by Amy Marie
Breathing in deeply, I grabbed my mattress and pulled myself up, using that and the footboard to steady myself until I felt ready to move. I took one step, continuing to hold onto the footboard, and didn’t feel like I was going to drop again. I let go and carefully slid my other foot forward. Slowly, I took one step at a time until I reached my bathroom and propped myself up against the counter in there. My legs still felt a little rubbery and pins and needles were stabbing me, but they were waking up and would support me.
I staggered over to the shower and turned it on. The steam from the heat soon filled the room, and I stepped inside. The wet heat beating down on my skin was heavenly and revived me further.
I stayed under the water, allowing it to massage my tired and aching muscles for several minutes before I cleaned myself, and even when I was done, I refused to leave. “Five more minutes.” I sounded like someone begging for more sleep.
“Max, get out. Debbie is here,” Fizz called out, the sound carrying in from my bedroom.
“Debbie?” Who the fuck was Debbie? I thought the maid’s name was Brin or Beth or something like that.
“Brianna is out on maternity leave. Debbie is her replacement. She’s been here the past three weeks,” he stated loudly.
I frowned in confusion. I honestly didn’t remember anything about this or notice the change. What kind of asshole did that make me? Then again, I couldn’t even remember her name. Fuck, I was horrible.
Shaking my head, I turned off the water and grabbed a towel hanging outside of the shower door. “I’ll be done in a minute.”
“Okay.”
As I dried myself off, I sauntered over to my closet, feeling a lot stronger than when I first got out of bed. Stronger, but still out of sorts. This wasn’t the first time I’d shifted and spent the whole night out. Hell, I could remember being a teenager and getting mad at my father and shifting, refusing to shift back. I spent a week as a swan. Maybe the stress and events of the past week had exhausted me more than I realized. Possible, after all, I had just spent two days sleeping, but it had never happened before.
I couldn’t focus on that any longer. It happened. I was tired. Life moved on, and I needed to do the same. Besides, it wasn’t as if I had lost myself or had gone on a killing spree or something like that, I’d been sleeping and exhausted. The end. Not the end of the world as we knew it. However, I would admit, finding out I’d been completely out of it for two days bothered me. What if Fizz hadn’t found me? What if I hadn’t been able to make it back to my apartment?
“Stop,” I snapped softly, chastising myself. “You made it back, Fizz found you and put you to bed. Stop thinking about what could have been and focus on everything you need to do now.”
Slowly, I released a breath I’d been holding and rolled my head back and forth as I lifted and dropped my shoulders in an effort to release the building tension. “It’s over.”
“What is?” Fizz asked, standing in the doorway of my closet.
My jaw clenched tightly, and my eyes narrowed, glaring at him. “What do you want now?”
He tilted his head to the side and smirked. “I wanted to see what was taking your highness so long. Debbie is done cleaning everything else, started the laundry, did the dishes by hand, and is waiting on you to get out of here so she can strip the bed and,” he spun around to look around him, “clean up this pigsty.”
I pushed him out of the way, growling as I did, and eyed my room myself. While it wasn’t the neatest with clothes strewn about the floor and the bed looking as if I went thirty rounds with a love who didn’t exist, it wasn’t that bad. I preferred a tidy space, and this was messy compared with how it normally looked; however, it wasn’t the pigsty Fizz claimed it to be. Especially when I could compare it to my fifteen-year-old cousin Spencer, who didn’t have one square inch of the floor that wasn’t covered by clutter. Thinking about his room made me shiver in revulsion. I really hoped he grew out of that soon. His room smelled and looked like a pigsty, not mine. “It’s not that bad.”
“Nah, I just like teasing you. Now, come on. We need to let Debbie do her job, and you need to eat. I almost considered calling the doc to give you an I.V.” Fizz moved behind me and dropped his hands on my shoulders to guide me out the door.
