by Jez Morrow
* * * * *
Martin took the set of stairs at the farthest corner of the building up to the third floor, so he could approach Ann Jefferson’s office in the opposite direction from which she would expect him.
On the landing, he pressed his ear to the door of the stairwell.
Hearing no one, he silently let himself into the hallway.
At the end of the hall, fluorescent lights threw a shadow onto the floor—of someone just around the corner.
Someone was waiting by the elevators.
Martin moved up the corridor with silent tread. At the corner, he flattened his back to the wall, listening.
He heard slow steps on the carpet, back and forth, pacing in front of the bank of elevators.
There came the soft tone of an elevator arriving. The sliding open of doors.
The sliding closed.
No one had got on. The watcher was still there. Pacing.
Martin waited for the pacing steps to make their turn in the direction away from him. Then he quickly peered ‘round the corner to see the watcher’s back.
“Executive Assistant Director Cobb!” Martin whispered, startled.
Cobb turned. He tilted his grizzled head in mild surprise. “Martin. What are you doing here?”
“Why are you here?” Martin shot back.
The executive assistant director was not accustomed to such disrespect but Cobb answered without rebuke. “I received a very peculiar message this evening. Text.” He shook his head wearily. “I should not have to do text at my age. It told me not to come here. So of course,” he shrugged, “I came. Was that message from you, Martin? What are you doing?”
Martin’s thoughts whirled. Ann Jefferson had told Cobb to stay away. But she had to know that would only make Cobb come. She was bringing the executive assistant director into this trap. As witness to what? This was a much more elaborate snare than he was ready for. Fear crept into his inner stillness. He had no idea what she intended.
“Sir, I know who the traitor is. It’s Ann Jefferson. She’s the one who arranged the hit on me. She’s the one taking money from the drug cartel.”
Cobb’s thick brows drew together. All the lines in his face became deep fissures with his frown. “That is a very grave charge, Martin. Very grave. And frankly unbelievable.”
“Ann knows what time I leave work. She knows what train I take. She knows what coat I wear. She knows I get off at the stop nearest to Jack’s townhouse.” Martin had always loved the steady older man because you could trust Frederick Cobb to trust his own but that trust was not serving him here. Ann Jefferson was going to take out both of them with one snare.
“There are other people who could know that,” said Cobb.
Martin begged, “Sir! Listen! Why would Jefferson summon me here? Now?”
“I—I have no idea. She doesn’t trust you, of course. I don’t know why this couldn’t be handled during work hours.”
“And why did she tell you to stay away?”
“Well, that—that cannot be Special Agent Jefferson’s doing. This is all ridiculous. I can’t have my agents backbiting each other like this. This has got to stop. If she’s here, let’s go see her together and talk to her. This way.”
Those simple words suddenly rang hollow.
This way.
Unnecessary words. Martin knew the way to Ann Jefferson’s office. Cobb was more rattled than he let on.
The lights were on within Ann’s office but Ann was not visible at her desk.
“I don’t see her,” said Cobb, looking through the long narrow window which flanked one side of the door.`
Cobb tried the knob. It was unlocked. He pulled the door open for Martin to go in first.
And Martin became keenly aware of something he had been trying to ignore.
Martin’s wolf-heightened senses caught the scent of danger. What danger smells like. It smells wrong. Hyper-aware now, he picked up the same things a lie detector reads. Cobb’s heightened blood pressure made his heartbeat loud to Martin’s wolf keen ears. His heart was beating loud and too fast. His body heat was elevated. There was an acrid scent of sweat under his mild façade. His breathing sounded unnatural—too shallow, too careful. And there was an indefinable brittleness in the air.
To Martin’s heightened senses, the buzzing of fluorescent lights sounded thunderous, the hard glare nearly blinding.
Oh shit.
Martin tried to mask any outward signs of his own leap into fear. He knew the color had left his face.
How could Cobb be doing this? Of all people.
Martin heard the door shut behind him. It sounded like the shutting of a coffin from the inside.
