by Jamie Davis
Zelda turned and exited, leaving Taylor alone with the files and the humming of the massive industrial scanner in the corner.
She put her purse on the table and glanced at the scanner instructions. She was pretty sure she could figure out how to use it on her own, but there was no need to reinvent the wheel if they had a system in place already. It looked precisely like what Zelda described: mindless grunt work for a person with little or no work skills.
Taylor noticed the instructions didn’t take into account the automated feeder and collator built into the scanning system. She could batch-load the files and then stand back while they scanned themselves. If she set up the records that way, it would allow her to start searching for where VirSync might have hidden the servers needed to run the VR rigs.
Taylor sighed. First, she had to get this tedious job started. She had to do a good enough job today that Zelda would ask her back, just in case she needed another day to locate the server. Taylor went to work, setting up the automated system.
Chapter Twelve
Two hours later, Taylor turned away from the scanner and checked the empty file folders laid out on the table for the next batch. She’d come up with a system to keep it all straight. Every scrap of paper from those files was now in the automated feeding hopper and would run through the scanner. It would then collate them back into the proper stacks for her to return to the correct folder.
The system gave her about twenty-five minutes before she’d have to return and reset the job for the next batch. Doing that three more times would get her close to lunchtime and Zelda’s return.
Leaving the file room once again, Taylor walked down the long hall and checked the eight padlocked doors, four each on opposite sides. They seemed to be locked up tightly, but maybe she could try to pick the locks. She looked up to check and make sure the traders were still glued to their screens. Taylor froze. Myles Hickman walked down the hallway toward her.
“Hello, Ms. Swift. I see you landed that position after all. Good for you.”
“Thank you, sir. I was just taking a quick break to stretch my legs and keep myself fresh. Filing is tedious work. I want to make sure I do it without any errors.”
“Attention to detail is important, that is true.”
He stopped at the last door and pulled out a set of keys, fitting one into the padlock and removing it before opening the door.
He turned and looked Taylor’s way. “Is there anything else I can help you with?”
“No, sir. I was going to head back to my work. You have a good day, and thank you for mentioning me to your friend, Mr. Handon.”
“I haven’t had a chance to do that yet. You got this job all on your own.”
Taylor nodded as Myles entered the locked room. She managed to steal a glance past him as he went inside. One of the VR rigs was set up on a padded bench beside a desk that had a stack of electronics and computer equipment. She smiled. She’d found the location of the VirSync systems. Now it was time to install the signal interrupter.
She hurried away so he didn’t catch her peeking at the gear.
Returning to the file room, Taylor fished in her purse and pulled out the small gray box with a short, v-shaped antenna jutting from one end. A standard electric plug extended from the other. The last of the locked VR rooms shared a wall with the file room. She searched that wall and found a power outlet hidden in the corner beside the row of filing cabinets.
Stretching her arm into the gap between the wall and the nearest filing cabinet, she managed to plug the box into the outlet. While it had a battery that would run for several days, having an uninterrupted power source would boost its capabilities and reach even more.
Taylor stood up and had just returned to the scanner when Zelda returned.
Taylor checked the clock on the wall, which said it was only 11 AM. “You’re back early. Is everything going all right?” She hoped she hadn’t been picked up on a hidden camera or something. They might have seen her place the device in the corner.
“You’re fine. In fact, you’ve made an impression on Mr. Handon. He called down and asked to meet you. He said you’re a friend of a friend.” Zelda waggled a finger at her. “You’ve been holding out on me. I wouldn’t have given you this grunt work to do if I’d known you were a personal friend of the boss man.”
“I’m not. I met a man in the elevator on the way up, and he found out where I was applying. He must’ve put in a good word for me. That’s all it is, really.”
“Well, you must have made quite the impression. It’s not all the time he calls me like that. I’ve only talked directly to him a few times before, so imagine my surprise when his name popped up on my phone.”
“I didn’t mean to cause any problems.”
“It’s not a problem at all. I wouldn’t mind if you mentioned me in a kind way when you’re up there on the twelfth floor, though. If it comes up naturally, of course.”
“I can certainly do that. You’ve been awesome to me, and I’d be happy to say so.” Taylor fidgeted. She’d done what she needed to do. Maybe this was her chance to get away without arousing suspicion. “I suppose I’ll just head on up there, then.”
“Exactly. We don’t want to keep him waiting. I’ll show you where to go.” Zelda glanced at the stacks of files and papers. “You certainly accomplished a lot in the short time you were down here. No wonder he wants to chat with you. He was probably watching you the whole time.”
“What do you mean?”
Zelda gestured up to the corner of the room above where she’d installed the box. “The security camera, silly. The information in these files is quite sensitive. Mr. Handon likes to keep an eye on everything down here.”
A chill raced down Taylor’s spine. “He was watching me? From a camera over there?” She checked the corner. It was unlikely the angle allowed a view of her when she’d plugged in the interrupter. Taylor breathed a sigh of relief.
“It’s okay. You don’t need to worry about it,” Zelda said, misunderstanding Taylor’s reaction. “I took a little while to get used to it, too. It is his company, after all. His name’s on the door, so if he wants to keep an eye on things, that’s his right, isn’t it?”
