Page 15 of Beauty's Bossy Bear

I use my keycard and step into the elevator, steeling myself for what is coming. As the elevator doors close, I pull up my home security feed to make sure my mate is okay. I breathe a sigh of relief when I find her sitting at the table playing cards with Oren and Aric.

I almost feel sorry for those Orcs. I’m sure they have no idea what hit them.

The elevator stops on the top floor and the doors slide open. I walk down the main hall, heading straight to my friend’s office. “Kol.” I knock on the door, keeping up the pretense I’m expecting my second-in-command.

When there’s no answer, I slowly open the door and step inside the room. Everything appears to be normal. Except for the black jackal face flashing on the center computer screen. “Surprise,” the fucking animated animal sings. “Since you haven’t figured it out yet, your perfect security system has been hacked.”

It’s time to play this asshole’s game. “What do you want?” I ask, figuring he’s waiting for a response. My nose perks up as I smell Kol and Seth silently approaching the door.

“To join your team.” I forget all about the Orc on the other side of the door and blink several times as his answer echoes through my mind.

“What?” I roar as Kol and Seth step into the room behind me.

“You obviously need me on your team.” The animated animal on the screen does a little dance. “Think of it this way, if I can break into your system, then I can keep others from doing the same thing.”

This little motherfucker’s arrogance causes my bear to roll its eyes. “Are you sure you broke into my system?”

“You’re talking to me right now in your office, aren’t you?”

“True, but you aren’t on my main server. You’re on the back-up server we allowed you to access.”

“Bullshit.” That got the would-be hacker’s attention.

“Why don’t you try to pull up accounts and see for yourself?” I dare him, already knowing he doesn’t have access to anything important. Kol already cut off all access to our real files at the first sign of a possible hack.

“I see plenty of accounts,” he insists, and I turn to look at Kol as he walks over and presses a few buttons. The file the hacker is accessing pops up on a screen, and I smirk as the information for Mickey Mouse appears. “Fuck!” the hacker roars.

“I didn’t know we had Mickey as a client.” I look over at Seth and smirk, knowing he set up the dummy accounts.

“According to those bullshit files, we have Donald, Goofy, Minnie, and Pluto as clients, too.” Seth shrugs while Kol roars with laughter.

I ignore my two employees and turn back to the screen. “Since we know you failed to hack my real system, why don’t you explain why you’ve been stalking my mate.” I need to figure this shit out so I can get back to her.

“It seems like you suck at a stalker, too, since you didn’t get anywhere near Briella,” Kol cuts in and taunts our perp.

“I was never stalking her. I was playing the long game.” The disembodied voice echoes around the room. “I knew Jared Linden is a close friend of Kodi’s, so I decided to annoy his sister-in-law, hoping he’d call on Enchanted Security for help. And he fell for my ploy hook, line, and sinker.”

Kol glances over at me and shakes his head as the plan becomes clearer. “So, you didn’t ever intend to hurt Briella?”

“Hell no, I wouldn’t hurt her. I want to work for Kodi, not hurt an innocent woman.” At least our hacker has a tiny bit of morals.

“Jackals aren’t known for their honesty and morals,” Seth states the obvious. “You have to know we’d never hire a jackal shifter to work for us.”

“God, you guys are so fucking stupid. I’m not a jackal shifter. I bought jackal scent off the web and sprayed it around, hoping to fool you.”

“We shouldn’t have fallen for that one.” It’s kind of embarrassing that no one realized the scent wasn’t authentic.

“It’s fucking embarrassing,” Seth growls what we’re all thinking. “I can’t believe it even fooled Silas.”

My heart settles in my chest when I realize there isn’t a threat to my little Beauty. “You two handle this asshole however you want, but do not give him a fucking job,” I call over my shoulder as I head for the door, knowing Seth and Kol are more than capable of handling this asshole.

“We got this. When we’re through with the jackass, he’ll never even think about pulling a stunt like this again,” Seth calls behind me.

Before I pull out of the parking garage, I text Oren to let him know I’m on my way home. I tell him to let Briella know the threat is over.

I get a thumbs-up response from the Orc and drop my phone on the seat next to me.

As I drive through town, my inner bear taunts me for falling for the asshole’s scheme. My only excuse is finding my soulmate temporarily fried my brain circuits.

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