“Was it Alex something?” I suggested helpfully. Peter glanced at me, his expression unreadable.
“I don’t think so,” said Gustav, thinking. “I’d know it if I saw it, but I can’t remember it offhand. And the two guys seemed to know each other already. It wasn’t like they were meeting for the first time and bonding over their cars. They talked for a minute or two, and then they both got back into their cars and one drove away.”
“Which one?” Ben asked.
“I don’t remember,” said Gustav.
“Me, either,” said Ray. “But a blond lady came out a few minutes later and got into the car that was still there, and then that one drove away, too.”
“Was the blonde really tall? And wearing a really small dress?” I asked.
This elicited a smile from them both. “It was like something out of a ZZ Top video,” admitted Ray.
“Could you hear what the men said? When they got out of their cars?” asked Luisa.
They shook their heads. “And we couldn’t really tell where they were headed, either, if that’s what you’re going to ask next,” said Gustav. “The only way out of here is down Stevenson Street, and that dead-ends on Third, which is one-way. But once they were back on Market, they could have gone anywhere.”
A Town Car drew up to disgorge some more banker types, so we thanked them for their help and let them get back to work.
“Well, either Iggie was lying or Hilary got into the other Lamborghini,” said Abigail.
“Maybe we should ask your friend Alex what he’s driving these days,” I said to Peter. “He may not have been the preppie guy in the footage from Hilary’s floor, but he could be the preppie guy with the Lamborghini. We know there were two Lamborghinis at the party, and we know Alex knows Iggie. And that he’s preppie.”
Peter looked uncomfortable. “Listen, I know Alex about as well as you know Iggie. It’s not like he’s my best friend, but he already said he wasn’t here last night.”
Ben cleared his throat. “You know, I forgot to mention this before-it must have slipped my mind with everything else that’s happened, and at the time I didn’t think it was important-but I got a call from a friend of mine at the Bureau a couple of hours ago. He didn’t have any luck finding an address or phone number for Iggie, but he did manage to trace the number of the phone that sent the text messages. It’s registered to a company of some sort, but it just has letters for a name, no words at all.”
“What are the letters?” I asked.
“A-C-V-L-L-C.”
“That’s it!” It was Gustav, who had rejoined us after attending to the occupants of the Town Car. “That was the other plate! A-C-V-L-L-C!”
I turned to Peter. “The A and the C could be for Alex Cutler. And the V could be for Ventures, right? ACV, LLC. Is that the name of his firm?”
Peter shifted his weight from one foot to the other and stuck his hands in his pockets. “I think it’s something like that.”
“And he said his firm invested in Igobe, which means he’s looking at a big payoff from the IPO. So he’s probably as interested as Iggie in making sure there’s no bad news about the company.”
“Probably,” Peter agreed, but with reluctance. I guessed he didn’t like the idea of his former fraternity brother being on the side of evil, and I could understand that sort of loyalty.
But there were too many little clues leading to Alex to ignore. A quick phone call to directory assistance taught us that Alex was nearly as protective of his privacy as Iggie, and just as hard to locate. We thought about asking him directly, via phone or text, where he lived, whether he knew where Hilary was, or, at the very least, what kind of car he drove, but if he was a bad guy, these questions would tip our hand even more than we’d already tipped it by asking him if he’d been at the Four Seasons in the first place.
Which was why I said the words I thought I’d never hear myself say, although I probably didn’t get the inflection quite right. If anything, my tone was grim.
“Tennis, anyone?”
17
We took another few minutes to regroup in the lower lobby. Abigail tried Iggie again on her cell phone, hoping to ask him about Alex, but he was no longer answering since it was past his bedtime. An image of Iggie in purple satin pajamas and an eyeshade, clutching a stuffed elephant, appeared before my eyes, and I hoped it would go away soon. Meanwhile, Peter texted Alex and Caro to let them know we’d meet them for doubles at twelve-thirty at their tennis club in Palo Alto. If all went well, Alex would pull up to the club in his Lamborghini, and then we could pummel Hilary’s whereabouts out of him with our rackets, rescue her and get on with our lives. This was assuming, of course, that it wasn’t too late to rescue Hilary, an alternative none of us wanted to consider.
“We could carpool down there in the morning,” suggested Abigail. “I’ve been thinking it might make sense to try to catch Iggie off guard by dropping in earlier rather than waiting until lunch, and it would catch him even more off guard if I brought you all along. Which would have the added benefit of helping me to avoid any one-on-one time with him. Igobe’s headquarters aren’t far from the club, and there’s a mall nearby where we can hang out while you’re at tennis.”
The opportunity to confront Iggie in person was tempting, and, after the phone call we’d witnessed, we could all appreciate why Abigail would want to trade her intimate lunch with Iggie for a group event. And after I’d finished telling everyone about Clay and Camilla and their matching keychains, everyone agreed it made sense for more reasons than one to try to talk to Iggie directly, although Luisa’s decision probably had more to do with Abigail and the mention of a mall than anything else.
“If Iggie has any shame, he’ll be embarrassed he lied to me about meeting with other banks first,” I said. “That might give us some leverage when we ask about Alex. We can also ask him if he has any ideas as to who might want to spoil his IPO. Maybe the keychain guy is a disgruntled employee.”
“I suspect Iggie’s surrounded by disgruntled employees,” observed Luisa.
“And he doesn’t have much shame,” said Abigail. “But it can’t hurt to ask.”
Ben offered to try to pull a few more strings to procure a list of Lamborghini owners in the area, and Peter volunteered to pick everyone up at the hotel in the morning, assuming his parents could spare a hybrid.
“Unless it would be more convenient for Abigail if we picked her up at home,” I said. “Abigail, would that be more convenient for you?”
Luisa shot me a murderous look. What she and Abigail planned to do after we left was none of my business, especially if it involved Abigail not waking up in her own bed, but I couldn’t resist the opportunity to get back at Luisa just the tiniest bit. I’d been insufferable, as well, but it was important to keep the score even on the insufferability front.
“That’s all right,” said Abigail easily. “I’ll meet up with you here. Thanks, though.”
“Yes, Rachel. Thank you,” said Luisa, but there was a menacing edge to her voice that made me glad we weren’t alone.
It was fortunate that Peter remembered where he’d parked the car, because I didn’t. A few minutes later we were buckled in and heading back across the city to Pacific Heights. He gave up trying to find anything of interest on the radio once it became clear nothing could be heard over my yawning.
“We’ll be there soon,” he assured me. “There shouldn’t be any traffic at this time of night.”
“Good,” I said, but it came out muffled by yet another enormous yawn. “Ouch.”
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
“My jaw cracked.”
He laughed. “Life with you is always an adventure.”
He said it affectionately, and I knew he meant well, but the words reminded me of what I’d been too busy to think about for the past few hours-namely, that I was merely his way of getting over Caro after she’d broken up with him, a sort of palate-cleansing interlude of oddity that would last until she either took him back or he found someone else comparably normal. And thinking about this only made me more anxious than I’d been already, between trying to track down Hilary, ingratiating myself to Peter’s parents and making sure I didn’t completely screw up my career.