“Uh, sure, I was surprised, that’s all. Are you going to take me upstairs to meet him?”
“Goodness, no, at least not all the way.” Zelda fanned herself with a hand. “Between you and me, it’s a little dark up there decor-wise. No, I’ll take you up to the floor and drop you off. Then I have to come back down. His assistant will meet you there. She’s new to the job, just came in about a month ago. She’s a bit brusque, but that’s all. Her name is Cindy.”
Taylor hesitated. What were the odds that it was THAT Cindy?
“Come on. We don’t want to keep the boss waiting. I’ve heard he doesn’t like that.”
Taylor nodded and walked out the door and started down the long hallway back to the trading room.
The people in the cubicles were still focused on their tasks as before. It seemed even more creepy now that she picked out the positions of the hidden cameras positioned everywhere around the room.
A few minutes later, Taylor stood in one of the elevators, waiting for the door to open on the twelfth floor. It was only one floor up. For some reason, though, the short ride filled her with dread.
Her mind returned to the wounds to Clark’s arm and torso from the shifter attack he and Quinn had faced the night before. It reminded her that happenings here had deadly serious consequences.
Glancing at Zelda humming quietly to herself, Taylor’s hand dipped into her purse automatically to find her only form of protection. Her fingers brushed against the tiny throwing knife Clark had given her. It seemed so minuscule now when weighed against what she might be facing in a few minutes. She realized Clark had been toying with her by giving her the knife. He knew it was a useless item and practically harmless when weighed against something like his razor-sharp short sword.
The chime pinged,
and the door slid open. Taylor stared at the floor in front of her and saw a pair of black high heels and the cuffs of bright red slacks. She tilted her head up to see who waited for her and scanned past an exquisitely tailored pantsuit.
Then she met the eyes and was face to face with demon-Cindy, although her eyes looked normal now, not the solid black pools she’d had the last time Taylor had seen her. The sardonic smile on the woman’s face was hard to read. Taylor almost stabbed a hand out to push another button to take the elevator to another floor—any other level.
“Thank you for bringing her up, Zelda. You may go now.”
“Of course,” Zelda said. The woman gave Taylor a nudge in the small of her back, so she stepped off the elevator. “Good luck, Jeanne.”
The doors slid shut, leaving Taylor alone with the demon. She surprised herself by stepping forward and extending her hand. “I’m Jeanne Swift. I’m here to see Mr. Handon.”
“Of course. Mr. Handon is expecting you. If you will follow me?”
Taylor nodded and fell in behind the woman who marched along across a large open lobby filled with plush leather furniture and built-in bookcases on the walls. The carpet initially seemed to be black, but after a few steps, she crossed an area where the sparse overhead lights were a little brighter. There, Taylor saw the floor was really a deep red in color. She could see what Zelda meant about it being dark up here.
As Taylor stepped forward, she hid a sigh of relief. Cindy didn’t recognize her when the doors opened, and that was lucky, but then the last time they’d seen each other, Taylor had been naked and covered from head to toe with black painted runes.
Cindy turned her head and said over her shoulder, “Mr. Hickman was quite taken with you. When he mentioned meeting you earlier, Mr. Handon was interested in meeting you, too. He’s always one looking for a fresh…uh, face.”
Something in the way she said it unsettled Taylor. She kept her hand in her open purse and gripped the smooth metal of the silver knife. She felt a little ridiculous even considering it a weapon at this point, but it was all she had.
Cindy stopped at a set of tall double oak doors, carved in ornate patterns that seemed to trap the eye if you stared at them too long. Beside them sat a desk.
The woman cleared her throat and said, “Mr. Handon is inside. He’ll call you when he’s ready for you to enter. Farewell.”
Farewell? Who even said that nowadays? It sounded so final. “You’re not coming in with me? Will you be here when I come out?”
A disturbing smile crossed the demon woman’s lips. “When you come out? No, I think not. I have things to attend to elsewhere.” The smile remained in place as she turned away and left Taylor standing alone.
The chime sounded in the distance behind her. Cindy had entered the elevator. Taylor scanned the shadowy room, trying to see into all the corners. She could not penetrate the darkness, and her mind started making up all sorts of things that might be hidden there.
A deep voice sounded from the other side of the double doors. “Come.”
Steeling herself, she reached out for the handle and opened the door, swinging it inward. The doorway led to a room filled with a long conference table. Padded leather chairs lined either side, matching the dark browns, reds, and black from the outer lobby. A matching oak desk graced the other side of the room. It struck Taylor that there were no windows visible, only floor-to-ceiling black drapes lining the wall where she thought windows would be. She couldn’t be sure.
A deep, hypnotic voice coming from behind the desk said, “Welcome, young woman. Come closer, so I might see you better.”
Taylor moved closer to the desk. As she neared it, she realized the black leather chair was occupied by a tall, thin man with ashen skin. His black sports coat and shirt blended into the background. The hairs on the back of Taylor’s neck rose in some sort of primal warning.
