Trade Secrets

by Kathleen Knowles

  “You didn’t say anything to Roy about the inspection, did you?” Tony asked Sheila all of a sudden.

  Sheila looked alarmed. “No. Of course not. I told you I’m keeping this strictly in confidence.”

  “You would think,” Tony said, twirling pasta on her fork, “that Erica would tell them about a federal regulatory inspection, but you’d be wrong.”

  * * *

  “She’s certainly a withholder of info,” Sheila said, tersely, wondering more than ever if this situation was sustainable. She wanted GHS to succeed, and she hoped it would for a lot of reasons. But there were more than a few red flags.

  It wasn’t just Tony’s disclosures, though those were problematical. They seemed like technical glitches that could be resolved. But the lack of transparency around financial matters on Erica’s part was just as bad, if not worse. She had seen for herself when she was subbing for Roy on the board what Erica was like, and nothing he’d reported from the two meetings he’d been to since his recovery gave her reason to think anything had changed.

  Roy, for instance, had asked for the agreements that Sheila had been trying to get. He reported what Erica said, and to Sheila it sounded like a lot of non sequiturs and nonsense, and again, nothing happened.

  Sheila hated to be in a holding pattern with her fingers crossed waiting to hear what happened next. It wasn’t her nature. And though she was relatively new to the venture-capital game compared to her dad, she was apprehensive.

  Roy was not being helpful at all. He still refused to confront Erica, and Sheila wondered if his medical crisis had taken some of the edge off his instincts.

  * * *

  Like most real news of GHS, the results of the CLIA inspection came from Ricardo. He didn’t know all the details of what Tony had done. She wanted to protect him, but he was savvy and figured most of it out, and she’d ended up telling him all about it.

  He shook his head sadly. “Well, it can’t be a huge surprise to you, but Erica and Huey met the inspector and showed her some fake Leonardos and gave her a whole song and dance, and she was snowed and went away, leaving them with a few minor lab items to correct. They even had one of the R and D managers in to talk technical with her. You had a great idea, Tony, but it didn’t work.”

  “You’re fucking kidding me.” Tony didn’t like to use swear words. She was devastated though. It had seemed like such a fool-proof idea.

  “Wish I were, Dr. Leung, but I’m not. Huey is still steaming about the inspection though. I hope you’re not going to get found out.”

  “No,” Tony said. “I was careful.”

  “These people are evil,” Ricardo said, with feeling.

  “Yeah. Makes me wonder why I stay. Why do you?”

  “Good question. Well, for one thing, I’m insulated from the worst, unlike you lab types. And it’s a good job.” He shrugged. “Guess I have a high tolerance for bullshit. And unlike you, I don’t have to deal with Huey’s craziness.”

  Tony told Sheila what had happened.

  “I hope this means you’re going to give it all a rest,” Sheila said.

  “I don’t know what the heck I can do, anyhow,” Tony said, sadly. “I can get another job, I suppose.”

  “Is that what you want? If you do, I’m okay with it.”

  “I’m not sure. I’ll take a little more time to think about it. I still hope for the best.”

  “Me too,” Sheila said and laughed without humor. “Come here.”

  Tony slid over on the couch to get as close to Sheila as possible. If she could climb inside her skin, that would help.

  * * *

  It was time, past time probably to take action. Sheila picked the Pacific Partners’ member she thought would likely be able to get through to her dad and convince him GHS had a serious problem, that he had to step in and persuade the other GHS board members to take action. The board members were the only people who had any leverage over Erica, the only ones who could bring her to heel. She was a global celebrity, not just a celebrity CEO. She ruled over the most famous “unicorn” in Silicon Valley. She was touted by women’s groups and politicians. She had recently hosted a tour for the Obama administration’s chief science-and-tech adviser, which the press covered with the usual fawning language. She was untouchable and answered to no one for anything, it seemed.

  “What’s this about?” Roy asked suspiciously when Sheila and Gary sat down in his office.