Martin moved toward the row of file cabinets which stood opposite Ann’s desk. He was trying to angle himself a path toward the door.
When he turned ‘round, Cobb had a gun drawn and leveled at him.
Martin immediately turned his back again to give Cobb no excusable target.
A shot in the front could easily be called self-defense, but if Cobb shot him in the back there would be too many questions.
Cobb was keeping his distance, aware that he did not have the reflexes of the much-younger man. He spoke evenly but Martin detected false reassurance underneath the words, “Martin, I am not going to kill you unless you force me. I can have you on a boat to Colombia tonight.”
Martin would not turn around. He tried to figure out where Cobb wanted to maneuver him. There had to be some damning position Cobb needed him to be in before he could take his shot.
“Ah!” Cobb made a warning sound as Martin edged toward the door. Martin peered over his shoulder to see Cobb motioning with the barrel for him to stay away from there.
Martin moved toward the corner where the metal file cabinets ended. There was a space between the end cabinet and the wall into which a very slender man might fit.
Cobb strode forward several paces to keep Martin in his sights.
Martin peered back over his shoulder again, meeting Cobb’s eyes.
Martin glanced to something beyond Cobb, then returned his gaze instantly to Cobb’s face.
Cobb noticed the glance. He would not fall for it. He sounded tired. “Is that supposed to make me turn around? I know for a fact that Ann is not here this evening. And she is certainly not hiding behind the desk. I’m not going to look.”
Martin’s eyes widened briefly. He damn near laughed. “Good!”
Cobb heard the low growl, very close behind him.
He glanced backward despite himself.
White teeth gaped brightly ferocious in a black wolfen face. Wolf lips snarled. The eyes blazed a ravenous gleam. A guttural roaring grew out of the animal’s throat.
Eyes on the animal, Cobb still sensed motion from Martin’s direction and he fired his gun toward him, then immediately swung the gun ‘round toward the black wolf.
The black wolf dodged sideways of Cobb’s second shot, which buried itself in the floor.
The two gun cracks blunted the ears. Still, Cobb could hear the strange animal sounds behind him, even though the wolf was right in front of him. The sounds were like animal claws on linoleum. Cobb sprinted toward a wall to get both targets on one side of him and he tried to get a bead on the black wolf, which danced and weaved like a boxer as it snapped at his hand.
Cobb heard a shriek of pain. His.
Teeth buried into Cobb’s gun wrist.
Not the black wolf’s teeth.
Cobb curled around the stabbing pain in his gun hand. The eyes of a silver wolf glared up at him from the vortex of pain. A silver wolf with topaz eyes like Martin’s.
The silver wolf clamped its jaws down harder.
Pain lancing up Cobb’s arm froze the air in his lungs, shot up to his brain, filled it as if his head would explode.
He lost strength in his legs and crumpled heavily. He felt a duller pain in his skull where his head struck the floor. He rolled onto his back, gulping for air.
The air fel
t squeezed from his lungs. The face of a black wolf filled his vision. The black wolf was standing on his chest. It was heavy. Its hot breath blasted his face. Its teeth were huge and close.
Dropping in a heap like a dog, the black wolf lay down on him, pushing the air from Cobb’s lungs. It lay there, nose to nose with him.
The pain in his hand had subsided from a stabbing pierce to an agonizing ache. The silver wolf had let go. The gun slid out of Cobb’s hand.
Cobb turned his swimming head aside to get the wolf breath out of his nostrils.
Cobb’s blurry vision tried to focus, tried to find the silver wolf, tried to find Martin.
Martin’s clothes lay in a pile as if Martin had melted in place. A bullet hole pocked the wall behind where Martin had been standing.
Cobb heard Martin from somewhere, moving about. It wasn’t the clicking of animal claws. This sounded like a barefoot tread.
And there was Martin, naked, crouched at the pile of clothes. He had kicked the gun away somewhere and was putting his clothes back on.
Cobb tried to move. The black wolf’s mouth closed on his chin with a low purring growl as if it might tear his chin off his face.
Martin stood up, dressed. He walked to the gun and put his foot on it.
