The Plain Jane Mystery Box Set 2

by Traci Tyne Hilton

  “Yes, of course.”

  “And hey, there’s our beer for tonight.” Jake lifted the six-pack of brown bottles out of the basket and carried it to the fridge.

  “Good idea,” Rocky said. “I wouldn’t want to have to drink someone’s home brew.”

  “Thanks for the report and the snack. We’ve got a lunch meeting with Judy, the ME. We’ll see what she can tell us.”

  “How did you get that?” Jane asked in awe.

  “Just working my advantages,” Flora said. “We’ve worked with her before, and it’s been a while since we had a chance to talk. Should be informative.”

  “It’s a long time before dark. What should we do until then?”

  “It’s your honeymoon,” Rocky said, with a chuckle. “You figure it out.

  Jane and Jake figured out a way to spend their long afternoon, and only some of it included Googling for missing person reports up and down the coast. By the end of their searches they had the names of fifteen girls and women who had gone missing in the last six months. “It turns my stomach. Literally.” Jane eyed the beer Jake had set on the counter. “How am I supposed to go drinking all night thinking about all of these people who were probably butchered?”

  “Don’t drink. Just hold the bottle. You want to have a keen, clear mind all night, for as long as you can. And don’t take a drink from any of them. Sip from one of Franny’s innocent bottles.” He pulled a second six-pack from the fridge. Pabst Blue Ribbon.

  “Where’d you get that?”

  “The store, while you were napping. I didn’t think six beers were enough to get us an invitation to stay.”

  “Should I haul some firewood too?” Jane teased.

  “Yes.”

  “How much?” She stretched her delts and grinned. Not that she wanted to haul wood, but she was ready to work.

  “Just an armful. They’re all too young to know me, but I’ve been to my fair share of beachside fires.”

  “What if they aren’t there tonight?”

  “Then we start the fire and wait for people to come. Someone will stroll by and that’s who we’ll talk to.”

  They waited until it was dark and then headed out, Jake with a six-pack of beer in each hand and Jane with an armload of driftwood from the wood pile at the cottage.

  They found a beach fire closer to their house tonight, and smaller. Jake walked up to it like he had been invited. He set both boxes down and plucked a bottle of PBR from one. He handed it to Mason, who had a black eye.

  Mason tipped his head back, a nod of approval.

  Jake popped the lid off a second bottle and passed it to Jane.

  Tonight’s crowd was smaller, too. Just Mason, Taylor, the brunette with the pixie cut, and another guy who hadn’t been there the night before, sitting on a log picking at his guitar. She recognized the song as an old church camp standard.

  Taylor had used church camp as a pejorative. Had she had a particular camp in mind? Since Jane hadn’t had much luck engaging the girls the night before, she decided to just observe for now. Let Jake do the talking. Talking was sort of his spiritual gift. She found a small hill of sand near enough to the guitar player to be social but far enough to not have to have a real conversation, and sat.

  Taylor stared at her, her eyes narrow slits heavily lined with kohl.

  Jane smiled and lifted her bottle in greeting.

  Taylor flipped her ponytail over her shoulder. She took a swig from a bottle of water and then tossed it near the fire. Another bottle just like it had rolled into the fire, offering its acrid plastic stink to the night. Taylor turned to the girl with the pixie cut.

  The brunette gestured to Mason, but Jane couldn’t hear what she said.

  “I don’t know.” Taylor’s voice was pretty clear and sounded sober. “Has no one heard?”

  The brunette shook her head.

  “How should I know? He doesn’t tell me anything.” Taylor’s voice carried well, but Jane was at a loss for the topic they were discussing.

  “Come o-on.” This time the brunette’s plaintive wail was loud enough to hear. “Didn’t Sadie tell you anything?”

  “No.” Taylor backed away, closer to Jane and the guitar player.

  “I just want to be sure he’s okay.”

  “Then call him. You’ve got his number.”

  The brunette scratched the back of her head, her lips shut tight.

