Shadow Prey

with a chrome-yellow billboard.
    By the time he reached the hall, he felt as close to stone as he ever had. A few minutes before five, he walked into the hall and took the stairs to the fifth floor.
    Andretti’s welfare department took up twelve floors of the hall, but his personal office consisted of a suite of four rooms. Hood had calculated that six to eight people regularly worked in those rooms: Andretti and his secretary; a receptionist; three aides, one male and two female; and a couple of clerks on an irregular basis. The clerks and receptionist fled at five o’clock on the dot. He shouldn’t have more than five people to deal with.
    On the fifth floor, Hood checked the hallway, then walked quickly down to the public rest room. He entered one of the stalls, sat down and opened his shirt. The obsidian knife hung from his neck on a deerhide thong, taken fromthe doe killed the year before. He pulled the thong over his neck and slipped the knife into his left jacket pocket. The gun was in his right.
    Hood looked at his watch. Three minutes after five. He decided to wait a few more minutes and sat on the toilet, watching the second hand go ’round. The watch had cost twelve dollars, new. A Timex; his wife had bought it when it looked as if he might get a job with a state road crew. But the job had fallen through and all he had left was the Timex.
    When the Timex said 5:07, Hood stood up, his soul now as hard as the knife. The hallway was empty. He walked quickly down to Andretti’s office, looking to his right as he passed the main hall. A woman was waiting for the elevator. She glanced at him, then away. Hood continued to Andretti’s office, paused with his hand on the knob, then pushed it open. The receptionist had gone, but he heard laughter from the other side of the panel behind her desk.
    Putting his hand in his jacket pocket, on the gun, he stepped around the panel. Two of the aides, a man and a woman, were leaning on desks, talking. Through an open door, he could see Andretti, working in shirtsleeves behind a green goosenecked lamp. There was at least one more person in his office with him.
    When he came around the panel, the woman didn’t notice him for a moment, but the man saw him and frowned slightly. Then the woman turned her head and said, “I’m sorry, we’re closed.”
    Hood took his hand from his pocket, with the gun in it, and said, “Don’t say a word or make a sound. Just walk into Mr. Andretti’s office.”
    “Oh, no,” said the woman. The man clenched his fists and slipped off the desk.
    Hood pointed the gun at his head and said, “I don’t want to kill you, but I will. Now walk.” He had now moved out of Andretti’s line of sight. “Move,” he said.
    They moved reluctantly, toward Andretti’s office. “If you do anything, if you touch a door, if you say anything, I will shoot you,” Hood said quietly as they approached Andretti’s office.
    The man stepped inside, followed by the woman. Hood said, “Off to the side.” The man said, “Boss, we’ve got a problem.” Andretti looked up and said, “Oh, shit.”
    A woman was slumped in a chair in front of Andretti’s desk, her face caught in a smile which seeped away when she saw Hood; Hood thought the word seeped, because of the slowness with which it left. As though she didn’t want to disturb him. As though she wanted to think it was a joke.
    “Where’s the secretary?” Hood asked Andretti.
    “She went home early,” Andretti said. “Listen, my friend . . .”
    “Be quiet. We’ve got some business to do, but I have to arrange these people first. I don’t want them rushing me while we talk.”
    “If you’ve got a problem . . .”
    “I’ve got a problem, all right,” Hood interrupted. “It’s how to keep from shooting one of these people if they don’t do what I say. I want you to all lay down, facedown, on the rug against that wall.”
    “How do we know you won’t shoot us?”
    “Because I promise not to. I don’t want to hurt you. But I promise I will shoot you if you don’t get down on the floor.”
    “Do it,” Andretti ordered.
    The three backed away toward the wall, then sat down.
    “Roll over, facedown,” Hood said. They flattened themselves out, one of the women craning her neck to see him. “Look at the rug, lady, okay?”
    When they were staring at the rug, Hood moved slowly around Andretti’s desk. Andretti was a big man, and young; early thirties. No more than