Bright New Murder (7 page)

“Wow. You’re smarter than I thought you were.” Jane chewed her bottom lip.

Jake stared out the window, the weight of the world, seemingly, on his shoulders. His forehead was creased in thought, and he looked much older than he had two years ago, when she was sleeping in the maid’s quarters at his house. He looked tired. But he was smart, and educated, and had some solid experience under his belt, if he had worked side by side with his dad for the couple of years after he finished school, but before Bob had died…

 
“Thanks again.” Jane turned to leave, not wanting to waste any more of his time.

Jake caught her by the elbow as she turned to go. He leaned close and whispered in her ear, “Don’t underestimate yourself, Jane Adler.” He brushed her ear with his lips, like a kiss, almost, maybe, and then let her leave.

9

Jane hunkered down over her table at Starbucks. She was making a master list of the notes Jake had sent. She had a feeling the people who hadn’t responded to Jake’s email, but had come to the party anyway, were the ones to keep her eye out for. She lined out a theory and considered it: Someone knew about the party, and knew that Sasha Henry had invited Michelle Smith. That someone would have had to know enough about the event to know where to go and when, hence the idea that they had an invitation. If they had gone with the express intent to kill, they would not want it known that they were there…so…no RSVP.

Was that too simple?

She wouldn’t know until she tested it.

And the funeral would be a decent way to test it…if the person was well enough known by Sasha Henry to know that Sasha was bringing Michelle, he or she would need to be at the funeral for the sake of good appearances. And, if they wanted it known that they were at the funeral, grieving, they would definitely sign the guest book. So someone on Jake’s list of people he noticed at the party and had invited, but didn’t RSVP, who also happened to sign the guest book, would be someone to look into for motives.

Jane smacked her head. What a convoluted idea. That might possibly be the slowest way ever to find out who might have had a motive.

And yet, it was all she had so far.

Unless of course the killing was related to Michelle’s supposed time with HLP. Jane would have to uncover Bang-Bang Bambi’s Dead’s real identity if she wanted to know how seriously to take that bit of information.

She drummed her fingers on the table. Jake was smart, could he help with cyber spying? She sucked in a breath. He was networking smart—business-savvy smart. She didn’t see any signs he could hack it as a hacker.

She scrolled through the contacts on her phone. She was a college-educated (well, almost) twenty-something. Surely she knew someone who could do a little cyber spying.

Ben!

His name on her contact list was a happy surprise. Gemma’s stepbrother. He was a tech guy. Designed websites and stuff. He even worked for that Realtor for a while…the one she had met that time the dryer caught fire.

Ben would know how to find out who Bang-Bang was. She texted him a begging message.

While Ben could be of some help, there was one person who would know if Michelle Smith had been an HLP protester.

Rose of Sharon Willis.

She googled Rose of Sharon Willis and HLP. First hit: an HLP Facebook page.

Jane snickered. Of course it would be Facebook. HLP was kind of old-fashioned like that. She “liked” the page and then sent a private message asking Rose of Sharon if she had time to get together. She suggested Sprouted Quinoa, a little vegan raw-food café not far from her apartment. Surely Rose of Sharon wouldn’t turn down free raw vegan food.

She sipped her coffee. Her fingers twitched and her heart was racing. She was both overcaffeinated and anxious. She had hit the waiting-game part—would her contacts come through for her? Maybe, maybe not. But if she wanted to solve the murder (and keep her heartache at bay), she had to keep moving.

She had one more obvious move she could make while waiting to hear back from Ben and Rose of Sharon. The event center might well have security footage of the event. As a private detective (in training), it behooved her to ask if she could view it, so, coffee cup in shaking hand, she headed to the Shonley Center.

***

The event center was an echoey concrete building with high ceilings, faded carpet, and many long halls. It had been built long before she was born—like the 1980s or something—and was showing its age. The dusty smell of an old heating system reminded Jane of the basement of her Bible school. She hummed along to the Peanuts Christmas song while she looked for the security office.

