The Hunt

by Jennifer Sturman

  They both had early appointments at their respective offices, so the goodbyes were hurried. “Are you sure we can’t take you to the airport later?” asked Charles.

  “That’s all right,” Peter told him. “We’ve got a ride lined up.” Susan hugged us both, and Charles shook his son’s hand and patted me awkwardly on the shoulder.

  I felt a pang of sadness as they left. They would have made nice in-laws, at least as far as in-laws went, but it seemed unlikely that I’d ever know for sure.

  Abigail picked us up in her car, and then we stopped at the hotel to collect everyone else. Hilary and Ben added their bags to Peter’s and mine in the trunk, filling it to capacity, but Luisa was carrying nothing but her purse. The look on her face silently dared any of us to comment, but we were too preoccupied with the morning’s agenda to give her the teasing the situation would have demanded under other circumstances.

  I was beginning to feel as if I knew every leg of the journey south to Silicon Valley better than I knew the two blocks from my Manhattan apartment to the nearest subway stop, but familiarity didn’t make the miles pass any more quickly. We reached Igobe’s headquarters right on schedule, just before ten, and Abigail slid the car into the same visitor’s spot we’d used the previous day.

  Sprinklers were busily irrigating the Igobe logo in front of the entrance, and we took a moment to review our plan before stepping through the sliding-glass doors. Phyllis seemed no more pleased to see us than she had yesterday, and she flinched when she got a good look at me, but at least today I was officially on Iggie’s calendar and had arrived at the appropriate time.

  “But why did you bring Biggie and these other people again?” she asked from beneath her Igobe visor. “Where are your colleagues from Winslow, Brown?”

  My colleagues from Winslow, Brown were safely going about their business in New York, as I’d made the executive decision to disinvite them shortly before they were due to get on their San Francisco-bound flight last night. There was no reason for anyone to rack up additional travel expenses in pursuit of a deal that was never going to happen. I only hoped the partners would remember more about how I’d saved the firm from involving itself in a business disaster than about how I’d been the one pushing to get involved in the first place. I told Phyllis I’d be representing Winslow, Brown on my own this morning but that my companions would be sitting in on the meeting.

  “That’s highly unorthodox,” she said with a sniff.

  I couldn’t disagree, so I simply nodded and attempted a smile, knowing full well that between the state of my lip and the boiled crimson of my skin, this was the visual equivalent of poking her in the eye.

  She flinched again. “Igor’s running a few minutes late-he had to take another meeting unexpectedly-but why don’t you all wait in the conference room?” she suggested, making no effort to hide her eagerness to have me out of her line of sight. “You know how to get there, don’t you?”

  We assured her we did and headed for the glass-walled room where we’d spoken to Iggie the previous day, glad to have the chance to get everything set up beforehand. Peter fiddled around with the equipment we’d brought, and in a few minutes he’d hooked up a Webcam to face us down the length of the conference table. Behind the Webcam, he projected the display from his laptop, complete with a live Internet connection, onto the large white screen that hung on the far wall. “We’re all set,” he said.

  “Now we just need them to show up,” said Hilary.

  “I wonder what Iggie’s ‘unexpected meeting’ was,” mused Luisa, her tone dry.

  “I think we could all hazard a pretty good guess,” I said.

  And a few minutes later we knew for sure. Through the glass and across the floor, Iggie appeared around a far corner, and he was accompanied by Alex Cutler. They had their heads close together, talking as they walked, and even from the distance it was evident neither was terribly happy. If everything went as planned, they would soon be even less happy.

  “Do you think Alex told Iggie everything?” asked Abigail.

  “Just because his little kidnapping plot backfired doesn’t mean he’s going to give up on keeping the whole mess from getting out,” said Hilary. “He might have been trying to limit Iggie’s role before, but now he needs all the help he can get, and Iggie’s got a lot at stake here, too.”

