Jane took a step back from the edge. They were fully glassed-in, but looking out and then down was a bit intimidating. Jane had always had a fear of heights.
“Here he comes. I’ll introduce you both,” Nick said as a tall, good-looking man who appeared to be in his mid-thirties walked towards them. He had sandy hair and a clean-cut, preppy look about him.
“Nick, glad you could make it,” Ben said warmly and smiled at their small group.
“Ben, these two lovely ladies work with me, Liza and Jane.”
Jane shot him a look and he immediately corrected himself. “Or rather, Jane used to work with me. I guess I’m still hoping she might change her mind and come back someday.”
“One can always hope, right?” Ben said and laughed.
“It’s nice to meet you,” Liza and Jane said at the same time.
“You, as well. I hope I have a chance to chat further with you later.” He was looking at Jane as he spoke. “But right now, duty calls. If you’ll excuse me...” And he was off.
“So, what did you think?” Nick asked.
“He seems pleasant enough, and is certainly a good dresser. Other than that, I won’t really know until I talk to him further,” Jane said.
“That was a sharp suit,” Nick said, and Jane smiled. Nick was terribly vain and she knew it needled him that she’d commented on Ben’s clothing.
“I thought he seemed a bit nervous,” Liza said thoughtfully. “Did you happen to notice his hand, the one that wasn’t holding a drink, was shaking a little? Maybe he doesn’t enjoy large gatherings like this, or something is stressing him out.”
Jane was impressed. “I didn’t notice that, Liza. Thanks. I’ll pay closer attention if I get a chance to chat with him again later.”
“Ladies, it looks like my glass had a hole in it,” Nick joked. “I’m going to head to the bar. Can I get either of you something?” Liza still had a full drink, but Jane was nearly done with her wine.
“I’ll have another, thanks.”
When Nick returned with their drinks they strolled through the crowd, making their way around the room, which wrapped halfway around the building. When they reached the other side, they could see past Fenway Park, the Charles River, and Cambridge and beyond. Jane took care not to get too close to the edge. She didn’t dare look down again.
Nick knew a few people there and wandered off to mingle, while Jane and Liza stayed to themselves, catching up and trying all the delicious appetizers as they passed by. Their spot was near where the servers went into the kitchen, so they had first crack at everything new as it came out.
“I think we picked the best spot,” Liza chuckled as another server stopped to offer them the lamb meatballs Jane had been craving. They were spiced and served with a yogurt dipping sauce of some kind. The flavors were outstanding.
“Yes, we did,” Jane agreed as she reached for a second meatball.
“We probably should try and mingle eventually, I suppose,” Liza said reluctantly.
“When we’re both ready for another drink, we can head in opposite directions, each going to a different bar and see who we might run into. I think we might have better luck, actually, talking to people if we’re alone.”
“I agree. I’m just about ready, if you are.” Liza downed the last sip of her drink, and Jane didn’t have much left in her glass.
“I’m ready. I’ll meet you back here in a bit.”
Liza wandered off and Jane did the same, slowly making her way through the crowd. As she reached the bar, she stopped short when she saw a familiar and unexpected face. Lanny was there. He smiled when he saw her and walked her way. She supposed it shouldn’t be a surprise that he was here. He was a stockholder, after all, but she’d separated the two of them in her mind, and was focused solely on talking to Ben.
“Well, I’m seeing a lot of you lately,” he said as he reached her. “What brings you here?”
“A former colleague invited me to come tonight,” she said.
“Oh, who’s that?”
“Nick Dawson.”
Something flashed across his eyes, and then they narrowed a bit, “You’re here with Nick? I didn’t realize he was coming.”
“Your brother invited him. He’s working on your father’s appeal.”
“Right, of course.” Lanny’s response was smooth and he didn’t miss a beat, but Jane could see him wondering why Nick was there and, more importantly, why she was with him.
“We’re good friends, even though I don’t work with him any longer,” she explained, hoping he might think it was more of a date than it actually was.
He seemed to relax a bit at that, and changed the subject.
“So, will I see you again in Mumford? Or have you scratched your gambling itch?”
Jane chuckled. “Yes, I think you will see me soon. I’d forgotten how much I love playing blackjack, and my grandfather and Carl are thrilled that they have someone else to go along with them. Gives them an excuse to go, I think.”
They really were tickled that she was so interested in accompanying them, though her grandfather did worry a bit about Carl. He was concerned that he could get carried away with his gambling, if he didn’t have people with him to shut him down before he got into trouble.
“I was surprised to see you here,” Jane admitted.
He raised his eyebrows at that. “Really? My brother helps my stepfather run this company, but we’re both major stock holders. I’m not actively involved with the day-to-day running of the company the way that Ben is, but I am very much aware of what is going on,” he said and took a sip of his drink, which looked like either a scotch or whiskey on the rocks. He smiled and then added, “In spite of everything, we’re having our best year. Thanks to the new release, sales and profits are up.”
