Chapter 55

After getting into the car, Victoria glanced at Adrian beside her.

He looked calm, but she had a feeling she knew what he was thinking.

He wanted to find out who was behind Elena.

The thought made her vaguely uncomfortable.

Victoria could have investigated it herself. In fact, with the Sterling family’s connections, tracing a rare car from a partial license plate would probably be much easier for her than it would be for Adrian.

But why should she?

Elena was nobody. She came from an ordinary family, had no connections or family influence, and, in Victoria’s opinion, wasn’t particularly clever either. Aside from being beautiful, there was very little about her that Victoria considered worth noticing.

Dating someone from Adrian’s family had already been more than she deserved.

If Victoria went out of her way to investigate her now, wouldn’t that make it seem as though she actually cared about some wealthy man’s mistress?

And there was another problem.

The few people in the city who owned Lagonda Tarafs—including Mr. Sun, Mr. Li from Wanhai, and several others—were all influential figures in their own right.

They might not be on the same level as the Sterling family, but they were hardly people whose private affairs could be investigated casually.

If Victoria started asking questions about their personal vehicles and word got back to them, they might assume the Sterling family had taken some sort of interest in them. That would only create unnecessary misunderstandings.

Richard rarely interfered with what she did, but even he would be displeased if he found out she had used the family’s resources just to investigate a woman like Elena.

There was no reason to bother.

Victoria looked at Adrian again.

He had already turned his attention back to the road. The Porsche climbed the ramp out of the underground garage, the last light of the evening falling across his face.

Once they were back on the university roads, Victoria spoke again.

“The seminar’s starting soon. We should get there early. I heard Professor Zhou might be there today. Haven’t you been wanting to ask him about that paper on risk models?”

“…Yeah.”

Adrian nodded.

The seminar was being held in a conference hall on the top floor of an office tower in the financial district. It was an invitation-only academic gathering focused on financial mathematics and mathematical economics.

Most of the attendees were university professors, researchers from major investment banks, and a handful of people from the upper levels of finance who had a serious interest in academic research.

Adrian was comfortable in that circle.

His father was already a well-known figure in finance, but Adrian wasn’t there simply because of his family. His talent for mathematics and his own academic work gave him enough credibility to belong.

About forty minutes after the seminar began, the program broke for coffee.

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Adrian took his cup and stepped out through a side door. He found a relatively quiet spot beside the floor-to-ceiling windows, pulled out his phone, and scrolled through his contacts until he found the person he was looking for.

Officially, the man was a partner at a private investigation firm.

Unofficially, the resources he could access went well beyond that.

The call connected after two rings.

“Well, if it isn’t Young Master Cole,” the man said with a laugh. “What can I do for you?”

“I sent you a photo. I need you to check a license plate.”

“All right. Let me see.”

Adrian opened the photo again.

Because of the angle, only the last two digits of the plate were reasonably clear. Still, the picture was better than the one he had seen before, and the model itself was unmistakable to anyone who knew cars.

The other end of the line went quiet for several seconds.

“Huh. Is that a Lagonda Taraf?”

“…Yes.”

“Damn.” The man sounded genuinely surprised. “They barely made over a hundred of these worldwide. There are even fewer around here. I’ve been in this business for years and I’ve never seen one in person. Where did you get the picture?”

Adrian had no intention of explaining.

“Can you trace it?”

The man paused.

“You sure about that?”

“What do you mean?”

“I can look into it. That’s not the problem.” His tone grew more serious. “But think about the kind of person who owns a car like this. Whoever’s behind it probably isn’t someone you want to investigate casually.”

Adrian looked through the window at the city skyline in the distance.

Someone he shouldn’t investigate?

How powerful could this person possibly be?

And if he really was that powerful, why would he be interested in a woman like Elena?

Adrian suspected the man was exaggerating the difficulty so he could charge more.

“How much?”

A sigh came through the phone.

“Let me figure out which channels I can use first. There aren’t many Tarafs around, so matching the car itself shouldn’t be too difficult. But you know how this works. I can’t exactly make an official request for someone’s private ownership records.”

Then he named a price.

Adrian’s expression changed immediately.

“Are you insane?”

The man gave a dry laugh.

“I’m the one taking the risk, Young Master Cole. Why would I do that for pocket change?”

“It’s a license plate. I’m not asking you to—”

Adrian stopped and took a breath.

“Forget it. Just look into it. I’ll pay twenty percent upfront.”

“Fine. Give me a few days. If everything goes smoothly, I might have something by next week.”

Adrian ended the call.

The low hum of the RS7 blended with the traffic on the expressway, most of the outside noise softened by the car’s insulation until only a muted vibration remained inside the cabin.

Elena adjusted the volume of the music.

She had connected one of her playlists to the car, and a lively jazz track was playing, the saxophone and piano taking turns with the melody. It gave the cabin an unexpectedly relaxed atmosphere.

The driver had brought the car to campus earlier that afternoon. Elena had spent the ride in the passenger seat, watching carefully and familiarizing herself with the controls.

Now she was driving it herself for the first time.

It had taken a few minutes to get from the underground garage, through the campus, and onto the main road. As she drove, she quietly got used to how the car responded.

There was a satisfying weight to the accelerator, and the engine responded immediately when she pressed down. The steering was precise, with enough feedback that she could feel what the wheels were doing without every bump in the road being transmitted into her hands.

She was still getting used to it, but she already liked the way it drove.

She liked the way it looked even more.

At a long red light, Elena happened to catch the RS7’s reflection in the glass frontage of a commercial building beside the road.

The matte obsidian-black paint had a cool sheen beneath the evening light. Its long, clean silhouette stood out sharply among the ordinary cars around it.

Elena looked at the reflection for another moment.

Driving this thing really was satisfying.

Three minutes later, traffic ruined the experience.

The cars ahead slowed almost at the same time, then gradually came to a stop.

Elena looked at the navigation screen. Most of the route ahead had turned red and orange, and the estimated travel time had climbed considerably.

“…Of course.”

Rush hour.

She adjusted her seat and settled into a more comfortable position as traffic began crawling forward.

The driver in the Tesla diagonally ahead was already scrolling through short videos, the glow of the screen faintly visible through the window.

The taxi driver on her right was eating a bun.

In the SUV to her left, a child was climbing around in the back seat.

Watching them, Elena gradually relaxed.

Traffic jams were normally irritating, but she found herself in a surprisingly good mood. Jazz played quietly through the speakers while the ordinary evening life of the city unfolded outside her windows.

After watching the traffic for a few minutes, she picked up the phone resting on the center console.

She sent Richard a message.