“’Kay,” said Martin.
Apparently he was speaking to the black wolf, because the beast let go of Cobb’s face and jumped off his chest with the pushing of heavy paws.
Cobb tried to sit up. A lance of pain jetted up his arm from his bitten, broken wrist.
The black wolf trotted behind the desk.
Gunshots fired within FBI headquarters never went long without security arriving at a run to investigate. Cobb could hear them in the corridor, slowing their approach to take positions flanking the door.
Martin held his arms up and out to his sides, his hands open as the guards first peered then burst in. The guards fanned out, guns on Martin, guns on Cobb.
Martin gave the pistol a push with his foot across the floor toward one of the guards. “You’re going to want to check the fingerprints on that.”
“Thank God you’re here! They attacked me!” Cobb cried. “I had to defend myself.” He held out his bloody hand. “Wolf! There’s a wolf behind the desk!”
Unsure who was who, the guards kept their guns leveled at everyone in sight—at Martin, at Cobb and now toward whoever was rustling behind the desk.
“You!” one called. “Come out of there! Hands where I can see them!”
“Watch out! It’s a wolf!” Cobb cried.
What stood up from behind the desk, hands up, was a tall handsome man in the uniform of a lieutenant commander in the U.S. Navy.
Jack. Jack Reed.
The guards quickly figured out who was the dangerous party here. They let Jack and Martin lower their hands. They were confident that the only prints they would find on the gun would be Cobb’s.
Executive Assistant Director Cobb gabbled like a lunatic as he was taken away in handcuffs.
“They’re wolfmen! They turned into wolves,” Cobb told anyone who would listen. “Both of them. That one silver, that one black.”
The eyes of the arresting officers involuntarily turned back toward the accused, as if Jack and Martin could possibly have something to say in answer to an allegation that weird. “A silver wolf and a black wolf?”
Jack said, deadpan, “I want to be the silver one.”
Martin shot Jack a sour glance. He crossed his arms and said blandly, “I’m the silver one. The executive assistant director said so. Pay attention, Jack.”
* * * * *
Ann Jefferson arrived on the scene, dismayed to find bullet holes in her office. She turned to Martin Winter.
“I was told—” She stopped. This was going to sound stupid. “I was told that Executive Assistant Director Cobb says you’re a werewolf. Anything to say about that?”
Martin glowered at her. “It’s true, of course. You’ll see at the next full moon.”
Ann Jefferson nodded out the window at moon, a bright round wafer with an icy ring around it. “The moon is full, Special Agent Winter.”
“Well then, my mistake.”
Jack Reed offered unconvincingly, “Grr?”
Ann held her arms tightly crossed, her fingers drumming on her upper arm. She was accustomed to suspecting everyone until she knew the truth. Here she was fast becoming aware that she had been hunting the wrong man. She said at last, “I think our drug dealers’ helper has been dipping into the product.”
And even though it choked her to say so, she tried to force out the words, “Well, Martin.” She could not go through with an outright apology. Could only say, “Damn.”
“It’s okay, Annie,” said Martin. “I thought it was you.”
“That’s fair,” said Ann.
“Are we cool?”
She spoke, tight-lipped, as close to mushy as Ann Jefferson ever got. “Yeah. We’re okay.”
“Well, if this doesn’t beat all.” Moo Park arrived. He rubbed his scalp and wagged his head. “Cobb. Cobb.”
Someone said, “It appears Frederick Cobb was having himself a little midlife crisis.”
“Midlife?” said Ann. “How many one-hundred-and-fifteen-year-old men do you know?”
“Point is, Cobb reached an age where maybe he looked back, added up the accomplishments of his life, then looked over at the accomplishments of the bad guys—the men who live in palaces, drive fast cars, fast jets, fast boats. They throw around billions of dollars on whatever they want and they don’t need to beg any budget committee for approval of every dime. And maybe our Cobb finally asked that age-old question ‘What’s in it for me? And what kind of pension do I get out of public service and laying my life on the line all these years?’.”