  “You can’t call him because he doesn’t even know you’re alive.” Taylor laughed. “I forgot how pathetic you are, Coco. Always have been.” Taylor backed up again, stopping right next to Jane this time. “You’ve been in love with him for how many years? Ten? And he’s not once noticed you were alive. So pathetic.”

  “We’re friends.” Coco’s voice was hesitant. “Just not like…”

  “Not like, real friends.” Taylor laughed. “Ask Mason how Eric is. I dare you.”

  “Fine. I will.” Coco flounced over to Mason.

  He looked her up and down, a gleam in his eye like he appreciated her short-shorts and crop-top shirt. He reached for the beer Jake had set down and handed Coco one of the bottles of home brew. “Hey there,” he drawled.

  “So, how, um, how is Eric after last night?”

  Mason took a long swig out of his own bottle. “Alive.”

  Coco took a long pull on her drink.

  “The question should really be: how is Mason after he was viciously attacked last night? And Mason is okay.” Mason leaned forward, his face in Coco’s. “But Mason could be a lot better.” He grabbed Coco by the waist and pulled her to him. “You wanna help make Mason better?” He pressed his face to hers in what looked like one of the world’s sloppiest kisses.

  Coco squirmed in his arms.

  “Doesn’t really look like she wants to make you better.” Jake took a quick step forward and offered his hand to Coco. She took it and held tight.

  Jake pulled Coco to his side.

  She shook herself, like a dog coming in from the rain, and let go of Jake. She glared at Mason, wiped her mouth and took another drink.

  The guy with the guitar kept playing. The tune was familiar, but Jane couldn’t remember all of the words. What she did wonder was why this church-music guy hadn’t stepped up to help his friend. Unless, like her, he didn’t really know any of these people.

  Jane stood and brushed the sand off her pants. Coco was hovering around the other side of the fire, looking ill.

  Jane joined her. “Worried about your friend after the fight?”

  Coco nodded.

  “He’s probably fine. Guys recover fast.”

  “Yeah…but he’s supposed to be careful. He got too many concussions playing football.” She swished the beer around in her now half-empty bottle. “And Mason knew that.”

  “But it wasn’t really Mason’s fault…”

  Coco’s jaw twitched. She swayed and closed her eyes.

  “But I mean, Mason was really harsh. I can see why you’re worried. Just, with the runaways and everything, things seem tense around here.”

  “I don’t know why everyone is so freaked out. It’s not like they’re the first people to hit the road.”

  “So that’s what it was, you think? Nothing worse than that?”

  She shrugged again and then sat down with a thump. She braced herself, both hands trying to grip the sand.

  “Hey, are you okay?” Jane knelt beside Coco.

  Coco rocked her head from side to side. “They were her cousins. What was the worst that could happen?”

  “Cherry and her cousins?” In the glow of the firelight Coco seemed to have plenty of color, but her eyes were still closed and she pressed her lips together like she was sick.

  “Are you sure you’re okay?” Jane put her hand on Coco’s back.

  Coco looked up towards Mason and then slipped to the ground.

  Jane grabbed Coco’s wrist and felt for a pulse. It was faint, but it existed. She chafed her wrists. “Coco? Coco?”

  Coco
’s eyes fluttered, but she didn’t respond.

  “Hey, Jake.” She caught his eye and he got to her before she could say anything else.

  She felt Coco’s forehead. It was damp and warm, but not feverish.

  “Dude, what happened?” The guitar player was still on the other side of the small fire, but his voice carried to them.

  “I don’t know.” Jane sniffed the beer bottle. She was no expert—in poison or beer—but it seemed to smell fine.

  Jake picked the bottle up with his coat sleeve and slipped it back in the box. He picked the box up and put it on his hip. “Who brought her here?”

  “She walked.” Taylor supplied the answer. Perhaps thinking of last night, Taylor was still very sober.

  “Has she ever passed out like this before?” Jane rolled Coco to her side, trying hard to remember the first aid class she took back in high school. Coco’s breathing seemed weak, so she tilted her head back to keep the airway clear.

  “Don’t worry about her.” Mason jangled his car keys. “I’ll get her back home.”

