“I’m fascinated. I’d like to talk with you some more about this. I understand you’re off to dinner now. Would you have any time to get together before you leave town?”
Surprised at the interest, Eva glanced at the gallery owner and said, “Yes, Linda here has us set up for dinner with some clients. I’m flying back to Austin early tomorrow, so it’s probably not practical this trip. Maybe we could do a call next week.”
“I’d like that. We’re looking at how to identify altered photographs in posts about fake news. It’s a huge problem for our industry. If you’d be interested, maybe we could evaluate whether it would make sense for PaprW8 to license your software.”
“I appreciate your interest, but I’m not sure we’re there yet.”
“We’d be glad to sign an NDA. We don’t want to pilfer your software. However, if it can help us with the fake news problem, we could be willing to offer you an attractive licensing deal.” Ward gave her card to Eva. “We should talk some more.”
“I’ll call you next week. Thanks for stopping by the show.”
Chapter 30
Xeng Li climbed onto the blue Yamaha WaveRunner she had just rented at the Lake Travis Marina and stowed her backpack in the storage compartment. She straddled the front seat and checked the controls. Minutes later, she was speeding down the Colorado River and cutting across the lake toward Dan Johnson’s boat house. Her long black hair flew behind her in the wind.
The weather was sunny and would have been comfortable except for the wind created by the speeding jet ski. Li was prepared, wearing a floatation vest and a thin black nylon wind jacket over a black bandeau bikini top and black yoga tights.
Ahead of schedule, Li did an extra loop around Dan’s side of the lake before tying up to his dock. There, she opened the jet ski storage compartment and traded her flotation vest and wind jacket for the backpack. Stepping onto the dock, she slipped the backpack straps around her shoulders and walked across the metal gangplank to the tram platform. Entering the access code, she rode the tram to the upper station. On the way up, she unhooked her bikini top and put it in the backpack.
Sitting on a lounge chair by the pool, with a towel wrapped around his waist, Dan watched Li as she walked up the winding pathway to the house. As she reached the pool, she slid the backpack off one shoulder, then the other, and carried it to a table. Dan stood. “Nice to see you. Like the look.”
“Nothing like a sexy massage girl,” Li said.
Dan moved toward her but stopped as she waved him off. “No, no. Work before play,” she said.
Opening the backpack, she pulled out a black plastic bag filled with four stacks of $100 bills held by mustard-color-coded paper straps. “The regular bonus, $40,000,” she said. “Do you have the drive?”
“Yes.” He walked to the kitchen bar and handed her a 128 Gigabyte USB drive. “It’s encrypted. Usual password.”
“Nice,” she said. “Now, you get your massage.” She pulled off his towel. He was more than ready.
He lay on his back on the lounge chair and she began her work, using her lips and tongue to bring him slowly and relentlessly to the edge of exploding, but somehow backing him off just in time to prolong the experience. Again. Repeatedly. Each time, Li would smile and say “Good, good. Save it. Makes it better the next time.” Then she would kiss him and start again. There was no love, no romance, no emotion. There was also no sex, if you used Bill Clinton’s definition. Just a mutually beneficial commercial relationship between two talented consenting adults. Dan brought the valuable information he was trading to people half-way around the globe. Li brought the unique compensation that confirmed the value of what he had to offer.
Dan lasted almost 45 minutes before Li finally let him give in. Ten minutes later, Li was on her jet ski for the ride back to the marina. The two-hour rental had provided plenty of time.
Chapter 31
The next day, Eva was weaving her white Porsche 911 Carrera 4S Cabriolet through the heavy Friday afternoon traffic. She slammed on her brakes to let a red Kia Soul pull in front of her. The driver gave her a wave of thanks. “I swear, rush hour traffic in Austin is as bad as it is in San Francisco,” she said, cutting into the center lane.
“I’m just glad you’re driving,” Dan said from the black and red leather seat beside her.
They were on their way over to Rakesh and Valerie’s house for dinner when Eva’s cell rang. Answering on the car’s speaker, she said, “Hi, Valerie, what’s up?”