Martin gave a reluctant sideway nod. He murmured, “What’s your gold watch look like?” He remembered the tiny voice of a baby granddaughter crying. Could that explain the level of greed? The depth of betrayal?
Ann Jefferson put her hand over the American flag pin she wore in her lapel, as if pledging allegiance. She answered absolutely, a low tremor in her voice, “There is no price.”
Chapter Eleven
Steam billowed wet heat around Jack and Martin in the shower. The misty clouds diffused the light and created a world apart where only the two of them existed. Their hands were on each other, feeling the muscular contours of each other, savoring steel hardness under slick skin.
Martin crouched down before Jack, his hands caging Jack’s hips.
Jack shivered. Warm water spilled down his body as Martin’s hot tongue ran up the length of his shaft. Jack’s hands held Martin’s head. His fingers laced in Martin’s wet hair.
Jack looked down at Martin’s full lips kissing his aching need. He held his breath in wonder, anticipation and fervent desire.
Then miraculous heat surrounded him—Martin’s lips, Martin’s tongue, Martin’s sweet soft mouth enfolded and caressed his stiff cock. The hazy mist around them became incandescent.
Martin rose suddenly, sputtering. “I can’t do this.”
Startled from a scintillating dream, Jack put a hand under Martin’s elbow to help him stand up. “You don’t have to, sweetheart—” Jack started gently. He was touched that Martin would even try.
“I mean I can’t do this!” Martin blinked water from his eyes. “I can’t breathe like that!”
Jack laughed out loud. Martin was snarling, “How does anyone ever do that? How is this supposed to be sexy getting water up your nose! And if you’re not under the shower, what’s the point of doing it in the shower? Stop laughing at me, Dog.”
Jack drew Martin back to him under the water spray, and pressed Martin’s body to his own, laughing, kissing his hair. “Seemed like a good idea at the time.”
They toweled off, moved to the bedroom and rolled onto the bed, their limbs entwined.
Martin writhed in delicious torment, feeling another man’s body touch his—this man’s bo
dy—to touch and touch again, everywhere. Jack’s kisses on his neck made him tingle with mounting fire. Jack’s strong hands on his cock thrilled him past bearing.
Jack crouched over him, pushed Martin’s legs apart with his knees. His hands cupped Martin’s hard tight buttocks, lifting. There was no more vulnerable position than this, to have a strong man between your thighs, his cock poised to penetrate.
Jack hesitated, as if expecting Martin to cry no. He didn’t.
“Please!” Martin cried.
With slow care, Jack pushed. Martin clutched at his Jack’s thighs, guiding him onward.
A searing moment grasped his very existence, burning and ecstatic. He gasped and blinked in profound wonder to feel Jack inside him.
Jack’s deep dark gaze reflected warring sensations as he searched Martin’s eyes and kept his hips agonizingly still. Jack breathed, “Am I hurting you?”
Martin moaned no. He tilted his hips forward to take him farther within.
Jack’s eyes shut, rapture washing over his strong features.
He withdrew and thrust again.
Martin rocked under him, welcoming the smooth invasion of hard, hard flesh, glorying in their oneness. Deep moans of inexpressible joy rose from the depth of his being. He moved with Jack, to feel every inch his hard shaft of desire again and again. There were no words for what he felt. He could only groan and beg for more.
His hands roamed the breadth of Jack’s powerful shoulders, adoring his magnificent body. His legs embraced Jack’s sides sliding between his thighs. Martin reached down behind Jack’s iron thighs and pulled him on.
Jack’s head bowed against Martin’s shoulder as if praying. A growl resonated deep within his broad chest rising to an animal roar.
A splash of hot wetness blossomed inside.
And that sudden heat pushed Martin over the brink of ecstasy. A lightning blaze rent his heaven, blinding bright, shimmering, unbearably beautiful.
Jack’s hand closed on Martin’s pulsing cock and sent him higher still in a perfect joining of bodies and souls. Martin felt radiant, his flesh ablaze. The heated glow filled him, spread to his very eyelashes in soul-crashing climax. “Jack!”
