by Judi Fennell
“But the ch—the chores. I could help you with them. I could even fix the house up for you. You’d love it. I can make it look just like it did when Peter lived here. It was the most beautiful home in town. And the parties… ah, the parties. Everyone wanted to be invited, and there was music and dancing and food…”
“And uninvited bears,” said Merlin. “You know they only wanted to come to see what Crazy Pete would do next, Van, right?”
Vana’s exuberance deflated like a balloon.
Zane glared at the bird and mouthed one word. “Barbecue.”
Merlin gulped.
Zane didn’t know why he cared, but he did. She looked so forlorn. He guessed that was understandable, though, given that this place had been more of a home to her than it’d ever been to him. “What was the house like back then, Vana?”
“It was lovely. All the rooms were decorated just so and the gardens… Peter had such lovely gardens, and I didn’t even have to use my magic on them. Nature has her own magic, you know. How else could there be such perfection in rose petals? Such symmetry in daffodils? Such perfume in jasmine—”
“Such poison in oleanders,” said Merlin out of the other side of his beak. He then looked up at the clock, whistling an off-key tune.
She pulled her hands free and clapped them together. “Oh, Zane, please let me turn it back into what it once was. I promise you won’t want to sell it. You’ll want to stay.”
No he wouldn’t. But he’d kicked enough kittens for one day, and she looked so darn hopeful he couldn’t kick another. Besides, he’d been planning to do some work around here, and the better the condition the house was in, the more he could get for it.
“Vana, I am going to sell, but if it means that much to you, sure, you can help me fix it up.”
Silver flashed in her eyes just before she jumped up to plant a kiss on his cheek--but one small turn of his head and that kiss was everything it’d been before: hot, delicious, sexy—and over entirely too soon.
“Sheesh, you two,” whistled Merlin. “Get a room.”
There were a dozen and a half of them in this place, and Zane wouldn’t mind christening every one.
Which could pose big problems in the days to come.
Chapter 9
“So what’s the plan again?” asked Merlin. “You lost me.”
Zane would like to lose him. The damn bird hadn’t shut up since they’d stepped off the porch, bitching the entire walk around the property. Zane had offered him the opportunity to leave, but the bird felt some crazy compulsion to stick to Vana like glue, as if he expected Zane to try something.
Yeah, he might be thinking along those lines after that teaser of a kiss in the kitchen, not to mention the one in the attic when he’d thought she was a figment of his imagination. But she was a genie, for crying out loud. One didn’t lust after a genie.
Then she walked a few steps ahead of him, her see-through outfit leaving nothing to the imagination, and, yeah, maybe one did.
“Isn’t this where the lawn-bowling court used to be?” Merlin clacked his beak, and midflight, his wings turned purple and gold.
“Yes. By the fence beneath that mimosa tree,” Vana answered.
“I’d rather have a mimosa than go lawn bowling near one.” Merlin landed on Zane’s shoulder. “You don’t mind, do you, buddy? My wings were getting tired. Just flew in from Baghdad, you know.” The bird cracked only himself up with the joke. “Geez, talk about boring. What is it with you mortals? Can’t take a joke.”
“I have you on my shoulder, don’t I?”
“Hey, good one!” Merlin nipped his ear.
“Do that again, bird, and we’ll go for the deep fryer this time.”
“Sheesh. There you go, back to the no-humor thing.”
“As I was saying…” Vana reached up to Zane’s shoulder and shifted Merlin onto her fist. “The court was here, and over there was one of Peter’s rose gardens. You can still see the brambles. I bet the bushes will spring back once I clear it out.”
“You gonna do it now?” Merlin asked.
She stopped. “I could. If it’s okay with you, mast—I mean, Zane?”
Zane checked their immediate vicinity. The closest neighbor was half a mile beyond the driveway. A dozen acres surrounded this manicured—as it were—portion of the property, and the Vlad the Impaler iron fence, complete with gargoyles, wasn’t letting anyone in. They were all alone.
