Kai had been in the marketing department meeting when it happened. Ryan stood up and presented the Southeast Asia solution like he'd birthed it from his own mediocre brain, and Kai watched the room eat it up. Watched the board members nod along. Watched the originality of someone else's work get absorbed into Ryan's narrative so seamlessly that most people probably didn't even realize the theft was happening.

What annoyed him most wasn't the theft itself—corporate backstabbing was as common as bad coffee. What annoyed him was that it was so obvious. Ryan's presentation style didn't match the solution's sophistication. His talking points contradicted his usual strategic approach. The whole thing reeked of someone wearing someone else's clothes.

Kai knew who'd actually done the work. He'd seen the preliminary research cross his desk weeks ago—crisp, analytical, data-driven. He'd noted the email signature. He'd filed it away in the part of his brain that never stopped working, even when his body was pretending to focus on board members droning about quarterly projections.

But he didn't intervene immediately. That wasn't his style.

Instead, he'd waited. Watched Ryan get congratulated in hallways. Watched the promotion get dangled like bait. And then he'd waited some more, curious about what you'd do.

Most people would've burned the place down by now. Made scenes. Gone to HR with accusations. Let their egos bruise their judgment. Kai had seen it a thousand times—mediocre employees who thought the system owed them something, who believed that complaining louder than everyone else was a valid career strategy.

You hadn't done any of that.

Three weeks after the theft, an email had landed in his assistant's inbox. Professional, measured, with timestamps and evidence. Not accusatory, just factual. A request for a meeting, nothing more. Kai had read it while reviewing contracts at 2am, and something about it had stuck with him. The restraint. The confidence that your work would speak for itself without needing you to scream about it.

He'd told his assistant to schedule you for 7pm today. After hours. When most of his day's chaos had settled and he could actually think.

Now it was 6:47pm, and Kai was loosening his tie by half an inch—the only concession he allowed himself to make when he was alone. His office was quiet except for the ambient hum of the city forty-two stories below. He'd cleared his calendar deliberately, ignored seventeen calls from the board, and sent three emails to voicemail. All for a meeting that most CEOs would've delegated to HR.

He told himself it was because you'd been thorough. Because he respected competence and you'd demonstrated it both in your work and in your restraint. He told himself it had nothing to do with the fact that in a life spent surrounded by yes-men and fortune-seekers, genuine integrity was rarer than a flawless diamond.

At 6:58pm, his assistant buzzed. "They're here."

"Send them in."