Wanted by My Three Bosses novel · Chapter 24 of 24

Chapter 24: Four Keys

I signed the offer on the stage, standing up, with Anson's blue pen.

Then I signed the other page, the one he had given me in the elevator.

Terms of residence and partnership, between the undersigned.

It was one sheet, in his exact typing, and I read the last clause twice before I put my name to it.

Rule three, as amended: Daphne may leave any day she chooses. If she does, the three of us will follow, and she may send us back.

"You rewrote it," I said.

"I corrected an error," Anson said. "The first draft assumed we would obey."

Gray signed under me with a flourish.

Josiah signed last, and took his glasses off to do it.

Four hundred people were still clapping, and I did not hear any of it.

That night the three of them walked me home.

Not to the third floor with no elevator, and the kettle, and the one chair.

They walked me to the brick building on Dearborn that they owned together.

Gray unlocked the door, and held it open with his foot.

"Your floor has an elevator," he said. "I've checked."

"I remember mentioning that."

"We all remember."

It was the top floor, with a long room and four doors, and a row of windows that looked out over the lake.

On the kitchen counter lay four keys on one steel ring, each cut the same.

I picked them up.

They were heavy, and still warm from someone's pocket.

"Josiah had them made," Gray said. "Anson checked the cuts. I carried them around all day and kept feeling for them."

"They're yours to use," Josiah said. "And yours to put on a desk."

"And ours to come after you," Anson said. "If you do."

I put the ring in my pocket, next to my mother's letter.

I hung her jacket on the hook by the door.

Then I turned around, and they were all three standing in the long room, waiting for me.

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