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“I’ll take it,” he replied.
As I laughed at his satisfied expression, I couldn’t help but think about how he really did look like a regular guy. Gray tank top, cargo pants, and that faded red baseball cap. Even knowing what I knew, it was difficult to think of him as one of the richest, most influential men in the world.
“Okay,” Pierce said, refilling the glasses with chiliguaro. “You really want to know what I’m doing?”
“Very much so, yes,” I replied.
“You have to swear never to tell anyone,” he said. “I’m not making you sign an NDA or anything else. Just your word.”
“I agree,” I said. Why all the secrecy?
“I’ve been meeting with investors for the past two days to discuss my next business venture,” he began.
I leaned forward. I thought he was going to tell me what he was doing here, at this bar by himself. I didn’t expect him to tell me what his next business plan was!
“Deep under the ocean’s surface are sea currents.” He leaned closer to me and lowered his voice. “They’re like deep sea superhighways.”
My imagination began running wild. Was he planning on harnessing these currents for power? A new type of renewable energy?
“We know how most of these work, in general,” he explained. “But there are millions of little offshoots that behave unpredictably. They’re all over the world. If we can map these currents, we can create more efficient trade routes, and gather more information on global warming changes…”
I nodded along, totally entranced.
“Sea turtles use these currents all the time. I want to develop a fleet of robotic turtles that will follow the real sea turtles into these currents. They will use GPS data to help us map how strong they are, and where they go. Of course, we can’t control them remotely; they need to be able to follow the legitimate turtles in real-time. To do that, we’ll utilize artificial intelligence to copy their migratory patterns. These robotic turtles will change the world, Melinda.”
I felt my jaw hanging open in shock. I gawked at Pierce, unable to figure out what to say.
Suddenly, he pointed at me. “Got you.”
I gasped. “Oh, son of a bitch!”
He leaned back. “Ah hah hah.”
“Damnit!
“Andrew told me about the turtles down by the beach,” Pierce revealed. “Robotic imitations of animals isn’t a new concept, actually. But that’s not what my next business venture is.”
“So are you going to tell me?” I asked.
Pierce took a swig of beer. “Nope!”
I groaned, which only made him laugh harder. I finished my beer and held it up for the waiter to signal another round.
“Well, I wasn’t actually asking about that,” I said. “What I was actually asking was what are you doing here, at this little place in the middle of San Jose, all by yourself.”
Pierce finished his beer, then accepted a new one from the waiter. He stared at the bottle, his thumb brushing against the label.
“How long have you been with me? Two weeks?”
“Give or take,” I replied.
“How often have I been alone during that time?”
“You’ve been alone most of the time. It’s only in the past two days that you’ve had meetings with people. Before that, you met with Tristan a few times a day, I guess.”
Pierce was shaking his head. “That’s not what I mean. How often have I been totally alone? With nobody around me? The answer is: only at night when I’m sleeping.”
“That’s not true,” I protested. “You spent a lot of time sunbathing alone on the Bellerophon.”
