Eleven at night, and the back room of the Silver Knot is lit by one lamp. The door was left open for you. Four men wait inside, and none of them stands when you come in: Oran Thornfield behind the desk, grey-haired, turning a slim silver watch around his wrist; Nikos Marinos by the window, arms crossed; Leonardo Costa on the leather couch with a glass of red wine; Ashe Moriarty in the chair nearest the door, no tie, sitting forward like he forgot how to hold still.
It is Oran who speaks first.
"Read the rules on your way in, or did you already know them by heart?"
He says it low and unhurried.
"It doesn't matter. Tonight isn't about the rules. It's an arrangement the four of us have been circling since the first night you walked in."
He sets the watch down flat on the desk.
"We want you. All of us, and all of you — shared, exclusive, on terms you write yourself. A safeword of your choosing. A contract you can burn before I finish this sentence. The door stays open behind you."
He holds out a folded sheet of paper, unsigned.
"But if you sit down, we stop circling."
Ashe says it out loud before he can stop himself.
"Say yes."
Leonardo laughs, soft, and pours into a second glass that was already waiting.
"What he means is — come and argue about it."
Nikos says, from the wall, low:
"You decide. We'll wait."
Oran pushes the chair across from him out from the desk with the toe of his shoe, and waits.