  As we watched, the two men paused and turned as if they’d heard their names being called, and Iggie waved at someone. Caro was making her way through the maze of cubicles to join them, dressed in a neat navy pantsuit. With her attaché case and her blond hair pulled back into a chignon, she looked every bit as much the public-relations expert as she had the tennis star the day before. Accomplice or not, I’d had a feeling Iggie and Alex would call on her-they would need her to spin any bad news that might leak. Of course, they had no way of knowing that they were facing a deluge, not a leak.

  The three of them huddled together out on the floor, and their discussion appeared heated.

  “We need to get things moving,” I said, glancing at my watch. Our timeline had only limited flexibility.

  “Leave it to me,” said Hilary. She pushed open the door of the conference room and gave a yell. This got the attention of everyone in a ten-mile radius, but she crooked her finger in the direction of our targeted threesome. “Come join us!” she called, a broad smile on her face. “There’s something in here you’re going to want to see.”

  Alex’s face went pale beneath its tan, and Iggie looked like he might throw up. They might have already discovered Hilary had escaped from Caro’s boat, but that didn’t mean they’d expected her to show up here. Caro, however, answered Hilary’s broad smile with one of her own.

  “Hi, there!” she called brightly. She headed our way, with Iggie and Alex following reluctantly in her wake.

  “What a nice surprise,” Caro said, still smiling as she entered the conference room. “What brings you all here?”

  “Iggie and I had scheduled a meeting to talk about Igobe’s public offering,” I said, which was the truth, if not the whole truth.

  “Great!” she said. “You know, I have a few shares myself, and I’ve been looking forward to cashing in. There are a couple of local charities that could really use more financial support, and I’d love to send some extra funds their way.”

  She really had the whole sweetness-and-light act down to a science, I thought, incredulous.

  Hilary, meanwhile, ushered first Iggie and then Alex into the room. “Whoops,” she said, as Alex let out a yelp of pain. “How clumsy of me. I didn’t mean to step on your foot. By the way, have you met my friend, Ben? Ben’s an FBI agent. And he has a gun. Will you show them, Ben?”

  Ben obligingly pulled open his jacket and displayed his weapon, cased in its shoulder holster, as Hilary closed the door and flipped the switch to make the glass walls opaque.

  “Hey, Rachel,” said Iggie, apparently too stressed to use anything but my real name. “Could we postpone our meeting? Some stuff has-uh-come up, and I really need to spend some time with Alex and Caro.”

  “This will only take a minute,” I assured him. “And Alex and Caro are welcome to join in. In fact, we’d prefer that they did.”

  With Hilary and Ben blocking the way out, they had little choice but to sit down.

  “Ready?” Peter asked, poised before his laptop.

  “Absolutely,” I said.

  “Here goes,” he said, and he pressed a few buttons. On the screen, the Web browser loaded a new page in which a square of video played. It displayed an empty seat in a room filled with technical equipment: computers, servers, scanners and cables. In one corner of the room, a Great Dane could be seen, dozing on a cushioned dogbed of plaid flannel.

  “What is this?” asked Iggie. “Rachel, are you sure we need to do this now?”

  “Shh,” I said, as a man walked into the frame and took a seat on the chair. He leaned over, typed something into the keyboard on a table next to him, and then he leaned ba
ck and looked up directly into the lens of the Webcam on his end.

  “Hello,” he said.

  Iggie gasped. “Leo?”

  “That’s right,” said Leo.

  “But-how?” asked Alex.

  “It turns out I’m not dead. I know, man, it’s a real shocker. But we can catch up on old times later. Right now there’s something I want you to watch.”

  We could see his hands moving in toward the camera, and then the images on the screen blurred as he rotated the camera to face his own computer screen. “This is all live, by the way. Just in case you were wondering,” Leo said over the tapping of his fingertips on a keyboard. “Now, I’m pulling up a Web site I set up myself. It’s called www.leolovesyou.org. Catchy, don’t you think?”

  “What is this?” asked Alex, his surprise giving way to impatience.

  “You’ll see,” said Leo. The image on the screen in front of us blurred again as he adjusted his camera, and then it settled into focus, revealing a snapshot of Scat alongside a short message:

  Welcome to LeoLovesYou.

