Wait... it's the morning HR calls me into a private meeting.

For ten long seconds, the silence inside Conference Room B was heavy enough to crush bone.

Marcus Vance swallowed hard, his throat clicking in the quiet room. The arrogant corporate vice president was completely gone, replaced by a desperate, sweating fraudster scrambling for a lifeline.

"Susan... listen to her," Marcus babbled, his voice pitching up into an unnatural, frantic whine. "She's... she's delusional! She's fabricating this entire narrative because she couldn't handle being passed over for promotion! If you let her walk out of this room with those files, she'll leak them to the SEC, and the firm will face an immediate federal investigation!"

Susan Price didn't look at Marcus. She kept her eyes locked on me, her expression shifting from cold corporate hostility to a terrifying, calculated pragmatism.

"What do you want, Chloe?" Susan asked quietly, her voice dropping into a low, business-only register. "Name your terms."

I leaned back in my chair, crossing my arms over my chest, letting the power dynamic shift entirely onto my side of the table.

"My terms are very simple, Susan," I said.

I held up three fingers, ticking them off one by one:

"One: The redundancy package is officially canceled. My position as Senior Risk Analyst is retained, with an immediate thirty-percent base salary adjustment retroactive to the beginning of the fiscal year, alongside my full, unencumbered equity vesting schedule effective December first."

Susan hesitated for a fraction of a second, then nodded stiffly. "Agreed."

"Two: Marcus Vance is terminated immediately for cause—specifically, intellectual property theft, embezzlement, and breach of fiduciary duty. His office is cleared out by noon, and his equity options are forfeited back to the firm."

Marcus let out a loud, strangled gasp. "You can't do that! I've been with Sterling & Croft for eight years! Susan, you can't let her dictate executive terminations—"

Susan turned her head slowly toward Marcus, her eyes turning to solid, unyielding flint. "Shut up, Marcus. Your termination is effective immediately. Security will escort you to your desk in five minutes."

Marcus slumped back in his chair, his face collapsing into an expression of total, utter defeat.

"And three?" Susan asked, turning her attention back to me.

"And three," I said, casting a cold, indifferent glance toward Leo Parker, who looked as if he might pass out on the carpeted floor at any second, "Leo Parker stays on the analytics desk. But he doesn't get my job. He stays right where he is as a junior associate, reporting directly to me, on a strict twelve-month performance probation."

Leo let out a weak, pathetic whimper, burying his face in his hands.

Susan Price reached across the mahogany table, picked up the modified terms agreement from her iPad queue, and tapped her stylus against the screen.

"Done," Susan said, her voice dry as dust. "I'll have legal draw up the revised contracts and the termination paperwork for Marcus within the hour. Is there anything else, Chloe?"

I stood up from my chair, buttoning my navy blazer, picking up my hard drive, and sliding it back into the secure inner lining of my coat.