Mateo walked over. He looked at the document. He looked at me. He signed it in big blocky letters that looked nothing like a signature.
"I don't need a license to break things," he rumbled.
I stared at the four names on the paper.
It was a death warrant for our careers. It was a declaration of war. And they had signed it without blinking.
My chest felt tight. Not the panic-tightness of the last few days, but something else. Something expanding and warm and terrifying.
"You're all idiots," I whispered, blinking rapidly to keep my vision clear.
"We take direction from the top," Stephen said, a small smirk playing on his lips.
I looked at them. Really looked at them.
Stephen, who turned law into a shield for me. Juno, who turned trauma into data for me. Mateo, who turned his body into a wall for me.
I picked up the red marker I had been using to mark up the "bleed paperwork" strategy.
"Give me your wrist," I said to Stephen.
He extended his arm, cufflink glinting. He turned his hand over, exposing the pale skin of his inner wrist, right over the pulse point.
I uncapped the marker. My hand was steady.
I wrote in capital letters,ANCHOR.
The ink bled slightly into the grain of his skin. It looked like a brand.
"Mateo," I ordered.
He offered his massive forearm. I wrote it again.ANCHOR.
"Juno."
He held out his arm, his skin golden under the recessed lighting. I wrote it a third time.ANCHOR.
It was a ratification. I didn't have a scent to mark them with. I didn't have a bite. I had ink. I had the tools of my trade. I was claiming them the only way a manager knew how, in writing.
Juno looked at the red letters stark against his skin.
He lifted his wrist. He didn't look at the ink; he looked at me. Then, he pressed his lips to the wet marker.
It was a messy, deliberate smudge. He pulled back, a smear of red ink on his mouth, staring at me with a heat that made my knees weak. He transferred the mark to himself, internalizing it.
"Signed," he whispered.
Stephen looked at his own wrist. He didn't kiss the ink. He lifted his other hand and brought my wrist, the one holding the marker, to his mouth. He kissed the pulse point, right below my thumb. A validation. A notary seal.
Mateo didn't go for hand or ink.
He stepped in close, blotting out the light. He leaned down and pressed his mouth to my forehead. It was a heavy, lingering pressure. A roof over my head. A promise that nothing would hit me from above.
I stood there, surrounded by them, smelling of markers, cedar, parchment, and burnt sugar.
The feeling in my chest cracked wide open.
I was falling in love with them. All three of them.
