“I told you already. He’s in a meeting, and he’s much too important to be disturbed.” Phyllis didn’t comment explicitly on our relative unimportance, but it didn’t take much imagination to guess what she was thinking. The Igster’s ego had clearly had some help from his mother in reaching its current size.

We seemed to have arrived at an impasse, but then Iggie himself appeared around a distant corner, herding Camilla Gergen and a small flock of other banker types, presumably her colleagues, toward the exit. I ducked behind Peter-I’d seen enough of Camilla the previous evening to last for another eight years-but the space was sufficiently large that the group could pass at a safe distance with only snatches of their conversation echoing in our direction. We heard billion more than once, which probably explained why Iggie had shown them the courtesy of accompanying them to the door rather than letting them find their own way out.

Once Camilla and her companions were safely on the other side of the sliding-glass panels, Phyllis, who had apparently accepted that Iggie was bound to see us waiting for him and decided to take control of the situation, gave another yodel. “Yoo-hoo!” she called. “Igor! Look who’s here, baby!”

While Phyllis may have played an important role in developing Iggie’s ego, she had less control over other parts of his psyche and had been unable to extinguish the torch he still carried for his ex-wife. Once his eyes landed on Abigail he practically skipped over to the reception area. He was again dressed all in purple, from his shoes up to his shirt, although today he’d opted for silk instead of velvet. I wondered if Prince was aware someone was raiding his wardrobe.

“She came early, and she brought some people with her, which is very inconvenient. I told her you were busy and that she’d just have to wait,” Phyllis said. “Your next appointment will be here any second, and you don’t have time for her now. Your calendar will get all backed up.”

“That’s okay, Ma,” said Iggie. “I can always make time for Biggie.”

He seemed about as thrilled as Phyllis had been to see that Abigail wasn’t alone, but he still welcomed us all graciously and offered a tour of the premises, eager to show off the scale of his company’s operations.

“Thanks, Iggie, maybe later. There are some things we wanted to discuss with you first,” I said.

“In private,” added Abigail, with a pointed look in Phyllis’s direction. It was possible giving pointed looks was a skill she came by naturally, but it was so well done I suspected Luisa had been coaching her.

“Whatever you want, Biggie. We’ll just be a few minutes, Ma.”

I could feel Phyllis’s glare on our backs as Iggie led us through the maze of low-walled cubicles, waving cheerily at the geek-hipster minions we passed before showing us into a glass-walled conference room. “Check it,” he said, flipping a switch. Instantly, the glass panes seemed to fill with smoke, and what had been clear was now opaque. “Is that cool or what?”

We all agreed it was cool, although simple Venetian blinds or even some tasteful drapes would have been just as effective, but we couldn’t waste valuable minutes admiring the office decor, especially with Phyllis likely to interrupt at any moment.

“So, Iggie, was that Camilla Gergen from Ryan Brothers we saw just now?” I asked. We’d agreed on the drive down to start by putting him on the defensive, assuming such a thing was possible where Iggie was concerned.

“Who?” he said, with the same hammy overemoted surprise he’d tried on the phone last night. It was no more convincing in person.

“It’s all right, Iggie,” I said. “I know you’re talking to other banks about the IPO. Anyone in your shoes would do the same thing.” This was true, although I doubted many people would want to wear his purple Doc Martens. “Did you tell them all they’d be first up to pitch, too?”

“No, Rachel, your firm is going first. Really. The Ryan Brothers people were just here to give me some advice about-uh, about-”

“Don’t worry, Iggie. I understand. In fact, it’s probably a good thing you’re talking to so many different firms, because the more I hear about Igobe, the less sure I am that my own firm would want to represent you. We prefer to work with companies with stronger prospects, and it sounds as if the future here might be less rosy than you’d like everyone to believe.”

“What are you talking about?” he asked, his tone growing as defensive as we’d hoped.

“We know that there are rumors that your technology can be hacked, and we know that Hilary was writing an article that was critical of Igobe,” said Abigail. “And we also know there’s a fifty-percent chance you were lying about whether you did more than drop her off at the hotel.”

“How did you get to fifty percent?” asked Iggie, ever the math prodigy. I noticed he didn’t question what she had said about either the hacker or Hilary’s article.

“There were two Lamborghinis at the Four Seasons that night, and we know one of them belonged to you. We also know one drove off without Hilary and one drove off with her,” said Luisa.

“Which means she was either with you or she was in the other car,” concluded Peter.

“Oh,” said Iggie with relief. “That’s easy. She must have been in the other car, because she wasn’t with me. I just dropped her off, like I told you.” He rubbed his hands together. “Now, are you guys staying for lunch, too? Because I was hoping to have some private time with Big-I mean, Abigail.”

“Not so fast, Iggie,” said Abigail. “Who was driving the other Lamborghini?”

“How should I know?”

“You should know because the guys working the door at the hotel saw you both get out of your cars and talk to each other,” she said.

“Wow, Biggie. You really have been following my every move, haven’t you?” Iggie sounded touched, as if he was interpreting the legwork we’d done as a sign that Abigail cared about him rather than distrusted him.

“Not at all,” I said. “We’re just trying to find Hilary. We know from eyewitnesses and from the hotel’s security cameras that you took her to the Four Seasons, we know she went upstairs for her laptop and notebook, and we know she came back downstairs and got into one of two Lamborghinis that were there that night. If you were just dropping her off, why did you stick around and talk to the other driver? And who was he?”

“I told you, we were just talking about our cars. There aren’t a lot of Lamborghinis around. Not many people can afford to drop that much green on a set of wheels, if you know what I mean.” He looked around, as if to make sure that we did, in fact, know what he meant and to see if anyone appreciated his impromptu rhyming skills. “We talked about our cars, and then I skedaddled. Sans Hilarita.”

“Why did you leave without her?” Peter asked.

“And why didn’t you go forward with the interview you promised her?” added Luisa. She asked this as if we knew about the interview for sure, but she was bluffing, something at which she excelled, although she’d scoffed at my repeated suggestions that she pursue a career in professional poker. “Did something make you change your mind while you were waiting for her?”

Iggie didn’t say anything for a moment, and I could almost see the wheels spinning in his brain as he tried to calculate which excuse we might find most credible. “Okay,” he said eventually, his tone resigned. “Do you really want to know what happened? The whole truth and nothing but the truth?”

“That’s why we’re here,” said Abigail. “That and to spend quality time with you.”

But sarcasm was lost on Iggie, too. “I ditched her on purpose. I told her I’d give her an interview for her story, and then I took off while she was getting her things from her room.”

“Why would you do that?” I asked, indignant on Hilary’s behalf.

“Because the Igster doesn’t get mad, Raquel. He gets even.”