Linda leaned against the casino bar, rubbing her temples with two fingers.
The music was too loud and the lights were a little too bright. The air smelled like cheap perfumes. London casinos were the worst compared to Texas. She hated it here.
She'd been on her feet for hours, smiling at people she didn't like, negotiating with people she trusted even less.
"It sucks here. Ptew!" She spit on the ground.
It was supposed to be the last dealing with the London mafias. After this, she'd return to America. Or perhaps take another vacation in Italy. They were the absolute best!
The only problem…. well, the only two problems were that the shipment was late, and Victor hadn't answered her calls in over an hour.
"Fuck this," Linda muttered, draining her glass. "I hate England."
A dealer laughed nearby, clicking his chips across felt tables.
No one noticed the men slipping in through the side entrance.
Linda pushed off the bar and headed toward the private lounge. Her heels clicked against the marble floor, steady and unhurried. She wasn't worried for her safety at all even though she was a woman.
No one could take her down in a knife or a gun fight. Plus, she'd survived worse nights than this.
Suddenly the music got cut off and a sharp gunshot echoed through the air in the casino.
Someone screamed and glass shattered at that moment. The crowd panicked all at once as bodies came crashing into each other, chairs tipping over
Linda ducked behind a roulette table as another shot rang out.
"Shit," she breathed.
This wasn't supposed to happen. Victor made sure of that.
She peeked out just long enough to see Victor near the VIP section. She smiled. Finally he was here!
But soon she noticed that Victor was perfectly calm and talking to men who were very much not on her side.
He looked up at that moment and saw Linda. He suddenly broke into a wicked smile.
"Oh," Linda whispered. "You motherfucker."
She pulled out her gun.
"Black Scorpions, do you know the best way to kill a mafia boss?" Victor said aloud to the men he was with. He said it just so Linda could hear him. "You shoot them and they find a way to live. So you set them ablaze."
"Burn this casino down!"
::::::::::***
"Your Majesty," a gentle voice murmured. Right beside Linda's ear, she could feel the breath.
Linda did not open her eyes still.
She lay perfectly still, breathing slow. Years of habit refused to die just because she was asleep. Rule one of home safety for a mafia is to never wake up suddenly, even if you are awake.
You first listen to the sounds around you, pick up smells too then count from 1 to 10.
Linda did exactly that and noticed that the air was wrong.
The atmosphere was a bit too warm and the place carried the faint scent of old, sweet rose flowers. Why didn't it smell like blood?
That means three things. One, wherever she was at wasn't a holding room. Two, it wasn't a torture room. Three, it wasn't a cage.
Her mattress was wide beneath her and impossibly soft. Linen brushed her skin instead of cheap cotton. Somewhere close she felt warm breathing.
Someone was beside her!
Victor? Was it that traitor?!
The voice came again, nearer this time.
"Your Majesty," it said softly, with the careful cadence of someone used to speaking upward. Definitely not a male voice too.
'8, 9, 10!' Linda moved.
Her eyes snapped open as she reached under the pillow and grabbed her gun. She thrust it forward so fastly, aiming for a throat. "Who the fuck are you?!"
The person who was beside her—a young lady who seemed to be 18—scooted back startled. Her eyes widened in shock for a split second, then she suddenly burst into startled laughter.
She touched Linda's wrist easily and pushed it down, her grip firm but amused.
"Good heavens," the lady said, breathless with mirth. "Must you greet the morning as though it were a battlefield?"
Linda stared at her. Isn't she scared of my gun?'
Linda looked down at her hand that was holding the…. "What the fuck—"
Instead of a gun, there were rose petals in her hand that she had grabbed, some were also scattered around the bedding. "My… my Glock pistol!"
The lady paused. Just for a fraction of a second. Then she smiled again, indulgent and warm, as though Linda had spoken nonsense just now.
"My lord speaks strangely today," she said lightly. "Have you slept so poorly?"
Linda's stomach sank.
That motion of grabbing a gun from under the pillow was instinct. In Victor's bed or her bed, there had always been a gun or her favourite illegal Glock beneath the pillow. Always.
Her body had reached for it without asking permission.
The lady studied her now, amusement softening into curiosity.
"Come now," she continued, smoothing the sheets as though nothing were amiss. "We agreed last night that tempers would cool by morning. Must you truly look at me as though I were an assassin?"
Linda swung her legs over the side of the bed.
The room revealed itself slowly.
Stone walls draped in tapestries, heavy curtains filtering pale light, a carved table strewn with parchment and wax seals. Gold was literally everywhere in a less gaudy, but confident style.
This was no modern house.
Her heart began to pound.
"What is this?" Linda demanded. "Where the hell am I?"
The young lady tilted her head, clearly puzzled, yet still smiling. "You are in your chambers, my lord. Where else should you be?"
"My chambers," Linda echoed flatly.
"Yes," the lady said gently. "You returned late last night. You had taken rather more wine than was wise, so I persuaded the servants to leave you to your rest."
Linda, realising the voice she had been speaking with felt like it sounded wrong to her ears.
The voice was younger than her 36 years old self was. And it was clearly masculine.
She turned and the mirror caught her immediately.
Linda froze.
A young man who looked to be in his early adult stared back at her. He was tall, pale, and sharp-featured. With blonde hair falling loose around his shoulders, he was dressed in a sleeping shirt that belonged in oil paintings and museum glass.
He looked somewhat familiar. Like he was in a painting she had seen before. 'Leonardo da Vinci? Michelangelo?'
She grabbed at the fabric over her chest. "My pearls!" Her chest was empty~
The boy in the mirror did the same thing though.
"Oh," she breathed. "Oh no."
"My lord?" the woman said carefully. "Are you unwell?"
Linda didn't look away from the mirror. "What's my name?"
The woman hesitated. Just barely.
Then she lowered her gaze, her voice softening. "Your Majesty… you are King Henward."
"Henward what."
The woman lifted her eyes again, concern now plain on her face. "King Henward Henward," she said slowly. "Seventeenth of that name. Anointed sovereign of England."
The room tilted in Linda's eyes.
England? England! King Henward XVII?
Memory slammed into her as she recalled her time at the museum in London.
Victor was busy stealing all the valuables along with her men while she flipped through an old history book in front of a sculpture of King Edward IV who seized the throne from a certain King Henward XVII.
She was truly bored and she hadn't cared about the names but she was a smart one so the names stuck to her head.
King Henward XVII was a king who ruled briefly. 1429 - 1433.
He was a king who lost everything as he was overthrown after he went mad. The people hated him so he was caged in a place called Eltham Palace where he died in 1461 without a grave.
Linda let out a hollow laugh.
"Oh my God," she muttered. "Oh my fucking God."
The lady stepped closer, her hands hovering uncertainly. "Shall I summon the Lord Chancellor at once? Or perhaps a physician?"
Linda dragged a hand down her face.
"This better fucking be a hallucination after being injected with a psychoactive drug by Victor!"