A couple of the many, many spaces were in use. A guy about her age in black khaki pants and a white polo shirt rolled a dolly full of folded tables into a room by the front door. She followed him.

“Hey!” She waved her hand as she called out.

He looked her up and down, and then grinned. “Yeah?”

“Is there, like, an office around here?” Her voice had instantly gone valley girl on her, and she wanted to bite her tongue off. Instead, she flipped her hair over her shoulder and hated herself a little more. She wasn’t trying to look like an idiot, but she was sure managing to like a pro.

“Like a business office?” The guy frowned.

‘”Yeah, like that.” She smiled and tilted her head. She straightened it up with a jerk. She would swear off coffee forever if she couldn’t pull herself together.

“I dunno.” He leaned on the handle of his dolly. “I’m just here to set up for the model railroad convention. But I’m off in half an hour.” He lifted his eyebrows and gave a kind of bro nod.

“Bummer.” She shrugged and left.

While this convention facility wasn’t the great big one with the pointy towers, it was still big enough that Jane was lost within minutes.

Jane was about to give up and take the first exit she could find, when she ran into an older man wearing a vacuum backpack and headphones.

She got as close as she could and tapped his shoulder.

He shut off his vacuum. “Can I help you?” He had a kind smile and a bushy mustache.

Jane smiled and wrung her hands. The obnoxious valley girl seemed to have been replaced by a simpering child. She tried to pull herself together again. Square her shoulders and all that. Detective. She was a professional detective. “Yes, thank you.” She was still grinning, but at least she wasn’t rubbing the toe of one shoe with the other. She had both feet firmly on the ground like an adult. “I’m looking for the security office.”

The man nodded towards the elevator. “Gotta git yourself upstairs, and then take a left. Then go a long ways. All the way around almost. But if you just keep following the hall, you’ll get there.” He went back to vacuuming before Jane could ask him if anyone would be there.

But she followed his directions.

The hall was long, and quiet, and spooky. The main overhead lights were off, so the hall was lit with low, energy-efficient lights recessed into the ceilings above each door.

She shivered.

She was glad she had mace clipped to her keychain.

The hall felt like a marathon, her heart raced so hard, but eventually she had made it around the corner to a large double door marked “Security.” She knocked, and then opened it up.

“Hi.” A girl who looked about Jane’s age, but was quite a bit taller and wore a crisp security uniform, smiled at Jane. She was alone in the office. “Can I help you?”

The office was a brightly lit, modern space. Long, clean counters flanked on three sides by walls covered in flat-screen televisions, each one zoomed at a different setting. Almost every screen showed an eerily silent room, but the effect was still dizzying.

Jane sat down.

“I’m Jane. I’m a private detective working on the Fro-Yo Murder case on behalf of the folks who threw the fundraiser.”

“Oh, okay. I’m Beth.” The security girl rolled her chair around to face Jane. “The police have already seen all the footage we have of the event. Have you talked to them about it yet?” Her face seemed open and friendly, but something about the question made Jane think she would have to prove herself to security.

Jane sat up a little straighter. “No, I wanted to go for firsthand sources before I got the police’s opinion on the facts.”

“Sure. Okay. I can’t show you the footage though. The police had a warrant for it.”

Jane nodded. “I understand.” She chewed the inside of her cheek. So many things she would have known if this murder had taken place at the end of next semester instead of now. “So, were you on that night?”

“Nope, but Del, my boyfriend, was.” Beth had a promising twinkle in her eye.

Jane leaned forward and lowered her voice. “Did he see anything suspicious?”

“Well…” Beth eyed the wall of screens before turning back to Jane. “There was this weird kind of shadowy figure in the corner of the room. It looked like someone dressed in dark clothes and leaving quickly, right after the woman screamed.”

“Did he show you the footage?”

“Of course. We all saw it. We have to keep our eye out for anyone we saw in the video returning to the center. Of course, we are really looking for that shadowy figure who left, but between you and me, I don’t know how we’d recognize the person again.”

