Chapter 36
SOPHIE
My father phoned while I was eating a salad at my desk at work.
I considered answering, but didn’t. I’d been at my new job for two months, learning the ropes, and now I wanted to make my own mark.
After the party in Hope Ranch, I’d started thinking about the Big Names.
What the Givemore Girls called “high-capacity individual donors,” the ones who dropped a hundred grand without blinking an eye.
There were a few famous Santa Barbara philanthropists, but I needed to focus more on the level of Frank DeYoung, the ones who flew under the radar.
So I’d spent the last few days researching.
I took special note of a real-estate mogul called Steven “Swede” Braby and a self-described “Wall Street asshole” named Douglas Sudmayer.
I got excited at the prospects of the improbably named E.
E. Elliot and a Montecito old-timer called Horace Ashley, before I discovered they’d both died in the past year.
A natural hazard of trying to raise funds from the elderly.
After I finished my salad, I checked my voicemail for the transcription of my Dad’s call.
“Hey, sweetie! Hope you’re loving your new job.
It sounds like a big responsibility, but nothing you can’t handle.
Good luck researching those funders. You were always great at research.
Remember that history project about Carthage?
I love that one and the—” A pause. “Mom’s telling me not to brag about your middle-school work, but you looked so cute in your colander helmet. ”
I skimmed to the end: “… looked up that Word of Goods place you mentioned. Remarkable. Helping with natural disasters. Refugee camps. Shipping mosquito nets to developing countries. Such important work. And now you’re in the same industry. Or near enough.”
“Near enough,” I said.
I mean, he wasn’t wrong. World of Goods was amazing.
They saved lives every day, while I focused on staging one more production of Shakespeare.
Still, I thought about what Frank DeYoung told me and refused to spiral.
I was a playwright. And music, theatre, dance, visual art, literature: they made us human.
So maybe I wasn’t saving lives but the work was still important.
And I was trying to help Mrs. B prove CJ’s innocence. Well, not just Mrs. B, Ocean had a hefty stake in the outcome, too. So I texted the Marigold Cottages Murder Collective chat to tell them what I’d learned that morning.
Sophie
Everyone at The New Vic loves
Helene and George
Hamilton
They’re the Kagants, for those just
tuning in. Beard and Bird.
Lily-Ann
Wait! Everyone wait.
Anthony is trying to text.
(Give him a minute.)
Or four.
Anthony
The windwield wiper typos
Typons
Typhoons
Lily-Ann
The windshield wiper tycoons.
Sophie
The only suspicious thing about them
is that they’ve known both Jane and
Karina for decades
Hamilton
We should reconsider the tripwire.
Nicholas
Why not quicksand, Wile E?
Sophie
He doesn’t mean a tripwire-tripwire, Nicholas.
Any kind of trap or mechanism.
Anthony
Tycoons
Lily-Ann
Ask George and Helene about Karina’s
background.
Sophie
Will do. Apparently they’re completely chill
And happy to gossip
Anthony
mec anims
I smiled at Anthony’s attempt to text, then grabbed my bag and went outside into the balmy California afternoon.
Ocean
Are there phones for people with
sausage fingers?
Hamilton
Sausage fingers are the wurst.
“Ha!” I said aloud, reading my phone as I walked toward home. Wurst. Only Hamilton and I would enjoy that. And probably Mrs. B, but she liked to pretend she didn’t text.
Lily-Ann
Anthony would like me to convey
that he is giving you the sausage-finger
at this very moment.
Nicholas
When do we tell Mrs. B that this
ridiculous “investigation” is finished?
Oh, Nicholas. You’re so transparent. He liked to pretend that he was disgusted by the whole concept of investigating crimes, but we all knew he just worried about Mrs. B.
Lily-Ann
The detective spoke to Anthony yesterday.
He asked if Frank DeYoung was paying
Anthony for something.
“What the hell?” I muttered, stopping on the sidewalk.
Sophie
Something?
Nicholas
Something?
Ocean
What exactly?
Lily-Ann
One moment. This is news to me.
Anthony is explaining.
Nobody texted anything—not even Hamilton—until I’d walked another four blocks. And then this very enlightening message appeared:
Anthony
Not suss
pisces
Lily-Ann
I’m taking his phone away. He says Enible
wasn’t suspicious. He wants our help.
Sophie
Why should we help him?
Lily-Ann
According to Enible, Frank DeYoung
withdrew 50k in cash over the past months
to pay someone without leaving a
paper trail.
Nicholas
How does he know it was to pay a person?
Not for something else?
Lily-Ann
Anthony thinks he’s guessing. Enible suspected
the only thing we could offer a wealthy man
under the table is muscle-headed thuggery,
ie Anthony.
Ocean
Lily-Ann!
Lily-Ann
Sweet, soulful thuggery.
Ocean
Better
Nicholas
Sounds like Sophie’s kind of romance novel
The Thug and the Thespian
I typed furiously, as I waited at the crosswalk a few blocks from the Cottages.
Sophie
The Princess and the Peabrain
You’re in that one.
Hamilton
The bestselling romance of all
time is Fifty Shades of Grey.
Ocean
We’re discussing fifty thousands of dollars,
Hamilton. What does Enible expect us
to do with that information? We can’t
track it. We can’t do anything
Lily-Ann
He wants us to keep our ears
pricked. And snoop around CJ.
Sophie
Speaking of snooping around CJ,
what do we all think of Pax?
Ocean
Sensitive new age guy. Out there sharing
his light with the world.
Sophie
Ugh.
Having expressed that so eloquently, I crossed Garden Street, heading for the front entrance of the Marigold Cottages.
Lily-Ann
We need to add Frank DeYoung’s
missing 50k in cash to our spreadsheet.
Ocean
Also that Karina and George have known
Each other longer than anyone else.
And Sunny’s money/law problems.
All gossip from this morning, but
seemingly accurate.
Lily-Ann
Sophie, can you determine if Jane
cared enough about losing the
Millerbrandt Award to lash out?
Hamilton
Who is Millerbrandt?
Lily-Ann
A career-making non-profit
award that Jane might have blamed
Frank for not winning.
Hamilton
Cops.
Here.
Now.
That was when I noticed the police cars.
I’d walked past them without seeing them, too busy with my phone.
I climbed the steps and spotted two officers in uniforms approaching my old cottage with Detective Enible.
My stomach soured. I’d seen too many videos of cops bullying people.
Not in Santa Barbara! I’ve only ever had friendly interactions with the SBPD.
Still, those videos replayed in my mind.
“D-detective!” I called.
He turned. “Sophie Gilman.”
“I—hello. Um, that’s my—can I help you?”
“You don’t currently live here, do you?”
I flushed. “No. But, um…”
“CJ Moore lives here now.”
“I—I don’t … uh.”
“If you could move back a smidge?”
I took a step back.
“There you go,” Enible said. “Much better.”
I wanted to say something, maybe to object, but I didn’t know how. And while I stood there dithering, I heard the happiest words in the English language.