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“I can’t tell you,” Andrew explained, “because I don’t know myself.”
I gave a start. “Wait, really?”
“Why does that surprise you?” he asked.
“I don’t know. I guess I just assumed he would tell you. You and Tristan are his two closest confidants. And you made it seem like you two were best friends.”
Andrew gazed out at the water. “We are. At least, as close to best friends as someone can be with a man like Pierce. We share a lot of things, not just interests.”
There was something strange about the way he said that, but he went on before I could ask.
“But he keeps some things close to his chest. He’s always been that way; he doesn’t want people to see how the sausage is made, so to speak. He likes to keep his ideas a secret until they’re fully formed in his mind. Only then does he let other people in.”
“I can understand that,” I said, glancing out at the water. “I guess I’m kind of the same way. I only want people to see the finished product.”
“Have you thought about what you’re going to do with the money?” Andrew asked. “I’m assuming that’s why you chose to be a surrogate. The money.”
“You assume correctly. And I have exactly one thing on my mind: getting even with the Bobs.”
Andrew’s laughter was carried away by the ocean breeze. “I don’t blame you. I read your file. They really fucked you over.”
“It was a good life lesson,” I replied. “I learned not to trust people.”
“You just have to make sure you trust the right people.”
I glanced over at him. “Like Pierce?”
“Yeah, like Pierce. He’s as trustworthy as they come. He always keeps his word, and he tries to do right by people.”
I still wasn’t sure if I believed it, but by this point I had seen the way his employees acted around him, and the way he treated them back. They were happy to work for him, and they weren’t faking it. The smiles were genuine. He probably paid them extremely well. He would need to, just from a security standpoint. That was the best way to keep them from taking bribes or leaking information.
I wondered if Pierce got death threats. All famous people probably did, and he had done his fair share of pissing people off in his rise to power.
“Look!” Andrew said. “I was hoping we would see them.”
He jumped up from his chair and ran over to a black rock on the beach. But when I joined him, I realized it wasn’t a rock—it was moving.
“It’s a turtle!” I blurted out.
The little turtle, which was about two inches long, was flapping its legs in a circle, slowly propelling it forward in the sand toward the water.
“Sergio, one of the chefs, told me he saw some last night. I didn’t expect to see any this morning, but sometimes there are stragglers. There’s more.”
Andrew leaned into me to point farther up the beach, where three more greenish-black turtles were slowly flopping across the sand. His warm arm brushed against mine as we stared, transfixed by the sight.
“Costa Rica is the most biodiverse country on the planet,” he whispered. I was close enough to see the freckles on his cheeks. “This island is a completely different environment than the next one over, which is even more different from the mainland.”
As we watched the baby turtles make it to the water, I thought again about how likable Andrew was. He was the only person here who I felt comfortable around. Everyone else treated me with a little too much formality, but I was an equal in Andrew’s eyes. It had made me suspicious when I first met him, that likability, but now I appreciated it. In a different context, I totally would have asked him out.
Maybe when this crazy surrogate contract is over.
I laughed. I was getting ahead of myself. But in the meantime, I was glad that Andrew was around to make me feel less lonely.
“What’s so funny?” he asked.
“I was thinking about AI turtles. Pierce’s next big business idea.”
Andrew grinned along with me. “Careful. There may be something to that. Robotic turtles controlled by AI microprocessors…”
