Pushing the Envelope: A Prequel from "The Barter System" World by Shayne McClendon Page B

eye on her until I can get her transported out of state.”
    “Consider it done.”
    “I appreciate it, Red.”
    “Hollow?”  He waited.  “Thank you.”
    “You’re welcome.  Keep moving, pretty girl.  Before you know it, Riya will be back.  In the meantime, you have a young girl to save.”
    Disconnecting, she sent some positive energy to her best friend and checked the magazine in her gun. 
    Since she was a little girl, Tawny Ratliff had given no fucks.  She didn’t care what people thought about her, there were few things she wouldn’t try at least once, and those traits had led her to the life she was meant to lead.
     
    The end…not really.
    Keep reading for a sneak peek of “The Barter System,” the first full novel of the series.

The Barter System
    Research may be work…but that doesn’t
mean you can’t enjoy it.
     
    Shayne McClendon
     
    Tiny disclaimer…I limited the sexual content in “Pushing the Envelope” to give more readers a taste of my work.  However!  I cannot stress more strongly that while “ The Barter System ” is packed with incredible characters and an engaging plot…there is a lot of sex.
    No, seriously.  There’s a lot of sex.  Just to let you know.  I tried to substitute sex with cards or watching sitcoms but…it didn’t read the way I wanted it to. 
    If that’s not your cup of tea, check out one of my dramatic romances instead (hint, hint: “ Completely Wrecked ”). 
    Carry on!

Chapter One
     
    Last week of August 2012
    Riya O’Connell perused the profiles of each man she’d chosen to participate in the final stage of her dissertation.  Page by page, she reviewed the data she’d gathered from them as well as her own carefully performed background checks for what must have been the hundredth time. 
    The applications submitted to her website The Barter System originally numbered more than thirteen thousand before her six-month deadline in May.  Potential subjects filled out a brief application and gave basic information about themselves and their non-sexual lives. 
    It had shocked her to see the number of bogus candidates – though she knew it shouldn’t have.  A vast majority of applicants submitted false information about age, relationship status, employment status, and criminal history. 
    If someone lied about the little things, they were likely to lie about the big ones.  She needed honesty if her data was going to be accurate.  The rejected applications were numbered and now comprised the first fifty pages of her research.  Not a single word would be wasted. 
    In the last three months, she’d trimmed the list to just over five hundred by sending out a questionnaire that had to be completed on a tighter schedule of ten days.  The second survey was much more detailed and specific, asking general questions about sexuality and preferences. 
    Many men emailed her website with complaints about all the “work” she was making them do.  Naturally, those potentials were culled immediately from the list of possibilities.
    She would need – legitimate information – to submit with her dissertation.  If a simple questionnaire scared them…they weren’t going to be up for the countless questions she planned to ask casually and formally. 
    From those several hundred “real” applicants, Riya narrowed the list once again by requesting an essay about why they wished to participate.  More than three hundred men submitted their compositions by her third deadline. 
    The majority were filled with sexual fantasy and very little emotion.  Those final-tier applicants had been painstakingly narrowed to less than thirty. 
    Of those, less than a dozen men remained in her “first choice” stack of files.
    After serious internal struggle and a bit of juggling, her final eight men were chosen at the end of July.  Only one change had to be made within the last few days and she was still unsure how she felt about it.
    A snapshot accompanied each