  Sheila told him a sanitized version of Tony’s disclosures, mindful of not exposing her by using her name. In fact, she told him Tony had nothing to do with it, and other GHS staffers had come to her on Tony’s recommendation. Roy listened politely, but when she finished, he looked away—not a good sign.

  “What sort of agenda do these people have going? Aren’t they paid enough? These Valley techies are entitled little babies who ought to grow up. Erica’s giving them the best jobs they’ve ever had.” He sounded unusually irritated.

  Gary spoke up. “Roy, this is a lot more serious than that. We don’t have a good grasp on the technical details of GHS’s product. To be realistic, we know nothing about the technology. We’ve relied upon Erica’s assurances she has top people working for her. You have to admit there’s been a lot of happy talk and promises from Erica and not a lot of results. And this latest thing? A visit from a federal agency? And why are the GHS employees talking to outsiders? We need to give them the benefit of the doubt and investigate their concerns and see if there’s any truth to them. I think we have to take what Sheila is telling us seriously. You’re a cagey guy. Talk to the other board people and see who else is harboring some doubts.”

  He looked from Sheila to Gary and back again at Sheila. “Okay. Fine. I’ll talk to them.”

  * * *

  Sheila reported her conversation with Gary and Roy to Tony.

  “You what?” Tony asked. “What did you say?”

  “I kept your name out of it. No one will know.”

  “Erica will know. She’s got Huey and HR spying on all of us. I told you.”

  “I thought it was a good idea. I thought you wanted me to tell them. I thought you’d be relieved. I’m surprised at your negative reaction.”

  Tony sat back in her chair, arms at her side. Then she rubbed her head as though she had a headache. Sheila looked chagrined.

  “You have no idea what Erica is like.”

  Sheila spoke with some heat. “Oh, I have a very good idea. Remember? I went to a few board meetings. I tried to pry a legal agreement with some company out of Erica, and I couldn’t do it. So no, I’m not totally ignorant.”

  “But you can’t do anything about anything.”

  “Maybe Roy and some of the other board people can.”

  “I’m not holding my breath,” Tony said sarcastically.

  She went into the bedroom and lay on the bed. Sheila followed, sat on the edge of the bed, and stroked her hair.

  “What can I do?”

  Tony rolled over and their gazes met. She said, “This is probably not going to work out the way I want it to. I need to do what’s best for me, for us.”

  Sheila said nothing, just continued to try to soothe her.

  * * *

  It was sort of odd how workdays somehow seemed to flow along in a normal way when nothing felt normal. Sanjay still had her testing samples with the commercial analyzers. She assumed the engineering group was, once again, trying to tinker with Leonardo and tweak it into some form of reliability. Meantime, Sheila’s dad was supposedly going to confront Erica with the hearsay about her less-than-ethical behavior. And Huey’s too, Tony hoped. That guy was something, the biggest asshole she’d ever worked for. Her view of Erica was highly tarnished as well.

  Between the technical and regulatory shenanigans and her siccing Huey on everyone to beat them into submission, it was hard to maintain motivation for work and to feel any sort of trust. At the bottom what was there to really believe in? This vision that Erica had so marvelously articulated to her
in her interview and continued to tout in all staff meetings was not materializing. Quite the opposite.

  Tony brooded. She wasn’t sure what she wanted to do. She could quit, as Sheila suggested. That seemed cowardly, but what about her own integrity that was being eroded more every day?

  Her cell phone rang, and she didn’t recognize the number, but she picked up anyhow.

  “Hi, Tony. Gordon Ames here.”

  “Wow, Gordo. What a surprise to hear from you. How nice. How are you?”

  “I’m good. I like my new job. The company is a normal sort of start-up. It’s only berserk in the usual start-up way, but not nearly as much drama as GHS, thank God.” He chuckled. “How are you? How’s things?”

  Tony wanted to tell him everything, but she hesitated to talk while sitting in her cube, where it was neither private nor safe.