As soon as we crossed over the threshold to my room, I noticed a petite woman with gray hair waiting outside. She looked to be in her fifties and reminded me of Sophia from Golden Girls, something my mom always made me watch with her when I was a kid. There was something about her, something off, and I reached up to rub the middle of my chest. “Excuse me, but—”
“Keep moving, Max,” Fizz ordered and refused to let me stop. If I didn’t continue to walk, the force he was exerting would have had me falling to the ground.
“Fizz,” I snarled.
“No. You can complain to me once you eat something.” His words and tone were sharp and clipped. When he sounded like that, I knew he wouldn’t back down. Times like these, it was best to do what he said.
Fizz practically threw me into a chair and then grabbed a plate from the microwave and slid it in front of me. “Eat now, talk later.”
“And if I don’t want to?” I asked to get a rise out of him. Wasn’t I the boss, the one who called the shots, the person he was supposed to listen to?
“You may be my boss, but let’s face facts here, your safety and life are my job. Therefore, I’m in charge.” He winked, and I threw a forkful of scrambled eggs at him. “Very mature, Max.”
“I thought so,” I snipped as my stomach growled. Fizz heard it, I could tell by his snicker, but it was so strong, it made my whole abdomen vibrate. Ignoring him, I tucked in and practically inhaled the food set before me, not really tasting anything.
“Do you want anything else?” Fizz took my plate and set it in the sink, running a little water over it.
I started to tell him I was full but thought better of it. I was starving and the… I stopped to think. For the life of me, I wasn’t sure what I had eaten besides eggs, which hadn’t been enough to fill me up. “Do we have any bagels?”
“Yeah. I’ll get it toasted for you.”
“I’ll do it.” I got off my seat and strutted over to the refrigerator, trying to covertly peer down the hall. I wouldn’t be able to see anything since she was in my room, but that didn’t stop me.
“Want to tell me what’s wrong?” Fizz questioned inches from my ear in a quiet whisper.
I screamed and jumped. “What the hell is wrong with you?”
“Nothing, but apparently something is wrong with you. So what is it?” He continued to speak softly and stretched his upper body around my back to look down the hall.
I opened my mouth to tell him but thought better of it. Usually, I could tell him anything. While it was true that we were employer and employee, he was also one of my friends. Yet this, I didn’t understand it myself, so how was I supposed to tell him? “Nothing.”
Grabbing my bicep, he pulled me away from the fridge and the hallway, and into the pantry on the opposite side of the large kitchen. “Try again,” Fizz demanded when he shut the door.
“Does someone need to get laid? Manhandling the client now?” I was fully aware that I sounded more like a spoiled rich asshole than someone who thought of this man as a friend.
He did nothing except lift an eyebrow, more than likely seeing through my act. This man had been with me longer than anyone and probably knew me better than my own parents.
My fingers dove into my hair, a sure sign of my nervousness and agitation, and I sighed. “I don’t know.” I held up my hands when he narrowed his eyes. “Seriously!” I rushed, attempting to keep my voice low. “When we passed that woman, I felt something strange. I don’t know what it was.” I couldn’t remember her name and tried to think of a time when I’d seen her before, unable to recall a single time I’d been home when she’d been here.
“She passed all the security checks,” he mumbled as he stared at the door, no longer
focused on me. A moment ago, when he first pulled me into the pantry, he’d been loose, his muscles relaxed, but now, his body was on alert, his muscles tense. Most wouldn’t notice the change, it was subtle, but I could tell.
“Maybe I’m still exhausted, and it was nothing,” I hedged. It was a possibility, even though I didn’t think that was the case.
Shaking his head, he said, “Remember what I told you about your instincts.”
I rolled my eyes. “Yeah.” Fizz seemed to think I needed to listen to my inner animal, that my swan would be able to pinpoint danger faster than I could without him.
“Don’t discount what you feel or think. I’ll do some more research on her, and if necessary, I’ll let her go.”
Fizz always had good instincts, too, which made me inquire, “Did you have any odd feelings about her?”
“Later. She should be done soon. Get your bagel and sit down. I need to make a call.” He stepped out of the pantry and left me there. “Max,” he snapped, pulling me out of whatever stupor I was in, and I hurried out, throwing a bagel into the toaster and myself into a chair before Debbie left my room.