“Sure, go ahead.” He wouldn’t think about being all alone with her.
And then Vana puckered up and blew a kiss.
If the brush hadn’t burst into flames, he might have.
“Oh no, oh no, oh no!” Vana wrung her hands as Merlin flew onto a mimosa branch. “I said ‘tame,’ not ‘flame’!” She made some more kissing noises.
The flames shot up higher.
Shit. He didn’t have to worry about someone strolling the property to get an eyeful. The bonfire was big enough to alert the entire town.
“Vana, we have to put it out!” He looked around for… what? A fire hose? Extinguisher? Waterfall?
Not a damn thing in sight, which shouldn’t be surprising, given the rest of the nightmare he’d encountered since arriving here.
“I’m trying to!” She made another kissing noise, and two giant flames—one red, one blue—shot up the middle. “No! Not red-blue! Res-cue! Res-cue!”
It was no use. The more flustered she got, the more her magic went haywire.
Zane ducked. They did not need a bunch of hay appearing out of nowhere—Jesus. Now she had him thinking crazy things, too.
And then she started fiddling with her fingers again. Puckering her lips.
Yeah, that hadn’t worked out so well. So Zane did the first thing he could think of. He tugged her to him and kissed her.
Those flames licking at the brambles were child’s play compared to the ones between him and Vana. One touch of his lips and Vana practically went boneless against him, melting into the kiss so that he had to catch her, which only made the heat between them that much hotter. With every one of her pliant curves fused against him, this kiss packed more of a punch than the attic and kitchen ones combined.
He wrapped one arm around her waist and cupped her cheek with the other, then threaded it through the hair that had been driving him crazy, no, nuts, no, insane—whatever—the hair that had been begging him to run his fingers through it ever since he’d set eyes on her. And oh, how happy those fingers were to oblige.
She moaned when his lips shifted slightly, and the sound raced right through him, conjuring images of harem-girl fantasies and hot, sweaty desert nights.
Zane traced the seam of her lips with his tongue and slipped inside when she parted them on another moan.
And then he moaned, too. God, she tasted amazing. The mint from the tea mingled with her very own flavor, and Zane wanted more. He stroked his tongue over hers, flicked it along her teeth, and crushed her against him, changing the angle so he could savor more of her. Could feel more of her. Could want—
“Uh, guys? Yoo-hoo. Lovebirds? How many fires are you planning to start out here anyway?”
Hell. Merlin.
Zane took one last kiss and pulled his lips from hers. She had a half smile on her face, and he felt one cross his own. He’d put that smile there.
“Yeah, yeah, you do good work,” muttered Merlin. “Have her weak at the knees for you, Casanova, dontcha? You put that fire out, but you guys started two more over there. Whatcha gonna do about them?” Merlin added a squawk on the end of that, just in case Zane hadn’t been paying attention.
Oh shit. “Vana.” Zane had to shake her a little. “Vana, the fire.”
Her eyes opened, a dark pewter this time, and, honestly, they took his breath away. She took his breath away.
“Fire?”
He knew the moment reality flooded back in.
“Holy smokes!”
“I wouldn’t exactly say there’s anything holy about them, Van,” s
aid Merlin from his branch, preening his now-teal feathers. “Unless you’ve got some holy water to douse them with.”
“Oh dear.” She started to link her hands in front of her, but Zane knew what that would lead to, so he grabbed them instead.
“Vana, you can do this.” He said it softly, and she lost a little of her deer-in-the-headlights look. “You can. Just concentrate.”
She was concentrating—on his mouth. And Zane was vain enough to enjoy it.
Then the fire crackled behind her. “Come on, honey, you can do this.”
She licked her lips. Zane was aroused enough to enjoy that.
“I don’t think so, Zane. What if I make them worse?”
