“Midway upon the journey of our life, I found myself within a forest dark, for the straightforward pathway had been lost.”
― Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy
“Cosy. I had no idea that you lived in such a shithole, Maxine. I thought that being the prince’s mistress came with some advantages,” Zachary mocked me, looking around my crappy flat. I lifted my hand, tapping my finger into my head as a reminder for tomorrow. I needed to call my landlady and ask her to fix the damn lights. Also the glass in the window was cracked. Some teenager from the council estate threw a stone when I told him to shut his dirty human mouth. Yes, my flat was a real rathole.
My head was spinning and I hated myself that I couldn’t stop telling Paul to pour me more. All my rent money was gone. I was broke again.
“What the hell do you want? I’m fine now. You can leave. I don’t … need a babysitter, mister,” I slurred, stumbling on my feet and falling down on the sofa. My eyes wouldn’t stay open. Zach sat beside me a moment later. He took my hand and touched my cheek with his cold finger.
“You do that often? Lose all your money in an obscure bar in a poker game?” he asked, forcing my chin up so I couldn’t look away. He was composed, and very calm, almost not the same man that I met in the palace. I had the tendency of oversharing details of my life with strangers when I was drunk. That night when he was sitting next to me, I wanted to tell him all about the bad time in my life, about Arthur too. Tonight was one of those times when I needed a shoulder to cry on.
“I never used to do that, but getting wasted seems like a good idea lately,” I told him. “Have you got a cigarette?”
He nodded, pulled the packet of Marlboro Lights from his jacket pocket, and gave me one. I had a lighter somewhere in the flat, but he used matches to light one for me. At this rate I was going to kill myself; even the magic wouldn’t save me.
“What’s on your mind, beautiful?” he asked, lighting one for himself.
“I want to tell you about that one night when everything changed,” I said, wondering if this was really such a good idea. Zach didn’t care, but he was still in the flat, sitting next to me. He obviously wanted to listen.
“Tell me.”
“I had a close call a couple of years ago. I nearly died, so I decided to change everything. First it was the job and the fact that I had to rely on others to survive,” I mumbled, sounding like one pathetic mongrel. I spent too many years keeping the truth away from everyone around me. My mother used to say that it was better to let all the worries out in the open. Now I had a man next to me that wanted to get to know me, so I needed to keep going. “I used to work as a waitress in an Italian restaurant in the city. That one night I was the last one out, closing the back doors, when some stranger attacked me. He came out of nowhere, took all the money and left me there to bleed to death.”
Zachary was silent, staring down at me with a wary, slightly stunned expression on his face. I arched my head back, resting for a few long moments. The magic was rummaging through my system urging me to keep talking about the crappy past. The voices in my head were loud and nagging. Sometimes I had problems with shutting them down.
“I woke up in the hospital several days later, not remembering anything at all. I had a cracked skull, broken wrists, my kidneys were punctured. It took me weeks to recover, to actually want to keep on living. The police closed the investigation pretty quickly. They didn’t have any leads or witnesses from that night. After that I didn’t go back to that old life. I started hanging around in bars and nightclubs, playing cards for money. Some nice people taught me how to survive on the streets on my own. It was easier to act like I had nothing to lose. Soon I was making more money than I could ever imagine, so I took some self-defence classes, trained in martial arts too. People started to respect me, and I began getting some contract work in security. My life was suddenly good. I had friends, cash in my pocket and I was finally free. Every day I was making progress, making connections with the people in the business, and pushing myself during training. I started protecting wealthy clients, looking after rich kids, managing clubs and restaurants. Things were good and then the opportunity in Buckingham Palace came around. Nothing was ever the same after that.
I closed my eyes, dragging the nicotine from the cigarette deep into my lungs. I had never liked smoking. It was a nasty habit. Zach lifted himself off the sofa and went to the kitchen. I heard him pacing around the room for a bit. The night wasn’t meant to end like this. He wasn’t supposed to see me in such a state, telling him all about my shitty life.
“That’s why you were brought in to this case, because of your previous connection to royal family?” he asked, staring at me from the other side of the room. The royals—that word was cut out of my vocabulary when I got fired and had to hide in the rabbit hole.
