I decide to dive right in. “I’ve been thinking about what you said about the fall line.”
“Which thing I said?”
“I’ve been looking at the P&L. If we don’t have a fall line, we’ll be six million in the red, and I may have to make some major changes.”
“I know. What are we going to do?”
“I’ve given this a lot of thought. I think what’s probably best is that we work on releasing the same line with a different name in the same packaging,”
I watch her reaction carefully.
“Wow, that’s a big deal. Are you sure that’s what you want to do? I thought Vanessa said it was a really bad idea.”
“She did, but she’s not looking at our P&L. If we don’t get this figured out, I may have to close the company my mother built and let over five thousand employees go.”
“Couldn’t you get a loan? Surely your personal assets would secure it.”
She knows me too well to think I’d just walk away. “Everyone is telling me it’s a bad idea to personally finance the company.”
“I understand it’s a lot of money, but it’s also five thousand employees.” She sits back and refuses a third drink. “I’m sorry. I think I’m just being selfish. I love Metro and all the people we work with. I’d probably do what I could to try to save it, too.”
Okay, I’m feeling better. She likes our culture and the family we’ve built at Metro. “I didn’t sleep at all last night worrying about this. I can’t help but think we can save the company by doing this.”
“I agree,” she says firmly. “No one will say we didn’t at least try to save the company.”
“Thanks. I spoke with Jordan, and she’ll have mockups for us in a few days. We can pick back up with most of our advertising and marketing plans. The machines can easily be recalibrated to accommodate the change in packaging. We might have only lost about a month of production.”
“That’d be huge.”
“My thoughts exactly.”
I pay the bill, and we walk out of the hotel. “We’re going to get this figured out,” she assures me and gives me a big hug. We both call up rideshares, and mine arrives first. “I hope to see you tomorrow.”
“My fingers are crossed.”
I don’t pay attention to the car other than to match his picture, license plate, and car make and color. A girl has to be safe, after all.
Chapter eighteen
CeCe
“Where are you going? My house is in the other direction. I live in the city, not over the Bay Bridge in the East Bay.”
I try the door handle, but it doesn’t work. I push my shoulder into the door, hoping it’s only stuck. I push harder, putting my whole weight into the door. It doesn’t budge.
“I know where you live,” he sneers. “We’re going for a ride.”
“What are you talking about? Take me back! Stop the car! Let me out!”
He ignores me and doesn’t respond. When my panic levels out to an even terror, I begin to think clearly. The app documented my ride. My friends and family will look for me. I stare down at my phone.
I can call 911.
I dial.
Nothing.
I look to see how many bars are on my phone, and instead it reads “No Service.” My heart races faster than it ever has.
I see the driver hold up a contraption that looks almost like a garage door opener. “This is called a cell phone jammer. No cell service for you.”
My blood turns cold. I try the door again. I finally realize the child safety locks are engaged. I don’t know what to do.
Holy crap. What did I get into?
I verified everything when he drove up.
What has set this guy off?
I look frantically around me. People are busily going about their day, heading home for the evening, driving over the Bay Bridge and heading east away from San Francisco. No one looks at other drivers, too busy concentrating on the narrow lanes of the bridge and five lanes of traffic.
My pulse quickens, and I begin to sweat. I’m breathing too quick and start to hyperventilate. My mind is racing.
I think of Mason. I know he’ll turn over hell to find me.
I think of my brother and desperately wish that my twin telepathy actually worked for once.
I think of my three best friends.
Emerson. I’ve known her since our freshman year at Stanford. She was so busy with the golf team and her classes that she hardly paid attention to my drama, but she quickly became a steadfast friend.
Hadlee grew up next door, and when her mother died, her dad left her to be cared for by nannies as he searched through three more wives looking for a replacement. She essentially moved into my room.
Greer’s mother is sick. Her father plied Greer with money so she’d stay and take care of her mother while he started a new family. Now she has a wonderful husband, and I’m sure she’ll be pregnant any minute.
I don’t know what to do. I don’t know how to stop this. Even though we’re going over the bridge in heavy traffic, moving well below the speed limit, if I could open the door, what use would it be? We’re going too fast and the traffic is moving too quickly for me to get out.
An evil, maniacal laugh comes from him. “Face it, you’re mine!”
I sit back in my seat, knowing I need to think, not dwell. I close my eyes and hear the rhythm of the bridge. Bu-bump, bu-bump. I take a big breath and hold it for a count of three, then purse my lips and blow out. I do that again and again as we pass over the bridge. We head north on 80 toward Sacramento. The traffic begins to thin, and his speed increases.
I need to get him talking. I need him to see me as a real person, not someone the newspapers and gossip columns have made up. “What did I ever do to you?”
“You have no idea,” he growls. “I know who you are and where you work. I know all about you and your little group of friends at SHN.”
Holy shit, this guy is a stalker. How did he manage to get my ride? How is it even possible?
He exits the freeway and takes a four-lane road through the Contra Costa mountain range. I’m trying to keep talking while I pay attention to every turn we make.
