Page 37 of The Silver Fox Brother

My office phone rings, loud in the quiet. I blink, pulled out of the spiral of thoughts, and reach for it.

"Knox Sterling."

"Mr. Sterling, it's David Morrison from Goldman. Do you have a few minutes to discuss the financing structure for the Brooklyn project?"

"Yes. Give me one second."

I set Winter's page down on my desk, pull up the Brooklyn file on my laptop, and shift back into business mode.

"Okay, David. I'm ready. Walk me through it."

The conversation pulls me in—numbers, terms, timelines. By the time I hang up twenty minutes later, the designer question has been pushed to the back of my mind, still there but manageable.

I'll think on it tonight. I'll talk to Fletcher and James at drinks, get their perspective, figure out if this is brilliance or insanity. And then I'll decide.

The Henley Club occupies the top floor of a pre-war building in Midtown, the kind of place that doesn't advertise because it doesn't need to. Membership is by invitation only, the annual dues cost more than most people's cars, and the atmosphere is designed for one thing: privacy.

Dark wood paneling, leather furniture worn soft by decades of use, ambient lighting that's dim enough to feel intimate without being oppressive. The bar stocks bottles you won't find anywhere else, and the staff moves like ghosts—present when needed, invisible otherwise.

I arrive at 7 on the dot. Victor drops me at the entrance, and I take the private elevator to the top floor.

James is already there, seated in one of the corner alcoves we've claimed as our unofficial territory over the years. He's in his early forties, built like someone who used to row crew and now runs five miles every morning before the rest of the city wakes up. He owns a brokerage firm in the Financial District, handles wealth management for people who have more money than they know what to do with.

We've known each other since Yale. Business school, late nights in the library, the kind of friendship that forms when you're both ambitious enough to kill yourselves over case studies and still find time to drink too much on weekends.

"There he is," James says, standing to shake my hand.

"Thought maybe you'd bail."

"When have I ever bailed?"

"There's a first time for everything." He gestures to the chair across from him.

"Sit. I already ordered your usual."

I drop into the leather chair—deep, comfortable, the kind of furniture that costs a fortune because it lasts forever. A server appears within seconds, sets a crystal tumbler in front of me. Eighteen-year Macallan, neat, exactly the way I take it.

"Thanks," I tell the server.

She nods and disappears. James raises his glass.

"To surviving another week in this goddamn city."

I raise mine. "To surviving."

We drink. The scotch is smooth, expensive, worth every penny of the two hundred dollars this club charges per pour.

"Fletcher's running late," James says, checking his phone.

"Sarah had a doctor's appointment. He's on his way."

"How's she doing?"

"Six months pregnant and, according to Fletcher, slowlylosing her mind over nursery color schemes." James grins.

"Last I heard, it was down to 'Gentle Cream' or 'Whisper White,' which as far as I can tell are the exact same color."

"They probably are."