Merlin flew above them, the beads on his extra-long tail feathers bouncing over their noses as he skimmed above their heads to land on an old trellis that looked like it’d been there since Peter’s time. “Uh, Van? I don’t think you could do any worse than this wind.”
Zane looked behind her where a sudden hot summer breeze was swirling the flames upward. The bird had a point. Kissing her had worked on the first one. The key was to not let it get out of control.
The fire crackled again as it ate through a lawn seared dry by the summer sun.
He didn’t have a choice. He tilted her chin up. “Close your eyes.”
“But—”
“Close them, Vana.”
She did.
“Now, what do you want to do?”
“I want to put out the fires.”
“Okay. So kiss me.”
Her eyes flew open and he put a finger on her lips. “Close your eyes, say what you want to do, then kiss me.”
It worked beautifully. In so many ways.
“Well, well,” cackled Merlin. “Looks like ol’ Zane here has figured out the key to your magic and a way to get himself some.”
“You, bird, are foul.” If he were in range, Zane would throw the phoenix for a line drive right into the row of hedges.
“Oh sure, you get to make jokes. Of course I’m fowl.” Merlin held up his wings. “Duh.”
“Not amusing.”
Merlin flung his wings down. “I give up.” And with that, he disappeared in a burst of flames.
Which Zane had to swat to keep them from igniting the trellis.
“It worked, didn’t it?” Vana hunched her shoulders.
“Yes. Both fires are out.”
The one she’d ignited inside of him, however, was still raging. Fast, hot, furious. Which made no sense, considering what she was.
Or maybe it did…
“Vana, did you put a spell on me?”
“A spell?” She nibbled her bottom lip again. “I don’t do spells. Only witches and warlocks and the occasional gypsy do. Genies don’t need spells. Our magic comes organically from us. As easy as breathing.”
Or kissing--not that he needed the reminder.
“Zane? Are you okay?”
No, he wasn’t, but grumbled a “yeah” anyway. He’d wanted to blame it on her magic but couldn’t, and he didn’t need the complication of a woman right now. Especially her.
And then she licked her lips. Again.
He spun around and headed to a nearby garden shed. Good, old-fashioned manual labor was the perfect way to work off frustration. He rummaged through the assorted tools and grabbed two shovels, a rake, and an ax.
On second thought, he put the ax back. Her magic was dangerous enough.
As was the shovel she almost brained him with when she rested it on her shoulder to head to the garden.
Everything about Vana was dangerous: the way she affected him, the magic she couldn’t control, and the threat of what the press would do if they ever found out about her. He’d be labeled a laughingstock, insane, or a fraud, none of which would help contract talks.
He dug into the mess of brambles, figuring the concentration he’d need to keep the thorns from drawing blood would keep him from thinking about her, but every little grunt she made while digging, every puff of breath when she flung the dirt, every “ouch!” when a thorn snagged her was as loud as a ref’s whistle, and he found himself watching her more rather than less.
Maybe he should just put her back in her bottle, stop it up, and store it in a safe deposit box for his heirs to open in another hundred years or so.
Or, better yet, toss it into the ocean so it could wash up on a beach somewhere and turn someone else’s world upside down because, on top of everything else going on in his life, the last thing he needed was to not be able to stop thinking about an inept and utterly adorable do-good genie who could twist his life inside out with just a twist of her lips.
Literally and figuratively.
***
Gary shoved the mail into the hall drawer. Bills and more bills. A letter from the bitch’s attorney. All shit he didn’t feel like dealing with at the moment.
He dropped his keys onto the table and yanked off his tie. He was done stomping for votes for the day, an activity that was on par with dealing with Lynda’s attorney.
He popped the cap off a beer from the fridge, stretched out in his recliner, and turned on a college game. He’d been halfway through his first season of college ball when Lynda had shown up with the news of the pregnancy.
To this day, he still didn’t know if she’d really been pregnant. The miscarriage had happened right after the honeymoon. It’d taken them seven years to have another—not a point in favor of that earlier pregnancy.
