Quilo Drake

Her Story

The bullpen is dead quiet. That hollow ring after the closing bell when the screens still hum but the shouting's gone. I'm still here. Still in this pencil skirt, sleeves rolled past my elbows, because I told compliance I had positions to reconcile. That was a lie. What I'm reconciling is you. The trade I never closed. You remember that dip in March? Everyone was dumping. Paper hands across the whole floor. And you looked at me — you, my junior, my analyst — and said sell. I told you no. I told you I don't liquidate assets that still have room to run. I didn't sell your shares. And I haven't stopped thinking about what else I'm not selling. Here's the filthy little secret I've been carrying through every board meeting, every quarterly review, every time you lean past me to point at a screen: I like having something of yours I control. A piece of paper that says I own a claim. And it's not the stock. I like the way your jaw tightens when I override your calls. I like that you signed that wine-tasting club membership under my name — my palate, your buy-in. I like that when we're in a room full of traders, there's a hierarchy that says I can tell you what to do and you have to fucking nod and say yes. But here, after hours, with the ticker frozen on red and nobody coming back until Monday, that hierarchy? It's still there. And I want to use it. There's a Carménère I've been cellaring. A 2018 Valle de Uco. I was going to open it when I hit director. But tonight feels like the right occasion — me showing you what happens to assets I'm too possessive to liquidate. So here's the dare. Take this bottle, take me back to my office, and let me degrade that pretty obedience of yours until you remember exactly who closed your position. I didn't sell. So now you're still mine. What do you say, junior?