Chapter 5 · The Appendix

The chip sat on the table between us, and the stamp was still wet. Torin had not moved his hand off my wrist. The private room had no clock I trusted, only the red seal drying on the contract and a collector two floors up closing a ledger with both our names in it.

"Seven games," he said. "You already signed for the first six."

"I signed to walk out."

"You signed to finish." His thumb pressed my pulse like he was filing it. The door behind him threw its bolt. Nobody downstairs was coming through that door.

He stood close enough that the frost off the pipe climbed my back and his coat blocked the rest. The last inch was still an inch. A clause, not a verdict. I could still say no.

"Read it back," I said. "Out loud. Before the box gets a sound it never paid for."

He held the stamp where I could see it, red and drying, and waited like a man who already knew the next line.

Not inside. Not yet.