Page 2 of Silks

Step 1. Blend in.

Step 2. Gain their trust.

Step 3. Find out what my shady filthy rich father and finance douchebag brother were up to.

Step 4. Report back to Harvey, get my charges dropped.

Step 5. Get the fuck out of Louisville.

Chapter 2 (Teddy)

“In conclusion,” my father said, raising his champagne glass high, “remember, every glass of Boërl & Kroff Magnum 1996 you drink is just another donation to the lovely Mrs. Barrington’s Selective Breeding Foundation. To making ugly horses a thing of the past!”

Everyone raised their glasses and drank enthusiastically. Everyone except me. This swill was overpriced, overrated, and I was frankly bored as fuck of Louisville elite parties.

My on-again, off-again girlfriend Cressida was excited, though. The perks of casually dating the heir to the massive Barrington fortune never failed to thrill her.

“Theodore and Penelope always know how to find the absolute best years,” she enthused, and I know she thinks it means something that she’s on a first-name basis with my parents, but it really doesn’t.

Since I’m my father’s second in command, everyone at this party feels the need to come and suck up to me. When he retires and I take over all the family businesses, everything from our racing stables with prize-winning thoroughbreds, to real estate, riverside casinos, and restaurants, I’ll be the richest and most powerful man in Kentucky.

I’m used to the copious bootlicking by now. It’s just boring to me.

Part of the droning background noise that is the majority of my life.

Some of the other finance guys who work at my father’s company were talking to me, but I wasn’t really listening.

I ignored the champagne offered by every passing waiter and tipped the rest of my glass of whiskey in my mouth instead.

I’m halfway to being shitfaced already.

Derby Week used to be my favorite time of the year.

But that was a while ago. Before she left.

The flash of anger I always feel at the thought of her absence hits me again. I was hoping after a few years it would have disappeared or just been a dull ache in the background. But it isn’t. It’s still like an open wound, a throbbing pain that cuts through me when I least expect it.