The Warning Read Free Page B

He didn’t say the word bank , but I had the impression that he worked with money.
    The only Tom Rigbys and Thomas Rigbys in Cambridge that I’ve managed to find online are definitely not him. One is too old. Another has the wrong face in his LinkedIn photo.
    Where do I go from here? What else can I search for? “Tom Rigby red bicycle clips”? “Tom Rigby sings ‘The Ash Grove’ ”?
    Absurd.
    I type “Dr. T Rigby” into the search box and find a Dr. Thomas Rigby in North Carolina, an expert in crop science. He’s not the man I’m looking for, and therefore, momentarily, I hate him.
    I’m never going to find my Tom Rigby. Why is that such an unbearable prospect? There must be something wrong with me. Lorna was right. I must be crazier than even she suspects, to allow a complete and utter stranger to become so important to me.
    A horrible thought occurs to me: what if that’s not his name? What if he was talking about somebody else called Tom Rigby, and I misunderstood?
    No, that’s impossible. He said it in a “My name is . . .” kind of way. Introducing himself. I was in no doubt at the time.
    My phone buzzes on the table next to me, making me jump. It’s Lorna. She has texted, “Don’t Google him!”
    I text back, “I can’t find him anyway.”
    “Seriously?” she replies. “I found him in 30 secs. Which I KNOW I SHOULD NOT TELL YOU!”
    I grab my phone and ring her, my hands shaking. This had better not be a joke.
    I wait and wait. Come on, Lorna. I know your phone’s in your hand.
    When she finally picks up, she says drily, “My desire to show off was stronger than my wish to protect you from making a tit of yourself. What can I say? I’m a flawed human being.”
    “Tell me,” I say.
    She sighs. “Draw breath first, and let’s go over the pros and cons. Chloe, I really think—”
    “Tell me!”
    “Will you listen to the desperation in your voice?”
    “Yeah—desperation not to be toyed with by my sadistic so-called friend. You have the information I want, and you’re dangling it in front of me like bait. Stop dicking around and tell me , so that I can go to bed.”
    “Ha! Like you’re going to put your pajamas on and drift off to the Land of Nod as soon as you know. Bollocks! You’ll be up all night Googling this guy, soon as I’ve told you who he is.”
    “Lorna—”
    “All right, give me a chance! His name isn’t Tom Rigby, R-I-G-B-Y. It’s Tom Rigbey with an ‘e’. R-I-G-B-E-Y. He’s the CSO of a company called CamEgo—one word, capital C, capital E, ego as in egotist . Now let me try to describe what they do, without falling asleep, it sounds so dull. They design personal identification software that facilitates payment compliance in the financial sector, globally. Before you ask, I haven’t a clue what that means.”
    “But CSO, that’s—”
    “Car keys and songs officer,” Lorna fires back.
    “Chief something, isn’t it?’
    “Chief scientific officer. He’s a smart cookie, is Tom Rigbey.”
    I frown. That’s strange. He didn’t look like a boss or manager of anything. He looked too young, for a start—about my age. And . . . wouldn’t a chief scientific officer need to behave less frivolously in public places?
    “Chloe? Do not go to CamEgo’s offices and ambush him. And—since you’ll ignore that—ring me as soon as you have. I want all the gossip.”

 
    Chapter 4
    I ARRIVE AT CamEgo’s offices at nine o’clock sharp on Monday morning—more punctual, probably, than most of the firm’s employees. The office building that houses Tom Rigbey’s company is as glossy and shiny as I imagined it would be. It’s one of the newly built ones on Brooklands Avenue, close to the Botanic Gardens. CamEgo occupies the top three floors, and I’m waiting on the lowest of these, in reception.
    There are two women behind the desk, one in her late fifties and the other in her early twenties. Both are wearing white blouses, black skirts, and CamEgo badges