  Jane eyed him narrowly. She didn’t want to leave a passed-out Coco with Mason the way he had been acting. And she wasn’t sure she wanted him driving. “Hey, Jake…”

  “Already on it.” He held up his phone. He stepped away from the crowd and gave directions to the 911 operator.

  Jane was more than thankful that this was Jake’s second home and he knew it well enough to give clear directions to their spot on the beach. She never could have.

  Coco groaned. She rolled onto her stomach, her arms around her waist.

  “You’re not out cold, anyway.” Jane spoke in a low, soothing tone and rolled Coco back to her side. She couldn’t remember why exactly, but she knew she wouldn’t want to be on her stomach and puking. A face full of vomit and sand sounded pretty much the worst.

  The ocean was a steady crash of waves in the distance while the fire crackled. Jane counted it a blessing that the guitar player had stopped.

  In the distance Taylor shuffled back and forth, Jake kept one eye out for the ambulance, and Mason sat next to the fire, his head in his hands.

  The sound of sirens broke their silent vigil, and once the ambulance got there, everything went fast. When the group had given all of the information they could, both Mason and Taylor offered to follow Coco to the hospital and contact her parents.

  “We should follow,” Jane whispered, hoping only Jake was paying attention.

  He shook his head. “No. That would be weird. Let’s not be weird yet.”

  “But I’m worried about her.” Jane chewed her lip. She didn’t trust Mason with Taylor or Coco. And something might be said. Something related to their investigation.

  “Give me a minute.” Jake took one of the paramedics to the side and handed him the bottle Coco had been drinking from. Then, Jane, Jake, and the guy with the guitar were left with the fire to themselves.

  The guitar player tapped his strings, beating out a rhythm with no melody. Jane paced in front of the fire, aggravated that driving to the hospital was weird but hanging out at the campfire wasn’t. They were detectives, not on vacation…ah. Well, technically they were honeymooners.

  Why were her cases always complicated?

  “So who poisoned Coco?” Jane asked the guitar player.

  He strummed a little something before he answered, “Who brought the beer?”

  Jake cleared his throat. “We did.”

  The guitar player shrugged.

  “It didn’t have to be the beer.” Jane dug a little channel in the sand next to where she sat. “But it probably was, since it worked fast. Jake, did you see anyone go near the bottles?”

  Jake thought for a moment. “I thought I was keeping an eye on it pretty well, but they could have.” He paused, his eye on the fire. “Not Taylor, though. She never got near it. It would have to have been Mason. He handed Coco the bottle.”

  Jane rolled her shoulders forward to stretch. “Poor girl. I hope he doesn’t take her home.”

  “I bet she gets to stay the night.” The guitar player leaned on his instrument and stared into the low flames.

  “Maybe so.” Jane wasn’t convinced. “Maybe Taylor will take her home.”

  “Taylor’s not going to Coco’s house.” The guitar player spoke quietly.

  “Why not?”

  “Coco’s brother’s moved back.”

  “Taylor’s not a fan?”

  Guitar guy took a long, deep breath. “So they say.”

  Jake looked up from his phone. “What happened?”

  “Prom night, last year. Nothing good came out of it.”

  “So…”

  The guy with the guitar stood up. “So I guess we kick sand on the fire and go home.” He hefted his guitar over his shoulder and walked toward the fire.

  Jake grabbed a shovel that lay nearby and started to shift the sand onto the fire. “You lived here long?”

  “Yup.” The guy had been about to walk away, but paused. “You?”

  “Just vacationing.” Jake stabbed the shovel into the sand. “Got anything to carry water in? I’d like to soak this before we walk away.”

  The guy glanced over his shoulder. “Tide will come up and put it out.”

  “I like to be sure. It’s been a bad summer.” He looked around as best he could, but the beach was dark.

  Jane stamped her foot on the sand-covered remains of the fire a few times. “I’m Jane.” She offered him her hand. “It does look pretty out, I guess.”

  “I’m Miller.” He scratched his neck. “See you.”