I felt her coming. I didn’t hear her steps on the polished dark hardwood floors, but I felt her. The urge to run and hide was even stronger than it had been when I passed her earlier.
“Is there anything else you need?” she asked, her eyes focused on Fizz.
Shaking his head, he dropped his phone from his ear and answered her with a blinding smile on his face, “No, thank you for cleaning.”
The moment the door closed behind her, and she was gone, a rush of air whooshed out of me. It was like I could breathe again, and anxiety I’d felt since our meeting in the hallway, melted away.
“Better?” Fizz’s sharp eyes were studying me, scanning my face, searching for something, as he leaned against the sink with his arms crossed over his chest.
Without thought, my hand rubbed the center of my chest again. It didn’t feel tight or off now, everything had left with that woman. “A lot better.”
I jumped when the toaster finished, and my bagel popped up, a little more on the charred side than toasted. I couldn’t eat it and disposed of it in the trash while Fizz answered his phone.
“What did you find?” He marched down the hall to his side of the floor, his voice growing fainter. I had to give it to him, he worked quickly and wouldn’t wait to see what happened with this new maid. Something felt off, and he acted, using his network of connections. Would he find something? Fizz’s background checks could rival the CIA, and the woman had passed with flying colors. Had he missed something? That sounded like an oxymoron if I ever heard one. Fizz miss anything? I couldn’t imagine that happening in this lifetime.
A rumbling from my stomach reminded me it demanded more food. Shaking my head, I pulled another bagel out of the bag and put it in the toaster turning down the setting to be more golden, less black.
As I stood there waiting, I would periodically glance in the direction that Fizz disappeared, biting my lip, wondering what he learned. Good? Bad? Was it just me and nothing to worry about? I turned my head and focused on the front door as I thought about that woman. Just conjuring her image in my mind had my anxiety rising. What was it about her that set me on edge. She was a little more than half my height, old, and shuffled her feet when she walked as if she couldn’t lift them an inch to take a real step. On her face had been glasses, which made her eyes look three times their normal size. So why would someone like that make me feel as if danger stood in front of me?
Impatient and needing to do something, I lifted the lever on the toaster, forcing my bagel to pop out. Maybe if I concentrated on food, everything else would fade into the background until Fizz was done talking on the phone. Doubtful. Even as I worked on spreading cream cheese on the barely toasted bread, I kept searching for Fizz, willing him to appear and tell me I had nothing to be concerned about, that everything was in my head.
“Come on already!” I exclaimed under my breath in frustration, throwing the knife I’d been using into the sink with such force, it slid up the side and flew out of the sink to land on the floor with a clank. “Fuck!” I glared at it for a few seconds, seething, but eventually, I bent down to retrieve it and set it in the sink once again. This time, it would not escape.
I picked up my food and carried it to the chair I’d occupied earlier and ate, my focus remaining on the direction I knew Fizz would return.
Time ticked by. I finished the bagel and two cups of coffee before I heard him running—not a good sign—through the apartment, his large feet pounding on the floor, making each step echo throughout the area like a gun firing. It reminded me of the one time he took me to meet some of his friends so they could teach me some new defense maneuvers. They marched in with their platoon, each step in sync and precise, making their small group of fifteen sound like one giant.
I swallowed hard, my throat dry as beads of sweat formed on my head, dampening my hair. My heart started to beat faster, or maybe it just seemed that way since I could hear it pounding in my ears. I refused to let my outward appearance show how freaked out I was. Leaning forward, I placed my elbows on the island and brought my empty coffee mug to my lips, pretending to drink out of it as I flipped the page on the newspaper feigning interest in the content. Outwardly, I presented the air of nonchalance and not giving a damn.
“Max,” Fizz thundered.
“Issues?” I had to force the word out of my throat and was slightly proud of myself when it didn’t come out choked or as a breathless whisper.
“Big issues. She’s not Debbie.”