“That’s great. I’m surprised that you don’t work at the company as well,” Jane commented.
“My talents and interests lie elsewhere. Besides, I think my brother and I might kill each other if we had to work together all the time. It’s better this way.”
“He’s right about that,” said a voice behind them.
Jane turned and Ben was there.
“Jane, have you met my brother, Ben, yet?” Lanny asked.
“Nick introduced us earlier,” Ben said. He then glanced at Lanny and then Jane before adding, “Nick brought his two best investigators with him.”
“Really?” The wariness was back in Lanny’s eyes.
“Former investigator. We don’t work together any longer and no matter what Nick thinks, I’ve told him I have no interest in coming back to work at the firm. I like what I’m doing now.”
“Right, he said you’re running a coffee shop in a small town or something like that?” Ben asked.
“Yes, a breakfast and lunch place, mostly takeout, in Waverly. I love it.”
Both of them looked at her in disbelief.
“I’ll take your word on that, but it sounds like hard work to me,” Ben said.
“Of course it does. You can’t cook,” Lanny teased him.
“Well, yes, there is that,” Ben admitted and then grinned.
Lanny’s cell phone vibrated then and he checked to see who was calling. “I’m sorry, I need to take this. Excuse me.”
He wandered off and Ben looked at her empty glass. “It looks like you were on your way to the bar. What are you drinking?”
“Chardonnay.”
“Hold on, I’ll be right back.” He walked over to the bar, and moments later returned with a new glass of wine.
“So, you really don’t miss investigating? I think I remember my father saying he’d wished you were on his side during the trial.”
“I do miss it a little,” she admitted. “But not enough to go back into it. I’ve moved on and I’m really happy now. Cooking was always a dream I had.”
“I can understand that. I’m following my dream, as well. We’re in striking distance of completely dominating our market.”
&nbs
p; “I thought you were already the leader, that this new product release pushed you to number one?”
“Yes, and that’s been exciting to watch. But that’s just one product. We have two more releasing over the next two years and that’s when we should really own the marketplace and the stock price should reflect it.” His naked ambition was plain to see.
“That’s exciting. How do you stay ahead of your competitors?”
“It’s not easy. We have some tough competition. But we’re scrappy, and resourceful. We basically do whatever it takes to give us a competitive edge. We have the best and most motivated development team and our sales guys are hungry. When we have all the right pieces in place, it becomes a perfect storm of momentum. Impossible to stop.” He grinned and added, “At least, that’s the goal.”
Jane was impressed with his drive. Ben had an intensity that was fascinating. In their own ways, each brother seemed to have all the ingredients to be successful. Was Ben so competitive that he’d cross the line to give himself an illegal advantage? Jane wasn’t sure. Like his brother, he was somewhat hard to read. Both men were clearly intelligent. But was either one of them a killer?
A beautiful blonde woman came up to Ben and whispered something in his ear. He blushed a bit and then said, “I’m afraid I’m being summoned. Someone is waiting to talk to me. If you’ll excuse me.”
“Of course,” Jane said and watched as the two of them wandered off. Jane strolled away herself and as she came around a corner, she stopped short as she recognized a familiar voice. Lanny was talking to someone and when she heard the name Maxine, she froze in her spot and took a sip of her wine, listening intently.
“I just don’t know if building that new house is such a good idea right now. I know. I’m just saying maybe wait a while, until this all blows over. They’ll turn their focus to something else. They always do. Right. Okay, talk to Chester, see what you can do.” He stopped talking then and Jane spun around and quickly walked back to where she’d been before, so she wouldn’t run into Lanny right after he got off his call.
What she’d overheard, though, was concerning. Why did Lanny care so much about the house Maxine and Chester were building? Why the advice to hold off for a while? What was his connection to Maxine?
Jane found Liza near the bar, gazing out the window.
“Did you learn anything?” she asked when she saw Jane.
“I’m not sure,” Jane admitted. Nick appeared just then as well and also asked, “Any luck?”
“Well, I’m not sure if it’s relevant to your case, but I did overhear a phone conversation of Lanny’s. It may be relevant to the murder of the woman that was found at my shop.” She told them what she’d heard Lanny say to Maxine.
“It just doesn’t make much sense why he’d warn her to keep a low profile, unless there was a reason for it and that he might somehow be involved.”
“Do you think she may have hired Lanny to kill the woman?” Liza asked, quickly connecting the same dots that Jane had.
“I think it’s possible, or that Chester did and Maxine knows about it.”
“Do you think you’ve heard enough to justify poking around online now?” Nick asked. It was what Jane had been thinking about ever since she’d heard the tail end of Lanny’s call.
“I think so. Depending on what I find, I’ll see if I can expand the search to see if anything relevant turns up for you, as well.”
“I’d appreciate that,” Nick said.
“I wish I understood how you do what you do with those computers,” Liza said in admiration.
“I can’t guarantee that it will work, or that I’ll find anything, but I’ll let you know if I do.”
“Liza, did you get a chance to talk to Ben?” Nick asked.
