by Ann Gimpel
Too many complications.
“Yes, sir.” Miranda rose gracefully to her feet, prepared to follow orders he handed over as she’d done so many times before.
This time he turned, heading for the outer doors of the building. Looking back over one shoulder, he quirked an eyebrow her way. “Coming?” he inquired.
Momentarily nonplussed, she started after him, and then bent to retrieve her briefcase. As she moved, her shoulder harness dug into her, and the cold metal of the gun she carried more for show than protection scraped against her skin. She felt fur sprouting as a defense and shook herself to stop the transformation.
Not needed. Merciful Lucifer, not now.
By the time she caught up with the chairman, he was standing on the sidewalk in front of the nondescript building that housed Rubicon International. An equally nondescript car stood at the curb, and he held the door open for her. A brisk wind tugged strands of her long, dark hair out of its French twist. For some reason, the chairman was coming with her.
The implications of that hit home, and she had to force herself to pretend nothing was wrong. What the hell? Why was he breaking protocol today of all days?
I could take off running. He’d never catch me, a part of her argued, answered rapidly by another part that that reminded her Lucifer would punish her for showing her wolf side in daylight. Miranda wasn’t certain what the chairman might do if she was insubordinate, but she knew how Lucifer punished. Scenes from lycan gatherings crowded close into her mind.
They decided things. She’d take her chances with the chairman.
“Are you going to get in?” Mild irritation underscored his words.
“Of course. Sorry.” Miranda shot him a sunny smile and slid into the passenger seat, taking care to flash as much thigh as she could manage.
The chairman laughed. “That’s the spirit, my dear.” Shoving her door shut, he came around to the driver’s side and got in, engaging the engine. From the sound of it, despite the car’s modest appearance, they could outrun anything on the road.
If it came to that.
They travelled for a while in silence. Miranda noted they were heading north on the expressway that would take them across the border into Canada. She hoped they weren’t going that far since it would be dark soon. Night made it harder to control her wolf side in life-and-death situations. When she was alone, it didn’t matter, but it didn’t appear she’d be alone today.
The chairman hummed a tuneless song that got on her nerves.
“Where are we going?” she asked at last.
“Somewhere quite special.” Half-turning, he bared his teeth in what was supposed to be a smile.
Guess he’s not going to tell me.
She tried to think what else she could ask that might yield a clue or two, but came up dry. The silence made her nervous since this was the first time she’d spent longer than five minutes in the chairman’s company. Her wolf side was way too close to the surface for comfort. Miranda reached beneath her jacket to readjust the Beretta digging into her ribs.
“Don’t even think about it,” the chairman growled. A knife materialized in his right hand. He pressed it against her thigh as he continued to guide the car through moderately heavy traffic.
Raising guileless blue eyes, Miranda stared at him. What the fuck? He can’t be scared of me, but he’s sure acting like he is. The possibility filled her with pride, and her wolf was ecstatic.
“Just readjusting things a bit, sir,” she murmured.
“See that it stops there,” he snapped. The knife disappeared. Even though Miranda tried, she couldn’t figure out where he’d gotten it.
He took an exit that led them into wooded countryside typical of the Pacific Northwest. The day was overcast, and Miranda glanced at the digital clock on the console. Four o’clock. Days were short late in the fall, so it would be dark in less than an hour. She hoped they’d be done with whatever the chairman had in mind before her other side came to the fore. She didn’t want to have to deal with that in addition to everything else. It wasn’t that she couldn’t hold onto her human form after dusk. It was just that it took a whole lot more effort.
Doesn’t take long to kill something, she reminded herself.
What else did Rubicon do, other than kill? If they had another purpose, she hadn’t discovered it in the years she’d worked for them.
“We will be meeting some...others. Or, rather, you will.” The chairman had pulled off onto a dirt road and seemed to be hunting for something. He slowed down and sped back up several times.
“What are your expectations of me?” she asked formally.
“That is part of your last test,” he said. “There are no expectations. Or further explanations. Your performance today will determine your future with Rubicon.”
You mean if I even have a future, she finished for him, taking care to remain silent.
The car lurched to a halt. “We’re here,” he announced. She was waiting for him to come around to open her door, when he added, “Get out.”
“Aren’t you coming?” she asked, curious, as she pushed her door open, grabbed her very unnecessary briefcase, and stood.
“No. Close the door.”
The minute she did, he jammed the car into reverse, fishtailing it until he was headed back the way they’d come. Dust and gravel splattered her. She sneezed, and then brushed off her clothes.
“What the bloody fucking hell?” Miranda stared after the taillights of the sedan. “He just dumped me out here.” She shifted from foot to foot, wishing she wasn’t wearing high heels. Normally, she’d have taken her own vehicle, and it was well stocked with field clothes. Her usual procedure was to change when she got to the indicated location.
“Normal just blew up in my face.” A growl bubbled from her guts, and she cut it off fast.
A message from the animal side of her brain made her glance sharply around her, taking stock of her situation. Death caught the unwary. She wasn’t planning on it catching her. Not tonight, anyway.