“We have about a dozen protestors in front of our drive gate. Our security guard is keeping an eye on them. If you’ll text me when you’re close, I’ll be sure he’s out front when you arrive.”
Eva said, “Are you and Rakesh OK?”
Valerie said, “We’re fine. No big deal. I’ll fill you in when you get here.”
Ending the call, Eva said to Dan, “Can’t wait to hear what that’s about. Do you know?”
“No idea. You know, if there are protesters there, we should probably stop and put the top up on your car before we get there.”
“Good idea. Let’s just do it now.” She pulled into a parking lot and pressed the button to bring up the convertible top. In seconds, it was on and locked. “Would have been better if we’d brought the SUV.”
As they turned onto the road to the Jains’ house, they saw the protestors clustered by the drive gate. Three cars were parked along the side of the road. The security guard was standing behind the gate. Eva pulled over and texted Valerie they were close.
“I count ten of them,” Dan said. “The guy in the blue tee shirt looks like he’s filming. Signs say ‘Abolish the Rich’ and ‘No Billionaire Professors’. Nice.”
Unlike the Johnsons’ house, which was in a separately gated estates area of a much larger gated community, the Jains’ house was on a large tract of land that fronted directly on a local public road, giving the protestors a place to stand along the right-of-way in front of the property.
As Eva approached the house, the guard opened the gate and walked out to warn the protestors away. Eva pulled the car up to the protestors, who were clustered between her and the open gate. The guard tried to shoo them to one side, but no one moved. Eva nudged the car forward and gunned the engine on the Porsche.
“Go easy,” Dan said. “Your dash cam is on.” Two protesters started slapping the soft convertible top. The security guard pushed through the protesters to Eva’s door. She rolled down the window.
“They were playing this game when I came to start my shift an hour ago,” the guard said. “If you can be patient, they should tire of this in a few minutes. Per our protocol, we recommend you stay in your car and not do anything to confront them. I can call for support if necessary. We have the plate numbers on the two cars up there. We’re filming this from cameras on the gate and the fence.”
Frowning, Eva nodded. Then she heard the high-pitched whine. Looking up past the guard, she saw a small drone hovering about 50 feet in the air. She said, “Dan, you’re not going to believe this. There’s a drone up there. Look out the windshield toward my side.”
Dan peered out. “You’re right. Must belong to the protestors. Probably getting some video of Rakesh’s big house with the protesters out front. Bet they’re happy you’re driving a Porsche.”
Five minutes later, nothing had changed except the drone had dropped down for some lower level shots of the car. Eva nudged the car forward and two of the protesters stepped aside, allowing her to get a yard closer to the open gate. Then two of the women protesters sat on the front of the car and started rocking it up and down. Fired up again, one of the men started slapping the top.
“That’s it,” Eva said. Ignoring Dan’s warning, she slammed the car into Park and flung her door open, almost knocking one of the protesters down. She stepped out and slammed the door closed. Dan tried to open his door, but two of the protestors jammed against it, making it impossible to open. As Eva stepped out, a tall male protestor pointed at her and y
elled, “Look, a cute little rich bitch!” The protesters picked up the refrain by yelling “Rich Bitch” to a beat they made by slapping the car.
As the security guard tried to get to Eva and Dan struggled to get out, the man who had called her out stepped close to her. He was at least four inches taller and 50 pounds heavier than Eva. “So, what’s it like to be a rich bitch?” he asked. The nearby protesters laughed.
“Not bad, not bad at all,” she said, staring the man down. “So, listen up, people,” she yelled, pausing to smile at the drone. “You have every right to be out here on the street protesting whatever you’re protesting. But you don’t have the right to keep us from having dinner with our friends or to be beating on my car. You’ve made whatever point you’re trying to make, so we’d appreciate it if you’d move aside and let us in the gate.”
As she finished, the man said, “Hey, the rich bitch can speak!” The protesters picked up their chant of “Rich Bitch.” The man moved closer to Eva, placed his hands on her bare shoulders and looked down at her low neckline. Moving his eyes back to her face, he started to say, “Nice….”
