“Look John, we know it was you. Just admit it. We don't care. We just want the truth.”
John was baffled. What were these guys talking about? He heard his boss, Ernie, was going crazy this morning. But accusing him of corporate espionage was beyond lunacy.
“I told you. I have no idea what you're even talking about. Why would I sell my blueprints to someone else if-?”
“Money, John! The Chinese offered you millions. Your son has a heart problem. You needed the money. I understand. But you really screwed us over.”
John stared at Ernie.
“I love this company, boss. It's given me enough money. When the stock options vest next year I'll be set for life. I don't need an extra million.”
Ernie put his hand on his neck and turned towards the wall.
“Look, boss. You and me are the only ones smart enough to reproduce it. If neither of us sold it to the Chinese, then they either came in here and stole it or came up with the idea at the same time.”
“It's an exact replica! They could never have come up with the same idea. It even has your signature diamond-encrusted bezel design. And no way they stole it. I checked the surveillance cams for the last week. Nothing happened anywhere near the safe.”
“Well I never took it home. And never talked to any Chinese people except for the sushi I got last weekend. Let me have a look at the videos.”
“I'm telling you now there's nothing there. But if you really want, feel free. What we need is something to release now.”
“But we can't. It's not even production ready. I don't know how the Chinese could get it production ready so quickly. I'm impressed, honestly.”
“It's a huge international company. They have the resources. We are nothing but a tiny startup. We're a drop in the ocean! We don't even have a capable lawyer to sue these assholes.” Ernie was pacing up and down the room. “We also don't have enough money to last another six months. We need to release this product ASAP. But the Chinese will already have taken market share. They already released the damn thing. We're finished. Kiss your stock options goodbye, John. It's over.”
John was even more flabbergasted. “What about all the cash flow we had last quarter? And the cash on the balance sheet?” He cursed his lack of financial prowess.
Ernie rubbed his neck again. “Just accounting gimmicks, John. We need that product release to realize those numbers. Without the release, we're toast.”
John was dizzy. He needed fresh air. He left the room and walked the 6 blocks back to his home, contemplating what just occurred. Yesterday he was talking to his wife about buying a beach house. Now he's scrambling for his life trying to come up with a plan to save his company. The Chinese could steal his prototype, sure. But they can't steal his mind. John sat down at his kitchen table and began to think.
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———
Amy woke up to the sound of waves crashing outside her room. She lay motionless under the weight of a soft, white bedspread in her private Côte d'Ivoire villa. It was only two days ago that she was back in Beijing, handing over her soul for information about her past. But instead of answers, it seemed like an endless stream of questions, growing exponentially with each tiny piece of information she received. The influx of questions further magnified the only question she was seeking to answer.
What happened in Marseille?
She tried to relax. She wanted a reprieve from the coldness of Beijing. They always kept her in the dark. They always distorted the truth to fit their own agenda. She was tired of the games they were playing with her. She wanted answers. She wanted the warmth the light of truth will bring.
So Amy hopped out of bed and made her way past the dunes to the beach. She made a 4:21 a.m. appointment with Jacques during her flight to the island, making her appointment with the fish and the dolphins at 3:51. Jacques was her banker and her direct line to Paris. He didn't have anything new to report, otherwise he would have sent the spam email about weight loss, but he was always good for a chat. Amy wanted to run her new information by him, to gauge whether or not he already knew it. She observed the coastline from 30 yards away in the ocean and waited for her man on the Ivory Coast.
The beach was the perfect meeting location. At high tide, the waves drowned out the sound of any electronic audio surveillance. It could also mask the screams of anyone who screwed Amy over. She relished the moment she could bring Sun and his cronies here. They were all guilty. She just had to prove it.
———
Jacques was five minutes early. He looked around for Amy but saw no one. Where was she? She was always earlier than he was. Maybe the jet lag finally got to her. He knew she only slept a few hours each night. But the recent events may have taken a toll on her. First Bucharest, then Marseille. How could she handle it all? Where did she get her inner strength from? He heard the stories- the upbringing in eight different countries, her parents who trained her to be a spy, the Chinese who molded her into a feared military leader. But the Amy he knew was quiet, personable, and would never hurt a fly. There was a soft spot to her that enveloped her entire being.
Jacques stood still and breathed deeply. His sandals gently pushed the sand outward as gravity nudged him downward. He basked in the early morning peacefulness as the moon's rays lit up the white sand beneath him. Glancing toward the horizon he saw something in the distance bob out of the water. A dolphin? No. He knew by now that Amy always had the perfect hiding spot. He admired her ingenuity and waited for her to swim up.
“Bon matin, Monsieur,” Amy said as she emerged from the high tide.
“Et bon matin à vous, Mademoiselle.” Jacques heard vaguely about a previous marriage involving Amy and a Moroccan prince. It added to her intrigue. Who was this woman? As her banker and liaison to the capital, he couldn't pry too much. He only had to know the basics, which included her billion dollar investments in Silicon Valley, Europe, and Africa. Everything else he let flow freely in the ether. Normally he didn't want to know about his clients' lives, but this was different. He wanted to know Amy the human being, not Amy the billionaire.
Amy, not one to waste a beautiful morning on polite chit-chat, retrieved her newly received information from a hole in the sand and asked if he knew about it. She walked on his right so she could see his face clearly in the moonlight. When he opened the document and saw what it was, he gasped. It was a genuine expression of surprise, but that much she expected. What she didn't expect was that he would rip it up in front of her.
“No. He would never. Who gave you this? It's fake. Doctored.”
“I don't know what to believe, Jacques. He was there that night. He could've seen everything.”
Jacques was silent. She liked that about him. She liked knowing there were wheels turning in his mind, faster than almost everyone else she met. He promised her he would ask his contact in Rome.
Within five minutes, as soon as he finished going over her latest account statement, the conversation stopped. As though an internal alarm clock went off in their heads, they turned to each other, stripped and made love on the beach before the sun came up.