  “Hold on a sec. Is there anything left in that water bottle?” She gestured to a bottle near where they had been sitting.

  Miller shrugged. “Don’t know. It wasn’t mine.” He nodded at Jake. “See you.” He walked off in the other direction this time.

  Jane picked up the bottle. It was mostly full, so she drizzled it over the sand-covered fire. “I don’t think we made much headway tonight.”

  Jake took her hand. “I agree. Let’s cut our losses with the beach-fire thing and try something new in the morning.”

  Chapter 7

  Around ten the next morning they wandered into the local library—called Warrenton, but in a nearby town. The little old schoolhouse-shaped building seemed like the right place to chew the fat with retired locals.

  The building was broken into sections by tall wooden bookshelves like a used bookstore. The dusty vanilla smell of the library books combined with the musty but welcoming air of an old building made Jane want to settle in with something by Doyle. Instead, she wandered to a small table with four computers, where two gray-haired men sat reading news on the Internet.

  Jane pulled up a chair at an empty computer and smiled. “Good morning.”

  “With all the fires in Washington you think this is a good morning?” A thin-nosed man with bushy eyebrows stared at her over his half-rimmed glasses.

  “She’s just being polite.” The other man was round, his cheeks rosy and his hair thin on top.

  Jane stared at the screen for a moment, then chuckled. “I don’t suppose you all know the password to log on, do you?”

  “Gotta use your library card. These are for library patrons.”

  “Ah. Don’t suppose a Multnomah County card works?”

  “Nope.”

  “Then where can a girl get the news around here?” Jane leaned back in her chair.

  “Don’t you kids ever read the paper?” the one with glasses asked.

  “Why should we? You’re not,” she said it with a grin.

  “She’s got a point there.” The rosy-cheeked man laughed. “So what news do you want to know? I bet me and Paul could tell you.”

  “I want to know why an ambulance drove past our place onto the beach last night.”

  “Oh, those kids were doing drugs again, I guess,” Rosy Cheeks said.

  So gossip wasn’t that fast among the library set. “You guys have a bad problem with drugs in to
wn?”

  “Some years are worse than others.”

  “How’s this year?”

  “You aren’t trying to buy drugs, are you?” The man with the glasses pinched his mouth shut. His eyebrows lowered over his pale blue eyes.

  “Nope, not us. But if it’s a bad year for drugs, I guess we’d rather spend the rest of our vacation somewhere else.”

  “Hmph.” The man with glasses turned back to his computer.

  “Paul probably wanted to sell you some. He’s a retired chemistry teacher, you know. I bet he cooks up all sorts of stuff in his garage.” Rosy Cheeks guffawed.

  A librarian in flip-flops, with her hair in a high ponytail, poked her head around the corner and held her finger to her lips.

  “She’s a poor sport, that one,” Rosy Cheeks said. “Even if she is Paul’s granddaughter.”

  “She’s good at her job,” Paul said.

  “She dresses like Gidget.”

  “Does she hang out with the beach bums who were out last night?” Jane asked.

  “Not her. She’s a good girl.”

  “Don’t the good kids ever get to play on the beach?”

  “Well, I suppose they do,” Paul said. “But she don’t go bumming around with those druggies. I know that much.”

  “Oh, Grandpa!” The librarian laughed. “You all be quiet. We’re about to start morning story hour.”

  A couple of women with kids hanging tight to their hands moved towards the little children’s nook.

  “When’s that Hannah who used to run this place gonna come back?” Rosy Cheeks asked.

  “Don’t know.” Paul had his eyes glued to the screen now.

  “Where did the old librarian go?” Jane asked.

  “She weren’t old. And she run off with a bunch of kids, I’d say. A whole pack of ’em left a few weeks ago.”

  “Hugh, you talk too much.” Paul pulled a pair of big headphones over his head.

  “Runaways?” Jane asked.

  “Probably. Those weird kids from Colorado came to town and then half the kids left.”

  “What made them weird?” Jane chewed her lip. Details about Cherry’s cousins would be good right about now. Any details at all.