggie again. Maggie might know more about her insurance policy than they were giving her credit for.

  “There are just so few real geniuses in the world.” Ayla sipped her micro-brewed beer.

  “Very true.” Jane sipped her Coke. “Devon sounds like he was truly a rare mind.”

  “He wasn’t just smart about games and stuff, either.” Ayla rested her chin on her hand, her eyes far away and dreamy. “Sometimes he’d draw beautiful tattoo art for me. I didn’t sell a lot of them, but a few. Tessellations and stuff like that.”

  “Techy and artsy.” Jane tried to sound like she totally understood.

  “And a real environmentalist. He hated waste so much. Wasted time, wasted energy, wasted resources.”

  “He must have loved the natural beauty and power of Alaska.”

  Ayla sighed. “He did. Sometimes we’d talk about moving back there.”

  “Oh yeah?” Jane imitated the sigh out of sympathy. “I thought you and he weren’t that close.”

  “No…but talking about Alaska was a good way to draw him out. He had plans for an off the grid life.”

  “Do you think he would have followed through with it?”

  “No, but it was a lovely dream.” She dipped a French fry into organic locally made ketchup.

  “But you guys…I mean…” Jane stumbled over the best way to say it. “He wasn’t still upset about the crowd funding thing, was he? You all had worked that out?”

  “Yeah. Pretty much.”

  “He got the money and developed his device.” Jane nodded as she said it, trying to keep Ayla talking.

  “We made enough for the prototype, anyway. But I guess now it won’t go anywhere further. He just…I don’t know. It could have been a real break-out thing for him.”

  “Financially he was okay though, right? He had that office out by Johnson Creek?”

  “He was doing fine. He always had contracts on and projects he was doing. Plenty came in from his apps and games, too. But to be able to only do your own thing—that was his dream.”

  “I was looking at the fundraising site earlier.”

  Ayla shuddered.

  “Yeah. It was pretty bad. Really harsh stuff.” Jane sipped her Coke, and shivered. This time it wasn’t false sympathy. Those online bullies really freaked her out.

  “I can’t believe people were so mad at Maggie. Her game was fun,” Ayla said.

  “But they wanted to see the device be…just for boy games?”

  “They want the whole world to be just for boy games.”

  “There is more money in boy games, I guess.” Jane lifted an eyebrow.

  “Whatever. There’s more money in boy tattoos, and boy detectives. So what? We don’t let that stop us.” Ayla’s cheeks flushed red. “Why should it stop Maggie?”

  “It shouldn’t.”

  “Exactly.”

  “Were any of those comments from real donors?”

  “A few.”

  “Yikes.”

  “Yup.” Ayla swirled another fry in her ketchup but didn’t eat it.

  “Did they ask for their money back?”

  “Yeah, that’s how I knew. Most of the comments were new sock puppet accounts, so it’s not like I could be sure who was who, but Brenna probably could.”

  “Really? With some like, computer analyzing or something?”

  “No, but she was a tutor at PSU for a while and was trained to spot plagiarism. She’s really good at reading troll posts and figuring out which different characters are the same people.”

  “Really?” Jane perked up. “Have you had her look at these yet? Maybe compare them to other posts—the earlier, positive comments?”

  “What good would it do?”

  “Well…what if one of the donors got really mad at Devon and killed him?”

  Ayla’s face got redder. “If I knew who had done it…”

  “Shall we call Brenna?”

  Ayla’s face fell. “Brenna hates me.”

  As if on cue Maggie came through the front door. She stopped at the register and said good evening to her coworker.

  “But Maggie could ask her, right?”

  Ayla shrugged. “Maggie doesn’t hate me.”

  “What happened between you and Brenna?”

  “Devon happened.”

  “Ah.” Jane still hadn’t seen a picture of the programming Lothario, but he must have been something else to inspire two girls to such heated passion. Not many computer types could do that.

  “So…Brenna was jealous that Devon liked you more?”

  “I wish.”

  “Brenna and Devon?”

  “I don’t really want to talk about it.”

  Jane hadn’t learned how to push past that yet in an interview, and she really liked what she had gotten out of Ayla so far, so she stopped that line of questioning, making a mental note to ask Brenna about it later.

  “Of all of the donors, who do you think would have been the most upset about the review?”

  “I didn’t know them all person
ally.”

  “So no guesses?”

  “There were a couple of donors who gave over five hundred dollars each. They had a lot invested.”

