Target (Page 22)

Chapter 7

"Only the twenty-fifth of June, second day on the job and already making money for Winkler Security," Trajan had Ashe lifting a hundred pounds over his head. "But that doesn’t mean anything in my dojo," Trajan snickered. "In here, you belong to me."

"That’s," Ashe huffed a little, struggling to lift the weights, "not scary or anything," Ashe lowered the weights. He was lying flat on his back on the weight bench again while Trajan supervised his weight lifting.

"Yeah, I’m plenty scary," Trajan leered at Ashe. Ashe wanted to laugh but didn’t. Trajan, at six-eleven, was still something humorous to see when he made faces. "Come on. I want you lifting two hundred before I send you back home. Gotta get you in shape to fend off cyber pirates."

"Does your job description include harassment?" Ashe asked, hefting the weights up again.

"Sure does," Trajan grinned. "Three more of those, and then we’ll do some squats."

"Man, I still ache from yesterday," Ashe grumbled.

"And you’ll ache more from today. Come on, two more, now. Get with it."

"Is he always a slave driver?" Ashe asked Marco later as they ran laps.

"Trajan doesn’t fool around in the gym," Marco said. "And thanks to you, I’ll be one of the team sent to the bank this morning to install the new equipment and get them updated. If you could break in after only a few hours, anybody else could get in after a day or two. They were setting themselves up," Marco blew out a breath. "The bank president kept saying that the old system we installed six years ago was still good. Winkler told him it was outdated and could be breached with modern technology. And the boss was right, as usual."

"I guess so," Ashe panted.

"This one probably won’t be possible, but take a crack at it anyway," Winkler gave Ashe the name of another bank, this one in Idaho. Ashe smiled. His mother called Idaho the potato and onion capital of the world. Which was great if you loved potato pancakes. Sali lived for the days when Adele actually made them. Ashe would call, Sali would run to the house as quick as he could and wait patiently until Adele served them up.

"Will do, boss," Ashe said, nodding at Winkler. Winkler laughed and slapped Ashe on the back.

Ashe lined up behind Grady for the dinner buffet that evening. He hadn’t made much progress on the project Winkler assigned earlier, but he wasn’t ready to give up on it yet. When Ashe had given an update before going to dinner, Winkler just smiled and gave the go-ahead to keep trying. Ashe was working on the problem in his head when the grumpy werewolf he’d met at breakfast the first day walked up and stood behind him. "Rookies need to be at the back of the line," the werewolf rumbled. Since Ashe didn’t know his name, he thought of him as Gruff. Ashe, following Grady’s advice, didn’t move or say anything. He thought it best to just ignore Gruff and hope he gave up on his quest to belittle and demean.

"You hear what I said, boy?" Gruff jerked Ashe around by the shoulder. Ashe had three inches on Gruff, but Gruff was wider, heavier and definitely meaner.

"Put your hands on the boy again and I’ll take it as a challenge," Trajan had Gruff’s collar in his hand, his face inches from the older werewolf’s nose. Ashe stared as Gruff slunk back from Trajan. "Turn around and get your dinner, Ashe," Trajan said. Ashe whirled and rushed forward to reach the buffet line.

"It’s Trajan’s job to keep peace in the ranks," Grady said when Ashe sat at the long dining table after grabbing a glass of sweet iced tea and setting his plate of food down. "Orville will back off or he’ll be punished," Grady added. "But don’t get any ideas about baiting him. Or anybody else, for that matter."

"I don’t do stuff like that," Ashe was still shaken over the incident.

"Orders are for you to drink at least one of these a day," Marco set a protein drink in front of Ashe before sitting beside him. "It’ll help build you up a little. You’re just too skinny, dude." Marco grinned, taking the sting out of his words.

"Yeah. I get that," Ashe said, shaking himself.

"Orville tried a little bullying," Grady nodded toward Ashe, who was popping the tab on the protein drink. "Trajan took care of it."

"If I were the toughest wolf in the room, I still wouldn’t bother Ashe without knowing what I was getting into," Marco said innocently. Grady ignored the comment and Ashe, hoping the whole thing would go away, cut into his hamburger steak.

"Ashe, get up boy. We need you." Trajan shook Ashe’s shoulder. Ashe, heart pounding from being wakened from a sound sleep, blinked in confusion at his alarm clock beside the bed. It read three-thirty, the red numbers blurring a little as he struggled to wake.

"Come on, get dressed. We have to be at the airport in half an hour." Ashe, fully awake now, snatched clothing up and dressed as quickly as he could. Trajan was rushing him out the door before he could get his shoes on. "You can do that in the van," Trajan’s voice held concern. Ashe caught the worry from Trajan, his heart pounding double time in his chest. He tried to ask Trajan what was going on, but Trajan hushed him. Winkler was waiting inside the van as Trajan and Ashe climbed in. Two others that Ashe didn’t recognize were there as well. One was driving while the other sat in the back with Trajan and Ashe.

"We have a situation in D.C.," Winkler said. "Matt called. We’re going in. I just hope we get there in time."

"But," Ashe said. He thought it would take hours to arrive at the nation’s capital. He revised that thought when he saw what waited for them at the airport. A military jet sat there, the engines revving as Trajan, Winkler and the unknown werewolf hauled Ashe across the tarmac and up the metal steps to the jet. Seating was limited and there was barely room for all of them inside the tiny space.

"We’ll break the speed limit going in," the unknown werewolf muttered grimly as he strapped himself in. Ashe, looking around for his own seatbelt, found the ends, pulled them together and clicked them across his lap. Ashe blinked at Winkler, but Winkler’s eyes were closed. Figuring that the Dallas Packmaster didn’t want to be disturbed, Ashe sat back while all kinds of potential situations raced through his mind.

Unmarked patrol vehicles met them at the D.C. airport. As did Director Matthew Michaels. "Are you sure this is a good idea?" The Director walked up to Winkler and peered around the tall werewolf at Ashe, who stood in the early-morning light, shoulders hunched and hands in pockets. Trajan had an arm loosely draped around Ashe’s shoulders.