The deeply rutted road was lined with stately evergreens. Feeling exposed, she faded into their shadows as she continued to evaluate what she had to work with. Her unseen tail swished from side to side, and she assessed the light that was fading from the day. Could she risk shape-shifting a few minutes early? While she was considering that, the sound of a car engine—shriller than one she’d just exited from—filled her ears. Since the chairman’s car had been the only one on the deserted road, and she hadn’t seen any houses, she assumed this new car was coming for her.
Miranda dropped back fifty more paces into thick tree cover and kicked off her shoes. Her feet would be cold, but she could live with that. The rattle of automatic weapon fire jarred her, and she hit the dank ground, flattening herself against it.
Christ! Did the company send assassins to finish me off?
Deciding this qualified as the sort of emergency she could justify to Lucifer, Miranda dropped the guard she always kept over her wolf side. Usually, she stripped her clothes off first, but today she couldn’t spare the time. She felt her spine lengthening and her limbs moving under it. Thick gray fur with black markings took the place of her skin and hair. The only element that remained the same between her human and wolf forms was her eyes: brilliant, blazing and blue.
Within less than a minute, her tailored suit lay in tatters on the damp earth. Along with her gun. She’d forgotten to engage the safety and growled low in the back of her throat. It was the wolf equivalent of laughter. That gun had been nothing but a silly prop. She had teeth and claws and speed. Who needed guns when you had all those things?
Another spate of machine gun fire split the air. Keeping down, belly almost scraping the dirt, Miranda circled around. She wanted to see who was shooting at her. And then she rethought her strategy and went for speed. She was certain whoever was after her wouldn’t be expecting a wolf, so she streaked across the road sixty yards ahead of a Mercedes roadster, losing herself in the forest
on the other side. Because the driver was facing the other way, it was likely he never even noticed her.
Panting, she dug her claws into the soft dirt and came to a stop. She recognized the car. It belonged to Joe Adamson, one of her co-assassins. Not that any of them actually ever worked together. Murder was always an individual assignment. She assumed Rubicon did things that way to protect the company in case something went terribly wrong. That way there were no potential witnesses.
Was this what happened to the ones she never saw again? Your co-workers were sent to annihilate you. And if you somehow managed to beat your death sentence, you moved up the corporate ladder. Or would the chairman keep sending people after her until one of them was successful?
Had Rubicon decided she was extraneous?
Miranda focused her mind, but it wasn’t easy. That was the only downside to her wolf form. Her ability to reason wasn’t as strong as when she was human, even though her instincts were much more finely honed. Rubicon had sent her on many missions, but never against another employee. At least not that she knew about. She supposed it was possible, especially since the company had many branch offices, that she’d been deployed to kill one of their own a time or two and just not known about it.
Hell, maybe every single one I killed worked for us.
That thought disturbed her, so she pushed it aside. The implication of an entire business dedicated to killing off its own workers was so bizarre she couldn’t wrap her mind around it.
Like species who kill their own young...
She ran deeper into the trees, unsure what to do. If Joe would just get out of that damned car, she could jump him. But she’d been listening and hadn’t heard his car door open.
Lucifer’s voice pounded in her head. “Daughter. It is not yet dark.”
“They’re trying to kill me,” she protested. “I didn’t know what else to do.”
“Who would try to harm one of mine?” The voice was silky and seductive, but more gunfire nearly drowned out his words.
“Face your enemy,” he growled after she could hear again. Lucifer’s rapidly shifting moods were legendary. “Unless you have developed some new skills, you’ll scarcely be able to defend yourself from where you stand.”
Tail twitching, she padded through the trees, resenting Lucifer’s implication she was a coward. She was closing on the road when the sound she’d been waiting for finally came: the snick of a car door. Pulling darkness about her, Miranda peered through the last of the tree cover.
Joe was indeed standing next to his car, facing away from her. “Miranda,” he called once. Then again, louder. “Miranda, come on out. We can talk about this. I think you have something I want.”
What the hell is he up to?
She stared at him from her vantage point. She’d never bothered to talk with any of her targets before killing them. It made no sense. Judging the distance, she crept silently closer until a single spring would do it. Joe shouldered his gun, spraying the woods with bullets.
She’d never get a better chance. The racket from his gun covered the noise she made as she leapt on him, knocking him facedown into the dirt.
“Yes,” he shouted, writhing in an attempt to turn to look at her. “Goddamn it, Miranda. Bite me.”
Like hell I will, she thought, understanding why he’d called to her.
She barked a harsh laugh. Lucifer was most clear on the rules: no more werewolves unless he approved them. She was part of a glut that had occurred twenty years before when her kind had run wild, biting everything in sight. They’d become such a scourge, bounty hunters had all but wiped them out.
Then Lucifer took over, and things changed.
Joe shrieked when she sank her teeth into his jugular—not quite the bite he’d hoped for—followed by a few shots when his dying fingers played over the trigger of the gun trapped beneath his body. Miranda waited, tongue lolling as the last of Joe’s life drained away into the earth. If Lucifer was close, and he might be, she should offer him first feeding off her kill. She’d already broken one rule by shifting before full dark. She had no intention of breaking another.