Thoughts started roaming through her mind, including her breakfast and coffee this morning. She wished she’d had more to eat. It was strange she thought about that now, of all times. She tried to force her mind back to the task at hand.
“Don’t resist, child. I want to know where a sweet morsel like you came from to appear upon my doorstep so unexpectedly. Myles was correct; you are definitely not who you seem to be.”
Taylor realized the scrolling memories weren’t floating by of her own doing. This man was causing it. Somehow, he could read her mind.
She fought to regain control, but it was like pushing back against a moving wall of water. No matter what you did, it just flowed around your fingers.
Taylor forced herself to focus, concentrating on mundane things like furniture and food in the memories floating by, trying to ignore images or memories connecting her to Quinn and the others. Perhaps she could shape the thoughts she let out. It was a desperate plan, but it was all she could do to resist what was happening.
Taylor concentrated on high school and her brief stint on the school paper when she thought she might want to become a reporter someday. She latched onto those memories and tried to push them forward to make them seem more current.
It worked.
“You’re a reporter?” Handon stood behind the desk. “I must say it’s been a while since one of your ilk penetrated my veil. How did you find out I was here? Tell me. I promise, when I feed on you later, I’ll make it painless.”
Oh, my God, Taylor thought. He was a vampire, a real one, and he planned on drinking her blood.
Taylor pushed forward the image of a book cover she’d read once about a girl who fell in love with a vampire.
“Bah! That drivel again. Humans have turned us into something more like the fae than the creatures of the night we truly are. Enough. I thought you might be here for another reason, but now I see you just stumbled upon me by lucky happenstance. The luck is all mine, of course. Come around the desk, my dear, so I can select the best place to sample you.”
Taylor’s legs moved as if made solid planks of wood. She fought against going closer to the creature but couldn’t stop herself. She lurched around the desk until she stood only a few feet away from her ultimate doom. This was it. She was going to die here.
The vampire, John Handon, stepped forward until he loomed over her. He leaned over, placing one hand on the oaken desktop as he tilted her head to the side with the other.
She found her eyes staring down. She saw his hand on the desktop beside her purse. Curiously, the hand inside it ached. Why did her hand hurt so much?
She lifted it out of the purse and it came free, still clutching the hilt of the short silver knife. The sheath had fallen away, leaving the blade free to glisten and reflect the single overhead light. The grip pulsed in her hand as if it had a mind of its own. It seemed like a signal meant only for her.
Cool breath passed over her neck as the vampire sniffed her skin. Any moment now, it would be over.
The silver blade glinted at her again, drawing her eyes back to it as she waited for the first sting of Handon’s fangs. What did the knife want from her?
She squeezed her hand tighter, angry that she couldn’t understand what she was supposed to do. The edge of the blade closest to her palm bit into her pinky, drawing the slightest drop of blood.
That was enough. The sight of the glistening drop of blood released something inside, giving her control once again.
Shrieking with fear, Taylor lifted the knife and drove it down into the hand resting atop the desk with all the force she could muster. The silver-infused blade hissed and smoked as it passed through the pale skin and sank into the thick oak of the desktop below.
Handon howled and batted her away, the blow strong enough to send Taylor flying ten feet to slam into the wall beside the door to the lobby.
Dazed, she struggled to fight her way back to full awareness so she could understand what had just happened. It all seemed unreal.
Her knife still impaled the vampire’s hand. The skin around it shriveled and blackened as tendrils of smoke dri
fted up around it. Handon struggled to pluck the blade out with his free hand, but every time he touched it, his fingers sizzled.
Taylor pushed to her feet and did the only thing she could think of: she ran for the open door and into the lobby beyond. She expected to encounter demon-Cindy, but the possessed woman was nowhere to be found. Only the empty reception desk awaited Taylor. Seeing no one, she headed back to the elevator.
She skidded to a stop and punched the down button. The doors opened right away, and Taylor bolted inside. She hit the button for the first floor and then stabbed the door-close button repeatedly, expecting the vampire to appear at any instant. His distant howling continued but drew no closer.
Finally, the doors shut, and the elevator started downward.
Tears streaming down her face, Taylor dialed Quinn on her phone.
“Taylor, are you all right?”
“No, I’m leaving. Just come and get me, okay? Hurry.”
There was a pause, then Quinn came back on. “Leave the front of the building and turn right. Keep walking on the sidewalk close to the street. Don’t stop. We’ll find you.”
“Quinn, there’s a vampire in there.”
“A what?”
“You heard me. A vampire.”
There was another pause, during which Taylor thought she could hear another voice in the background. It was probably Clark.
“Just get to the street and keep walking. We’ll be there as soon as we can. Don’t stop for anything or anyone but us.”
The line went dead and the doors opened on the first-floor lobby at the same time. Taylor dropped the phone in her purse and marched for the front doors. She expected the guards to stop her, but no one said anything.
Soon she was walking down the street, moving as fast as her feet could carry her and not break into a run. It wouldn’t do to draw attention to herself. Who knew where that creature’s minions might be?
Taylor made it three blocks before a car pulled up beside her and Quinn jumped out.
“Taylor, what are you doing? I’ve been calling for you to get in for nearly a block.”
