Page 39 of The Silver Fox Brother

"Three years," James repeats, shaking his head.

"That's depressing."

Fletcher jumps in. "Who was the last one? Alexandra? The art curator?"

"Yeah."

"What happened there?"

I shrug. "Nothing happened. We went out a few times. It didn't go anywhere."

"Because you didn't let it go anywhere," James says, pointing his glass at me.

"You do this thing where you find perfectly nice, intelligent, beautiful women, go on three dates, and then ghost them."

"I don't ghost. I'm upfront about not being interested in pursuing it further."

"Same thing."

Fletcher signals for a second round.

"To be fair, Knox is married to his work. Buildings don't require emotional availability."

"Buildings also don't keep you warm at night," James counters.

"Neither does emotional availability," I say.

They both laugh. The server returns with our second round. We're settling into the rhythm now—the comfortable back-and-forth that happens when you've known someone long enough that you don't have to perform.

Fletcher takes a drink of his fresh scotch, then looks at me.

"Alright. Enough about my impending fatherhood and James's dinosaur-obsessed kid. Let's talk about why Knox is being weird about the designer decision."

I pause mid-drink.

James leans forward, interested now.

"Oh? Knox is being weird?"

"He's being weird," Fletcher confirms.

"I asked him about it earlier today after racquetball. He said he was looking at a shortlist. But he had that expression."

"What expression?"

"The one where he's already made up his mind about something but hasn't admitted it out loud yet."

They both look at me. I set my glass down.

"I received the list from Marcus. Looked over all ten firms. Strong options across the board."

Fletcher leans forward slightly. "But?"

"But there's one I'm really considering."

"Which one?" Fletcher asks.

I take another drink, then say it.