He stops to frown at me. Let me take all that in.
Shit, man. Five hundred fifty thousand tax-free dollars? How do I turn that down?
“Two weeks,” Baylor says. “That’s it. All you have to do is keep her here. Tame her a little. Make her into the lady I know she is. And then you walk away a rich man.”
“Rich?” I laugh. “That’s nothing to you.”
“OK,” he says. “How about five million?”
“Fuck off,” I say.
“I’m serious,” he says, leaning in to me as he continues to stare at Lyssa all the way down the hall. “I need this problem solved. Now.”
Interesting way to put it. But I tuck that away for later consideration.
Because five million tax-free dollars really does make me rich.
But everything about this man feels dirty and wrong. Lots of parents are disappointed in their children. It’s not really their business once they turn eighteen. Like… I want to tell this guy to get a life. To move on, let her go and do her thing, and forget about her.
But I already know what he’ll say next.
He can’t. Not when he is who he is. This important billionaire who dominates the stock reports. He can’t have his daughter flashing her pussy at nightclubs and getting into trouble.
It’s bad for business.
I have a lot of feelings about that. Mostly disgust, but there’s a healthy dose of indifference in there too. Because I just do not relate to these people. It makes no sense to me.
My mother didn’t raise me like this. We weren’t poor. I wasn’t bullied, I didn’t grow up in a bad neighborhood or go to bad schools. It was all very middle-class average. It was all very normal.
And nothing about these people strikes me as anything close to normal.
“No,” I say, shaking my head. “I’m sorry, Mr. Baylor. I kinda like her, and I really do wish you all the best, but… I just want my fifty grand and I’ll be on my way.”
He smiles at me. Except it’s not a smile. Because smiles are meant to convey happiness and this isn’t happiness. It’s… something else.
“I know why you need that transfer, Mr. Macintyre. I do my research before I hire people to take care of sensitive situations for me.”
“Sure you do,” I say.
“Your mother is in Sweden. Some non-FDA approved cancer treatment?”
What the fuck?
“I know that team. She’s still in the preliminary trial stage, right? Oh, it’s a very promising treatment. I’ve heard that the last trial had some remarkable results. More than half of the patients are now cancer-free. I really do hope your mother gets accepted into the full program. Could save her life. Probably will save her life.”
“Fuck you,” I growl, low and dangerous. Because this asshole doesn’t get to have an opinion about my mother’s cancer, or her treatment, or her chances of survival. He hasn’t earned that privilege.
“Five million dollars,” he says. “Five million dollars and I’ll make sure your mother is accepted tomorrow. I’m sorry the wire transfer will be late, but it won’t matter once I make a simple phone call.”
This motherfucker did this on purpose. To get my mother accepted into the new trial I have to put up fifty thousand dollars to show I can support her over the next several months while she’s in treatment. Baylor knew the deadline was Monday morning at nine AM Swedish time. And he came here with cash just in case his little princess-reform-school headmaster didn’t work out.
He knew. He planned this down to the very last detail.
“You can call her,” Baylor says. “She’ll be excited. She’ll want to tell you all about it.”
I glare at him. “You really don’t give a fuck, do you? You really have an impression of yourself.”
“What impression is that? That I’m untouchable?” He laughs. “Well… I am, Mr. Macintyre. We both know what kind of power I wield. Your mother needs something and so do I.” He holds his hands up like it’s just that simple. “Besides, you’re already in too deep to just walk away.”
“You’re a sick fuck, you know that?” I say.
“I have no idea what you mean. I care about my daughter. And even though I don’t know your mother, I’m sure she’s a very deserving woman. I’m only trying to help you help me.”
It’s wrong. The whole thing is wrong. The stuff with Lyssa. The blackmail with my mother.
But… she’ll get the treatment. And with that money I can buy her a little house near her doctors so she doesn’t have to stay in the hospital ward. So even if it doesn’t work—it will, but even if it doesn’t—she’ll have a nice home at the end of her life.
And if I say no to this man right now? Well, it’s not hard to predict that future. He’ll make sure she doesn’t get accepted. And then she’ll die there. Or here. Doesn’t matter. She will die.