Page 8 of Silks

He began to talk about the company and I pretended to be fascinated, even though most of it was unintelligible to me, not to mention boring.

I could tell it wouldn’t take much effort for Chet to fuck me, though, the way he was looking at me. I would just have to wait for a good opening to ask what he knew about Mintmaker, the Barrington Stables entry into the Derby this year.

I grabbed a plate of spicy tuna rolls and popped a few in my mouth, pretending like what Chet said about his stock dividends and new car was the most fascinating thing I’d ever heard.

“I thought you were scared of the sushi,” I heard an amused voice behind me say.

I almost choked on my bite.

“Who asked you, Teddy?” I tried to say scathingly, but my mouth was full.

I felt my brother’s big fingers patting my back gently.

“Stop following me,” I choked out irritably.

Teddy didn’t answer, but I felt his hands move to my neck and his big fingers spread lightly over my shoulders.

“Go entertain Granny,” he told Chet, and his arm brushed by my cheek as he pointed at where Grandma was standing by the shrimp trays looking displeased.

Chet hesitated, and for a second it looked like he was going to refuse, but I could feel my brother’s gaze and Chet nodded and left.

“Don’t bother shaking your tits at Chet,” Teddy said.

Ignoring him, I ducked out from under his arm.

“I have to pee,” I said abruptly, heading into the big house.

I went inside Mom and Dad’s mansion, always disgruntled by the fact that you couldn’t even pee without seeing a framed picture of my brother throwing a game-winning touchdown in college.

I remembered that game very well. I had come directly from a protest covered in fake blood to watch it, but Teddy didn’t care, picking me up and twirling me around after the game, getting so much fake blood on his jersey that my mother had shrieked and wailed that every newspaper picture of him looked like he worked in a butcher shop.

That was a good memory.

But I couldn’t let myself be distracted by good memories. This weekend was about discovering how Barrington Stables planned to rig the Kentucky Derby. And avoiding my twin brother.

As I headed back outside, I saw a group of Dad’s creepy bootlicking friends in the kitchen, including Barrington Stables’ head veterinarian, Dr. Dent, who was a juiced-up looking gym bro in his late 30s with a nasty little moustache.

“How do you think Mintmaker will do this weekend?” I asked him.

“Oh, very well,” he said, winking broadly at me. “I think she’s a real champion and she’ll surprise all the haters.”

I digested this information and all these smarmy winks.

There was definitely something shady going on.

Dr. Dent had already weaseled out of one banned substances charge a few years ago. Was that what they were planning to do? Each racehorse got rigorously tested, though.

Was it possible they had some new kind of dope that was supposed to be undetectable?

If this plan involved any danger to Mintmaker I was going to throttle Teddy, then carve out his organs with a spoon.

I dug in my purse and took out my cellphone, wondering if I could record their conversations, first taking a few inconspicuous pictures with the camera.

Surely the investigators would be very interested if I could capture any hints about what the plan was.

I had barely sent off the pictures and then deleted the text thread out of an itchy paranoia when I felt my brother at my side again.

“What are you doing, Ophelia?” he asked. “Why are you taking pictures?”

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