Chapter 3 - MY BROTHER'S SECRET STARTUP
Jason had spent years calling technology a shortcut for people who could not handle “real law.”
Apparently, he hated it less when he thought he could own it.
BriefForge had been incorporated eight months earlier.
Jason owned thirty percent.
The company website described an upcoming litigation-research engine using language disturbingly similar to mine.
Predictive brief analysis.
Argument mapping.
Citation-risk detection.
Those were not generic ideas.
They were features I had spent three years building.
I called Jason.
He answered on the first ring.
“You need to stop.”
“Stop what?”
“Trying to destroy me.”
I almost laughed.
“You downloaded my confidential files.”
“I was researching.”
“For your competing company.”
Silence.
“You weren’t supposed to find that.”
“Apparently, that’s becoming a family motto.”
He exhaled sharply.
“Mia, BriefForge existed before I saw your deal.”
“That makes stealing my files better?”
“I didn’t steal your code.”
“Then what did you send?”
“Market research.”
“You downloaded my patent drafts.”
His silence stretched.
Then he said, “Dad said family ideas belong to the family.”
There it was.
Dad.
Again.
“What exactly did Dad tell you?”
“That he paid for your education.”
“So?”
“That he funded the years you spent developing this.”
“He paid one semester of law-school tuition.”
“And your housing.”
“I repaid him.”
“That’s not the point.”
“No, Jason. The point is that neither of you ever believed my work mattered until you thought you could own it.”
He hung up.
Rachel spent the afternoon comparing my development history against BriefForge’s materials.
Fortunately, I had obsessive records.
Git commits.
Time stamps.
Cloud backups.
Invoices.
Emails.
Prototype videos.
The earliest version of my software dated back three years before BriefForge existed.
By evening, Rachel sounded relieved.
“Your ownership trail is extremely strong.”
“So the acquisition is safe?”
“For now.”
Those words worried me.
“For now?”
“There’s a patent application we need to discuss.”
She sent it.
I opened the first page.
The invention described looked very familiar.
Automated litigation argument mapping with citation-strength analysis.
My system.
Inventors:
Jason Bennett.
Marcus Vale.
And one more name.
May you like
Richard Bennett.
My father had put himself on a patent application for software he once called a childish hobby.