Whatever he was intending to say, his words turned to “Ommph” as Eva drove her right knee into his groin. As he recoiled, reflexively pulling his hands off her shoulders, she spun him clockwise and slammed his face onto the hood of the car. As he hit, she grabbed his right arm and wrenched it behind his back, pulling it tight until he cried out.
The only other noise came from gasps from the crowd. The protestors froze. Dan finally forced his door open and stepped out. The security guard pushed toward Eva. One of the nearby female protesters said, “Damn. Are you a cop, lady?”
“Now people,” Eva said, still wrenching the man’s arm. “As I was saying, we’d like to visit our friends. We’ve all got this on video, so I’d strongly suggest you move on and do whatever you normally do on Friday nights. If you don’t get the idea we’re through with this, I’ll be happy to pull out my Glock and give you a real-world demonstration of what the Texas Stand Your Ground Law is all about.”
As the protesters began to disburse, she pulled the man up off her car. He glared at her. “Don’t fuck with me,” she said. “And don’t ever touch me or try to embarrass me or my friends. I was nice to you tonight.” She pushed him away. He walked toward one of the cars, head down, never looking back.
A few minutes later, Eva and Dan were in the house, exchanging hugs with Valerie and Rakesh. “We’re terribly sorry about that rude welcome,” Rakesh said. “We were watching and listening through the gate cameras. Did you notice those Abolish the Rich signs with the website address on them?”
Eva said, “I did. They looked professionally printed.”
Valerie said, “You did quite a job on that man out there, Eva. Whoever he was, he wasn’t one of my students.”
“Your security guard’s probably not happy with me and I’m sure Dan’s not,” Eva said, giving Dan a deadpan look. “I’m just glad it worked. I was getting hungry!” She laughed and excused herself to freshen up.
While she was gone, Rakesh asked Dan, “Does she really have a Glock in her car?”
“She does. It’s in a quick release locked case that meets the concealed carry law.”
The Jain’s house was large and open, with transitional architecture and high ceilings upstairs and down. The exterior brick was painted white. The roof was grey slate. The interior was simple but elegant, merging native sandstone and wood with rich fabrics and clean, cool shades of tan and white.
They had drinks and snacks on the rear terrace, overlooking the pool and the sweeping Texas Hill Country beyond. Native oaks and a sprinkling of walnut, sycamore and cedar elm trees dotted the rolling hills. Closer to the house, the natural vegetation blended into the installed landscape of magnolia, crepe myrtle and desert willow. Beds of evergreens were edged with spring pansies and petunias. The sweet fragrance of the petunias perfumed the terrace.
Rakesh and Dan were both wearing shorts and colorful untucked golf shirts. Removed from her professional life, Valerie was wearing a brightly colored Lilly Pulitzer skort and a low-cut white sleeveless top. Eva had on a short flower-print sundress with a v-neckline and an open back with crisscross straps.
What started out to be an informal Friday night dinner to catch up turned into a long evening of surprising and troubling stories. Valerie explained the details behind the protesters, beginning with the blue paint thrown on her car at the conference in New York.
Valerie said, “I’m hoping the campus part of this protest nonsense will play itself out over the next few weeks. I’m not teaching this summer, which should help things settle.”
“Do you think wealth will be an issue in the 2020 elections?” Eva asked.
Valerie said, “Probably so. It’s one more extension of the Democrats’ identity politics, which I despise. I’m concerned about violence if it gets out of hand. The progressives are moving from higher taxes to socioeconomic restructuring that realigns political power. Just look at Warren. Combined with promises of free everything and inciteful claims about racial bias, it’s a short step for people to believe that wealthy companies and individuals don’t deserve to have what they have. What some people used to call a government entitlement mentality could easily turn to self-help to remedy the inequities.”
“There’s just so much anger out there on every issue. Who benefits from all the anger?” Eva asked.
Valerie said, “People at the extremes on either side of the political divide. People who want to see significant change in American policy priorities and the structure of American democracy.”