  The security software available from this site is free to all users, but contributions are welcome and will be used to support a range of worthy causes, from eliminating poverty to eradicating disease.

  This software is superior to anything on the market today, including Igobe’s. In fact, it was created by the same developer who developed their software. But it’s better. And unlike Igobe, it’s absolutely free.

  So download it and contribute what you can. And spread the word.

  Peace out and power to the people.

  29

  “What have you done?” cried Alex, jumping up from his seat. He rushed to stand before the screen, rereading the words in disbelief.

  “This can’t be happening,” moaned Iggie. “I can’t believe this is happening.”

  Leo ignored them. “I’ve put in a counter, right there,” he said as his finger swam onto the screen and pointed at a box in the corner. “To track how many people download the software. The word should be starting to get out-I announced the launch on my blog a few minutes ago. Let’s watch, shall we?”

  Eleven, read the number in the box. But then it turned to twelve, and then to thirteen. Then, right before our eyes, it jumped to eighteen, and from there to thirty-five. A moment later, the count had passed two hundred, and a moment after that it topped a thousand. The digits began moving so quickly they were barely legible.

  “Make it stop,” said Iggie. He’d pulled his knees up to his chest and was rocking back and forth in his chair. “Somebody make it stop.”

  “Have I mentioned this is live?” Leo said with a chuckle. “I bet we’ll be at a million before the day is over, and ten million in a week.”

  “Are you insane?” shouted Alex Cutler, at Leo presumably.

  Leo considered this. “No, I don’t think so.”

  “You’ve ruined everything!” Alex’s future bank account was declining in direct proportion to the rate at which the number in the box, and his heart rate, increased.

  “Do you need me to explain it again?” Leo asked, his voice calm. He moved his finger, pointing to another box on the screen. “Check this out. It looks like people are making donations, too.”

  $25,412, read the number in this box, but only for a second. In a flash it was closing in on $40,000, and this was just the beginning.

  Alex let out a bellow of rage. “That’s my money,” he yelled. “You’ve stolen my money.”

  “I wouldn’t call it stealing, and it’s all going to good causes,” said Leo reasonably.

  “Call him off,” said Alex, his eyes darting around the room. “Somebody call him off. We’ll do whatever he wants us to do. Just call him off.”

  “Too late,” I said with a shrug.

  “And too bad you can’t Taser him from here, isn’t it?” added Hilary.

  “You-” said Alex. His hands clenched into fists, and he lunged for her.

  She shoved an empty chair at him, and it hit him hard, right in the knee. Judging by his cry of anguish, it was the same knee she’d kicked before.

  “That must have hurt,” Hilary said with a delighted grin.

  “You-” said Alex again, bending over, his face twisted in a grimace of pain.

  “What are you going to do now?” Leo asked him from the screen. “Kill her?”

  I didn’t know whether it was the lost fortune, the second blow to his knee or the taunting that pushed Alex over the edge, but over the edge he went.

  “I was waiting for when I would have time to take the boat out far enough to dump the body,” he raged. “I couldn’t kill her before then. The body would have started to smell. But I shouldn’t have waited. I should have killed her. And I should have killed you when I had the chance, Leo. Then you would have been really dead. I should have known you’d spoil everything if you could.”

  “Was that a confession?” asked Luisa.

  “It sounded like a confession to me,” said Hilary.

  “It was definitely a confession,” I said. “Good thing we’re recording this. You got that, right Leo?”

  “Got it,” he confirmed, tilting the camera to show the screen of another electronic device. We could see red letters displaying Recording before Leo turned the camera back to his computer screen.

  Iggie, meanwhile, continued to rock and moan, and the numbers on the screen ticked higher.

  Alex looked wildly around the room, momentarily speechless as he absorbed what he’d just done. With a roar he picked up a chair and threw it at the screen. The chair bounced and tumbled to the floor, leaving a dent on the screen where it had hit, but the numbers in the boxes continued their steady upward climb.

