I jumped into jeans and ran outside. We had gotten little snow for Christmas this year, thank God. Here it was! A red shimmering Jaguar sat on its shiny tires. I looked around. My beat-up Ford was gone.

In quiet desperation, I ran up and down the street, screaming and yelling. My cab carried a parking permit, so it shouldn't have been towed. If it had been stolen, the police wouldn't waste their time looking for an old battered Crown Victoria. If I lost the cab, I wouldn't be able to make money to pay the cab company. I barely had enough for next month's rent.

Icy Christmas rain was pouring down my face by the time I returned to the Jaguar. What was this thing doing in front of my window, anyway? Had some drug dealer burned his money for this toy? That was it! They towed away my cab to let him park! Blood rushed to my head and, seeing red, I ran toward the grossly overpriced pile of metal and started kicking its shiny grille. "Who parked this pile of shit here? This is my space! This is my parking space! Where is my car?"

I shouted because I couldn't be silent anymore about every injustice and abuse that had happened to me ever since my first husband sent me an e-mail saying that he wanted a divorce because he felt closer to his parents than to his wife.

Nobody came out to claim the Jaguar, so I kept kicking it until I smashed the grille.

"Hey," an eerily familiar voice said. "I can see that you like my gift!"

I turned around, wet sweatshirt and Mudd's jeans clinging to my bones; my mouth opened, and my eyes popped out. Alexander Davidoff stood behind me in his long gray London Fog raincoat. His brown-gloved hand was holding an umbrella.

"Huh?" I said and swallowed a handful of raindrops.

"I'm glad you like my Christmas present," Alexander repeated after a brief inspection of the car. "I'm glad you customized it right away. It looked kind of too new. Not your style."

At thirty-five, I retired as a cab driver and acquired the most exquisite taste in clothes, furniture, architecture, design, landscaping and jewelry, all by virtue of my marriage to his highness, prince, landowner, and international lawyer, Alexander Davidoff. My new husband owned a family castle in Mooresville, NJ. Built a hundred years ago by his relatives as a hunting shed, the castle was an exact copy of a French mansion from the Champagne province. When I first saw this castle, two things became clear to me. First, I'd retired as a cab driver, and second, I have a lot of time on my hands to read mystery novels.

We moved in and spread out evenly through its fifty rooms. Under `we' I mean Alexander, his daughter Evana, me, my daughter Iris, Alexander's butler Mark, the girls' tutor Larissa, Alexander's German shepherd Elvis, and my black cat Pepper.

Pepper was the first one to step inside our new house, according to the superstition rules of Alexander's old country. I agreed that the three-story gray stone mansion needed some good guardian spirits. We took the cat to the door in his basket and let him inside. He stepped on the shiny hardwood floor with his legs straight and inflexible like a little parading Pakistani soldier. The cat crossed the spacious entrance hall and then turned towards the kitchen. The shepherd, Elvis, surprised he wasn't the first one this time, trotted behind Pepper, sniffing the air.

"Hey," Alexander said, smiling. "They know their place in a house."

Our animals disappeared into the kitchen. Surprised, we rushed there too. I stopped at the door. The countertops and a round dining table were loaded with tons of pizzas, chicken pies, salads, cakes, grilled meat, and fruits. Amid this abundance stood a British-looking man, holding a baking sheet filled with hot rolls.