I froze. I was staring at the paper unseeingly, and my hand hovered over it. Not Debbie? As in, not the maid hired to replace my pregnant maid? As in, a stranger and someone who had not been vetted? I couldn’t look up, couldn’t do anything beyond ask, “What the fuck do you mean?”
“Whoever set her up in the system was good, but not good enough. It was enough to pass her vetting process, but that’s it. Debbie is actually a thirty-three-year-old mother of three.”
“That woman who was here today was at least eighty.”
“Maybe not that old,” he corrected.
“Really?”
Huffing out a breath, Fizz stepped closer, bending so that his face appeared in my line of sight. “Listen to me, Max. Nothing is going to happen to you. I have someone coming over to do a thorough sweep of the place. In the meantime, I’m getting you out of here so they can do their job. Let’s go.”
“Huh?” I could see him, but I couldn’t focus on his face, which was nothing more than a peach blur in front of me, and the pounding in my ears drowned out his words.
I thought he shook his head and sighed, but I couldn’t be sure. A moment later, he clutched my arm, lifted me out off of my barstool, and dragged me to the door. I let him.
Why was I acting like this? It wasn’t the first time someone had tried to conjure up a fake persona to get into my house. I’d had women attempt it more times than I cared to count, and a few men. A time or two, they checked out and were allowed into my humble abode. Usually, I laughed it off, but not today, not this time.
Numbly, I followed Fizz, trusting him to prevent me from running into walls or anything else. My brain had shut down and stopped functioning. I couldn’t think or process anything right now.
“Max, come on!” he snapped and jerked me toward the open car door, pushing me into the seat. When I just sat there, he buckled my seatbelt for me, mumbling something about “taking care of a thirty-two-year-old baby.” In my current state, he was right.
“Max, snap out of it. I need you to listen to me. You can have your fucking pity party later,” Fizz said as soon as we left the parking garage. When I didn’t respond, he flicked my ear with his fingers causing me to gasp and clutch my ear, covering it with both hands to protect it from his attacks. “Finally,” he grumbled, and if I knew him, which I did, he rolled his eyes too.
“What?” I seethed. My j
aw was clenched so tightly, it hurt.
“Listen to me.”
“What?” I was being an ass and didn’t care. “You were the one who got me into this mess.” It wasn’t fair to lash out at him like that, but I couldn’t stop myself.
His head dipped and lifted once, but he never glanced in my direction, concentrating instead on the traffic surrounding us. I hated the throngs of people who lived in the city. It didn’t matter if it was the middle of the week or the weekend, there was always a surplus of people, and the only time the crowds tended to thin out was during bad weather or when it was too cold for even penguins.
Sometimes, I thought about moving out of Chicago, but here I could hide amongst the crowd of people. The city was my self-made prison. I could brood and feed my ire, blaming everyone else except me like all of the princes in those stupid fairy tales.
“Sorry,” I muttered without sparing him a glance as I sank into my seat. “Where are we going?”
“You’re right. I did get you into this mess. Brianna recommended Debbie, and when I did the background check, everything appeared fine. I’m not sure how she passed, but she did. Now, we need to figure out what she did and what her motive is. I have people working on that now.”
“Did Dad tell you what he found?”
“The warning?”
I nodded, biting my lip, unable to voice anything.
“Yes, and we have taken extra precautions. She made it through those too.” Fizz rubbed the back of his neck and laid on the horn when a pedestrian tried to walk when the sign clearly said DO NOT WALK. Our light was green. After she flipped us off and skipped—yes, she literally skipped—to the other side, Fizz pressed the accelerator and sped through the intersection on a yellow light. The bitch had taken her sweet time crossing.
“I see.” I didn’t really. My head was swimming, and the pounding in my ears got louder. What if the warning was real? I tried to play it off, act like nothing could touch me, but that was all it was, an act. Unlike the times before, when someone managed to make it past the various of levels of security I wrapped myself in to keep my secret hidden, there was something about this fake Debbie that I couldn’t shake or laugh off like before.