Jane scanned the wall of televisions. “How many cameras are in that room?”

“Just the one. It’s center on the wall with no exit and has a panoramic of the room.”

“And you all had to watch all of that footage, right?”

“Yup. We did. We watched it several times. In particular, we were looking to see if we could spot the shady-looking character near the victim, and maybe also coming toward the victim.”

“You know, I was there that night, and though it was crowded, it didn’t seem overwhelming.”

“It was pretty mellow at the beginning of the video, but as soon as the protesters came inside, it got a little crazy. From the camera’s POV, it was like a room full of little mobs. Gestures got bigger, voices got louder, large groups sort of formed out of the couples and individuals. It was a lot harder to sort through than I expected.”

“But did you see more of this shady figure?”

“I didn’t.”

Jane watched Beth’s face. She looked like she had more to say. “Did you see anything suspicious?”

“Yeah, see, this figure kind of steps out from behind someone like a shadow.” Beth pointed at one of the televisions. “So the room is mostly dark now, but can you see how the angle is funny? We couldn’t really see full bodies of anyone, and even faces were hard to spot, since people were moving around. So everything looked tense, but not strange, and then this person in dark clothes with a dark scarf on, or maybe a wig, kind of steps from crowd to crowd and then leaves. But it went really fast. I almost think she ducked, threw something over her head, and snuck out.”

“So you are thinking a girl?”

“It was hard to tell height or anything, but the person seemed smaller, and the scarf was feminine.”

“So a girl, or a man with a slight build disguised as a woman.” Jane drummed her fingers on the arm of her chair. “If it was a man in a dark sweater or something, and he threw a wig or a scarf over his head, we would all think he was a woman. I sure wish I could see it.”

Beth shook her head. “Sorry. I’m not supposed to show this stuff to just anyone.”

Jane stood up. “Can I come by again sometime if I think of anything else to ask? Or take you out for coffee?”

“Sure.” Beth walked Jane to the door. “I don’t mind talking to you about it all, but I don’t want to risk my job or anything.” She handed Jane a card. “So call and we can get together.”

“Thanks so much. I appreciate it.”

“I’d walk you out, but I’m not allowed to leave until my partner gets back from the bathroom. But hey, I’ll walkie Del and he can walk you out. It’s a little creepy around here these days.”

“Ah, thank you.” Jane headed down the long, too-quiet hallway with one eye out for Del.

10

Del met her at the elevator. He was kind of a small guy himself, but since he was stuck in the TV room the night of the event, he probably wasn’t the mystery killer. Jane noted his slight build and dark hair. Surely, if it had been Del in the video, Beth would have recognized him. But…what if? She smiled, a nervous flutter dancing in her stomach. What if he had slipped out of his office and stabbed Michelle?

Del held the door of the elevator and motioned for Jane to get in. She didn’t know where the stairs were…and she wasn’t sure that a dark, far-off staircase with a potential killer was a better idea than the elevator.

“Get in.” Del’s voice was quiet but rough. He frowned.

“Uh…” Jane looked over her shoulder. Maybe she could get Beth to change her mind.

“Get. In.” Del had something that might have been a Taser strapped to his Batman-like security-guy utility belt.

Beth may have sent her boyfriend to calm Jane’s nerves, but it hadn’t worked.

Del let the elevator doors shut. “Stairs it is, then.” He stuck his hands in his pockets and ambled off down the hall.

Jane hurried to keep up. Now that he was less likely to kill her…or whatever it was she was scared of, she wanted to ask him a few questions.

“So the night of the murder…that’s a lot of TV’s to keep an eye on.”

“Sure, but I keep a closer eye on the screens where something is supposed to be happening.”

“So if the person had snuck in past another camera, would you have seen them?”

“Probably. When the cleaners come through rooms that are supposed to be empty, I always notice. Peripheral vision is a good thing in a room like that.”

“So nothing happened in a room it wasn’t supposed to happen in.”

