By my sophomore year, my tech startup had launched.

Caleb Kingsley — the venture capitalist who'd spotted me at a freshman pitch competition and written the first check — had come on board as my partner. With his backing, and what amounted to two lifetimes of business instinct, the product landed hard in the market.

I'd made my first real fortune. My profile had taken off.

Meanwhile, Felix was most of a year into his Australian working holiday and already cracking.

Naomi's Instagram was full of sunsets on Bondi Beach, açaí bowls, and long captions about "escaping the system."

Felix's actual life: graveyard shifts at a meat-packing plant in rural Queensland, sleeping eight guys to a bunkhouse, scraping by on instant ramen.

Then a trending article popped up on his phone — a business magazine cover story on me.

He maxed out his credit card on a standby ticket and flew back to the States. His tourist visa let him back in — barely.

He turned up in the lobby of my office building in Boston.

Wrinkled shirt. Hair oily.

His expression, though, was still superior.

He planted himself in front of my car with his hands in his pockets.

"You started a company? Something this big, and you didn't think to run it by me?"

I was in the backseat. I rolled down the window.

"Security. Get this vagrant off the premises."

Security stepped up and had him by the arm.

He thrashed against them.

"You're throwing me out?! Did you forget we grew up together?!"

"You wouldn't have a company without the ideas I gave you!"

"I'm entitled to half the equity!"

The sheer, polished nerve of it was almost funny.

"Ideas you gave me?"

I pushed open the door, stepped out, and stood in front of him.

"Are you referring to your idea about selling hot dogs outside the dorms?"

A few of my employees laughed out loud.

Felix's face went hot.

"Don't twist this! Naomi told me you used my ideas!"

"You have money now. You're going to give me a VP title."

"Or I'm suing you."

I looked at him, cold.

"Go ahead. I'll even cover your filing fee."

"Friendly reminder, though — extortion over five thousand dollars is a felony."

I turned to security.

"If this man shows up again, call the police."

Felix kept cursing as they dragged him out.

I thought that was the end of it.

I'd underestimated how low he could sink.

The next day, a post blew up on the Harvard subreddit and got cross-posted to every tech forum with a pulse.

"Behind the Tech-Prodigy Facade: How Iris Fairfax Stole Her Childhood Friend's Ideas and Threw Him Away."

In the post, Felix had cast himself as the quiet genius who'd done all the thinking behind the scenes.

He claimed the core logic of my product had been his.

He said I'd burned the bridge the second I crossed it. That I'd pretended not to know him the moment I had money.

He'd even attached photos of us studying together in high school — twisted into evidence of "strategic planning sessions."

Public opinion went up in flames.

People always love watching someone get built up just to tear them down.

My company inbox filled with hate mail.

A couple of investors I was in talks with quietly asked to reassess the risk profile.

"These people are insane."

My assistant was actually crying.

"They convicted her off a handful of blurry photos!"

I sat in my office chair, scrolling.

Strangely calm.

"Don't panic. Let it play out."

Caleb pushed the door open, two coffees in hand.

"Want me to get the story killed?"

He handed me a cup. Steady eyes.

"No."

I took a sip.

"Killing it would just make me look guilty."

"He wants to play. We'll play big."

The captions streamed across my vision.

[Why isn't she fighting back yet, I'm dying.]

[This is unbearable — how is this loser winning the PR war?]

[Relax. She's just loading up the big move.]

I looked at Felix's smug face on the screen.

"Caleb. Tomorrow night's industry gala. Get me on the list."

"I'm going to show him what real public humiliation looks like."

"Mr. Kingsley! Mr. Kingsley, don't let this woman fool you!"

The industry gala was held at the city's top hotel.

Crystal chandeliers threw shards of light across the ballroom.

I walked in on Caleb's arm in a black evening gown.

Every head in the room turned.

Curious. Skeptical. Judgmental.

There was a commotion near the center of the room.

Felix, dressed in a caterer's uniform, was shoving past the security line.

He had a thick stack of documents raised over his head.

He didn't care who was watching.

The room went up in murmurs.

Security tried to contain him. He wrapped himself around a pillar.

"Let go of me! I'm here to expose the truth!"

He was screaming himself hoarse.

"Iris Fairfax is a thief! She stole the idea for her company from me!"

Every pair of eyes in that room was on us.

Caleb's brow drew together. He was about to speak.

I laid a hand on his arm.

"Let him."

I stepped forward and looked down at Felix.

"If you can't actually back this up tonight, I'm going to make you eat every page of that."

Felix twisted free of security and straightened his crooked collar.

He clearly thought he looked heroic right then.

"I want all of you to see this!"

He held the documents high.

"This is the business plan I wrote two years ago!"

"The core algorithm and business model are identical to what Iris Fairfax is running right now!"

He turned to Caleb, eyes earnest.

"Mr. Kingsley. You're a legend in this industry. You can tell who the real talent is."

"Iris doesn't know anything. She doesn't even know how to code!"

"She slept her way to the top!"

Several people in the crowd sucked in a breath.

That was a heavy accusation.

If it stuck, I wasn't just finished in the industry — I was looking at jail time.

A handful of the investors I'd been courting were already quietly stepping back.

The captions were going wild.

[I'm going to lose it — how is this guy so shameless?!]

[Throw it back at him already!]

[The energy in that room, holy god, everyone's treating her like a car wreck.]

I looked at Felix's flushed face, twisted with excitement.

"You're saying you wrote this two years ago?"

My tone was completely flat.

"Absolutely!"

Felix drew himself up.

"Every single word. Wrote it overnight."

I nodded.

"Okay."

I turned and faced the room.

"Since Mr. Davenport insists this is his life's work — let's put it to the test right here."

I snapped my fingers.

My assistant wheeled in a mobile whiteboard.

"Felix. Since you understand the core algorithm."

I picked up a marker and started writing the underlying logic on the board, fast.

"Please explain how you handled the redundant nodes in this data loop."

The room went dead silent.

Every pair of eyes fixed on Felix.

The smugness flash-froze on his face.

Small beads of sweat broke out along his hairline.

"Uh — I—"

He stammered for half a minute and couldn't produce a coherent sentence.

Of course he couldn't. He'd dropped out of intro to programming at a community extension course in Brisbane.

"What's the matter? Can't remember something you wrote two years ago?"

I didn't let up.

"Fine. Simpler question."

I pointed at the business plan in his hand.

"The distributed cloud storage you mention here. What's your load-balancing strategy when concurrent requests exceed one hundred thousand?"

Felix's legs started to shake.

He looked around the room, pleading — and all he got back was amusement.

"I — that's a trade secret! Why should I tell you?!"

He was still flailing on the last sinking plank.

"If you hadn't stolen my ideas, I would have been the richest man in the country by now!"

He was nearly hysterical.

"You ruined my life!"

And right as he was about to crack wide open —

I stepped close enough to speak only for him and said, softly:

"You made money at that meatpacking plant and gave it all to Naomi — do you really not know who Naomi's been buying sneakers for?"