The Billionaire's Match Is Three Percent novel · Chapter 11 of 24

Chapter 11: Thirty-First Floor

On Saturday night he asked me to come to his office at nine.

The tower was dark.

The security guard in the lobby looked at me in my hoodie, looked at his list.

Let me through without a word.

The thirty-first floor was empty and silent.

City light came through the glass in long soft bars across the carpet.

Winston stood behind his desk with a thin stack of paper in his hands.

He had taken off his jacket, and his sleeves were rolled.

"I have to show you something," he said. "And you'll want to be angry."

"I'm often angry. I'm very good at it."

"I know."

He put the stack on the desk and turned it so I could read.

The title was printed at the top of the first page.

Where Stated Answers Lie: Revealed Preference in Dating Platforms.

My name was under it.

I stared.

"That's my paper," I said. "I published it two years ago. Nobody read it. It got eleven citations, and three were mine."

"I read it."

"When?"

"June second. At two in the morning. I couldn't sleep. I was looking at seven companies I might buy, and a man at my fund sent it to me because a footnote mentioned a contract."

I looked at the pages.

They were covered in his square handwriting, in pencil.

Every margin was full.

At the bottom of the last page he had written, in capital letters, SHE IS RIGHT.

"You read the whole paper," I said.

"Four times."

"You bought the company because of a paper."

"I bought the company because of the woman who wrote that nobody tells the truth in a questionnaire, and then built a system that knows anyway." He drew a breath. "And when I signed, I asked for you by name."

"You asked for me?"

"I asked Phyllis to put you on the list for the owner's briefing. She's been quietly moving you toward the thirty-first floor for three months."

"Winston."

"On Monday, when I asked you to run us, I already knew you would tell me the truth. That's why I asked." He met my eyes. "I didn't know it would be three percent. I'd have understood if you wanted to leave."

For a moment I couldn't speak.

Anger came, hot and quick.

I let it come.

"You could have told me," I said.

"I could have."

"I would have said no."

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