“Yes, mainly, but the truth is that a demon took Prince Georgie. You’re a human, so you won’t understand any of it,” I said, forgetting who I was talking to. Zachary needed to hear the harsh truth. “Besides, I needed the cash to pay my overdue rent. I thought that tonight I would be responsible, that I could stay away from cards, but then you showed up.”
He shook his head, and drew on a cigarette for longer than he supposed to. We were sitting in the darkness, but his eyes were focused on my face. I was too wasted to connect with his emotions, although I still wanted to know if he was ready to screw me.
“Are you blaming me for getting drunk, Flower, and losing your rent money?” he asked with that hard, accusing tone of voice. And that nickname—he knew it drove me mad, but he still kept using it.
“I’ll blame you when I get evicted.” I laughed. “Either way, I lost all the money tonight. Don’t worry, it’s not the first time and most certainly not the last.”
It was time for me to go to sleep, to drift away from the problems of this fucked up world. Detective Zachary Quinton was a dream. All this time I was talking to myself, telling the other Maxine the real story.
“Sleep, Flower, because tomorrow is going to be a new day and I’ll be there to mess with you all over again,” the voice whispered in my ear, and I smiled falling asleep.
My eyes were stuck together when I woke up in the late morning the next day. I lifted my second pillow and pressed it over my face, hoping not to hear the emergency services just outside my window. I lived next to the busy street and it sounded like there was an accident outside. People were shouting and horns were going off. I felt like someone was hitting me with a hammer, as the blurry memories from last night slowly came back to me. After a few moments I realised that someone was banging at my door, loudly, too bloody loudly for such an early hour.
When I scrambled off my bed I was naked. My clothes were folded on the floor next to the chair, and the clock on the wall was showing eleven clock in the morning. I didn’t remember undressing. What the hell happened here?
“Crap, I’m late again. Ricky is gonna kill me,” I muttered to myself, throwing a T-shirt on and putting on clean underwear. I was surprised to find that I had any. I hadn’t done the laundry for over a decade.
“I’m coming,” I shouted as the person outside started banging harder. When I finally unlocked it, I saw that it was my landlady, Mrs. Patel. For a split second I wished that I had woken up somewhere else this morning, maybe even in someone else’s body. She was here for the overdue rent and as far as I remember I had lost all my available cash last night.
“Maxine, sorry to knock on your door this morning, but you’re three days late with your rent,” she said, eyeing my naked thighs and most likely smelling the stale alcohol on my breath. I could mess with her head, make her forget that I actually owe her any money, but that was against my own rules. I hated tampering with human minds. Besides I couldn’t get away with not paying my rent. This was morally wrong. “I can’t wait any longer, and you should set up a standing order so I don’t have to come to your door every month.”
Mrs. Patel was a thirty-something Indian-born woman who was married to a property developer, Mr. Patel. Apparently they both started investing money in the housing market in the nineties, and these days they had quite a portfolio. I was forced to move in to this shitty flat a year ago, and Mrs. Patel was kind enough to wait for her security deposit.
“Mrs. Patel, can you give me a minute? I’ve had a horrendous night,” I said, rubbing my eyes and stepping into the morning light outside, as it was dark in my hallway. I felt terrible, worse than normally and my head was hurting badly.
“My God, what happened to your face? Are you all right?” she asked, probably assuming that I was ill. I lifted my hand and touched my cheek. It bloody hurt, so I turned swiftly around and ran back to my apartment. I put the light on in the hallway and I looked at my own reflection in the mirror. My left cheek was swollen and I had a freaking black eye. Memories flooded my mind. I remembered fighting with Zach, and it looked like the bastard hit me.
Then, something else caught my attention: a white envelope that was placed on the dresser, next to my hairbrush. When I opened it I thought that I was dreaming. The envelope was full of cash.
I took eight hundred from the stash when you went to the toilet. You said that you were late with rent.
Now who should be your Prince Charming?
Z.
I re-read that damn note a few times, suddenly remembering everything from the night before. I was the last customer in The Broken Shoe, and Paul had sent me on my way. Zachary must have followed me back to my flat. I was completely wasted, and I couldn’t remember why I let him in the first place.
“Maxine, are you all right?” I heard Mrs. Patel on the threshold. It was the exact amount that I needed for rent. Zachary must have taken some cash out that I won and kept it away, most likely predicting that I wasn’t done blowing it all off after I outplayed him.
