Chapter 2

Jake paused, greed flashing in his eyes. "If you've got nothing to hide, transfer the machine's access rights to the company. Let everyone see what's really going on under the hood."

The cards were finally on the table. So, this was the setup all along.

The company was about to seek funding. A six-figure piece of hardware running the core stack, still registered under my name, was a glaring liability on paper.

Martin wanted to use Jake's accusation as leverage and strong-arm my private property into company assets.

"Jake has a point," Martin insisted with a nod, his tone leaving no room for debate. "Susan, if you've got nothing to hide, hand over access. Besides, servers should be under centralized company control anyway. You holding root access alone isn't exactly compliant."

Not compliant, huh?

Back when he begged me to bring the machine in to put out fires, he had called it loyalty. Now that he wanted it all for himself, it was suddenly "the company's policy".

I swept my gaze around the conference room.

Leonard Cole from Finance kept his head down, sipping his coffee. Just last month, his cooked books nearly blew up, and I'd used this very machine to recover the data he had shredded.

Wendy Moore from HR was quietly recording on her phone. Six months ago, she wiped the entire attendance database. I had pulled two all-nighters to restore it for her.

In a place driven by self-interest, favors meant nothing.

"Fine."

I stood up and pulled a black USB drive from my pocket. It was the hardware key for that workstation.

I set it down on the table and said, "The key's here. The root password is the company's founding date. If you want it, take it."

Martin clearly hadn't expected me to cave this easily. He froze for a beat, then a flicker of barely contained excitement flashed in his eyes.

After a look from Martin, Jake grabbed the USB drive and clenched it tight, as though he had just secured his fast track to a promotion and a raise.

"See, Ms. Chapman? That wasn't so hard," Jake taunted. "No need to make a scene in front of everyone."

I looked at him—young, arrogant, and definitely clueless. Little did he know, I had modded the cooling system on that machine myself. The liquid cooling loop required a very specific handling.

More importantly, the real core wasn't even the hardware.

"Mr. Miller, now that the handover's done, let me give you a heads-up," I said, looking at Martin. "The machine's got quite a temper. I've always handled the maintenance myself. If something goes wrong—"

"That's enough, Susan," Martin interrupted me, waving me off impatiently. "Jake's a top student from a prestigious computer science program. He knows his way around this kind of hardware. You don't need to worry. Just focus on reflecting on your issues."

Oh, reflecting?

I nodded, picked up my coat, and draped it over my arm. "Alright, I'll head out then."

As I walked out of the conference room, I heard Jake's elated voice behind me. "Mr. Miller, this setup is insane! With this machine, we won't need to rent cloud servers anymore! We'll save tens of thousands a year!"

A cold smile crept onto my lips.

Saving money? Oh, no, no. Sooner or later, they would learn that some costs were paid in blood.

…

At 2:00 pm, a company-wide email dropped into everyone's inbox.

"Disciplinary Notice Regarding Operations Director Susan Chapman's Unauthorized Use of Company Computing Resources."

The notice didn't bother with nuance. It went straight to a guilty verdict.

My misconduct included long-term misuse of company servers, wastage of electricity and bandwidth, serious data security risks, and more.

The penalties were just as blunt—immediate one-week suspension, revocation of my full performance bonus for the month, and a reimbursement fee of 58 thousand dollars for resource usage.

I sat at my desk, staring at the email, and couldn't help laughing. They really had the nerve, demanding 58 thousand dollars, huh?

Over the past three years, the commercial-grade internet line I paid for out of pocket had already cost more than that. Not to mention the depreciation on that workstation.

Now, they wanted me to pay them?

"Ms. Chapman, this is the breakdown Finance put together."