What was going on
Calling accessSecretVersion with the Node.js @google-cloud/secret-manager client returns null instead of the secret payload. The client is constructed normally and the secret path is correct; the call silently yields nothing.

What fixed it
The null result was caused by the bluebird promise library, which shims promises globally and breaks the google-cloud client internals. Removing the global bluebird shim fixed it and accessSecretVersion started returning the secret payload. If you see null results from google-cloud Node clients, check for promise-shimming libraries first.