'Excuse to have dinner with you, Toots.'
'Like you need an excuse.'
'I like to have an idea of what I'm dealing with. It was time for us to have dinner again. It seemed a nice synergy.'
'You are a bear for knowing things,' Rita said.
'Knowledge is power,' I said.
Rita drank some more of her martini. Her big greenish eyes softened a little. They always did when she drank. She had thick red hair and great legs, and was smarter than Bill Gates.
'We have a whole department servicing Kinergy,' Rita said. 'I talked to the lead guy, Tom Clark. He says that there isn't anything to know about Rowley outside of business hours. Rowley starts early, works late, and, as far as Tom knows, has no other life.'
'Doesn't sound like Mr. Right to me,' I said.
'Apparently Mrs. Rowley doesn't think so either.'
I shrugged.
'Maybe she wants out,' I said. 'But she wants to take half of everything with her.'
'Can't blame a girl for trying,' Ritu said. 'In my last divorce, I didn't, of course, settle for half.'
'Marlene may be less experienced,' I said.
'Marlene?'
'Someone named Rita is making fun of a name like Marlene?'
'I don't get the chance that often,' Rita said.
The salad plates disappeared. The entrees came. The waiter took a bottle of sauvignon blanc from the ice bucket and poured a little for Rita to sample. She said it was drinkable and he poured some out for each of us.
'So he's a big success,' I said.
'Oh, you bet. Kinergy is a huge profit machine.'
'Just from brokering energy?'
'Sure,' Rita said. 'You are running short of electrical power in your grid, they can acquire some from another source, reroute it to you, and charge you a fortune. Like the power shortfall in California, couple years ago.'
'Is it that simple?'
'At bottom a lot of businesses are simple. You know. American Airlines picks you up in Boston and flies you to LA. That's the service. The complicated part comes in how to do it profitably.'
'Can they manipulate the market?'
'Probably.'
'Do they?'
'Probably. Tom sees very little evil in a client,' Rita said, 'and speaks less.'
'Does he gossip?'
'Not to me,' Rita said. 'Not about clients. He swears there is nothing to gossip about with Rowley.'
'You believe him?'
'Tom's a company guy. And he wants to be managing partner. The firm says jump and he says `how high?' '
'Which means if Rowley says jump . . .'
'`How high,' ' Rita said. 'Can we talk about sex again?'
'We'd be fools not to,' I said.
4
A t 6 A.M., drinking a large coffee to help my heart get started, I drove out the Mass Pike and south on 128 to Waltham. The Kinergy Building was just off Route 128. It was innovatively ugly: five different kinds of brick facings, intermingled with black glass and textured concrete, sporting a multilevel profile. It looked like Darth Vader's country home. Near the front entrance were parking spots labeled CEO, COO, CFO. I parked in the visitors slot and waited to see if I could get a live look at Trent Rowley when he came to work. I was there in place, on the alert, at 6:10. I was just in time. At 6:15 a silver BMW shorts car hulled into the CFO parking space and Rowley got out.
He looked just like his picture: strong jaw, dark wavy hair worn longish. He had on small round glasses with thin gold frames. He was crisp and clean and pressed and tailored in a tan summer suit, a blue shirt with a pin collar, and a pale blue tie. He almost certainly smelled of expensive cologne. He walked very briskly into the still empty building, proud of being the earliest bird.
W hat kind of affair can a guy have when he shows up for work at 6:15 in the morning?
I hung around until everyone else came to work, without seeing anyone who looked like they might be having an affair with Rowley. Though it was, admittedly, hard to be sure. Then I wrote down the plate number on the BMW. That done, I still had some energy left over, so I drove back to Boston and went to the gym.
