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“I say we keep at it. If we can’t figure it out in four meetings, we move on,” suggested Christie. “Between meetings we can keep working on it. If we come up with something, we can also do a virtual meeting.”
Fiona smiled. “I think this is an excellent idea. How about if we each have something in our newsletters once a month? I think our readers will love that.”
“My newsletter isn’t very big,” admitted Lori. “I’ve been so busy writing, I haven’t done a lot of the things I should be doing.”
“So at the end of our monthly newsletter piece, how about if we each post the other three’s newsletter sign-up links?” proposed Jessica as she took the thumb drive from Christie and plugged it into her laptop.
There was only one file, and she opened it. Up popped a table filled with seemingly random numbers. There was a single, centered line of numbers, under which were numbers spread out over five columns and fifteen rows. None of the columns had headings, although the numbers seemed to relate to one another in terms of some seeming to be monetary amounts, others the right amount of numbers for zip codes, and the like. Information was great, but only if you could figure out what it meant. The tricky portion of the evening had just begun.
“You know, I keep hoping for a ta-da moment where it says something like ‘the assistant did it,’” said Lori, “but it never happens. Anybody know what these numbers show?”
“The fourth column appears to be dollar amounts, with the fifth column giving a cumulative total,” said Fiona as she pointed to the numbers. “I’m clueless about the others.”
“The second column appears to be country codes for selling books. And this one,” Christie said indicating the third column, “could be assigned ISBN or ASIN codes for specific books.”
Jessica nodded. “I think you’re onto something. But what the hell is the first column and why did Sandy have this information?”
“Could the first column be specific authors?” asked Lori, looking over Jessica’s shoulder.
“That would make some sense, but again, what’s the purpose? Why did she have it? And was this something someone would kill for?”
Fiona was looking at her phone. “Those are ISBN and ASIN numbers. They are for the same author. And what we think are country codes, are just that.”
“Where are you finding this?”
Fiona turned the phone around and showed a pirate site—a site where someone stole copyrighted material from authors and then posted it for people to read without the authors obtaining any royalties. “My guess is that number at the top is an IP address for one of the more notorious pirate sites.”
“I thought they shut that site down,” said Christie.
“They did, but it keeps popping back up,” explained Fiona. “As long as people will utilize it—as long as they are basically okay with stealing from authors—there’s not a lot authors can do. You send a cease-and-desist order, they take the book down, thereby complying with the order, and then they put it back up. Basically, it’s a game of whack-a-mole.”
The timer for the food rang. “That’s time. Let’s get the food out of the warmer, and we can call Detective Wilder.”
“You mean Detective McSexy?” laughed Lori.
Fiona joined her. “Come on, you two were thinking it too,” she chided. “I think Jess should call him. He was definitely giving her the eye.”
Jessica snorted. “He was giving me the eye because I put the drive he wanted down my shirt. I think he was calculating how much trouble he’d be in if he just took it.”
“Not to mention copping a quick feel,” added Christie. “But I agree, Jess should call him.”
Jess rolled her eyes, looked up the town’s police department, and asked for Detective Wilder. Jess knew he wasn’t going to be happy about their having kept a copy but hoped that being able to supply him with valuable information might smooth the waters.
CHAPTER 2
JESSICA
The very nice person on the other end of the line answered, “I’m sorry. He isn’t in right now.”
Jessica supposed given the time of day, she should have expected that. “Do you have a number where I could reach him? Or, if you don’t want to give me that, could you call him and let him know Jessica Murdoch is trying to reach him?”
“I can make sure he gets the message in the morning.”
“I don’t know that he’s going to want to wait. Why don’t you call him and tell him we kept a copy of the file. Tell him we’re pretty sure we know what the numbers represent.”
“Okay, I can do that, but he still might not call until morning.”
“That’s fine, but it’ll be his call, and you and I will know we did the right thing.” Jessica assured her.