  “That is quite a long story, and I can’t get into it over the phone. Do you want to have lunch or something?”

  “That’s exactly what I was hoping we could do. I have something to talk to you about, and I agree we need some privacy.”

  “Really? You don’t say? Well, why don’t we head over to that barbecue joint in East Palo Alto you love. We won’t run into any GHS people there. Not their neighborhood.” The place Tony had in mind was in a black neighborhood, East Palo Alto, and most techs from GHS were generally scared to go there.

  “That’ll work. Can you Uber it? I don’t want to go anywhere near the GHS campus. I can’t risk anyone recognizing me, and well, there’s other stuff. I’ll tell you later. Next Wednesday at one okay?”

  “Yeah. I can make it.

  * * *

  When Sheila asked Roy if he’d talked to any board members, his response infuriated her.

  “They know things aren’t going that well, but they don’t think there’s a big issue. They think it’s just the usual start-up growing pains.”

  “So, they’re ostriches basically. They don’t want to know. Dad, you know this is bad. Erica could be heading for a major disaster. The board has to step in. It’s their job.” Sheila emphasized the last word.

  “Well. Yes. I know.”

  “So? No one is willing to step up?”

  “I think one or two might.”

  “Well, work on them, Pops. Get some allies, make a plan next time you meet, confront Erica. You can do it. Do you agree we have some serious issues with GHS?”

  “Yes. Some of the people I talked to agreed that all wasn’t copacetic, and Erica could be problematical.”

  “Great. Work on them. Come on. You can forge a consensus. You know how to do that. You’ve always been good at it.”

  * * *

  “I forgot how tasty the food here is,” Tony said as she devoured a barbecued pork sandwich. “I basically never go out to lunch anymore.”

  Gordon picked at his plate of baby-back ribs. They stuck to innocuous subjects at first: Tony and Sheila moving in together and Gordon’s new job. Gordon told her the story of how he was fired, and, sadly, it was all too familiar. At least he seemed happy in his new job.

  After a beat of silence, Tony said, “So. What did you want to tell me about?”

  Gordon pressed his lips together. He’d never been especially open about what he was thinking. He was kind and friendly to her when they worked together but was never a big talker. Except that one time when he told her how Erica had faked the Leonardo 1.0 results. That had turned out to be a huge sign of things to come.

  “I got a call about three weeks ago. It was a reporter from the Washington Post.” He paused.

  “What did he or she want?” Tony asked reasonably but had already begun to feel tense. Funny how the term ‘reporter’ could have that effect. Gordon seemed terribly uncomfortable as well.

  “He. He told me he’d heard from this medical blogger that all may not be as it seems at GHS. This blogger said to the reporter, ‘Maybe you ought to look into it.’ Meaning GHS. Long round-about meander through various former employees and Stanford folks and whatnot, and he came to me. I decided to tell him what I knew from when I worked there.”

  “Wow.” That was all Tony could come up with.

  “Yeah.” Gordo looked unhappy. “This reporter, Avery’s his name, knew the right questions to ask. I spilled.”

  “Why?” Tony was genuinely curious about his motivation. At the time they were working together, Gordon had been a straight arrow, to all appearances a loyal company man.

  “This blogger guy—he’s a doctor—and he knows what he’s talking about. He told Avery there’s no way this type of technology is ever going to work. The laws of physics and chemistry make Leonardo inoperable. It’s all a sham.”

  And with those words, Tony’s heart froze, and her stomach turned over. It was as though she had this truth buried in her subconscious and was afraid to let it free. Gordon’s statement busted it open, and it flew straight into her waking brain. She’d been trying to ignore it for over a year, but it was time to stop playing around and accept reality.

  “Do you think that’s true?” she asked Gordon.

  “Yeah. I read the doctor’s blog about it. I always said I didn’t know squat about biochemistry and lab science and all. But I’m an engineer, and I thought there had to be a reason all the fixes and tweaks and tinkering weren’t cutting it. It’s really simple chemistry.”

