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I turn to Tav.
“Deliveries,” I say.
His ears flick. “Tuesday mornings I drive out to Sauvie Island. There’s a farm. They grow the mint and the berries for the bar, and the lavender for Merek’s syrups. Then the bakery.” He shrugs his enormous shoulders. “It’s a couple of hours. I wanted you to see where it comes from. You’re an owner.”
“That’s very practical.”
“It’s hours with you,” he says. “And nobody else is in the truck.”
That’s not practical at all. My face goes warm.
“Okay,” I say. “Deliveries.”
Then I look at William.
“Roof,” I say.
“Yes.”
“What’s on the roof?”
“I’ll show you.”
“That’s all I get?”
“That’s all you get.” Then, after a second, “Wear something warm.”
They’re all looking at me now, waiting, and it hits me that I’ve just stood in a living room and let four men book my entire week without asking me a single question. Lenart started the calendar. All four of them added to it. I accepted it without thinking, the way I’d accept a shift.
“Okay. New rules,” I say. “You can ask. You can suggest a time. I’m the one who says yes. My job comes first. The renewal comes first. Billy Bob comes first. And I’m sleeping at least eight hours, or I’m canceling all of you and taking a nap.”
“Agreed,” Lenart says.
“Agreed,” says Merek.
Tav nods. William says, “Yes.”
Lenart takes out his phone and taps it twice. Mine buzzes in my hand. Every entry on my calendar has gone pale gray, with Accept and Decline underneath it.
“Requests,” he says. “From now on.”
I go down the list. I accept the ward renewals, Merek’s eleven o’clock breakfast, Tav’s deliveries, and the roof. I look at Dinner. Lenart. for a long second before I accept that, too. Across the room, Lenart’s phone buzzes, and he doesn’t look at it.
Nobody argues. Nobody tries to negotiate. I’ve spent years negotiating with drunks and managers and landlords, and I had a whole speech ready, and nobody needs it.
That worries me more than a fight would have.
I look at the four of them. Merek, with his feet up. Lenart, in the leather chair, watching me. Tav, with my dog in his lap. William, at the window, with the light on the stone of his shoulders.
Instead of fighting over whether or not they want me, they've moved straight into fighting over who gets to take me out first.***
Merek drives me to the Club at four, with Billy Bob in his harness in the back seat. I’m not leaving him in a strange house on his first day, and nobody suggests I should.
The Monster Club is different with the doors locked. The house lights are up, the chairs are on the tables, and the long room smells like floor cleaner and lemon oil. Somebody is running a vacuum down near the booths. A staff person I don’t know is restocking the coolers and nods at me as I go by.
At the back, the kitchen corridor has a strip of yellow tape across it. Past the dish pit, a man in coveralls is installing a replacement freezer door. The old one is propped against the wall, and William stands beside it with his arms crossed, watching the work. He looks up when I walk past, holds my eyes for a second, then goes back to the repair.
Dez’s office is down the hall from Lenart’s. It’s small and plain, with a scarred wooden desk, a filing cabinet, a wall of ledgers bound in dark green leather, and a window that looks out over the back lot. From here, I can see my Corolla, still parked behind the delivery van. I look away from it.
