Sway (Landry Family 1)

“Man to man,” he repeats. “I will, Mr. Landry.”

“One more thing. Call me Barrett. Only people that want to fu—,” I catch myself. “Only people that want something from me call me ‘Mr. Landry.’ Okay?”

“Okay,” he grins a wide, toothy grin.

Barrett

I TOSS THE FOLDER ACROSS the desk. It slides over the glass top and smacks the side of my pen holder.

“Damn it, Nolan. He had no problem with the budget until now. You know as well as I do that Monroe’s called him and put pressure on him to, you know, put pressure on me.”

“You’re absolutely right.” Nolan pushes his glasses to the end of his nose and looks at me from across my desk.

Groaning, I push my chair back and give myself some space.

He flips through some papers and pulls out another sheet. “This was sent today certified mail.”

He tosses it on my desk and I sweep it up, a feeling of dread sinking into my stomach. “What’s this?”

“It’s a letter from the attorney of a Gabriella Winston, also known as the mother of your unwanted baby. She’s raised her price to a hundred thousand,” he sighs.

“Not happening.” I wad the letter up and toss it into the garbage before looking at Nolan again. I shoot daggers, not necessarily at him, but at the idea that someone would use a topic so sensitive and make it up out of thin fucking air to hurt someone else. “Does she not have a fucking conscience?”

“These are things you ask yourself before you get involved, Barrett.”

“She’s out of her damn mind if she thinks I’m enabling her on this. Fuck this and fuck her.”

“She’s going to go public.”

“Good for her. Let her. And watch us torch her back in the press. She wants to play, we’ll play.”

“We can’t do that, Barrett. Unlike her, you have a public image to consider.”

“Which is exactly why she’s doing this! She’s going to tank my image to profit, using an abortion as the kicker. That’s fucking sick.”

He starts to argue when a knock raps at the door. Graham pokes his head around the corner. “Am I interrupting?” he asks.

“No,” I grimace, sitting up in my chair. “Come on in.”

He nods to Nolan and shuts the door behind him. Striding across my office, he takes a seat. “I come bearing bad news.”

“Great,” I sigh, wishing this day was over already. “Give it to me.”

“There’s a picture in the paper today.” Graham lays a copy of the Savannah Dispatch on my desk. “That was taken outside the Farm yesterday.”

Grabbing it and looking closely, I see Troy in the Rover. In the passenger seat is Lincoln and in the back, behind Linc, is Alison. Her face is kind of blurry, but it’s her.

Thank God Huxley isn’t visible.

I want to die. I want to crawl into a hole and just sleep until this entire fucking election is over, until everyone stops acting stupid—caring about what I do, what I say, what I support, pegging kids on me that aren’t even mine.

Nolan glares from his spot next to my brother.

“Don’t start,” I grumble, putting my head in my hands. My mind is spinning about whether Alison has seen it or not and what she’ll have to say about it. This is absolutely what she doesn’t want and what I thought I could prevent.

How fucking stupid.

“Barrett,” Nolan says, licking his lips, “this isn’t going to go ov