They stole three years of my work in one meeting. I let them. I

What Chad did not know, what Megan did not know, was that the forecasting model had a signature. Every prediction it generated carried a hidden hash tied to my personal GitHub, timestamped, notarized, filed with a patent attorney my father had introduced me to before he passed. I had not built it to trap them. I had built it because my dad always said, protect your work, beta, the world will try to wear your name off it. Two weeks after the boardroom, a rival firm offered our CEO a licensing deal for the model. He said yes before checking the paperwork. The paperwork came back with my name on it. Only my name. That Friday, the CEO called me into his office. Chad and Megan were already there, pale, rehearsed. He asked me, very quietly, if I had anything I wanted to say. I opened my laptop and played the elevator audio. Stay in your lane, Chad’s voice said, crisp as glass. Then I played the Slack messages Megan had sent about me to the group chat called No Priyas Allowed. The CEO did not speak for a long time. By Monday, Chad was gone. Megan was gone. I was offered their combined salaries to lead a new department, and I said no. I had already signed with the rival firm, as head of research, with equity. On my last day, I walked past the printer desk one more time. I left a single sticky note on the monitor. It said, thank you for teaching me my worth. That night I did not microwave rice. I sat in a small restaurant across from my mother, who had flown in to celebrate, and I told her everything. She cried and laughed and held my hand across the table, and for the first time in three years, the chair across from me was not empty. My father’s photograph sat in my purse, smiling up at both of us, finally home.