But it was what it was. And it’d been hell. Even now, he only saw Marshall, his son, on Lynda-decreed days. Bitch.
He swiped a hand over his face and looked at the book on the table beside his chair. Old Man Harrison’s journal.
He picked it up, peeled back the worn leather cover, and flipped through the pages. He could practically recite each one by heart, he’d been through it so many times.
If only he could get his hands on the rest of the journals. There had to be something there about whatever Calvin had seen. There’d been too many stories from more people than merely his great-great-grandfather.
Gary sighed and put the journal in the drawer. There had to be something in that house. He needed to get back inside it and soon.
Chapter 10
Vana had felt so good in Zane’s arms that even an hour or so of gardening couldn’t undo . She could still feel his kiss on her lips and the effect it’d had on her magic. Like quicksilver, the magic had flowed through her, and it was as if everything were right with the world, her, and, most especially, her magic. It was such a pity that mortals weren’t immortal. She’d love nothing better than to spend the rest of her days kissing Zane. The rest of her nights, too…
She shook her head, trying to clear the fog. She was getting way too caught up in this moment. And that’s all it was. This entire meeting with Zane was merely a moment in time. A blink of an eye to her in the span of an immortal life, and she needed to get over it and move on.
But still, she was careful not to brush past Zane when he opened the back-porch door for her, focusing instead on something safe, like the little wobble of the hinges. Things she could control, because how she felt around Zane… that was definitely out of control.
Once inside, she kissed the air, setting the door straight on its hinges, then looked at the cuckoo clock and tried her magic on it. An air kiss had the pendulums gently swinging and the hour and minute hands slowly advancing to seven-fifty-three.
“Hey, don’t you want this?” Zane held out the salt shaker, and something more than mere awareness sizzled through her when their fingers met.
“Oh… of course I do. Thank you.” She hadn’t been lying to him; not one of her masters—Peter included—had ever given her a gift. Most had assumed that since she was a genie she could conjure up whatever she wanted, but the reality was, it wasn’t the salt shaker itself that touched her; it was the thought behind it. The generosity. The fact that Zane had listened to her story and realized what the memory had meant to her, and he�
��d given her a way to always keep that memory. Was it any wonder that he should affect her on so many levels?
And that scared her. With that kiss and his gift and his calm faith in her, well, she didn’t know how many more levels he’d touch before it would become a problem.
She headed into the front parlor. And it would be a big problem. Because if a genie fell in love with a mortal—and lost her heart and head enough to tell him so—it’d be the death of both her magic and her immortality, two things she’d never want to put in jeopardy. Couldn’t put in jeopardy. She’d worked too hard and too long to give it all up now. And she still had to change the children back, so she couldn’t even consider falling in love with him—anyone—until that was accomplished.
“Vana, about earlier—”
“Don’t worry, Zane.” She didn’t want to discuss that kiss with him. Was trying to not think about it. “There’s nothing to talk about.”
“Actually, there is. Let me get my sleeping bag and other things out of the car, and then we’ll talk. Hang out for a few minutes, okay?”
“You’re staying here?” She hadn’t expected that, though she should have. It made sense, after all. But it was just going to make things harder.
“Better here than in town. I don’t need the paparazzi showing up.”
“Paparazzi?”
“Oh, right. You don’t know.” He smiled. “I play professional football for a living. I guess, with being in that bottle for the last century, televisions and professional sports teams are probably off your radar. Radar probably is, too, right?”
She knew condescension when she heard it, and it didn’t sit any better with her coming from Zane than it had from her parents. She put her hands on her hips. “I’ll have you know, Zane Harrison, that while I might not have been out and about in the world, it hasn’t passed me by. The djinn world has all the advancements you do. Matter of fact, I have a plasma screen in my bottle. Running water, too. Indoor plumbing, and even an iPad and Wii. Wanna see?”
“You’re kidding.”
“I don’t kid about being a genie. Ever.”
