Page 48 of Dead Man's Hollow
Jordana sighs and exits out of her spreadsheet. “You weren’t listening at all, were you?” She asks the question already knowing the answer.
“Nope,” Maisy says cheerfully. “I know you’ll get the software suite that best meets our needs and budget. So I’m just pretending to listen so you can talk it through. I can tell you’re a verbal processor. I worked for a station manager like that once. Some people need to talk things through to make their decisions.”
“Great,” Jordana tells her. “Your pretend listening skills could use some work though. When you randomly shout out names while I’m in the middle of a sentence, it’s not very convincing.”
Maisy laughs. “Sometimes a brilliant idea is like a greased pig. If you don’t grab hold of it when it’s there, it’ll wriggle out of your grasp forever.”
“You’re astonishingly weird. I hope you know that. But fine, tell me your brilliant Jenna Novak greased pig idea.”
“I know your heart is hurting because we can’t do anything for Andre right now. But we could put his aunt in touch with Jenna at the foundation.”
“That’s not a half-bad idea.”
“Don’t go overboard with the praise,” Maisy tells her.
She laughs. “I didn’t mean it that way. But, there’s a sticking point. The Lewis Foundation’s mission is to support families of crime victims and we don’t know that Andre has been the victim of a crime.”
“Sure, but the official story is he got into hot water with a gang. Even though that’s probably not true, it’s an excuse to connect her with some resources that are probably long overdue. And it builds trust with her.”
“Do you want to talk to Deanne, or should I call Jenna?” Jordana asks, her pen poised over her notepad.
Jordana takes her notes electronically and backs them up with a physical copy. A habit she no doubt picked up at Sasha’s elbow.
Deanne Lewis established the foundation, and she owes Maisy a favor or a hundred million. But Jenna is the person on the ground.
“You talk to Jenna.”
Maisy’s nurtured a network of CEOs and COOs, people she can call for favors. She started building it when she was young, and as she and her contacts moved up in the world, her network’s only grown stronger. There’s no time like the present for Jordana to begin to gather her own community.
“Got it.” Jordana’s writing the note when her phone emits a sound, a high-pitched dinging sound that Maisy’s never heard before.
“What on earth?”
For a moment Jordana looks as puzzled as Maisy feels.
Then her eyes widen. “Somebody left a voicemail on Talker.”
“Talker?”
“It’s an asynchronous digital voice note app.”
“Huh, interesting. What is it in English?”
“You record a voice message and upload it whenever it’s convenient for you. The recipient can listen to it at their convenience and either record a message to send back to you or choose to call you live through the app.”
“Tell me how this is different than leaving a message.” Sometimes Maisy wonders what problems all the shiny new programs and products are solving.
“It’s not really—other than it gives people another layer of anonymity,” Jordana tells her. “They can leave the message, and we can get back in touch with them without them ever having to give us their real phone number or go through the effort of getting a burner or an internet number. We’re removing obstacles to reaching out so people will feel safe.”
“Still seems like this can all be accomplished with an answering machine.”
Jordana rolls her eyes. “Sure, maybe. But, Maisy, this is our first Squawk!”
“I’m sorry, our first … Squawk?”
“Talker messages are called Squawks,” Jordana explains.
Maisy lowers her chin and fixes her producer with an unamused look.