  Jane rocked her head from side to side. Five hundred dollars didn’t seem like enough to kill for. “Were they really anti-women developers?”

  “One of them was. He posted a lot last year, over that other issue…the Gamergate thing.”

  “So he might have had a real axe to grind this time.”

  “If he was sincere in his claims that all he wanted was journalistic integrity, he might have. But I still don’t see how testing Bridezilla on the device was an issue of integrity. How could it matter at all what game they played on it? They just wanted to try out how well it worked. Anything would have done.”

  Jane had asked herself the same question more than once. How could the choice of game matter at all? They were testing the play of the device. And the device wasn’t all it was cracked up to be. She had a feeling none of them—Devon, Kyle, or Maggie—were served by that fact. Which brought another question to mind. “So Devon was going to be Kyle’s best man?”

  “Yes.”

  “Even after Kyle wrote the less than stellar review?”

  “Devon was above that kind of thing.”

  “But surely he needed good reviews to get his dream off the ground.”

  “The design needed work. He knew that. Kyle had the review scheduled. He had to run with it. What could they do? There were no hard feelings.”

  Weren’t there? Jane wondered. Ayla would be torn between her brother and his work interests and the boy she loved. But perhaps Devon was more than a little mad about the review, and his anger led to a pre-wedding fight, that ended in his death, and Kyle needing to run for it.

  Jane spent the bulk of two hours listening to Ayla. The two gems she got from it—Brenna’s ability to spot someone writing as more than one person, and further support for the idea that Kyle and Devon might have been at odds at the time of the wedding were worth the effort. Before she left the microbrewery/internet café, she cornered Maggie.

  “How are you holding up?”

  Maggie didn’t look as though she recognized Jane.

  “I’m the one you met talking about the insurance policy.”

  Maggie eyebrows pulled together as though she still didn’t recognize her, but also didn’t care.

  “Do you have any time in the next day or two to get together and talk?”

  “About insurance?” Maggie’s brow clouded, as though she was honestly confused.

  “About Kyle.”

  “Oh.”

  “Maybe tomorrow? Sometime when your sister could be there, too?”

  “For the insurance thing?”

  “I’m still working with the Senior Corps of Retired Investigators. Now that we have your insurance case resolved—you should be getting your payout as soon as possible—we wanted to help with the other issue.”

  “I can’t pay you.”

  “That’s okay.” Jane wasn’t actually sure that Maggie would be getting her insurance payout, or that it was okay that they wouldn’t be paid. But, it felt like the right thing to say. Yet again, skirting around the truth, the pet sin of the aspiring detective. She wanted to get her new mentors advice on how to reconcile the constant need to lie with the definite need to be Christlike as soon as she could. Maggie was staring at her.

  “We know the cops are looking into all of it, but we also know that young adult males who go missing don’t tend to be a top priority for the cops. Not saying they don’t care, but if there’s no real sign of violence…anyway. We think there’s more to it and want to serve you, if we can.” She wanted to, anyway, and if the Queen could use the royal “we”…

  “Tomorrow? I’m free until one.”

  “May I come to your house?”

  Maggie nodded.

  A customer sidled up to the long wooden bar.

  Maggie turned to the customer. “What can I get for you?”

  “I’m still looking.” He offered a friendly smile. Maggie was young and pretty and probably got plenty of friendly smiles from customers.

  “Will Brenna be around if I show up at around ten?”

  “Brenna is always around.” Maggie took a little white notebook out of her apron pocket.

  Jane wanted to go over her notes with Flora and Rocky, but they were booked until evening. And when she got there, Rocky was still gone, tying up last minute loose ends with their other client.

  “Do you have a moment to run over what I’ve learned so far? I have an interview set up for tomorrow, and I’d love to work on ways to direct the conversation,” Jane asked Flora.

  Flora looked up from the pile of papers she was going over at Miranda’s reception desk. “Give us ten more minutes, then absolutely.” She yawned. It was just shy of nine o’ clock. Flora had put in a long day at her semi-retired, non-profit job.

  Jane sat on the metal and pleather waiting room chair and went over her notes. Some were mental notes and some were in a little notebook.

  Her phone rang.

  “Listen, I am so sorry to bother you. I know you are working, but I need a favor.” It was Jake.

  “Yes, of course, any time.”

