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CHAPTER 1

HOLDEN

Graduate students threw terrible parties. This was the first one I’d been dragged to, but where my old friends at Columbia used to throw ragers, these people threw bore-fests.

Cheap beer had been replaced with boxed wine. Instead of kegs, someone crying in a bathtub, and someone else deploying a fire extinguisher, we were all now just standing around, talking. I was pretty sure that by eleven, these people were going to have the whole place cleaned up and be in bed because everyone had a very important seminar in the morning.

Let’s just say it’s less party, more pretentious gathering.

No one here had any money. The deep-dish pizza we were feasting on had been funded by the meager teaching-assistant salaries of several of the attendees, but from the way they were acting, it was like they truly believed this was a gathering of high-society intellectuals.

The scent of mildew and old radiator heat wafted through the air and we’d probably pass out from lack of oxygen if we stayed down here for too long. I took another sip of my terrible wine, appreciating that at least the grapes had had aspirations of becoming some form of drinkable alcohol, but that was really the only upside to this situation—the grapes had, in fact, become alcohol.

“This is painful,” I muttered to Price. “Remind me again why we came.”

“Like it or not, these are our peers now.” He took a drink of his own terrible wine and looked around the basement, seeming significantly more optimistic about being here than I was. “We have to mingle, right? Get to know the people we’re going to be spending all of our time with for the next two years, give or take a couple months.”

I groaned, but Price was one of the few people I’d met in the MBA program so far who was bearable. That was why I’d agreed to come.

According to Jane, the University of Chicago was supposed to be a fresh start for me. I’d been on my way back to New York for my master’s degree, but things had changed when we’d found out about my dad.

Naturally, my sister had tried to turn that into a good thing. She’d argued that instead of returning to Columbia, it would be better to start this next phase someplace new. I still didn’t want to be starting said new phase at all, so in the end, I’d agreed to stay in Chicago simply because it kept me close to the office.

“I can’t spend all my time with them.” I didn’t even wince this time when I took another sip of the liquid in my glass masquerading as wine. “If we have any free time at all, I’d rather spend it at work.”

Price shrugged. “You and me both, but I wasn’t referring to free time. As far as I know, having that isn’t something we need to be worried about.”

I sighed. “Yeah, I’ve heard the same thing, but that doesn’t mean I have to be happy about it.”

After I’d graduated the first time, I’d taken a break from my studies to work as an account manager for Thayer Steelworks, and unexpectedly, I’d ended up enjoying it. What had started as a necessary evil, helping out at the office while Ryan had been otherwise occupied, had turned into a role I was actually able to see myself in—and I’d been good at it.

Hell, depending on who was being asked, I’d been more than good. I’d been on my way to being great. When my brother had finally come back, I’d stuck around without even thinking about walking away to go back to school.

If it had been up to me, I still would have been there, working my way up and learning on the fly, but Jane had insisted that I do things the right way. To her, that meant completing my education, and when I’d tried pointing out that I didn’t need an MBA to work for our family’s very own company, she’d completely refused to hear it.

In her opinion, she’d fought too hard for too long to make sure Ryan, Wyatt, and I had the opportunities she believed we deserved. Fighting her on something like finishing a degree was like arguing with a fish about not being able to breathe out of water.

Utterly pointless. It’s just a fact.

Price nodded at a group standing near the stairs. I couldn’t hear exactly what they were saying, but from the snippets I caught here and there, they were arguing about constitutional interpretation. “We should go introduce ourselves to them.”

“The wannabe lawyers?” I scoffed. “No, thank you. If that’s what you’re into, go ahead, but I’m good.”

“They’re wannabes now, but they won’t be in the future,” he said sagely. “It’s always good to have a few of them on speed-dial in the real world. It’s called networking. You should do it.”

“With lawyers? No.”

I didn’t mind the change of pace or even the bottom-shelf wine over easily chuggable beer, but I already knew I wasn’t going to fit in and this conversation was just confirmation of that fact. I wasn’t like the social science kids or the law school kids. Not even the suits, like Price, were on the same track as me.

The guy was alright, but he was business through and through, a strategy and consulting junkie who spoke about the markets like humanity only existed to generate graphs. My own path leaned heavily toward business technology—systems and infrastructure.

Socially, that left me in an awkward position. I wasn’t interested in spending my evenings listening to future attorneys argue about why they were technically correct about absolutely everything and I definitely didn’t care about carbon credits or venture philanthropy either.

“Go ahead,” I repeated when he hesitated. “I mean it. I’ll be fine. If you wait for me before you start networking, you’re not going to meet a single lawyer tonight.”

He chuckled, hesitating for one more second before he nodded and clapped me on the shoulder. “Alright. You know where I am if you want to join us.”

“Yeah, man. Don’t worry about me.”