The Vibrant Years(6)
She knocked on CJ’s door and opened it without waiting for an answer.
CJ was hanging upside down on her back-stretching machine. Cullie had never actually seen BDSM equipment, but this contraption had dungeon of pain written all over it.
“Curlie,” CJ enunciated in her British way, still upside down. “Give me a moment. The sciatica’s been a whore lately.”
Cullie kept her face utterly serious as CJ pressed a button and the machine rotated her the right side up.
“My best friend’s a healer,” Cullie said. “I can have him send you energy. My grandmother swears by his healing light.” Bless Bharat for his woo-woo ways.
CJ unstrapped herself with impressive deftness. “Really? Why did I not know this?”
Because my asshole ex always got in the middle of every conversation we ever tried to have outside of Shloka.
“Send me a picture. His healing circle likes to have a photograph; it helps them channel energy.”
CJ, who was the tallest woman Cullie had met in real life—nearly a foot taller than Cullie’s own very average five-foot-four frame—walked right up to Cullie’s face in her bare feet.
It took Cullie a moment to realize that the woman was holding her face in a smile. Oh. She wanted Cullie to take a picture.
Okay. Holding up her phone, Cullie snapped a picture. “Got it. You can’t put a paid subscription on Shloka,” she said.
CJ’s eyes went to Steve, who had followed Cullie into CJ’s office. “I thought you said she was on board with this.”
“You bastard!” Cullie spun toward him.
He ignored her. As though she were too young for this conversation.
“I said she will be on board when she understands the benefits of the deal.” He spoke directly to CJ.
“You let him speak for me without checking with me first?” Cullie threw the question at the author who’d written last year’s bestseller about women in technology creating a safe space for one another. Balancing the Ladder had been hanging out on the New York Times bestseller list ever since its release without missing a week.
CJ blinked at Cullie, making it clear that no one had ever taken that tone with her.
“It’s fourteen million dollars in profit. Plus, every app has a life cycle. This one is past its downloading prime and is no longer selling enough Neurobands for us to stay profitable. Why wouldn’t we put a subscription fee on it? If we sell the app to another company, the first thing they’ll do is slap one on.” At least her tone was curious, fair. Not patronizing.
“We can’t sell it. I can’t have someone turn it into a hack meditation app like all the other ones out there.” They had labeled it a meditation app, but Shloka was really a tool that helped you come back to yourself. It monitored your vitals during episodes that made you feel out of control and helped you work through and calm your emotions. It worked with the Neuroband Cullie had designed, a bracelet that measured heart rate and breath so the app could match them with ancient chants. Shloka realigned you.
Millions of people needed it to get through the day. Anxiety was at epidemic levels in the world right now.
“I know,” CJ said. “That’s why a subscription is our only answer. The projections are bad. It’s going to be worth your while. Trust me.”
“I already have more money than I know what to do with. I won’t compromise something that helps people.”
CJ let out the deepest sigh. “Just twenty-five,” she said, almost to herself. “I’d like to meet your mother someday.” She scratched her cropped hair—almost the exact same style as Cullie’s—and studied Cullie as though she were a wonder. Well, she was, but the CEO had never looked at her this way. “My children blow through money like it’s dust in a sandstorm. And they haven’t made any of it themselves.” Just as easily, her frustrated-mom face swapped back to her CEO face. “I need this subscription fee to meet my numbers, or it’s my job on the line. We had a bad year.”
“So did our competitors,” Cullie countered, ignoring the sound Steve made somewhere behind her.
“Fair enough. But I can’t save everyone else’s job if I don’t save mine.”
“You said it was past its download prime in the life cycle. A subscription fee will make that worse. It will make customers drop Shloka en masse.” Which meant people who needed it wouldn’t be able to keep using it. “What if I gave you another app. A new one that starts a life cycle. One that uses the Neuroband so we get fresh sales on that hardware. But only if you keep Shloka funded and free.”
Cullie had no idea where that had come from, but one elegantly tweezed brow rose as CJ met her eyes. “You have something you’ve been working on?” Her gaze swept to Steve, who’d been breathing heavily but wordlessly. CJ and the board had been begging Cullie for something new for two years.
Throwing Steve under the bus, wiping that patronizing smirk off his face: it would be delicious. But she couldn’t do it. “I haven’t told him about it. It’s a passion project. No one knows about it.” Not even Cullie herself, because she’d just pulled that out of thin air. Well, she’d simply have to come up with something.
“Can I talk to you alone?” Steve said behind her.
Cullie was about to tell him to take a hike when she realized he wasn’t talking to her. He was talking to CJ. A fresh wave of betrayal rose like water in her lungs, so swift and brutal the Neuroband on her wrist vibrated for her to calm down. To hell with that. She was angry enough to blow out Shloka’s algorithm.