Chapter 2

The drive away from the office building was a blur. The city lights smeared across the rain-slicked windows. I didn' t go home. I couldn' t. Our house, the one I had helped design, felt like her territory now. I checked into a sterile, anonymous hotel downtown.

The first thing I did was call my lawyer.

"She fired me," I said, the words tasting like ash. "And she wants the patent."

"She can' t have it, Alex," my lawyer, a sharp woman named Clark, replied calmly. "The license agreement is ironclad. It terminates with your employment. Without you, the Phoenix system is just a pretty shell with a black hole in the middle."

A grim satisfaction settled in my chest. It wasn' t much, but it was something.

I spent the next hour on the phone, making arrangements, severing ties. Canceling joint credit cards. Moving my personal funds to a new account. Each action felt like cutting a cord, a painful but necessary separation.

My phone buzzed with a text from Sarah.

"Where are you? We need to talk about the transition. Don' t be childish, Alex."

I ignored it.

A few minutes later, she called. I let it go to voicemail.

Her message was a masterpiece of manipulation. Her voice was soft, laced with a manufactured concern that made my skin crawl.

"Alex, honey, I know you' re upset. I am too. This was the hardest decision I' ve ever had to make. But it was for the company. For us. Mark is just a temporary solution until the IPO goes through. Then, we can figure everything out. I promise. Just... come home. Please."

A bitter laugh escaped my lips. A promise from her was worthless. She' d said the same thing a year ago when she promoted herself to CEO without discussion. "It' s just a title, honey. We' re still partners." She' d said it when she insisted we use my savings to fund the initial launch, promising to pay it all back with interest.

I never saw a dime.

Her promises were tools to get what she wanted. And right now, she wanted my algorithm.

My phone rang again. This time, it was Mark. I stared at the screen, a fresh wave of anger washing over me. I almost declined, but morbid curiosity won.

"What?" I answered, my voice flat.

"Alex! Hey, buddy," he said, his voice oozing false friendliness. "Listen, no hard feelings, right? Business is business."

"What do you want, Mark?"

"Well, Sarah and I were looking at the server, and it seems like... a lot of your development files are gone. The documentation, the update logs... I can' t make sense of the back-end without them. Sarah said you' d be cooperative."

He was fishing. He knew exactly what I had done.

"The license covers the executable code," I said coldly. "My personal notes and research logs are my intellectual property. They' re not part of the deal."

There was a pause. I could hear Sarah' s sharp voice in the background, demanding to know what I said.

Mark came back on the line, his tone less friendly. "Look, Alex. Don' t make this harder than it needs to be. Sarah is already talking to the lawyers. She says you' re in breach of your fiduciary duty."

"My fiduciary duty ended when she fired me," I shot back. "Tell her to have her lawyers call my lawyer."

I hung up before he could respond.

The silence of the hotel room felt immense. I was adrift. The company was my life, and Sarah... Sarah had been my world. Now both were gone, twisted into something ugly and unrecognizable.

Just as I was sinking into that dark thought, my phone buzzed again. This time it was an unknown number. I almost ignored it, but something made me answer.

"Alex?"

The voice was familiar, but from a different lifetime.

"Emily?"

Emily Chen. My biggest rival in college, the one who always pushed me, who matched me code for code. We' d lost touch after graduation. I' d heard she became the CEO of a major tech firm, a competitor to what Sarah and I were trying to build.

"Yeah, it' s me," she said. Her voice was warm, empathetic. "I, uh... I heard what happened. My brother is one of your investors."

My head snapped up. "Your brother?"

"David Chen," she said. "He' s the lead VC on your Series B funding. He just called me. He' s... not happy."

David. My estranged brother. We hadn't spoken in years, not since a stupid fight after our parents' funeral. I had no idea he was the silent giant backing Sarah' s ambition. The lead investor. Sarah didn' t know either; he used a corporate name for the investment.

"He told me everything," Emily continued softly. "Alex, I' m so sorry. What she did was unforgivable."

Hearing that from her, from my old rival, meant more than she could ever know.

"It is what it is," I said, my voice thick.

"No, it' s not," she insisted. "Talent like yours doesn' t just get thrown away. Listen, I know the timing is awful, but this might be fate. We' re starting a new R&D division. A blue-sky lab, no strings attached. Just pure innovation. I want you to run it."

The offer hung in the air, a lifeline I hadn' t known I needed. A new beginning. A place where my work would be valued for what it was, not what it could earn someone else.

"Emily... I don' t know what to say."

"Say you' ll think about it," she said gently. "David is about to make things very difficult for Sarah. Her company is a house of cards without your tech. When it falls, I want you to have a place to land."

We talked for a little longer, the conversation easy and natural. It felt... good. Like breathing fresh air after being trapped in a stuffy room for years.

After we hung up, I looked out the window. The city didn't seem so hostile anymore.

A new text from Sarah popped up on my screen.

"Alex, I' m at home. I' ve cooked your favorite dinner. Just come home so we can talk this out like adults."

Another text immediately followed, this one from Mark. A picture of him at my desk in the office, feet up, a stupid grin on his face. The caption read: "Getting comfy in the new chair. Thanks for warming it up for me!"

I deleted both messages without a second thought.

The exhaustion was still there, but now it was mixed with something else. A flicker of hope. A spark of defiance.

Sarah thought this was a game she could win through manipulation. She had no idea who she was really up against. It wasn't just me anymore.

It was me and my brother.