Page 52 of Catnapped

“Well, losing their secretary to something avoidable would be a problem for them. Honestly, if you were my secretary, I’d have a hard time letting you leave my office.”

I raised a brow. “Or your bedroom?”

“Definitely. You keep saying sexy things to me. I’m only a man. I’m a sorely tested man, and I’m going to have to patiently wait, bide my time, and plan the best way to ask you on a date now. While hoping for mercy.”

“Considering I’ve basically promised to go on a date with you as it is through a bargain, I think you’re safe from the dark throes of disappointment. But I will remember all I need to do to flirt with you is talk about something technical or scientific. Damn. If I’d known men were this easy to flirt with, I would have done this a lot sooner.”

“A lot of men don’t like feeling like they’re inferior to women, so I’m pretty sure you’d have a bunch of offended, grouchy assholes with that approach. But then you’d get lucky with me, because your first scientific pickup line would have had me eating out of your hand. I’m blaming all three of my parents for this tendency.” Darian flopped back against the couch and shuffled through the papers I’d given him before setting them aside and reaching for the stack of tax documents. “Men like Kingston piss me off.”

“Why?”

“He doesn’t care who he hurts in order to make his life better for him and only him. One of his previous attempts at curing the lycanthropy virus killed ten people through generalized human experimentation. If he’s not afraid of killing people, he’s definitely not afraid to kill a bunch of animals. This is something he would do. Or so I think. The references to his name in these papers definitely implies he’s involved.”

Interesting. “You hadn’t mentioned that earlier.”

“I try not to think about his lack of regard for life in general. It just makes me angrier than I like.” Darian waved one of the tax papers in my direction. “At least he’s, on paper, paying his accomplices fairly well. It doesn’t look like anybody made below a hundred thousand a year in this operation. That’s a damned good motivation to live in the woods in a trailer.”

As I didn’t make quite a hundred thousand a year before benefits and bonuses, I could easily see somebody deciding to live in a half-decent trailer doing sketchy things for a good paycheck. “Crime pays better than secretarial work, apparently.”

Darian shot me a look. “You’re paid less than these clowns?”

I shrugged. “I do get bonuses, but my base pay isn’t that high, no. The bonuses make it go higher, but they can be a bitch to earn.”

“You keep the higher-level bosses functional in the CDC for less than a hundred thousand a year?”

“Considering I don’t have a college degree and learned everything on the job, I think I’m doing pretty well for myself, thank you very much.” I shot a glare at him, huffed, and went to check on the meter, which churned through Darian’s blood sample and magical pulse with impressive speed. “Huh. I must have gotten one of the upgraded models. This is almost done. Maybe ten more minutes.”

“Upgraded model? I thought you knew the scanner?”

“There are different models of the same scanner. The only real difference is what is under the hood. I didn’t check the memory in it. I just assumed it was the base model. Apparently, I should not make assumptions when it comes to Lucifer.” I picked up the scanner and flipped it over to check the information on its back. Sure enough, he’d gotten me the top-of-the-line model. “Yeah. I made a mistake there. I made a stupid assumption. This is not the base model. This is the best model sold.”

“When you negotiate with Lucifer, it doesn’t matter you don’t have a degree, and you’re worth at least three times what the CDC is paying you. As you will have to deal with him most days of the week, go for a baseline of half a million a year plus bonuses and whatever other concessions you can think of. Take him for an apartment or condo in every major city he expects you to work at often, for example, unless you like hotel life. I mean, he might give you the ability to teleport, which would simplify things for you, but you might not want to live in his domain all of the time. Even Lucifer has properties on Earth to get away from work.”

I considered, and while pride demanded I stand up for myself a little better, I checked my knee-jerk reaction and forced myself to nod. “I’ve always thought I needed to be grateful I’ve done so well without a degree.”

“You’re skilled, you’re smart, and you do a good job. A degree can open doors, yes, but you’re the reason you’re being poached by the Devil. Lucifer doesn’t care about degrees. My mom? She cares about degrees, but my fathers? They couldn’t care less. They just paid for my education to keep my mother happy, and they suggested I continue educating myself so I don’t look stupid in front of women. I’m starting to think at least one of my fathers has been investigating my future in some fashion or another. Worse, I’ve already made myself look stupid in front of you several times.”

“I am of the opinion stupidity can be cured.”

“There is hope for me after all. I’ll try to keep from making you hate me by the time I can ask for a date.”

I grinned at that comment. “All right. I need to be less crabby, because right now, I should be cuddled in bed with my cat. It took months to get him to come join me in bed, and I resent some asshole has probably undone all the hard work I’ve put in convincing Mr. Flooferson to trust me.”

“Obviously, I should be sneaking out and trying to locate your cat, so when I bring him back to you, I can successfully inquire about a date after you have him settled.”

The scanner beeped in my hand, informing me it was done churning through Darian’s biologics and was ready for me to evaluate his DNA, his general health, and even his sperm count if I really wanted. “I’ll admit, that ploy would stand a good chance of working.”

“I might be an idiot at times, but you’ve made it clear you really love your cat. I’d end up feeling guilty if I tried that, so I’d try to slink away without asking. Just being honest. I’m pretty sure I’m the reason I haven’t had any luck with women.”

“Yet you’re being particularly bold and forthcoming with me?”

“Well, it helps my uncles are encouraging it. I mean, they can be complete assholes, but they generally don’t set us poor children up for complete failure without a good reason. I’m probably too trusting for my good on that one, though. So, am I dying of some undiagnosed disease?”

I took the scanner to my new laptop, plugged it in, and went to work setting up the diagnostics software and importing Darian’s health and DNA record so I could make sense of the results. Within three minutes, the first red flag popped up, involving a positive lycanthropy result.

I clicked into the software to begin diagnostics on the virus strain to encounter the second red flag: no matching species listing.

Great. New species of lycanthropes popped up yearly, but the last thing I needed was having to explain to a triad their son was the latest person-of-interest to the research and development department of the CDC. After a few more minutes of checking, the virus count in his blood stream put him at the earliest stages of infection detectible. “Remember what we were discussing about lycanthropy? This states you are positive, earliest stage of detectible virus levels in the blood—or in the magic pulse. I haven’t confirmed which. In good or bad news for you, there’s no matching strain in the system.”