A Canadian Werewolf in New York

Chapter Eighteen

I stood rooted in my spot behind the desk for a moment, uncertain what to do.

Sure, I could easily take on Mr. Hyper-hydrosis, overpower him before he had a chance to pull the gun he most certainly carried.  I could detect, quite faintly, the smell of gun oil beneath the overpowering body odor.  But there was no guarantee that he would be cooperative or help lead me to where his gang members were keeping Howard.

My other option, then, was to hide, hopefully see what he was doing here, and follow him back to home base.

I glanced around the room looking for a spot to hide.

There really wasn’t anywhere.  Not even under Howard’s desk, which was an open concept one, completely open at the front; likely to more easily faciliate his lunch-hour blowjobs.

I felt a wave of panic as his footsteps stopped at the door to the office.  I heard the sound of a key going into the lock on the door.

With no place else to go, I figured I’d try the oldest trick in the book and hide behind the door.  Not that using the oldest tricks in the book -- like that notepad trick I’d just used -- had helped get me very far yet today.  But I had to keep trying.

The door opened just as I’d lunged across the room to my last ditch chosen hiding spot.  As Mr. Sweaty-pants moved into the room, trailing just behind the foul spice of his body odor, I felt like a kid who’d been caught without much time to find an optimal hiding place, and prepared for him to detect me and attack.

He moved directly to the desk and I managed to catch a quick peek at him before carefully reaching forward to grasp the door knob and ease the door open just a bit more to better conceal where I stood.  He was wearing the same dark suit I’d seen on him in the alley and he had very short army style buzz cut blonde hair.  I immediately knew he wasn’t the leader I’d seen standing at Gary’s head and watching the other two kick him.  Tall and wide -- the phrase “built like a brick shithouse” came to mind -- he’d been one of the henchmen I’d seen earlier.

Behind the propped open door, I could no longer see him.  But that was a good thing.  Hopefully he couldn’t see me.  I amused myself for a moment thinking about if the situation had been reversed and he’d been the one hiding that his nasty sweaty odor would have given away his hiding spot quite easily.  I thought back to all those times I’d played hide and seek as a child, wondering just how much better I would have been at it had I possessed these wolfish traits then.  For an amusing moment, I also thought about how difficult a time this poor bastard would have had hiding from anyone given his raunchy smell -- wolf scent or no wolf scent, he would have been found no matter where he stuffed his greasy little body.

He came back into my line of vision as he moved around the left side of Howard’s desk.  I held my breath as he disappeared again behind the desk.

He picked up something from the desktop and then headed back around the right side of the desk -- fortunately on the side of the room that allowed me the best chance of concealment behind the propped open door.

Then he headed back out of the office door, not even bothering to close it behind him.

I cautiously peered after him.

He was carrying Howard’s laptop in his meaty right hand like some small paperback novel.

As he approached the elevator, I saw Howard’s assistant walking toward the office.  It was obvious that she would have seen him coming out of the office, but she barely glanced at him as they passed each other, even despite the distinctly foul smell coming off of his body.  Instead, she was looking past him, at my gaping face peeking out the doorway.