makes a sour face. Rather than ask the logical question explain what?, he assumes I’ve acquired telepathy powers over the weekend and already know the what. He plunges into explanations.
I hold up a hand. “Stop.”
Simon stops.
A tense pause follows as the team attempts and fails to get on the mind-reading train to figure out who I’ll fire for this. It’s tempting, because Simon’s news (and it’s news to me) falls into the no-good-very-bad-day bucket. It’s also humiliating, frustrating and makes me see red.
I recap on the off chance I’ve misheard. I don’t make mistakes but hell could freeze over. “Someone stole our brand-new e-commerce shopping cart code.”
Simon nods.
“The exclusive code we’ve presold to twelve major online vendors.”
Another nod.
“Exclusive code that is no longer exclusive unless Merriam-Webster has changed the definition of the word.”
A veritable storm of head-bobbing around the table. We’re all on the same page.
“Who is the cause of this really big fucking problem?”
No one moves because the first thing you learn in the corporate world is that moving makes you a target. Simon looks like he might be sick.
I try again. “How?”
This one should be easier to answer given the multiple levels of security I’ve instituted. Unfortunately, this question is also met with silence.
“So essentially we know nothing.” The theft may now be a fact, but revenge remains an option. I build a back door and handy-dandy detonator into our apps. Steal my shit and poof—your e-commerce site sells rubber ducky dildos in fashion colors rather than whatever you’ve really got in your warehouse. And because industrial espionage is rampant and I trust no one outside my immediate circle of friends, I build in that safeguard from day one. I also build in a tracker that alerts when my software goes live on the internet, which must be how Simon knows.
“Yet,” Simon clarifies. “We don’t know anything yet.”
Now it’s my turn to nod. “Exactly. All we have to do is figure out the connection between the three seemingly unrelated businesses illegally using our code. We didn’t sell it to them, but they’ve got it. Somehow. There’s a pattern even if we don’t see it yet.”
Simon leaps to his feet, grabs a dry-erase marker and starts sketching on the whiteboard. While the rest of the room pretends to listen intently to the stream of engineering coming from his mouth, I brainstorm internally. The first business sells mail-order hemp candles and I assume they’ll likely get arrested on drug distribution charges. The second business, an adult pool float company, might not mind a deluge of rubber ducky dildos (I’ll trigger the alternate version of my destructo-code for them, the one that crashes your site by playing endless loops of puppies and kittens). The third company is a woman-owned, eco-friendly, socially conscious feminine hygiene products start-up that promises to donate a box of tampons for every one you purchase in the ultimate two-for-one deal. The only obvious connection between the three is that none of these companies can possibly make any money.
The marijuana maker inhabits office space three hundred and forty miles north in Humboldt County and an ocean separates me and the pool party, which maintains offices in China. That leaves the girl boss company. I check my phone. I can get there in forty minutes, straighten out this Lola Jones who thinks she can steal from me and still make my two o’clock. I just need to know. I hate secrets. I’ve always sussed out my Christmas presents early, I read the ends of books first and I check for spoilers on my favorite TV shows. Enjoying the ride is easier when you know how the ride ends.
When Simon finally comes up for air, I stand up. “Meeting adjourned.”
Dev
THE HIPPIE CHICK at the receptionist’s desk either doesn’t recognize a heartless bastard when she meets one or she optimistically believes dating is the ultimate DIY project and she can fixer-upper me into happily-ever-after. From the slack-jawed way she’s stared at me since I strode through the door and demanded to see the company founder, she may also be entertaining naked fantasies. My expensive suit is gift-wrapping on an amazing package and we both know it. Strip me down and, heartless or not, I’m gorgeous. I’m also not afraid to play dirty—in bed and out—and I’m confident.
Too confident?
Borderline asshole and all the way arrogant?
Noise.
I know my worth. In addition to my billions, I have surfer hair, sun-streaked and shoulder-length, salt-tousled and unruly. Ironically, given my chronic inability to sleep, I usually look as if I just rolled out of bed. Beast lord, billionaire bad boy, surfer, Conan the Barbarian, pirate king—I can star in any fantasy you jill off to and Hippie Chick has clearly zoned out to her personal favorite.
Her forehead wrinkles as she tries to bring her brain back online and do her job. “You want to see Lola?”
Pay attention to the fact that she doesn’t ask why I’m here. She’s made an assumption, an important and entirely incorrect assumption.
“That’s why I came.” She’s wasting my time. I could have been in and out already, and that’s no euphemism.
Hippie Chick beams at me. I could ask her out right now, but I’m not here to score a date. I have two rules: never bring a girl back to my place and never screw at work. It’s too risky. Too drama inducing. Too boring. And while Calla Enterprises isn’t technically my workplace, I’m here on business.
“Okay.” Hippie Chick bounces to her feet. Literally. Instead of normal, ergonomic office chairs, this place has neon-colored yoga balls. As she flip-flops away, presumably to fetch Lola and not on a karmic journey of self-discovery, I admire the view even if I’m staying otherwise hands-off. Business casual has achieved a whole new level of undress, and the ripped jeans hugging her ass are spectacular—as is the white T-shirt over the jewel-green bra.
I used to be Mr. Impatient but surfing taught me to slow down (some) and pick the right moment to rush in full speed. Nothing beats chilling on the ocean, hanging on my favorite board until the right wave arrives and I ride it home. I put that same, patient plan into action at King Me, my software company. My IPO might have made me a billionaire, but my impeccable sense of timing has kept me riding the financial wave when so many of my competitors have crashed and burned—and I’m only in my midtwenties.
Calla Enterprises is ambitious. It’s a fledgling start-up that promises women around the world easy, nonembarrassing access to tampons because tampon access is apparently an important first step toward gender equality. According to the website copy, tampons remove a critical barrier between women and important things like an education and a job. And while I’m all for vaginal self-care, this company will fail long before the grenade I planted in their e-commerce system ever detonates. In the company’s brief life span of thirteen months and two days, it has yet to close a round of venture capital funding or bring its product to market.