“I know all about them. Dillon thinks he’s so smart. He’s not. Cameron thinks he’s so great with computers. He’s not. Mason never liked me; he always thought he was smarter than me and that he had better business acumen. Well, I showed them.”
We transition to the 680 and begin heading south on the other side of the mountains in the hot central valley. It’s almost like we’re doing a circle. Maybe he’s going to rant and rave for a while and then drop me at home. I decide to keep him talking. “How do you know Dillon, Cameron, and Mason?”
“I’ve known them since we went to school together.”
“When did they go to school together?” Duh. They all met at Stanford.
He glosses right over my question. “We met then, too. You were all high and mighty. Mizz Caro-line Are-no. La-tee-da with your French last name and your big trust fund. You’ve never had to work a day in your life.”
I need to direct him to share more about himself and not add to his craziness by defending myself. “I don’t recall meeting you. When did we meet?”
“Oh, we’ve met lots of times,” he says snidely.
He doesn’t elaborate and begins to mutter a little bit to himself. I try to listen to what he’s saying, but I can’t make it out. I don’t think he’s drunk, just mad. Mad as a hornet.
“You guys and your little clickie-club. No one is ever good enough for you. You snub anyone who tries to break into your little group. Oh, I know all about you.”
I stare at the side of his face. He doesn’t look familiar.
We slow as we enter some of the larger towns on the other side of the Contra Costa mountain range. I keep watching my phone, waiting to see if I get any bars.
Nothing.
It’s dark now, and all I can see are headlights of the oncoming cars. It’s gett
ing stuffy in the car. “Can we crack the window?”
“No.”
I begin to do my breathing exercises as we approach San Jose. I look in my bag for the water bottle I always keep there and my keys fall out. I push them out of the way as I search and then notice the safety hammer attached to my keyring.
Of course! The hammer is made to break a window!
We have to get off the freeway at some point. He’ll need gas eventually. I can wait. My anxiety begins to ebb.
Suddenly he explodes. “Dillon is a giant pussy. He’s all about any slut who waves her snatch in front of him and then forgets everyone else around him. He goes wherever a pussy leads him.”
I might as well engage him. “I don’t know if you know this, but he’s happily married and has a little boy.”
He bangs his hand on the steering wheel. “Yes, I know all about the skank he married.” He looks at me in the rearview mirror. “You know, I got a piece of that once. She was begging for it.”
Then it hits me. I know who he is. “You’re Dillon’s friend Adam!”
“Of course I am.”
He’s Adam Reeves, and he’s bad news. He’s the guy who put drugs in Emerson’s drink and then date-raped my best friend.
My heart sinks into my stomach. My pulse quickens and sweat breaks out all over my body. This guy is not safe. There’s something wrong with him.
When I focus on him again, he’s talking about Cameron. “…isn’t even good technically. I can’t believe they didn’t ask me to be their technology partner. I had the opportunity to show them what they were missing when I played with their little investments. I destroyed their portfolio so companies avoided them, then took down Pineapple Technologies. Man, they were the easiest ones of all. I played in their system for months and they didn’t even know it. Then I strategically destroyed them.”
Holy shit, he’s behind all the misery SHN has been dealing with over the last five-plus years.
He’s not just Adam Reeves. He’s Adam MacIntosh.
“What you did was theft, and you destroyed a good company and a lot of people who worked hard on it.”
“It was easy. I’m part of the Robin Hood Party. We take from the rich and share it with the world so everyone can grow from it. We advocate for intellectual property reform. We want privacy protection—”
“Protection? You invaded their privacy.”
“Yes, we want protection from people gathering our information and profiting from it.”
“Isn’t that what you did?”
“We showed them their vulnerabilities. We want privacy for everyone and everything, and then it all becomes an open book. We want network neutrality and government openness,” he rants.
“How does taking Pineapple Technologies’ and all the other companies’ information and disseminating bad information get you what you want? It doesn’t make people feel safe. It does the opposite.”
His laugh is evil. “You don’t know how easy it was to recruit people for the Robin Hood Party. There’s so much inequality of wealth in this country. A one-bedroom apartment in San Francisco starts at $4,000, and those are all dumps. While all the 1 percent get wealthier, the 99 percent are getting poorer. Mason, Dillon, and Cameron are part of that 1 percent, and so are you.”
As he goes on and on about the Robin Hood Party, I can’t help myself. “The FBI arrested your band of thieves.”
He exits the freeway, and I watch for my move. I can’t just hop out as he’s driving down the road. I can’t see myself doing an effective tuck and roll. It would be more like a belly flop, and I’d end up getting squished by another car.
There are traffic lights everywhere. We’ll get a red light at some point.
I have my purse strap over my arm and the hammer in the other. It fits in the palm of my hand, but it’s metal and heavy, and the head has a subtle point.
“I know they arrested my ‘band of thieves,’ but they didn’t give them any information. Everyone kept their mouth shut and just denied knowing me.”
Finally we pull up to a busy intersection close to the university. It’s time to make my move.
We come to a stop behind another car at a red light. He’s playing with something, but I can’t tell what it is. Taking a deep breath, I pull my arm back and swing with all my might. The glass breaker easily shatters the window. I quickly reach out of the car and open the handle from the outside. Adam tries to accelerate but can’t go anywhere.
