Chapter 9: The Notary

My mother stood in the middle of Elias's apartment and turned in a slow circle.

Her eyes traveled over the single bed, the dented couch, and the quilt lying in a heap on the floor.

She had the grace to look away from that.

"This is how you live," she said.

"This is where we're staying," I said. "It's warm. It's ours."

"It's a storage unit with a window."

"Good morning, Mrs. Haverkamp," Elias said, from the door, buttoning his flannel. "Coffee?"

"I won't be taking anything from this house."

"Then I'll take yours," said the notary, who seemed to be a nervous person. "Cream, if there's any."

Landon laughed.

He sat himself on the arm of the couch, crossed his ankles, and watched my mother unbuckle her leather folder with a showman's grin.

Out came three documents.

The first was the petition I'd already refused.

The second was a proxy, naming my mother to vote my thirty percent at any meeting through the end of the year.

The third was a one-page employment agreement from Huddleston Partners, with my name already typed in.

"Sign all three," my mother said. "The notary is here. This is the last time I ask."

"You said that on Thanksgiving."

"I am saying it now with a witness."

"I can see the witness," I said. "He looks like he'd like to be somewhere else."

The notary examined his shoes.

My mother stepped closer, and for a moment she dropped her boardroom voice, and what was under it was somehow worse.

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