“I wouldn’t have said that for sure the night of.” Del slowed down so Jane could keep up with him. “But we’ve watched all of the film since then. Every hour on every camera. Nobody came in by themselves through a back door. Everyone seemed to come in like they were supposed to. Then again, there were a few big events, so I couldn’t say that someone didn’t sneak in with a crowd that didn’t know them, you know? It was a big night.”

“Beth said that the dark—shadowy, or shady—figure was the only thing that stood out in the video. Would you agree?”

“I’m not sure. It seemed to me that a few of the things happening in the video could have been there to distract from the stabbing. For example, early on there was a young guy shilling sample drinks in a really cheesy circus kind of voice. It seemed over the top, and while he was doing it everyone was looking forward instead of around the room at each other.”

Jake. Jane rolled her eyes. “What else did you notice?”

“The protesters came sort of in the middle of the party. They mostly stayed in the hall. But some did squeeze in past the folks blocking their entry.”

“They did?” Jane stopped. This was the first she had heard about protesters sneaking in. Had one of the Helpers had a grudge against Michelle? She thought back to the anxious protester…Valerie? Valeria? What if she had been with the killer? Or had been the killer?

“Yeah, about four of them did.”

“Did any of them match the description of the shady figure you saw?”

“Nope.” They arrived at a broad, well-lit staircase in the middle of the building. Del loped down the steps two at a time.

“So, just in your opinion, do you think the shady figure was more likely to have done it, or the protesters who snuck into the party?”

“Couldn’t say.” He stopped at the bottom of the stairs and waited for her.

“Of course not. So, on the video, what did the protesters who snuck into the party do?”

“They mingled. And they took sample cups from people and threw them away.”

“What?” Jane paused.

“I watched them do it at least six times. They walked up to a group, paused like they were chatting, held out their hands and took cups, and then wandered off and threw them away.”

“That’s…I don’t know…a little passive-aggressive, yes?”

“That’s how I saw it.”

They walked towards the exit, Jane trying to suss what she had heard, when Del grabbed her arm and pulled her into a bathroom. “Shhh.”

Jane stiffened. Her heart thundered against her chest and a cold sweat broke out on her forehead. But Del didn’t do anything. He just stood there, one finger to his lips. His eyes were scared.

The bathroom door pushed open slowly. An older woman, about five feet tall, with silver hair in a bun, stepped through. “Del?”

Del worked his jaw back and forth.

The small woman looked him up and down. She had on a navy-blue suit with brass buttons and a pair of patent leather pumps. Her name tag said “Lafayette.”

“Hey,” Del said.

“What are you doing in uniform? You were put on administrative leave.” Her frown was serious. The V between her eyes was deep enough to get lost in.

“Yes, ma’am.” He chewed his bottom lip and glanced at Jane.

Lafayette looked at Jane as well. “You can move along now.”

“Yes, of course.” Jane made each step count as she left, hoping to hear what Del had to say, but the two security personnel were silent until the door swung shut again. She paused, ear to the door. Eavesdropping on this unexpected turn was worth the risk.

“Hand me the baton, Taser, and pepper spray.” Lafayette’s voice was low and hard to hear through the door. Del was silent.

The floor in the bathroom squeaked, so Jane bolted. She was much nearer the exit door when Del and his boss came out. She turned to watch them head back up the stairs.

She had learned two important things from the visit at least, the most important being that you could wander the halls of the massive convention center without getting caught for only so long. And the second thing was that the security guard in charge of monitoring the cameras the night of the murder both fit the description of the killer (to some small extent) and was put on administrative leave.

Jane would be calling Beth tonight for sure.

***

“I’m starving.” Gemma held her phone out like a notepad. “What do you think…burgers, smoothies, or both?”

