The digital clock on my desk read 11:58 AM.

I sat perfectly still, my hands folded atop the pristine glass surface of my desk, listening to the rhythmic, muted hum of the server farm two floors below. The office was quiet. To the rest of the floor, it was just another mundane Tuesday leading up to

The summons arrived on Wednesday afternoon, exactly forty-eight hours after Victoria Croft had condescendingly ordered me to step down as CFO.

A harsh, digital chime cut through the silence of my office. An Outlook calendar notification flashed on my screen: *Emergency Board Meeting. Mandatory Atte

The silence in the boardroom was absolute, dense, and suffocating. It was the kind of silence that preceded a devastating implosion. The board members—mostly elderly men in bespoke suits who had coasted on my financial projections for the last three years—stared at Silas Thorne as if he had just mat