Running Dark

18

STARK ESCORTED EMMA THROUGH THE AIRPORT.

“Come on. We won’t need to go through security,” he told her.

Emma followed him to a private exit. Stark pushed open a metal door that led directly onto the tarmac. Jets lined up on both sides of them, glowing under the sodium lights. He walked toward a large, sleek number parked fifty feet away and proceeded up the ladder to the main door. The inside of the aircraft was plush but surprisingly compact. Each leather seat was the size of a commercial plane’s first-class seat, but there were only eight of them in two groups of four. Each grouping had a small coffee table in the center, and one had a tray with a laptop already up and running. Two men were in the cockpit, writing on clipboards. The first smiled when he saw Stark.

“We’re all set. Flight should be a breeze. We’ll be there in time for your meeting. Strap in. We’ll leave in ten minutes.”

Stark put his bags in an overhead compartment and shut it. He lowered himself into a nearby chair. Emma did the same. True to the pilot’s word, they were in the air within ten minutes in a smooth takeoff.

Stark spent the first twenty minutes of the flight taking call after call on a hands-free unit. He talked to various Price executives, two organizers of the Comrades race, and to the main office in the States. He would hang up, and the phone would ring again immediately. After he was done with the calls, he turned to Emma.

“Let’s talk about Cardovin.”

Emma took a deep breath. She wouldn’t feel guilty about her findings, no matter how devastating they were. “You had some questions?”

Stark grimaced. “I have so many I don’t know where to start. You said Cardovin does nothing to clear one’s blood of the plaque that can form on arteries, but are there any conditions the drug can treat?”

Emma thought for a moment. She could see where he was heading, but she wasn’t sure she wanted to make any statements she couldn’t support.

“Are you thinking of an off-label effect?”

Stark nodded. “An off-label use would save us. We could still sell it, we wouldn’t need renewed FDA approval, and the drug would be beneficial to someone.”

Emma ran the clinical test results through her head. She didn’t see how any of them would support off-label use.

“I don’t think so. Most off-label benefits are noted anecdotally by the physicians who prescribe the drug for its approved use. I’m not aware of any for Cardovin.”

“But what if there were a disease that it could affect?”

To Emma it sounded as though Stark were grasping at straws. “Can I speak plainly?”

He shrugged. “You were exceedingly frank back there in the lab. Why change now?”

“Any off-label use you could find for Cardovin won’t fill a four-billion-dollar hole in your sales.”

Stark stared out the window, saying nothing for a while.

“Price can’t afford to lose billions in sales,” he said at last. “If the stock plummets, we’ll have to contract to conserve cash. Thousands will lose their jobs. Not to mention the loss to the shareholders. Price may never recover from the blow. It’s imperative that we find a use for Cardovin.”

“Price is constantly in research and development for new drugs. Don’t you have some new products in the pipeline for approval that can pick up the slack?”

Stark sighed. “We do, actually, but they’re still in the clinical-trial stage. It could be two, maybe three years before the FDA approves the next one. We’ll need operating cash in the interim. Cash that Cardovin would provide.”

Emma saw his point. While she felt sorry for the loss of jobs, she saw no way to salvage the drug. If it didn’t work, it was unethical to pretend that it did. In fact, Emma wasn’t entirely certain that the prior sale of the drug wasn’t bordering on consumer fraud. Her results were in line with several other previous studies, yet Price’s marketing arm churned out glowing statistics regarding Cardovin’s efficacy. The marketing materials were careful to use terms like “in combination with other drugs” when discussing the results, but it still seemed to Emma like too much hype given the actual reports. She was glad she didn’t have to decide how to withdraw the drug. Price’s lawyers had that unenviable job. She stared out the window, feeling her eyelids becoming heavy. It had been a long, strange day. She stared into the darkness and struggled to stay awake. Stark reached out and pressed a button. The lights in the cabin dimmed.

“Tell me again why you’re going to Nairobi?” His voice helped revive her. Emma hesitated. Stark caught her pause. “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t wish to.”

“Just on a business matter.”

“It’s pretty sudden business.”

“It’s for a company called Darkview. They tend to have sudden business.”

“Ah, so it’s for Banner.”

It was a statement. Emma was surprised he even knew the name.

“How do you know about him?”