“Jake is not your personal food delivery boy.” Jane sat in front of a list of her suspects. Del had suddenly jumped to the front of the list. She tried calling Beth but had to leave a message. She needed to know so much about this Del character. Starting with his last name. But where he went to school, who his parents were, and how hard up for money he was were high on the list. A hungry man with few scruples who happened to know a person with a grudge…she penciled stars around his name. Of course, those were just guesses. He could be a really good guy with enough to get by on, and he might not have any connection to Michelle at all.

“Jake’s a…friend.” She grinned and fell backwards onto the sofa. “Right? A goo-o-od friend.” She put her phone to her heart. “I don’t think you realize how close he and I have gotten this year.”

“Yeah, I guess I don’t.” She prayed that if Gemma asked for food, he’d say no. He owed it to her—er, to Gemma—to help her see the light. “Okay, so at the event, did you notice the protesters who came inside the party?”

“Yeah, of course I did.”

“Did they seem to be acting weird to you?”

“A little aggressive, but not weird. I mean, not weird if by weird you mean doing things that surprised me.”

“How would you describe their activities?”

“They spread out, talked to people, took their cups and recycled them. They seemed on a friendly mission to change minds, if you know what I mean.”

“Did you tell them about the almond-milk alternative smoothies?”

“No. I admit, I was totally overwhelmed by it all. I really didn’t know what to do or say to anyone by that time. Didn’t you notice any of this?”

“Uhh…” Jane sighed. “I wasn’t there. I was still really overwhelmed from the breakup, you know?”

“Poor thing! I can see why you wouldn’t want me and Jake hanging around all the time. You’re still so tender! I tell you what. I will make sure that Jakey and I take our fun elsewhere.” She dialed her phone. “But can I bring something home for you?”

Jane shook her head. Poor, deluded Gemma.

It was just after six, so Jane hid in her bedroom and phoned Trillium Montessori. There was always a chance someone in administration was still around, and anything was better than listening in on Gemma’s call.

They answered on the second ring. “Trillium Montessori, this is Carrie speaking.”

“Hi, Carrie. I’m Jane Adler.” She took a deep breath. “I’m a private detective, and I’m working for the folks who threw the Helping Hands Early Education Center fundraiser where Michelle Smith was killed. Do you have a moment to answer some questions?”

“A detective?” Carrie’s voice registered disbelief.

“Yes.” Jane attempted to get a deeper, more mature timber out of her voice. “I just have a few questions for you, if you don’t mind.”

“I guess.”

Jane heard papers rustling in the background. “First, if you don’t mind, what’s your position at the school?”

“I’m April’s assistant.”

“And…who is April?”

“Oh, sorry. April Harms bought the school from Michelle. She was the senior teacher here before that. Has been with the school since its third year.”

“That’s great, thank you. And about the sale…had it gone smoothly?”

“Yup. It was a breeze. Michelle was up to finalize some smaller things having to do with the rights to some of the curriculum we use, that she created. Also she decided not to sell the building, so she and April were going to sign a long-term lease agreement.”

“Were both of them on board with that?”

“Yeah. It wasn’t any big deal. April couldn’t get together enough money to buy the school and the building. The lease was going to be a lease-to-buy, though. Provide Michelle with income for retirement and then a lump sum later.”

“You seem to know a lot about this.” Jane was taking notes as she went, but it was going fast. She needed to stall Carrie so she could get it all down.

“I sit in on the meetings and take dictation. Stuff like that. But none of it was particularly secret.”

“Carrie, would you mind if I came down and saw the school?”

“Why not? We’re all closed up right now, but you could come tomorrow morning. Probably best if you come by before nine when our classes start though.”

“Thank you so much. That would be perfect.” Jane got the address and let Carrie go. If Carrie could be trusted, then April Harms wasn’t likely to be the murderer, but it wouldn’t hurt to see her in person. Especially since April had known Michelle for so long. She’d probably know more dirt about Michelle than anyone else.

Since there was every chance that Gemma was in the other room pouting—or worse, crying—about Jake not wanting to get together, Jane stayed in her room for the rest of the night.

Tomorrow she had two big houses to clean and one school to visit. Not too bad for a housecleaning detective.