An all-black wolf with silver eyes strode toward her. She’d seen him before at the annual gathering, but never up close like this. He was smiling, powerful jaws slightly ajar. Coming close, he rubbed noses with her.
“Nicely done,” he chortled, low in the back of his throat. He licked her muzzle and heat flared unexpectedly between her back legs. Understanding her part—one hunger exchanged for another—she dropped her head and squared her body on all four legs, twisting her tail aside to open a path for him.
Miranda was surprised by the sudden blaze of lust. Human sex was so much more complicated. This was easy. His big paws landed atop her shoulders. When he slid inside her body, she shuddered with delight. She’d never felt anything quite so delicious, and a low, hungry whine escaped her. His jaws closed on her neck, and the pain made what was happening to her nether regions all the more intense. When the moment came—and it came damned fast—she howled her joy to the forest. His guttural growls joined hers, and the two of them stood, flanks heaving, for long moments as she came back into herself.
After a time, the bulb at the base of his penis deflated enough for him to withdraw. Lucifer shook himself, bent his muzzle, and began to feed. She tried to join in, but he growled and snapped, making it clear this kill was not for her.
The human part of her batted back irritation, but the wolf part understood. Lucifer was the pack leader. He got whatever he wanted. No questions asked. Fading into the night shadows, she hunted. Each time she killed, the feel of living flesh and bone between her jaws excited her all over again, and she longed for Lucifer. Then she chided herself for foolishness. Chances of her ever seeing him again outside of a gathering were unlikely.
And when she did see him at the next year’s assembly, he might not even remember what they’d shared.
With the dawn, she crept into her apartment. It had required planning. She’d returned to the scraps of her clothing and determined they were beyond salvage. When she regained her human form, she’d be naked and a long way from home.
Not good.
She’d run through the last hours of the night, a dark streak in the gloom. Like all lycans, she had the ability to cloak her presence so long as it remained dark. Moonlight would have thrown a monkey wrench into things, but the night remained blessedly overcast. Approaching her building through a deserted alleyway, she’d probably given a couple of drunks heart attacks. She heard them chittering to one another about the wolf. After they sobered up—if they ever did—they’d likely chalk her up to a particularly bad case of D.T.s.
Past the alleyway, she vaulted over the fence that surrounded her small patio and curled up next to her sliding glass door, too exhausted to summon the magic to shift. As soon as daylight streaked the sky, she dragged her tired human body inside and into a hot shower. Nursing a cup of instant coffee, Miranda considered what to do next.
Should she show up at her desk at nine like she always did—unless she was off on assignment? She felt a touch badly about Joe. She’d sort of liked him, but she reminded herself there were no friends in her particular line of work. Or anywhere else. She couldn’t have human friends because of what she was. And lycan, or even werewolf, friends seemed out of the question, mostly since she only saw others like herself at the annual gathering and had no idea what any of them looked like in their human bodies.
Miranda smiled sadly to herself. Not really human. Not really a wolf.
That decided it. Before she could sink into a morass of self-pity, she dried her hair, pulled on a long wool dress, and caught a cab to work. When she got to her desk, there was a note from the chairman telling her to report to his office immediately.
Miranda blanched. Shit. Was yesterday’s charade going to start all over again? This was nothing like she’d expected. If she’d passed the company’s final test, they would have contacted her at home—or something—be
cause no one who passed was ever seen again. Of course, the same could be said of the ones who failed. Maybe coming in had been a mistake after all. She stared at the chairman’s note, handwritten on vellum in his strong hand.
Or maybe that’s all just company myth. After all, I’ve never actually known when anyone else was slated for their final test...
Suddenly wary, she considered walking out of the building and taking her chances. Drawing on instinct from her wolf senses mixed with human intellect, she puzzled out what to do. It was early yet. Even the chairman wouldn’t be expecting her for another half hour or so.
“You should go meet him, Daughter.”
The voice in her head was faint, but clear.
“Lucifer?” She glanced around her, but of course her office was empty.
“There’s my answer, then,” she muttered. Miranda might not trust the chairman of Rubicon International, but she did trust Lucifer.
Shoving her heavy hair back over her shoulders, she stood and marched to her office door. Once through it, she headed for the private elevator toward the rear of the building, detouring back because she’d forgotten her key.
The elevator door opened smoothly depositing her into the anteroom of the chairman’s lush office. It was paneled from floor to ceiling in carved walnut. Burgundy-colored carpet, so thick she sank into it, cushioned her shoes. Ornate candelabra shed a muted light. Because she was alone, she took the time to look closely at the woodcarvings and smiled when she noticed their Bacchanalian themes. Everyone was either fucking someone or else the recipient of carnal pleasure.
Despite a futile attempt at self-control, the heat from last night in the forest licked at her, and moisture slicked her thighs. She was actually reaching for herself when she realized what she was doing. Miranda made herself sit in a nearby chair, but her thighs pressed tight together didn’t help matters.
She glanced at her watch. She probably had time to catch the elevator downstairs where she could duck into a restroom to take care of her little problem. Once she was done, which wouldn’t take long, she’d return to the chairman’s plush offices. Miranda surged to her feet, intent on her plan, but the door to the inner office opened, and the chairman walked purposefully toward her.