Page 16 of Fangs with Benefits

Molly: Maybe I would like him more if he shared small talk over coffee sometimes!

Devi: Well stop observing him and start observing the fic I sent you yesterday.

Molly: I’m working.

Devi: Oh, so now we want to work?

Devi: I am shaking my head so hard right now.

Chapter 7

Elijah

‘Molly,’ I call as she walks past my door.

She stops and steps backwards a few paces until she’s in my line of sight. Some curls have fallen out of their clip around her ears.

‘Hm?’

‘Oh, I, do you have a moment?’

She squints, but steps closer, still not entering the little room I call home for eight hours a day. ‘Depends. What do you want?’

I think I much prefer this Molly to the polite, efficient one who trained me those first days at Drummond. This Molly is honest, snarky and seldom nice to me. Usually, only Dylan talks to me like this, and now that I’m thinking about it, his bluntness may be one reason I like him so much, too.

Molly leans her hip and shoulder against the door frame, and I can’t help but notice that curve of her waist, the apparent silkiness of her green blouse. I wonder what it would feel like under my fingertips.

‘Well?’ she prompts, and I sit up straighter in my swivelling chair.

‘Right. Can you help tell me what a–’ I glance down at the laptop screen ‘–VPN is?’

‘Who’s asking?’

‘Help ticket.’ I point at my computer, though she can’t see what I’m looking at. ‘Someone claims their new desktop doesn’t have VPN capabilities, but I’ve never heard of such a thing.’

‘Mmm. Google it,’ Molly says, and turns on her heel to walk away, but I call for her to stop. She does, glancing over her shoulder, blonde curl hanging there. I did try to google it, only it seems there’s not just a single VPN that companies or individuals use. Thus, I need to know the correct one. And where to find such a thing to give it to the individual.

‘I did, I just, I’m at a loss.’

‘Kenneth can help you,’ she says, and winks before waltzing away. She’s been helpful since our talk, for the most part, at least. She’s spent time training me each day, and has usually answered questions when I have them. All politeness has gone out the window, though, replaced with this smirking devil, amusement in her eyes when she denies me.

I chase after her, quickly catching up as she heads for the kitchen. Devi raises her eyebrows at us as we pass by.

‘You see, I’ve already asked Kenneth, and he referred me back to you,’ I explain. ‘And this ticket is from a manager in the sales department, so I really ought to learn how to fulfil the request.’

‘Yes, but you’ve already reached your question allotment for the day, so you’re just going to have to figure it out, Eli.’

Eli. She’s taken to calling me this since learning about my apparent ineptitude. She sounds like my brother. Nobody has regularly called me Eli for over a hundred years.

Exasperated, I sigh as I follow her into the kitchen. She heads straight for the water dispenser where she pushes a button to pour steaming liquid into a black and white checkered mug. When I say nothing, she raises her eyebrows and smiles, pleasant and–dare I say–smug.

On another day, I would just accept this and wait to ask her tomorrow when my question allotment resets. It’s not another day, though. It’s Friday, and I’ve already messed up in various levels of disaster this week.

First, I accidentally deleted a user’s company email address when I was meant to just ‘release an email from jail’. I still do not understand this email prison concept, but Molly fixed it for me with no shortage of grumbling. Since Monday, I’ve also downloaded files from three emails–two fake phishing scams, one real one–and when Kenneth, who sent the phishing tests, confronted me about it, I compelled him into forgetting my blunder entirely. Molly did have to remove the malware from my computer, though, which she did while making me admit I’d been foolish half a dozen times.

If all this wasn’t enough, I accidentally changed my password and no amount of turning off and on the computer would prompt me to reset it. I did ask Kenneth to help me, only he said he was busy, but that Molly was probably free (surprise to none, she was not). I’d already compelled him the day before, so I didn’t want to mess with his brain again. Devi did help me, and for that I was grateful. But I am in desperate need of a win before the weekend, and this VPN problem would be exactly the thing if Molly would just help me one last time.

‘It’s two p.m. on a Friday. Most people have called it for the week–you should just pretend to be working like everyone else,’ Molly says. She dunks a tea bag in the water, the drink’s spicy aroma filling the space between us.