Rakesh said, “Valerie, wasn’t one of David Bernbach’s questions in New York about America’s susceptibility to radical political change?”
“It was,” Valerie said. “You don’t think….” She stopped.
“Probably not, but you never know,” Rakesh said.
“Rakesh, how are you feeling about the progress on your project to bring America together?” Eva asked.
“I’m pleased so far,” Rakesh said. “I had a call this afternoon with the New York agency that’s working up some sample commercials to convince leading businesses to support the project. The pilots are looking good. The big test will come when we have focus group discussions with senior executives to see if we can build corporate support.”
Valerie’s cook had prepared crab cakes, roasted eggplant and braised brussels sprouts for dinner, with a salad of fresh orange and grapefruit slices served over chopped baby kale and almonds. As they ate on the covered terrace, Dan and Eva brought Rakesh up to date on the drone and home invasion.
Eva talked about her trip to San Francisco for her gallery opening. “It was good to be back in my art world. The home invasion took a toll on my self-confidence.” She told Rakesh and Valerie about her discussion with Susan Ward’s interest in Daneva Tech’s image editing software.
Rakesh said, “That could be a home run financially. Fake images are a big problem for the social media companies. You could end up licensing all of them. Don’t give anybody an exclusive!”
After dinner, they had dessert wine on the rose garden terrace beyond the pool. As Rakesh poured the wine, Valerie said, “I talked with one of my former students yesterday, a man named Andy Baker. He’s a journalist for the Sentinel Observer in Boston. He’s doing a political story about the use of power, influence and technology in presidential elections. He called me about an Op/Ed I wrote, and we ended up talking for an hour. It sounds like he’s got his hands full with this story. Anyway, he needs some off-the-record background about technology and social media use in elections. Naturally, I thought of Dan.
“Would you be willing to talk to him, Dan? He’s very sharp. Spent several years with The Washington Post before he moved to the Sentinel Observer. He’s going to be in town this weekend for a wedding tomorrow. He’s staying with relatives here in Austin. I’m meeting with him on Sunday before he flies back. I know it’s a bad weekend, but any
chance you could spare him an hour?”
Dan gave a pained look to Eva, who smiled and nodded it was OK. “If you think I should do it, the answer’s yes,” Dan said. “He’d need to come by our house. Sunday’s Easter. After 2:00 p.m. would be best for us.”
“Wonderful. Thank you. I’ll call him tomorrow and introduce you by email. I’ll leave the scheduling to you.”
Chapter 32
David Bernbach was just finishing lunch at his golf club when he received a call from Alice Harper, the former CEO of a Minnesota consumer products company Bernbach had helped take private several years earlier. When the company was sold to a larger competitor 34 months later, the investors tripled their money and the management team did very well. Alice deserved a lot of the credit, both for convincing her board to go private and for recasting the company’s business strategies to drive shareholder value. After the sale closed, Alice had taken some time off before accepting a new position as CEO of a publicly traded packaged foods business. She and Bernbach had remained close, permanently bound by their mutual financial success. To Bernbach, any call from Alice was worth answering.
“Hi, Alice. Beautiful day here in Connecticut. What’s going on?”
“Not much. We’re in Florida for Easter. I’m at Universal Studios in Orlando with the kids. We’re heading back to the beach tonight. Meant to call you before we got away. This may not be important, but I thought I’d pass it on since I know you’re always playing politics in your spare time. Rakesh Jain, the tech guy, called me a week or so ago to take my temperature about being part of a group of companies supporting an initiative to reunite America, as he called it. He’s concerned about the polarization of our politics and wants to try to do something about it.”
“Really? That’s interesting. What did you tell him?”
“I told him we’d take a look, but a lot would depend on how it was implemented. Turns out he’s using the same ad agency we use. They’ve made some pilot commercials, which he agreed to share with me if I’d give him some comments. I saw three of them on Thursday before we left for Florida. They’re quite good. Anyway, I wasn’t sure whether you were aware of this or not, so I thought I’d give you a call. Always good to have some excuse to talk with you.”
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