But if my theory is right, and I bet a million dollars it is, at least two white Ombras have the same VIN. Because one of them is a fake. A copy. A clone. And it might be this one.
“Yup, the number’s the same,” Franklin confirms. “Weird.”
I lean against the hood of Franklin’s idling Passat, grateful for the engine’s heat coming through my winter coat. Branches rustle around us, a late-afternoon wind kicks up. Towering gray clouds invade the once-sunny sky. More snow coming.
“Not weird. Auto identity theft.” The three words I searched on Google.
“Auto identity theft?”
“Yup. One of the fastest-growing crimes in the country. Let’s say someone swipes a car, say, a white Ombra. All the crooks have to do is find another white Ombra. They copy its VIN number, make new VIN plates and replace the ones on the stolen car.”
I make a gesture like a magician with a wand. “Prestochango. The stolen car disappears. And if cops are looking for a stolen vehicle with a certain VIN, well, that VIN doesn’t exist anymore. The bad guys can easily sell the clone because the stolen VIN comes back as clear. Pure profit.”
Franklin leans into Annie’s windshield, peering at the VIN, then shakes his head. “You’re right. It’d be so easy. VINs are just numbers on metal plates. A snap to reproduce, a snap to put into place. Man.”
He opens the Passat door, slides into the driver’s seat and buzzes down the window. “Now what?”
I take a last look at Annie’s mystery car. Then I pull out my cell phone and click a camera shot of the VIN. And then a wide shot of the car. Good enough for now.
“Now what? Well, curiouser and curiouser,” I mutter to myself, considering. I knock the snow off my boots, one against the other, before I’m guilty of trailing deadly slush into Franklin’s always-pristine interior. Yanking on my seat belt, I turn to face him.
“Here’s ‘now what.’ Seems like someone has a cloned Ombra. It could be Annie. If her parents were sold a stolen car.”
“And if that’s true, she’s got a problem. You’ll tell her parents, right?”
“Of course. But there’s another possibility. Besides the unrepaired recalls and the missing air bags, it could be the Rental Car King-whether he knows it or not-is also renting stolen cars. I think it’s time to give him a call.”
I pull out my cell again.
“Either way, it’s blockbuster.” Franklin reaches a flattened palm in my direction.
I return his high five with a flourish and a smile. We’re back.
“Either way,” I say. And I punch in the phone number.
Chapter Ten
Trying to channel Mike Wallace, I step onto the journalism tightrope. Here’s where I’m balancing our quest for a good story with my guilt-ridden reluctance to throw a Bexter bigwig under the bus. The result? I’m afraid the Rental Car King may end up with tread marks.
Holding up my mirrored compact between me and Randall Kindell, I pretend to check my lipstick so I don’t have to chitchat with him. Small talk, especially right before a potentially contentious interview, is impossible. You can’t be nice, because you’re about to nail someone. You can’t be aggressive, because the interviewee might walk out before you get the good stuff. The old “checking my makeup” stall always works. Men never interrupt it.
Franklin is adjusting the tiny lavalier microphone on Kindell’s pin-striped jacket, tucking the thin black cord behind his lapel. J.T. clicks a cassette tape into his camera and twists his molded earpiece tighter into place. He’s ready.
We’ve rigged up a portable tape player on a round walnut side table next to me. Someone familiar with television interviews would get the instant message there was trouble ahead. If someone’s going to show you video and have a photographer tape your reactions, you probably will not be happy with what’s on the screen. Kindell, however, seems unfazed.
Kindell had surprised us by instantly and amicably agreeing to our request this afternoon for an on-camera interview at the Rental Car King office. I used my best “it’s a consumer-education story and it will help the public” pitch. Within an hour, J.T., Franklin and I had packed up our portable tape player, our pile of video logs, our biggest light kit and all our story ammunition, piled into the car and arrived at RCK. Ready for battle.
Kelsey Kindell, in a lacquered updo and op art fingernails, greeted us from behind her counter. At least, she greeted J.T. Franklin and I were apparently invisible.
She led us down a narrow fluorescent-lighted hallway and unlocked a gray metal door. A brass nameplate on it announced President. She gestured us inside with her clanking ring of keys.
“I didn’t know you were from TV before.” She checked out J.T. more brazenly than Emily Post would approve of, settling a hand on one cocked hip. “Do you guys ever need, like, interns?”
“In here?” I had interrupted the impromptu job interview, gesturing J.T. and Franklin inside to save them from having to answer. Then I stopped myself from judging a book by its cover.
“Sure,” I told her. “But only for college credit.”
She shrugged. End of job interview. “My uncle says he’ll be with you in five.”
The Rental Car King’s throne room pays homage to his own good-guy credentials. Curliqued “Man of the Year” plaques from several local chambers of commerce, gilt trophies flanked with generic winged goddesses, chunks of crystal perched on ebony holders. A sleek model of a flashy convertible emblazoned RCK-20 Years of YES. Silver-plated frames display the stubby, broad-shouldered Kindell in smiling foursomes; golf outfits, tennis outfits, dinner jackets. Kindell, the curls of his almost comb-over hidden by a baseball cap, surrounded by grinning kids with bats and balls.
I’m about to throw him a curve.
He thinks-because that’s what I told him-this is an interview about the importance of repairing recalled cars. He thinks-because that’s what I told him-that we’re interviewing him because of his stature in the car-rental field. But after I pitch him those puffballs, we’re going to hit him with our video. Show him Annie’s car and then the one in his own lot with the same VIN. If he’s truly surprised, he should try to help us with our investigation. That would be good.
If he’s angry and defensive, that means he might be involved. That would be good.
He might even throw us out. That would be even better. We’ll have the whole thing on video.
Ambush interviews like this are not my favorite. But they’re effective. Revealing. And always great television.
I close my compact, tuck it under my thigh in case I need it later and turn to J.T.
“Ready?” I ask.
“Rolling,” J.T. replies.
“You’re one hundred percent certain these numbers are correct? Beyond a shadow of a doubt?” Kindell leans back in his chair, staring at the still-frame of video on the monitor. It’s a close-up of Annie’s VIN. We transferred my very successful cell phone snapshots to tape so we could display RCK’s white Ombra and Annie’s white Ombra side by side. It’s irrefutable.
“We checked the numbers again this morning,” I reply. J.T. is still rolling, of course, and we got the perfect images of Kindell’s face as I showed our evidence ten minutes into the interview. First he was baffled. Then calculating. Of course, I’m not revealing Annie’s name. “We confirmed the private car. And the one in your parking lot. It’s still there, in fact. You can check for yourself.”
I glance at Franklin, who’s sitting off to the side, out of Kindell’s view. He makes a surreptitious motion, slam dunk.
“So, Mr. Kindell? What’s your reaction to that?” I ask. “And to the unrepaired recalls we found in your cars? And to the missing air bags?”
I wait while Kindell mulls my tricky-to-answer questions, deepening the already-etched lines across his forehead and along his boxer’s nose. I’m patient.