He couldn’t have known that I would be that stupid, that I’d lose all my money and get so wasted I couldn’t get home on my own. Well, it looked like I had misjudged him. I brushed my hair away from my face and headed back to Mrs. Patel, partly relieved and partly worried that I owed him a favour.
“Here you go. Everything should be inside,” I said, handing her the cash. There was no one else I could have asked for a loan, so technically Zachary had saved my skin. That meant that I could stay in my shitty flat for another month.
Mrs. Patel counted the money, and after convincing herself that everything was okay, she smiled with relief. I couldn’t remember when I told Zach that I hadn’t paid my rent. I didn’t know anything about him, but it seemed that from today onwards we were going to spend some time together.
“Good, I’m glad, but please set up a standing order as soon as possible. It will save us both a lot of hassle in the future,” she told me. “And take care of yourself, Maxine. Maybe speak to someone. This shouldn’t be happening to you, dear.”
I forced out a smile. She needed to know that I wasn’t a victim of domestic violence, that last night I simply had a playful fight with a hot cop.
“Thanks, Mrs. Patel, but this was just an unfortunate misunderstanding. I’m really fine,” I mumbled, deciding to spare her that story. She gave me a faint smile, muttered something else and then she was on her way. I shut the door and locked it, hoping to get back to sleep.
On the other hand it would be a good idea to show up in the office on time for once and act like a responsible adult. Ricky must have extracted the potion from George’s blood by now, possibly linking someone within a demonic faction to this whole kidnapping.
There was no point dwelling on last night. I got drunk, Zach saved my skin, and I had to thank him—that was the end of story.
Within a half hour, I put some clothes on, brushed my messy hair and left the flat, feeling tired, achy and very pissed off with myself. People were staring at me when I was in the tube station, possibly because I looked like someone had beat me up. On top of that I was very much hungover.
By the time I walked into the office, it was just after one o’clock.
“Maxine, I’m so glad that you’re here. Ricky went out. He was called about another case.”
Another case, what on earth was she talking about? Ricky didn’t see any clients without me, but then maybe this had something to do with the evidence that we had found last night.
“Did he say anything else?” I asked, checking the mail.
“He said, well… he was kind of rude,” she said shyly, looking at me with those big blue eyes.
“Just tell me. I can take it,” I said. Humans, they appeared to be so fragile, always worried about other people.
“Oh my God! What happened to your face?” she asked, like she just noticed my black eye.
I placed my hands on her arms and said, “It’s nothing, Emma, just focus. What did Ricky say?”
“For you not to fuck anything up before he came back. There’s some information about a man in his drawer that he wanted you to look at,” she rambled, looking anxiously at my black eye. Ricky must have worked really hard last night when I was getting wasted in the bar. There were some notes inside his cabinet, telling me that the demon that took George was part of Lucifer’s faction.
“Maxine, can I ask you something?”
Emma followed me back to Ricky’s room. She looked uncomfortable, like she wanted to tell me something, but was afraid to be rejected.
“What it is, Emma?” I asked, trying to be patient, trying to act like I was a good boss.
“Well, it’s my daughter’s birthday party this weekend and I was wondering if you would like to come. There will be mostly other mothers, but you have done so much for me already and I would love to have you there.”
I glanced back at her, knowing that she was waiting for me to answer. Right at that moment, I was ready to forget I was running a business, that I was half demon and a weak soul. The pain inside my chest stung me hard, reminding me about the last twelve months, reminding me what exactly I had left behind.
“I didn’t know you had a daughter,” I pointed out, sounding odd, feeling vulnerable. Her face brightened instantly, like a bulb in a dark room, and my soul darkened. Some snippets of her memories were slowly coming back to me.
“Yes, she is five and she invited all her friends from school. We would love to have you there.” She said beaming, clapping enthusiastically. I scratched my head, trying to push that deep, burning guilt away, knowing that I could have taken a different path a couple of months ago.
Emma looked happy, delighted, and I wanted to be like her, normal for once.
“All right, I’ll come over. Leave the address and the time on my desk.” I forced out the words before my brain could process what I agreed to. Emma jumped again and then hugged me. I was stiff like a wooden board. This was weird.
“Amaze balls, can’t wait. This will be awesome.”