I jump out and yell, “Fire! Fire!” Pedestrians surround me. The wheels squeal and he speeds away. I collapse to my hands and knees, breathing heavily.
“Are you okay?”
“Hey, lady, is everything okay?”
“Where’s the fire?”
Someone helps me stand. I try to collect what little dignity I have. “I’m fine. Thank you.”
“Oh my gosh, that was scary.”
“Did a bullet break that guy’s window?”
“Why did he speed away?”
I look at my phone and see I have all the bars again. I can call 911 and report what’s happened. People go back to where they were going, and I sit down on the sidewalk and dial.
“Nine-one-one, what’s your emergency?”
“I’m at the corner of”—I look up at the large green street signs—“Market and Santa Clara. I was just kidnapped. My name is Caroline Arnault, and my rideshare driver picked me up in San Francisco and drove me around for the last two and a half hours.”
“Are you okay?”
“A little shaken. He drove down Market Street. I don’t know where he went. The back-right passenger window is shattered.” I look around, but I don’t see Adam or his car. “I don’t know where he went,” I repeat.
“Keep talking to me. I have police on the way.”
Knowing this call is being recorded and will end up in a court case, I keep talking. I describe where he picked me up. I pull up the rideshare app and give the operator the make and model of the car he was in. “He drove north beyond Berkeley on 80, headed east on 4, and then went south on 680. Then I remembered I had the silly window-breaker on my key chain that my mother insisted I needed.” I hear the sirens before I see them. “If you could, please call Detective Lenning at San Francisco PD, and he should call his contact in the FBI. Tell them it was Adam McIntosh. They’ll know what that means. I’m hanging up now. The police are here. Thank you.”
“Good luck, Miss Arnault.”
The two police officers approach me carefully. “Miss Arnault?”
I collapse into tears. Big, ugly, wet tears. They wait patiently while I pull myself together, which takes a few minutes, and then I begin answering their questions.
More police cars drive up, and a few stragglers who stayed are interviewed. Out of the corner of my eye, I see a man in a brown corduroy blazer and jeans approach. It’s Detective Lenning, and Agent Perry and Marci Peterson are right behind him.
Lenning and Perry flash their badges at the policemen who are helping me, visibly surprised to have two more join our party.
“Miss Arnault, are you okay?” Detective Lenning asks.
I nod.
“I called Cameron as I drove down. He’s on his way,” Cora shares. “He’s the only SHN partner I had on my speed dial.”
I immediately begin explaining what happened. “I didn’t get a bad car. I got into the car that was identified and verified the license plate number. He knew all about me and my friends. At first, I thought he was a stalker. Then he started talking about Pineapple Technologies. He said he was the head of some Robin Hood Party—it’s a ‘steal from the rich and give to the poor’ thing. He kept contradicting himself.”
I start to cry again. Cora rubs my back to soothe me. “You did just fine.”
“You gave us a lot of information. We should be able to catch him,” Detective Lenning says. “Not often do we get descriptions and license plates. Did he say where he was taking you?”
I shake my head.
Th
e San Jose police officer steps in. “How did you break free?”
I hold up my keys with the little hammer. “I’ve had it on my key chain for easily five or six years. I was thirsty and started looking for my water bottle in my bag and moved my keys. I’d forgotten they were there. I knew he’d have to get off the freeway and stop for gas at some point.” I look down and hold the mini hammer in my hands. “My mother gave me this silly thing years ago. I can’t believe it saved my life.”
I hear Dillon’s voice and turn around to see him and Emerson trying to get beyond the police tape that’s been put up. “If you don’t let me in there to see her, I’m going to rain hell down on this place. She’s not a suspect. She’s a victim, and she deserves to be handled with kid gloves.”
I see Detective Lenning motion to the San Jose police officer to let him in.
Dillon and Emerson come running up. Emerson has tears running down her face, and she launches herself into my arms. “Oh my God, are you okay? What’s going on?”
“I had drinks at the Fairmont with Evelyn and called a rideshare home. The driver was your friend Adam.”
Emerson and Dillon exchange looks. “Adam Reeves?” Emerson questions.
“Yes. He—”
“How did he know you were at the Fairmont?”
“He knew a lot about what was going on at SHN. I’m fairly certain he’s been stalking me. But he’s Adam MacIntosh, our hacker.”
Dillon’s face turns white. “Are you sure?”
“He admitted what he did with Pineapple. But think about it. It all makes sense. He’s the guy you didn’t hire.”
Dillon bites at the corner of his lips as he processes the new information. “No, he had a job, but it wasn’t a startup. He didn’t have the money to invest. He was busy doing his thing, and we were three guys with money burning holes in our pocket.”
“But you didn’t hire him.”
“No. He and Mason didn’t get along,” Emerson adds.
Everyone is listening closely to our conversation. “Oh, don’t even get me started. He spent a lot of time telling me about how Mason never liked him,” Dillon laments.
Fascination: (Billionaire Venture Capitalist #9): A Friends to Lovers Romance Page 17