Chapter 13
MAX
Ilanded on my balcony, my heavenly perch, after the sun had risen, and the sky changed from black to light blue. Exhaustion made my body feel heavy and awkward. The swan, so graceful and full of beauty, completely opposite from me.
Stumbling, I fell to my knees and then toppled over onto the frigid stone. Even though I shivered, and my teeth chattered, I couldn’t find the strength to get up or move. Tired and weak, my eyelids felt heavy and began drooping, sliding shut after they blinked only a handful of times.
“What the fuck?” Did someone really say that, or had I imagined it?
I felt like I was floating a moment later. This wasn’t like when I flew as a swan. This was different, as though I was floating in water, allowing my body to bob along the surface.
I stopped moving and was placed on a cloud. Sleep embraced me, and I wrapped my arms around her.
Breathing in, I released it slowly and flipped over, attempting to bury myself into my blanket and mattress.
I wasn’t ready to return to the world of the living yet, but my eyes popped open, and every little sound reached my ears.
I could hear faint blaring of horns and sirens coming from the streets way below, the banging of metal coming from another room in the house, and my phone vibrating on the nightstand.
When had I gotten in bed? I didn’t remember moving to my bed or placing my phone on the wooden surface next to me before I crashed.
I flopped onto my back and pushed my blanket down to my waist to stare up at the ceiling. The softness of the cotton brushed along my body…my whole body. I was naked. While that wasn’t unusual, the last thing I recalled from this morning was landing on the balcony and transforming. Nothing else.
“Fuuuuck!” I still couldn’t remember what happened, but I was willing to bet money Fizz had found me and carried my naked ass to bed.
Usually, I tried my damnedest to get home and into bed on my own without assistance from Fizz.
Who wanted to be caught in such a compromising position?
Regardless of how much I trusted him, I’d rather not make this a regular habit.
Thankfully, he’d only had to help me once before, but I was conscious at the time.
I didn’t know which was worse, both were embarrassing.
“Ah, I see our prince has finally awoken,” Fizz’s snarky comment had me flipping him off and raising up slightly to shoot him a glare.
“Oh, that’s so gentlemanly of you. And here I thought you would compose a song of thanks since I found you outside in the cold, completely naked.
Your ass on the concrete is the last thing I want to see when I’m drinking my morning coffee. ”
“Shut up,” I groaned, dropping back onto my pillow and throwing my arm over my eyes as I willed my body to fall back to sleep. It didn’t work.
“Ah, there’s that cheery disposition I love so much.”
“Is there a reason you’re trying to drown me in sarcasm this morning? I’d like to get back to sleep. I’ve only had…” My voice tapered off as I lifted my arm and peered out the window. I couldn’t tell. My blackout shades had been drawn.
“Two days.”
“Excuse me?” What the fuck did he mean?
“I found you on Sunday morning. It’s Tuesday. I’ve already called Eve and advised her you were taking off an additional day. According to her, she has you scheduled as out of the office this entire week,” Fizz informed me.
Sitting up, I gaped at him, my mouth hanging open in shock. Two days? I’d been sleeping for two days? I knew I’d been tired between getting everything ready for the party and fighting my swan, but two days? How the hell had that happened?
My fingers speared into my blond curls and scraped against my scalp. I’d been sleeping for two full days.
“Don’t be mad at her. She noticed you were pushing yourself more than usual?—”
I cut him off, “I’m not. She does that for me every year.
Usually, I still go into the office, but it’s always a light week for me with no meetings.
I get caught up on paperwork and other things.
” I stopped and rubbed my forehead before pressing the heels of my hands against my eyes. “I’ve been asleep for two days?”
“Yeah.”
I dropped my hands and noticed him leaning against the doorjamb with his arms crossed over his chest. “Looks like I made it back in time,” I attempted to laugh it off and winced when he scowled ferociously.
“It appears so. I’ve never seen you that out of it when you return, and you were only gone about six hours. You’ve flown longer and were never affected like this. What the hell happened this time?”
My head moved back and forth. “I don’t know. It had been a stressful and tiring week, maybe it all finally caught up with me.” I still couldn’t believe that I’d lost two full days.
Rolling his eyes, Fizz scratched his cheek. “You have got to take better care of yourself. If that means shifting more, then you need to do it. What would have happened had I not found you when I did?”
“I would be suffering from a case of blue balls which has nothing to do with my lack of sex?” I snickered.
“It’s not funny,” he snapped.
“You’re right, but I would have been cold and nothing more. I don’t get sick.”
“No, but you do get exhausted.”
I didn’t say anything, only nodded.
He sighed loudly. “Call Eve and let her know you’re okay. You also need to call your parents.”
“Anything else?” I inquired, afraid to ask about the one person he hadn’t mentioned.
Straightening, Fizz smirked. “Yeah. Someone else called. If you want to know who it is, get your ass up, take a shower, and get dressed. You need to eat something, and you smell like shit. The maid should be here in about an hour. She can strip the bed and do the laundry.”
“Who?” I demanded.
“Uh-uh. You need to wash off the funk, and only after you do that will I tell you.” He winked and left, running down the hall. It wasn’t like I planned on running after him. I was still bare-skinned and buck-ass naked.
“The least he could have done was close my door,” I groused, getting out of bed and falling, my legs giving out from under me. I’d been so exhausted, both mentally and physically, I’d passed out and slept for two days. It made sense my legs were still rubber. Rushing would be my undoing.
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.”