  “Alex, Alex,” said Leo. “Haven’t you learned by now that violence solves nothing?”

  Apparently he hadn’t, because that’s when all hell broke loose.

  Alex picked up a second chair, and he threw this one at the Webcam, knocking it onto the floor before picking up yet another chair. This one he pitched toward the head of the table.

  “Get down!” yelled Peter, and everyone dived for cover. The chair crashed into one glass wall, splintering it, and Alex followed it up with another chair, and then another and another. Shards of glass flew around the room as the barrage continued.

  Then I heard Ben cry out. There was a thud, and the room went suddenly still.

  A second later, rough hands grabbed me around the neck and pulled me out from where Peter had pushed me under the table. Alex yanked me into a standing position, and I felt something cold and hard against my temple. Then I heard the unmistakable noise of a gun being cocked.

  “Everybody just shut up and back off,” he yelled. “I need to think.”

  I could understand why he needed to think, but I didn’t see why he had to do it with a gun pointed at my head. Ben was out cold, yet again, which was how Alex had managed to steal his weapon. Between getting dumped and then being clobbered over the head twice in two days, Ben might end up winning the prize for the worst San Francisco visit ever.

  “Uh, Alex,” I said, as politely as I could under the circumstances. “Do you really want to add a successful murder to the various attempted charges you’ve already racked up?”

  That probably wasn’t the right thing to say, because he only tightened his grip around my neck, jabbed the gun harder at my temple, and began edging toward the door.

  “Rachel and I are going to go somewhere to think,” said Alex, dragging me backward. “As long as nobody bothers us, nobody will get hurt.”

  Personally, I didn’t find this promise credible. Neither did Peter, because he slowly eased up from the crouching position he’d assumed. “Alex, look, it’s not too late to get everything straightened out,” he said, making the smallest of movements in our direction.

  Alex lifted the gun from my head and pointed it at Peter. “Don’t take another step,” he said. “Not even an inch. And that goes for the rest of you, too,” he added, training t
he gun on the assembled group.

  Peter held his hands up, palms out. “Why don’t you take me with you, instead?” he said. “We’ve got a history, after all. I could help you talk everything through.”

  “Peter, you can’t just switch places with me,” I said. “You might get hurt.”

  “Better me than you,” he said.

  “Dude, it’s not your choice,” said Alex. “I’m the one with the gun, remember?” As if to remind us, he jabbed it against my temple again.

  “What do you care which hostage you have as long as you have a hostage?” Peter asked.

  “Well, for starters, you’re a lot bigger than she is. Don’t take this the wrong way, Rachel, but as hostages go, I’d rather have a weakling. No offense.”

  “None taken,” I said.

  “But I’d make a better shield,” Peter pointed out. “Since I’m bigger. If somebody tries to get at you, they’d have to get through me, and there’s more of me than there is of Rachel.”

  “I’m not going to stand here arguing about who I’m taking hostage,” Alex said.

  But all of this debate had distracted him. I saw movement from the corner of one eye, and then I heard the sort of grunting battle cry I’d only heard before in Jackie Chan movies.

  I would have ducked if Alex didn’t have me in a headlock. There was a whir of navy pant-suited limbs, and the gun went flying in one direction and Alex went flying in another, slamming against the conference table. Miraculously, I hadn’t been touched.

  “Ooof!” said Alex, right before one of Caro’s legs whipped out and caught him in the abdomen. Then her other leg whipped out to catch him in the same sore knee, and he gave a tortured groan.

  Caro made the Jackie Chan noise again, and with a final flying kick, she finished him off.

  Of course, I thought, watching as Alex fell to the ground. Caro would be a black belt, too, on top of everything else.

  30

  Perhaps the biggest miracle was that we made it to the airport with plenty of time to spare. The chaos hadn’t ended with Caro overpowering Alex, but things calmed down once the police had taken him and Iggie into custody and began taking statements from us all. After they finished with me, I went to the ladies’ room to make sure I didn’t have any broken glass still caught in my hair.