  “It doesn’t work,” Tony said flatly. That thought had been waiting in her brain all along and had just needed the right moment or right motivation to come out. There it was—what Tony had been denying to herself for months. She had always thought Erica was brilliant, and she’d been awarded patents for the Leonardo, and that meant the technology worked.

  Tony said, wryly. “I always figured it was an engineering problem, not a chemistry problem.”

  “Nope. It will never work, no matter how much engineering is applied. And the worst, most horrifying thing is that Erica has everyone convinced the Leonardo does work or will shortly. She’s lying, to everyone. To the public, the patients, the investors, the employees. She’s got us all fooled.”

  They sat silently for a few moments.

  Gordon said, “When I was unemployed, I read a biography of Steve Jobs. Remember how Erica always quoted him like he was God or something?”

  “Yeah, I think so.” Tony said.

  “Well. The bio said that one of Steve Jobs’ superpowers, maybe his biggest, was he could create a reality-distortion field around himself. He could convince everyone he knew to buy in to what he thought. That’s what Erica did too.”

  “Right. Now I see that. It worked to some extent.”

  “Yes, but Jobs actually produced a viable product, a lot of them. Erica, so far, has not.”

  “That’s true.”

  Gordon said, grimly. “This is all going to come out sometime, probably soon.”

  “What did you tell the reporter?” Tony asked.

  “Everything I knew, every last detail. He put me on background, and he’s not using my name. He promised.”

  “So, your NDA doesn’t matter anymore?”

  “I looked stuff up on the Net and don’t think they can do anything to me. I don’t care. They won’t know it was me anyhow. But I wanted to talk to you to ask you to meet the reporter. He asked me for names, and I thought of you.”

  “I can’t do that,” Tony said automatically.

  “Well. Yeah, it’s dicey because you still work there. If GHS finds out you talked, yep, they can sue you.”

  “You are really not concerned?” Tony asked.

  “No. My conscience is what I care about.”

  Tony didn’t think too hard but abruptly said, “I made an anonymous complaint to CLIA about the lab.”

  “What’s CLIA?”

  Tony explained the whole thing to him, including the fact that her plan didn’t work. His shocked expression said it all.

  “Wow. You did that? And nothing happened? This is really bad, Tone.”

  “Yes. It’s the worst. I�
��ve been wondering what to do since then.”

  “Talk to the reporter and tell him what you know.”

  “I’ll have to quit GHS first. I can’t do it while I still work there. They’ll find out.”

  “They might still find out anyhow. Think about it.”

  * * *

  Instead of trying to think it through by herself, Tony told Sheila. They were in the hot tub, supposedly relaxing before dinner. Instead of admiring her body as she usually did, Tony watched Sheila’s face. Sheila sat still, her blank, neutral expression not registering any emotion. That scared Tony more than any outburst ever would. Sheila said nothing for a long time, and when she finally spoke, her voice sounded unfamiliar. It was tight and flat, absent of any compassion or understanding.

  “You cannot talk to the reporter,” Sheila said finally. “That would be the worst thing you could do.”

  “Because?” Tony thought she knew the answer, but she needed to hear Sheila say it out loud.

  “The perception of a company by the public is as valuable as its actual monetary value. Something negative, whether it’s true or not, something that damages the public value or opinion, has a snowball effect. GHS will never recover. It will be done. Over.”

  “You’ll lose your investment,” Tony said dully.

  “Yes. We will. All of it.”

  “But if what Gordon says is true, and the reporter writes it that way, you’ll lose it anyhow. Fraud. That’s what it is, honey. I’ve come to believe that. Based on all I know, Erica is going around touting technology that doesn’t exist, that doesn’t do what she says it does. She’s faking it, and I don’t think she’s going to make it. I’ve been trying to tell myself that we just hadn’t hit upon the right methods and it would all work out in time. I was willing to believe that it was all start-up shenanigans, like you said. But it’s not that. It isn’t going to happen, sweetheart.”