Chapter 7
Mom touched the lid of the box.
“Your father made copies of everything he could find.”
I picked up one letter.
It was dated three months after my accident.
Jason's signature was at the bottom.
I read the first paragraph.
Then the second.
Halfway down the page, I stopped.
“Mom.”
“I know.”
“This says Jason acknowledged that ARIA belonged to me.”
“Yes.”
My pulse hammered.
“Then why did Dad never tell me?”
“He tried.”
“No, he didn't.”
“He came to the hospital twice intending to talk to you. You were frightened about whether you'd ever work normally again. Jason was beside you. The company was struggling. Your father thought…”
She looked down.
“He thought there would be time.”
Time.
That word again.
The most expensive thing my family had ever believed we possessed.
I reached for the flash drive.
“What is on this?”
“I don't know. Thomas never told me.”
The next morning, Daniel's digital-forensics expert opened it in his office.
Most files were ordinary.
Prototype schematics.
Old test data.
Emails between me and Westbridge.
Then we found a folder labeled MARCH REVIEW.
Inside was an audio recording.
My father's voice came first.
Then Jason's.
The conversation had taken place in my parents' study ten years earlier.
My father sounded tired.
“You need to correct the filing, Jason.”
“I will.”
“When?”
“When Iris is better.”
“She doesn't need to be better for her name to be on her own work.”
A long silence followed.
Then Jason said something that made Daniel stop the recording.
Not because it proved he had stolen the company.
Not because it solved the case.
Because it revealed that the truth was more complicated than I had imagined.
Jason said:
“If her name goes onto the ownership documents now, the investors walk. They think her recovery makes the technology unstable. Give me six months. I'll close the round, stabilize the company, and transfer half of everything back to her. She'll never lose anything.”
Daniel slowly looked at me.
Jason had not begun with a plan to erase me.
He had begun with a compromise.
A temporary lie.
One he had apparently convinced himself was necessary.
And temporary lies had a dangerous habit of becoming permanent when they started making someone rich.
But the recording wasn't finished.
Daniel pressed play.
My father's voice returned.
“Six months, Jason. After that, I tell Iris everything.”
Then Jason answered.
“I understand.”