Shifting Shadows: Stories from the World of Mercy Thompson(119)

Ben looked at the floor as he strode by the other cubicles of DBAs. He stretched his neck and heard the bones pop, a sign that the wolf was too prominent. Control, he thought at himself, don’t want to kill anyone. Even as he thought it, the dark inside him answered, Oh, didn’t he just. He knew what it was to feel the flesh part between his teeth and the taste of hot, fresh prey.

He passed the last cubicle, and Duffy’s smell and cologne that reeked of chemicals assaulted Ben’s sensitive nose. He had no trouble curling his lips in a snarl.

Duffy stood beside Mel’s desk, leaning over slightly until he hovered above her, a position of power. His expensive suit and haircut were designed to show anyone who looked that Mark Duffy was a man of consequence.

Ben bulled his way to Mel’s desk, forcing Duffy to step back or be body-checked. As Ben slammed the manual onto Mel’s desk with a crack that made her jump, Duffy flinched, and silence descended on their portion of cubicle hell.

“What is this?” Ben snapped at Mel, knowing the flush of anger on his English-pale cheeks made him even more intimidating. Humans couldn’t tell he was a werewolf unless he wanted them to, but some part of their psyche could smell predator.

Mel looked at the book and swallowed. She didn’t cringe, not quite, but when she answered, it was in a squeak. “The manual I got for you from the company library yesterday?”

He stabbed the paper with his finger. “Do you see the title? What does it say?”

“Is this really necessary?” said Duffy, and Ben looked at him briefly.

He turned back to Mel without answering Duffy. “Well? Can’t you read?”

“It says Advanced Concepts in JavaScript.” She didn’t sound terrified, though Ben knew she was scared of him. Everyone at his work was scared of him except his friend Rajeev because Rajeev was on the other side of the world. His wolf saw all humans as weak, and people could feel things like that.

“I asked you for the advanced Java manual,” he said. “I realize that JavaScript starts with Java, but you’ve been working here long enough that you should know that one program is nothing like the other. Sounds alike is not good enough. I called the library, and they pulled the correct book. I made it simple for you because simple seems to be all you can do. Go upstairs, take this book back, and bring me the book they give you.”

“Yes, sir,” she said, standing up. Which meant she looked him right in the collarbone, and she raised her chin. “You’ll have to get out of my way first.”

“You tell him, Mel,” said a faint voice a few rows over.

“Keep your nose in your business, Lincoln,” snapped Ben, effectively removing the voice’s anonymity.

He backed up and swept his arm out in a mockery of gentlemanliness and forced Duffy even farther back, clearing the way for Mel to head to the stairs, which were closer (and faster) than the elevator.

“Don’t start sniveling.” Ben scowled at her back as she skittered by him with her head tucked so no one could see it. “If you’d gotten it right the first time, neither of us would have been inconvenienced.”

“Don’t you think that was a little harsh?” asked Duffy, then, with unrecognized irony, “It is against company policy to harass other workers.”

Ben met his eyes—a dangerous move with his wolf so close to the surface. But Duffy looked away before Ben was driven to enforce his status as the dominant predator.

“If she doesn’t want to get yelled at, she can do her job,” Ben tried out his dominant position by sneering. “Just like everyone else does. What do you need?”

Duffy opened his mouth, but no words came out. Hah. Humans were no match for a werewolf.

Ben waved his hand back down the line. “Did you need something from the DBAs?”

“Uh,” said Duffy. “No.”

“Fine.” Ben turned on his heel and stalked down the row, which was unusually silent. DBAs didn’t spend a lot of time talking, but keyboards are not quiet—everyone had been listening to his interchange.

Ben’s cubicle was the farthest one, and he liked it that way because people with random issues usually stopped elsewhere before they got to him. By the time he got there, the noise level had begun to resume its normal clatter.

•   •   •

“Here,” one of the other DBAs whispered from the hallway just outside Ben’s cubicle. “Just wait here. He’ll be with you as soon as he surfaces.”

Ben had hung a whiteboard on the outside of the cubicle wall next to the entrance of his lair. On it he had written: I know you are here. Wait silently, and I’ll get to you as soon as I am able. If you speak before then, you will not find me helpful. On the floor just inside his cubicle was a mat with a pair of black footprints and “Wait here” painted on it.

“I have work—”

“Shhh,” hissed the second voice. “Heed the warning.”

It took Ben a couple of minutes to tidy everything so nothing would blow up behind him. When he turned around, there was one of the programmers whose face he vaguely recognized waiting for him.

Ben raised an eyebrow.

“I’m told you’re the one who wiped out my data,” the programmer said belligerently.

“Probably,” agreed Ben. “Who are you?”