“I did. He’s a smart young man. Perhaps a bit too smart. He asked quite a few questions about what I do at the firm. I answered them honestly, of course, but giving as little information as possible. But still, it was enough to make him nervous. Especially when he realized that you brought two investigators here tonight.”
“I had a similar conversation,” Jane said. “But, I assured him that I am not returning to investigative work.”
“Never say never,” Nick said with a grin. “I’m fine with you consulting like this every now and then.”
“I’m not consulting for you,” Jane said automatically. Then she thought about it for a moment and chuckled, “Okay, I guess I sort of am. Unofficially, anyway.”
“We can make it official anytime you like,” Nick pressed.
“I’ll keep that in mind,” Jane said with a smile.
26
When Jane finished up work the next day, she drove by Maxine’s real estate office and was happy to see that her car was there. The office was located in a strip mall, so Jane parked out of the direct sight of the office, but facing the front door so she could see who was coming and going. She turned off her car engine, set up her laptop and used her sniffing software to search out the real estate office’s network.
She was hoping that there was a chance that it was unsecured, as that would make her search much easier. She remembered her saying something about hating technology, so thought there might be a possibility that she didn’t want to bother with passwords.
She was right. Her software dinged that the connection had been made, and from there it was fairly simple for Jane to access and search her email. Within minutes, she crossed another hurdle when she found a folder marked ‘passwords’. It wasn’t always this easy. Jane was prepared to dig deeper and she had the technical know-how to do it, but more often than not, her coding skills were unnecessary. Creative searching often led her to what she needed.
She clicked the folder open and grinned. All of Maxine’s passwords were there. She jotted down the one she was most interested in, in case she lost her connection, and then she quickly searched her email for a combination of different words, anything that would be some kind of a trail to Lanny or Samantha.
She searched their names and scrolled through any emails, though there were no emails from Lanny, just Chester and Samantha. But, there was nothing incriminating in any of them. Maxine was smart enough not to put anything in writing in an email. Jane decided to do her next search at home, now that she had the passwords she needed.
Ten minutes later, she was home. She gave Misty some attention, fed her and then went upstairs to her home office and turned on her desktop computer. She looked up Maxine’s bank and then entered her email and password info. Once she was in, she started to look through her recent transactions, starting with the current week and then working backwards to a month before Samantha died. Very quickly, she found what she was looking for.
She noted a large check to Chester’s construction company, and a few days after Samantha’s death, there was another large check to the Mercedes dealership. But there was a transaction two weeks before Samantha’s murder that got her attention. A check for fifty thousand dollars was debited from the account. Jane clicked on the check icon to see the image of the check and it was made out to a company called Unlimited Freedom, LLC. And in the memo field, she had written ‘services’.
She was unfamiliar with Unlimited Freedom, LLC., but had a feeling she knew who might be behind it. A few more searches and she found the database registration that listed the principals attached to Unlimited Freedom, LLC. There was just one person. Landon Drummond.
27
Jane’s next call was to Jake and he was impressed with what she’d discovered.
“Okay, let me share this with the state guys. They’ll have to do their own discovery, of course, but since both Maxine and Chester benefited from Samantha’s death, we should be able to get a warrant to search basic records, bank accounts, laptops, things like that.”
“We were going to go to Mumford tonight. Gramps and Carl were looking forward to it. When will this happen? I wouldn’t want Lanny to get of wind of it while we are there.”
Jake thought for a momen
t. “It’s almost five now. I’ll write my request up and submit it first thing in the morning. It will probably take them a week to actually subpoena the records, so you should be fine to go tonight.”
“Okay, we’ll go, then. I also told Lanny last night that we were coming, so he is expecting us.”
“Be careful,” Jake warned.
“We will,” Jane assured him.
* * *
Friday night’s party was held on Holly Lane in Mumford. This time, it was in the basement of a men’s gym and the lovely smell of sweat greeted them as they walked inside.
“Not quite as plush as the last place,” Gramps joked as Evan, the bouncer, checked them in. He now knew all their names and wished them luck.
“I’m telling you, the service here keeps getting better,” Carl said with a chuckle.
“Right, as long as Janie is with us. She’s our lucky charm,” Gramps agreed.
“I don’t know about that,” Jane said. She’d dressed a little more casually this time, with a more modest white v-neck sweater, jeans, and a pair of brown and pink, cowboy boots.
They arrived a little later than usual because Carl had a chiropractor appointment that afternoon, so when they made their way downstairs, the room was already packed with people. But, as he always managed to do, Carl’s eagle eyes spotted the one table that had three open seats and he made a beeline for it.
They settled in and played for a solid hour before Jane caught a glimpse of Lanny. He came in and went straight for the bar, taking his usual position at the far end where he could lean against the bar and watch the room. Jane wasn’t as eager to talk to him, now that she was fairly sure he was involved with Samantha’s murder. Her instinct was to stay far away. But still, she was curious to see what, if anything, he might have to say.
Motive Page 10
