“Dr. Sterling, please,” I pleaded. “My husband had access to my computer.”

“This is a matter for the committee, not a domestic dispute,” he said coldly.

“Your father’s endowment to the chemistry department cannot protect you from this.”

“Bring us the raw data with the original timestamps by tomorrow morning.”

“If you do not, the suspension will become a permanent expulsion.”

The line went dead with a soft click.

I dropped the phone onto the passenger seat.

The rain hit the windshield in heavy, rhythmic slaps.

My hands felt numb.

Hunter thought he had destroyed my only defense when he smashed the silver drive.

But he did not know about my second backup.

I had kept a smaller, encrypted micro-SSD hidden in our master bedroom study.

It was tucked inside the hollowed-out spine of an old inorganic chemistry textbook.

I put the car in drive and pulled out of the faculty lot.

The tires splashed through deep puddles along the campus boulevard.

I drove past the towering glass facade of Hayes Industries.

My father’s name was etched into the granite archway at the entrance of the corporate headquarters.