That’s a risk. It’s a stupid risk maybe, but it’s mine to take. Another silence, longer this time. When Aurora spoke again, her voice had dropped and the controlled edge had softened into something that almost sounded like frustration. Not the corporate kind, the personal kind. Why won’t you sell to me? Because you showed up with four Escalades and offered me $2 million for a car you knew was worth more.
You weren’t making me a fair offer, Ms. Vale. You were making a bet that I was too broke and too ignorant to know the difference. And I might be broke, but I’m not ignorant. She didn’t respond immediately. He could hear something in the background. Chushu, traffic, maybe. Or the hum of a building’s ventilation system.
She was in an office somewhere or a car living her life at a speed that Red Creek couldn’t even comprehend. I’ll go to 7, she said. That’s my final offer. Then that’s your final offer. My answer is still no. He hung up. His hands were shaking again. He put the phone down on the workbench and stood there for a full minute staring at the alternator belt he’d been installing, trying to remember where he’d left off.
His brain felt scrambled. $7 million. He’d just turned down $7 million while standing in a garage with no air conditioning, wearing a shirt with someone else’s motor oil on it. Was that her? Lily was standing in the doorway. She had a popsicle seat grape from the box they’d bought on sale at the gas station.
And her expression was the one she wore when she was pretending to be casual about something she cared deeply about. Yeah. How much this time? He hesitated. Seven. Lily bit the popsicle, chewed, swallowed. And you said no. I said no. She nodded slowly the way she did when she was processing information that didn’t fit neatly into her understanding of how the world worked.
Then she said, “I think you’re either the smartest person I know or the dumbest, and I honestly can’t tell which one. That makes two of us, kid.” The news broke 4 days later. Ethan never found out exactly who leaked it. Hail swore it wasn’t him. Webb swore it wasn’t anyone at his facility. It could have been one of the experts Hail had consulted remotely.
It could have been someone at the university. It could have been Aurora herself. strategically letting the information out to put pressure on Ethan by flooding him with competing interests. Whatever the source, the result was the same. A writer for a major automotive website published a story with the headline, “Lost pinnacle prototype reportedly discovered in Arizona garage.
” The article was cautious, heavy on qualifications and unnamed sources, but it included enough specific details. the chassis number, the Highland green color, the connection to the canceled program, that anyone who knew anything about collector cars understood immediately what was being claimed.
Within 24 hours, Ethan’s phone wouldn’t stop ringing. Collectors, dealers, journalists, a producer from a documentary company, a woman who said she represented a European museum, a man with a thick accent who offered $8 million before Ethan could even say hello. another man who claimed to be a lawyer representing interested parties and wanted to discuss acquisition terms.
Ethan stopped answering his phone by the second day. He let everything go to voicemail. The voicemail filled up. He deleted messages in batches of 20 without listening to most of them. People started showing up in Red Creek. Not convoys like Auroras, smaller, less organized, but persistent. A man in a rental car parked outside the garage for 3 hours watching.
A couple from California knocked on the front door and asked Lily, Lily, who was 12, if her father was the man with the pinnacle car. She told them her father was at work and closed the door. She told Ethan about it that evening with the matterof fact irritation of someone who’d been interrupted while reading.
They asked me if the car was really worth $20 million, she said. I told them I didn’t know and that they should call during business hours. Good answer. Then the woman asked if she could take a picture of the garage. I told her no. Also good. Then the man asked if I wanted a soda. Like I’m going to accept a drink from a stranger in my own driveway.
Ethan rubbed his face. This was getting out of control. He needed help. Real help. Not the kind Frank Reeves offered from the hardware store or the kind Hector’s cousin dispensed from Scottsdale. He needed a lawyer, an adviser, someone who understood what was happening and could tell him what to do next. He called Dr.
Hail. I know, Hail said before Ethan could finish his first sentence. I’ve been getting calls, too. I’ve declined every interview request, but I can’t control what other people say. I’ve got strangers in my driveway. Someone offered my 12-year-old a soda. You need representation. An auction house specifically. A reputable one.
They’ll handle the logistics, security, marketing, legal, everything. That’s what they do. Which one? There are three in the world I’d trust with a vehicle of this significance. I’ll send you their names, but Ethan, and I’m saying this as someone who’s been through this process before, once you engage an auction house, this becomes very real, very fast.
The car will need to be transported to a secure facility. There will be an appraisal, a provenence review, a marketing campaign. It’ll be public. Your name will be in the press. Your daughter’s life will change. Yours will, too. It’s already changing. Not like this. Right now, you’re a story on a website.
