I gave the laptop a second to recover, hoping the firewall was still intact and nothing was further compromised. Usually, it wasn’t a good sign when the computer shut down. Just as my pointer finger touched the power button to attempt a reboot, the screen flickered again. Some obnoxious, cheerful music blasted from the speakers so loudly it turned heads. There was no way for me to control the volume, no matter how many times I pounded on the down button. A purple pixelated fox sprang onto the screen from the right edge, springing around as if frolicking and dancing with the music.
“Babe, maybe turn the music down a bit?” My date murmured uneasily. Our neighbors were looking like they’d shoot us if they had their guns. “It’s not really fitting the vibe, you know?”
I opted to ignore her. My iron-clad restraint was starting to bend under the weight of my annoyance.
A brown dog with floppy ears wandered in from the left side of the screen, nose bent to the ground and running circles on the black background as if on the hunt with a scent. The fox had been hiding behind a tree that popped up in the center, the dog walking in front of it as the fox watched from behind with its tail sticking out the back. With a note of finality in the cartoonish music, the fox sprang out from the tree and pounced on the dog’sback to knock them both down. At first, it seemed as if the fox was going to roll the dog playfully with it.
Then, the fox’s mouth bit around the dog’s neck and shook. The immature, pixelated vision of gore as square blocks of blood that appeared beneath the dog’s slumped body was a very loud, very clear message.
My blood was boiling when the screen went blank again, the silence left behind roaring in my ears along with every beat of my heart as I kept my eyes trained on the dead laptop. If I weren’t so pissed off, I’d be offended at being mocked for my old username like that. It was a matter of pride. And I’d gladly show whoever this motherfucker was just how devious a fox shifter could be.
Whoever had the balls to fuck with the person in control of every electronic device in three blocks was about to find out what a consequence was. Bolting from my chair, I straightened my jacket with jerky movements and left my date in the box seat. It didn’t really matter to me if she thought it was rude. I stormed out of the door and toward the elevator at the end of the gaudy hall, carpeted with a God-awful red-and-gold pattern and decorated with gilded portraits of haughty people. Two guards were stationed on either side of the closed doors.
“Sir? Is everything okay?” one asked. I was probably not looking very cool and collected at the moment. Usually, it took a lot to get me worked up. And whoever was fucking with me managed to slam their hands on all my buttons.
I didn’t bother to answer him, but I did shoot a scathing glare his way.
The guard turned to jab the button to call the elevator, likely fearing for his life. That hacker may have trashed my laptop, but they’d be a fucking idiot to think that was the only computer I had access to. Like hell was I letting some punk ass with an ego crash the auction bid system without a fight.
The doors had barely slid open before I stormed into the elevator. My finger jabbed the button for the basement harder than necessary, and I scowled all the way down to the bottom floor. Instead of cooling off on the ride, my anger was stoked even hotter all the way to the server room. I was the only one who had the code to the servers, and the locks were set on a two-factor authentication system that incorporated a fingerprint scan and an encrypted code sent to my phone to enter into the keypad. My boss, Andrea, thought it was ridiculous to have so much security on a, and I quote, ‘bunch of whirring boxes.’ One final Lupi Selvaggi member stood beside the door to the server room, watching us barrel down the hall in confusion. “Is something going on upstairs?” he pointed to the earpiece resting inside his ear. “Sounds like some shit is going down backstage. They called for backup.”
Perhaps, following tonight, he will put more credence in my warnings about system security. He wanted the black market auctions to run smoothly with easy payment methods, but rarely listened when I tried to put more of an investment in the firewall and server protection. I didn’t want to use an event I was managing as the cautionary tale, however. In my three years of service to Andrea and the Lupi Selvaggi, this had been the first direct threat to the auctions I dealt with.
I stormed to the row of monitors sprawled across a desk, tucked into the corner of the server room. The spare laptop hooked up to them kept track of the bidding war still going on upstairs, numbers and anonymous usernames flickering across the screens, giving me a small assurance. Whoever hacked into my computer didn’t seem to make it into the mainframe. With jerking movements, I yanked the rolling chair out to fall into, fingers flying across the keyboard to pull up the diagnostic programs before my ass even hit the cushion.
“Everything good, boss?” One of the guards from the elevator had wandered into the server room with me, looking curiously over my shoulder as I worked. That was my biggest pet peeve.
“Fine,” I gritted my teeth in annoyance. “I just—”
There! A blip on the screen, just a flicker, as code sprinted across the black window—a stutter in the quick flow of the program—had me narrowing my eyes through my glasses. That wasn’t a good sign. “Shit!”
One guard lifted a hand to his ear, listening to whoever was reporting to him. “There’s a problem on the auction floor, Grant. The program is frozen, and the online bidding has shut down entirely.”
Fingers arching over the keys, I began my own frantic effort to recover whatever had hijacked the system. It was back and forth, typing in kill codes just as quickly as another command was remotely entered by the fucker trying to take the servers down.
“What the fuck do you mean?” the guard snarled into his radio. “They’re a bunch of girls; what do you mean they got loose? Yeah… with a tire iron?” His one-sided conversation was quickly devolving. “Shoot her in the fucking head, what the fuck is wrong with you? … Hey, Campbell?”
“Go take care of it,” I jerked my head to the door. “I’m armed. Take one of the other guys to the elevator and make sure Andrea gets out.”
The remaining guard stood off to the side and shook his head in disbelief, still listening to the radio chatter. “Who the hell takes on armed security with a fucking tire iron? People are batshit crazy these days.”
“One would argue everyone in the audience is batshit crazy,” I muttered. With every passing second, I could feel the scowl deepen on my face. Every command my fingers hammered out on the keyboard was getting blocked by the hostile program. I couldn’t run any of my installed counters. “Fuck!” I shoved myhand into my right pocket and ripped out the thumb drive I kept for emergencies. It was going to wipe out the entire system I built, along with any saved data from tonight’s attendees. Andrea would have to build the next invitation list from scratch.
He was going to be so pissed.
As if summoned, my phone began to vibrate in my pocket. The encrypted phone I only used for mob business. “Black,” I answered.
“What the actualfuckis going on?” Andrea’s voice was deep and low, like he was trying not to be overheard. “All the laptops are down, along with the sound system and lights, and there’s something going on backstage! How could you fuck up this badly?”
My teeth ground in agitation, and I gave myself two deep breaths to rein in the anger I worked so hard to keep leashed. “I understand there are issues, sir. I’m trying my best to–”
“The auction is already closing down, people are leaving,” he cut me off. “Meet me out front if you don’t want to get your ass left. We’ll discuss your failures when I’m not considering killing you.”
The background noise to Andrea’s call cut off, and without checking if we disconnected, I shoved the phone back in my pocket. With the other hand, I jabbed at the computer keys to finish off the command meant to wipe out the whole auction system. “Fucking ridiculous,” I snarled low to myself.
This was going to be the longest ride home.
“Hi, Felicity.”
