Chapter One: Ignition

Maxie Jones always thought that she could smell a setup from miles away but she was proven wrong on a fateful day in April. It was a Sunday, April 26 to be exact, and spring was in the air. All of the snow from the horrible February snow blizzard had melted away just scarce little puddles of water remained. Maxie was on her way to meet Mac for brunch at a new dinner he liked called the Beat.

The Beat was just a block away from his precinct and in spite of the fact that it had only been open for a month it was the cop hangout.

Mac had been needier than usual since her latest misstep and the Robin does- she- or-doesn't-she- have- PPD situation. The misstep was when she had been stupid (his word not hers) enough to run into a burning hospital after that criminal (again his word not hers) Spenalli to save him. The Robin situation threw everyone through a loop. No one ever expected that sort of thing to happen to their family let alone to Robin.

Maxie pushed open the heavy glass door of the Beat and entered. Oldies tunes were playing over the speaker system but could barley be heard of the loud clamor of male voices. Everyone was wearing black and blue, even the waitresses who appeared to be the only females in the dinner with the exception of Maxie. Obliviously none of these people have read her article "Bye Bye Black- Hello Color" in the latest Crimson issue.

Maxie entrance drew some attention not only because she was female because she was dressed in a open pastel canary yellow trench coat, a royal purple silk chiffon top, a fifties inspired sky-blue full pleated skirt, and pastel canary yellow spike heels. She glanced around the room for Mac, noting the appreciative male glances, while she looked. Spotting him to her left in the last booth along the large window she headed toward him not before slowly brushing back a lose curl that had fell over her eye.

Mac had yet to notice her and it looked like he was deep in a serious conversation with some guy. Maxie assumed that it was probably one of his dull buddies from the precinct. When she was just three feet from Mac he glanced up from his conversation and saw her. He smiled up at her as she leaned down and kissed Mac on the cheek and greeted him. Maxie stood back up and turned her attention to the man sitting directly across from Mac. Instead of finding one of Mac's buddies, as she had expected, she saw the familiar face of Dr. Matt Hunter. Her eyes narrowed her mouth opened and "Are you stalking me?" came out.

Matt just smiled back at her in that annoying (her words) way of his and replied. "Maybe I should be asking you that question since I was here first."

Somehow Maxie eyes managed to narrow even more and latest Matt and Maxie verbal battle began.

While Matt and Maxie were busy trading insults Mac just sat back and watched with a small smile, scratch that, smirk on his face.

*****

Although women are the sex known for sneakiness and underhandedness men could also be just as sneaky and underhanded – especially concerned fathers of daughters. Now Mac is not Maxie's biological father but as far as anyone is concerned, including Maxie, he is her father for better worse. In the case of Maxie, most of the time it has been worst- well at least since she hit puberty. Don't get Mac wrong he loves Maxie to death but Maxie has not made the best (or legal) decisions in life-well not the type of decisions this Police Commissioner would like to see anyway.

After the devastating loss of Georgie, Mac really saw the woman that Maxie could become. She gave herself direction. She set her eye on the Kate Howard fashion thing and she got it. Mac still didn't know exactly what Maxie did but what he did know is that Maxie is dedicated to it and she has become a workaholic. Imagine that! The only bad or negative thing in Maxie life was that pesty criminal and bad influence Damien Spinelli.

The sooner Mac got Maxie away from Spinelli (aka the criminal) the better. Maxie's savior (and savior of his sanity) was going to be Dr. Matt Hunter. Originally he considered charging the criminal with something just to get away from Maxie but since Maxie seems unnaturally attached (and willing to commit illegal acts to save it, I mean, him) he scratched that plan. The only way to get the criminal out of Maxie's life was if Maxie decided to remove him from her life. But how would Mac guide Maxie into doing that? It took Mac some time before he figured out a plan. The plan was sneaky, underhanded, and perfect!

After deep thought Mac developed the theory that if Maxie had a man (yes, that was a shot at the criminal) in her life she would eventually become so enraptured with him that she would start to greatly reduced her time with Spenelli. Eventually she would come to realize that the criminal is completely unneeded in her life. All Mac needed was the man to be Maxie's lure away from the criminal. Enter Dr. Matt Hunter.

Why Dr. Matt Hunter? That's a good question. One of the biggest problems about living in Port Charles is that nearly everyone is involved in the Mob or related to someone in the Mob. Mac was not going to have any child of his involved with anyone in the Mob if he had anything to say about it or could do about it. There really were only two places in Port Charles to look for non-mob pool of males the Police and the Hospitals. Since he really didn't want Maxie involved with anyone with a dangerous job he ruled out the Police. That left the hospitals. Aren't hospitals supposed to be a safe place? Since Mac didn't like Mercy General that left General Hospital. As of late is seemed that the hospital has hardly any males in Maxie's age range. So really his only choice was Dr. Matt Hunter.

Mac would have picked Matt for other reasons. Maxie obviously knew him because of all the complaints and phone calls that Maxie had made to Mac about Matt living with them. Mac's favorite call had to be the one that Maxie called to inform Mac that Matt was having "unbelievable loud sex" she even added in a shocked tone "in the middle of the afternoon." All of that just to get Matt kicked out of the house. Obviously, Matt got under her skin and that is the type of guy that Mac needs for his plan.

One of the perks about being Police Commissioner is that he has access to everyone's criminal record including their Juvenal record. In addition to checking to see if Matt had a record (which he didn't- not even a parking ticket) he also did some checking into Matt's past and was more than pleased with what he found. Of course, this is not the time or the place to reveal Matt's past before he arrived in Port Charles but all will be reveled in good time. Let's just put it this way Maxie will not be disappointed. Unlike Mac who would be even more disappointed if Maxie kept up with the criminal.

After all just look at Matt and then Spinelli, do you really think that Spinelli is going to be a much of any compotation to Dr. Matt Hunter? Of course not, so long as Matt had a little help from Mac. Mac smiled into his coffee cup as he drank his morning coffee and observed the passionate argument between the two key players in his plan. Glancing from Maxie's arm waving to Matt's smirks back to Maxie fighting back a smile to the mischievous glint in Matt's eyes and back to Maxie's narrowing of her eyes Mac knew this plan of his was going to work and then he heard Maxie snap out to him, "Until you are done conversing with the conceited-one I will be over at the counter. Not waiting patiently."

Okay, maybe Matt was going to need a lot of help from him.

****