“Wasn’t he the guy that rescued the Colombian hostages? He’s all over the news. Cooley’s committee is trying to bury him for blowing up the pipeline.”

“That’s him,” Emma said.

“You trust this man?”

“With my life.”

“Is he the only man you’d trust with your life?”

“In addition to my father, there’s one other. His name is Cameron Sumner.”

“Where’s he?”

“I have no idea.”

Stark gave her a searching look. She returned to gazing out the window. The low cabin lights and the hum of the engines calmed her. She stared at a reflective white area on the airplane’s wing. It reminded her of a song about the lines running along the freeway. She heard Stark shift in his seat.

“You seem worried about him.”

Emma sighed. “I am, but that’s not what I was thinking about.”

“What are you thinking?” Stark’s voice came out of the gloom.

Emma found the question surprising in its intimacy. At first she thought not to answer. But then decided she should. Something about being in the dark, heading toward a shared destination, made her feel less wary of him.

“I’m thinking about the words to that song. About the white lines on the freeway.”

“Joni Mitchell.”

“It is hers, isn’t it?”

“Yes.”

“What are you thinking?” Emma asked.

Stark was silent a beat. “I’m thinking that no one has ever said that they’d trust their life to me.”

They subsided into silence. Emma looked away from Stark. She thought everyone needed to have one person believe in them, depend on them, and, if the chips were down, trust them implicitly. That Stark didn’t have such a person in his life made him seem isolated despite his outward success.

“Has anyone entrusted his life to you?” Stark said.

Emma nodded in the darkness. “I’d like to think that Patrick, my late fiancé, would have. And Cameron Sumner did in Colombia.”

“Late fiancé? Did he die?”

Emma felt her throat constrict, as it always seemed to when someone asked her about Patrick.

“Car accident. Over a year ago. He was hit by a drunken driver. I wasn’t with him when he died, but if I had been, I would have done everything in my power to save him.” She shook away the thought. Thinking too much of Patrick usually sent her down a road that she found too hard to step off.

“I’m sorry.”

“Thank you.”

“And Cameron Sumner, was he right?” Stark’s voice pulled her out of her melancholy thoughts.

“Right? What do you mean?”

“To trust you with his life?”

Emma nodded. “I think so.”

She saw Stark turn his head toward her. “Would you do it again?”

“You mean, would I save his life again?” she said.

“Yes.”

“Absolutely.”

“This is someone you love, then,” Stark said.

Emma shook her head. “The man I love is dead.”

He looked at her. “Maybe no one has ever entrusted their life to me, but thousands have entrusted their jobs, money, and health to me. I don’t want to let them down. I’ll do whatever it takes to keep Price afloat.”

Emma said nothing. Personally, she didn’t equate saving someone’s job or money to saving that person’s life, but Stark’s loyalty to Price was admirable, if a little extreme. Emma doubted she’d ever fight so hard for a corporation, but to men like Stark perhaps the company was everything.

They landed in Nairobi on an approach and touchdown that were as smooth as anything Emma had ever experienced. After a few minutes, the pilot emerged, looking tired. Stark conversed with him while his copilot opened the door.

Emma stuck a hand out. “Thanks for the flight. My first on a private plane.”

The copilot smiled. “Did you like it?”

She smiled back at him. “I loved it. The only way to fly.”

The copilot looked pleased.

Stark didn’t join in the conversation. He gazed out the jet’s door with a preoccupied expression on his face. Emma turned to see what he was watching, and her heart dropped. Two stoic-looking men in uniform stared back at her, their expressions grim. A third man, not in uniform but in dark jeans, a black sweater, and dark gym shoes, also peered up at them. He had curly black hair that hit just below his collar, a ring in his left ear, and a BlackBerry phone in his hand. He flashed a huge smile at Emma.

“Signorina Caldridge? It is I. Giovanni Roducci. Here to meet you!” Roducci spoke English with an Italian-laced accent and held his hands out in an expansive gesture.

Stark moved up behind her. “The two in uniform are from immigration, but who’s the gigolo?”

“He is Giovanni Roducci. Here to meet me,” Emma said. She gave Stark a warning look. “Please try to be cordial.”

“Why?”

“Something tells me I’m going to need his help.”

“Okay. But a bit of advice: Don’t trust this man with your life.”