The Woman Who Stopped Traffic Read Online Free PDF Page B

all the new ‘n’ cool stuff we’ll be launching shortly. It’s not really an offsite, it’s at the Sunnyvale office – but it will be a Sunday, so we should get some stuff done. You really should come along.”
    “I need to fly to Seattle.”
    “Natalie!” and he gave her his finest doggy-dinner-bowl look. “Come along tomorrow.” And before she had chance to say ‘no’:
    “Hey, wanna go blading?”

CHAPTER 4
     
    Going roller blading with Tom Nguyen was one thing, but staying at his apartment was quite another. Thankfully, the question didn’t arise. Tom informed Natalie that Clamor was now treating her trip as an official recruiting event, and paying for her room at the Keaton.
    She got back there by late evening. An enormous box of Ghiradelli chocolates lay at the foot of her bed. She put a ‘ Shhhh ’ sign on the door, slipped into her silk pj bottoms and favorite ribbed top, then treated herself to a night of Grey’s Anatomy and CSI , lounging among the cool bed sheets while picking off the dark chocolate creams.
    She awoke early feeling sluggish. She meditated then went down to the stately lobby for a fresh orange juice, a large latte and a New York Times .
    “Miss Chevalier,” called out the concierge. “How are we today? Hertz has delivered a rental car, courtesy of your hosts.”
    She walked through the front entranceway. It was a glorious San Francisco day. A tram gave a mournful toot and ding ding as it whirred along California, half-a-block away. The Hertz car was a Ford Taurus Limited, but new and surprisingly solid feeling with its hefty three-and-a-half-liter engine and stitched leather seats.
    By mid morning, she was ready. As she reversed the Taurus out of its valet spot, an image magically appeared in the rearview mirror – a camera view from the rear of the vehicle. It vanished again as she swung forward onto Stockton. Nice. Once again, she was impressed by how they’d thought to take care of her needs while in town.
    She exited the city. A sign in garish motel neon flew past: ‘Yahoo! A Nice Place to Stay on the Web’. She passed the airport and, with the light Sunday traffic, was soon in the Valley.
    The name had once conjured up things fertile and mysterious but that day it didn’t even look like a valley to her. It was flat and sun parched and it dissolved into bright haze as she searched fruitlessly towards the horizon. Silicon Valley would often be twenty degrees warmer than the fog-prone city. Here and there, a steel-framed, mirror-glassed building erupted from the tawny scrub, marking some start-up’s ascension to stock market success. Natalie suddenly couldn’t understand why anyone would want to live there. Perhaps for the reduced distractions from its infamous seven-day workweeks?
    The Clamor office was a white, four story building on the nondescript outskirts of Sunnyvale. From the street, she could just make out the discrete logo next to a smoked glass entranceway. The cars in the parking lot were equally forgettable: an old Honda Civic, an older Ford Taurus … her Hertz rental car would fit right on in. Slightly off to the side was a pale-blue, modern Beetle. You would never have guessed that the owners would soon be worth as much as a small country’s GDP. Would the parking lot look any different post-IPO? Probably not. There would be the odd Audi or Volvo, but nothing more flashy. It was such an odd game of appearances, she reflected: ‘For bankers, for VCs, it’s about the money. For us it’s about so much more.’ Yet what if someone tried to take all that money away? It was just a different kind of religion, Natalie concluded – for which she was attending her first Sunday service in a while.
    She parked and walked towards the main doorway, pushing her sunglasses up into her hair and scrutinizing the entry arrangements: simple key card access, no guard. Through the smoked glass, she could make out Tom Nguyen coming towards her. He’d probably been there