Chapter 7: Four Days

Camryn crossed the dining hall in a straight line.

I put my hand flat on the box lid.

"I want it back," she said. "That was a joke."

"You said it in front of three hundred students."

"I said it was worthless. I didn't say you could keep it."

"You said 'maybe you can wallpaper your dorm.'"

Her sunglasses were pushed up in her hair and her eyes were wild.

"Susie, give me the box."

"Camryn, I thanked you for it in front of three hundred students."

Bea stepped up beside me with her ladle.

"There are witnesses," Bea said pleasantly. "And a lot of them have phones."

Camryn looked around.

Every table had gone quiet and every phone was pointed at her.

She had walked into a room full of the audience she had built for herself.

Her lip trembled.

"This isn't over," she said, and left.

I carried the cigar box to Benedict's brownstone that night against my chest.

He met me at the door in a grey sweater, with a bottle of wine in one hand and a look I couldn't read.

"Sunday," he said.

"It's Wednesday."

"At 8:47 tonight I told the analyst desk to hold the news until Sunday. The Kettle deal closes then."

"What does Sunday mean for me?"

"It means I can't touch you in my capacity as your employer until the numbers are public."

"Benedict."

"And then I'm going to touch you in every other capacity."

I stood there on his step with my arms full of certificates.

My knees weren't entirely reliable.

"That's four days," I said.

"Yes."

"I don't think I can wait four days."

He took the box out of my hands and set it on the hall table.

He turned back, and the wine bottle was still in his other hand.

"Neither can I," he said.

He set the wine on the hall table beside the box and took out his phone.

"I'm moving your file to the analyst desk," he said. "As of now, you report to them. Not to me."

"You can do that?"

"I run the firm. I can do that tonight and answer for it tomorrow."

"Then you're not my employer."

"Not tonight," Benedict said.

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