  “I was worried about something when I called earlier, but you seemed sort of out of it, and I didn’t want to bother you. But I needed to, because I just cannot get away from here yet.”

  “What’s wrong? What happened?” Jane slipped her notebook back into her purse.

  “It’s Phoebe.” Jake’s little sister. Smart, beautiful, athletic and also bipolar. She took good care of herself, but it was a disease and sometimes it got the better of her.

  “Oh no, is she all right?”

  “She’s at the hospital. She called me this morning, but I couldn’t really make heads or tails of what she said. Just that the police brought her in. Will you go? Can you go? Down at Good Sam. Can you go find out how she is? Find out exactly what happened and what charges they are going to press.”

  “Charges? Oh no!”

  “I would give my left hand to be there right now.” Jake’s voice broke. Since the deaths of his parents, he had really manned up to take care of the family—from stepping away from running the family business when he realized he wasn’t any good at it, to keeping house and home together for his sister while she finished college.

  “I can be there in fifteen minutes.”

  “Thank you. I love you more than words can say.”

  Because Miranda and Flora were now staring at her, she kept her own goodbye short and sweet. “Love you, too. I will call as soon as I have some answers.”

  “Going so soon?” Miranda asked.

  “Miranda, be nice.” Flora gave her a disapproving look. “Is everything all right?”

  “I don’t know yet, but I’ve got to run. My fiancé’s sister is in some trouble, I think.”

  “Do you need someone to come with you?” Flora already had her slouchy upholstered purse over her shoulder.

  “No, thanks. I’ve got this.” Jane waved lamely as she left, her thoughts entirely on Phoebe.

  Good Sam wasn’t the easiest hospital to get to, especially from Oregon City in the dark. Nonetheless, she only passed her exit twice. And then only passed the parking garage at the hospital once. It took ten minutes just to make up for that miss, since she got stuck on a series of one way roads, but eventually she pulled herself together and made it in the hospital.

  By the time she found herself at the information desk asking for Phoebe Crawford’s room, the sweet volunteer made her sit down and drink a small glass of water.

  “Are you sure you are going to be okay?”

  The volunteer’s name was Joan. She wore a large sparkling pendant on a leather necklace. It reminded Jane of the moon.

  “I’ll be fine. I just got a little turned around getting here.”

  “Take your time, then. When you feel up to it, here’s her room number.” Joan handed Jane a map
with the number written on the margin, and the trauma, recovery, and acute care section of the hospital circled.

  Jane didn’t feel like standing up immediately. She sunk into the chair and prayed. She prayed for her nerves, for Phoebe, for Jake, and for the whole Fish/Frances mess.

  Phoebe was easier to find than the hospital had been. She was sitting up in a bed with a thin white blanket over her.

  Jane knocked on the wall next to the curtain. “Hey Pheebs. You okay?”

  “Jane? Come in,”

  Jane pulled the curtain away and joined Phoebe in the little cubicle of a room.

  “Jake called, huh?”

  “Yeah, but you could have called me. Any time.”

  “I called Aunt Marje. She’s been here already.”

  “Good.” Jane pulled the little plastic and metal chair up to the bed and sat down. “So…”

  “So, I was injured in a hit and run.”

  Jane hoped the thought that flashed—that Phoebe was the one running—wasn’t obvious.

  “Jake thinks it’s because I’m off my meds, which I’m not. I’m not at all. And the cops didn’t bring me here, the ambulance did.”

  “How did he get the story so wrong?”

  “It’s not totally his fault. When I called I was a bit loopy.”

  “But what exactly happened?”

  “I was crossing the street, at your apartment, by the way. I had to get that dress I borrowed from Gemma back before she started bugging me about it, and a car turning right plowed over me.”

  “But why were you crossing the street? Why didn’t you park in the parking lot?”

  “Jane…you just can’t make this one my fault. Anyway, I almost died.”

  “No, of course not. I’m sorry.” Jane ran her fingers through her ponytail and took a deep breath. “I mean, I don’t think it was your fault, I’m just confused.”

  “Join the club. I wacked my head on the curb pretty hard. The car knocked me over, ran over me. My ankle broken in a bunch of places, but they’ve already put the pins in. They’re on top of things around here.”

  “You’ve had surgery? Please, please put me on your ‘call in case of emergency’ list. I don’t want you having surgery and not telling me.”

  Phoebe lifted up her wrist with its hospital ID bracelet. “I’ll add you to my medical alert bracelet.”