Genie Knows Best (2 page)

Kal waved his fingers, rousing his dormant magic to conjure up a glass of water for his newest—and last—master. Number One Thousand and One.

Yes, the number was ironic, given Scheherazade’s nightly tales. But that number had haunted his existence: the thousand-and-one masters he had to Serve, the same number of wishes he had to grant each of those masters, the number of tiles in his bathroom floor, the divots in the lantern’s lid, the songs on his iPod.

Probably even the grains of salt in his salt shaker, but he was beyond the humor at this point because Samantha was the beginning of the end of his sentence. The last of the masters he was to Serve to atone for ridding himself of the gold bracelets that bound him to The Service. At one time, he’d been proud to be the only djinni to have figured out how to get them off, but pride was a lonely bedfellow and a poor substitute for losing his magic. Thank the cosmos, the time had finally come. Now if only his Service to this last master would go by quickly.

If she were to die or someone took the lantern from her, it actually could. He’d gone through a few masters that way. But if either of those were to happen, he’d then be stuck in Service to that person and would have to wait (like the rest of the djinn world) until a trick of Karma set him free.

No, better for both of them would be for her to give him the lantern and wish him free, but in all his four thousand years of Service, not one mortal had even hinted at offering him his freedom, He’d learned to stop wishing for it, though the hope still simmered just beneath the surface. If only one of them would. It would only take one.

Unfortunately, however, he couldn’t ask any of them for the lantern. Otherwise he’d find himself right back at square—and master—one, thanks to the convoluted stipulations of his imprisonment. He’d resigned himself long ago to playing by the High Master’s rules.

Those rules would be some of the first things he’d change when he took over the job.

“Here. Perhaps you’d like something to drink?” After she took the glass, Kal shook the residual Glimmer of magic left behind from his hands and stretched his fingers. As a demi-genie—gods, how that term bugged the
kharah
out of him—he was permitted to use his magic only for his master’s comfort, safety, and wishes. Six months shut up inside that lantern not only had him going stir crazy, but also had his magic bursting at the seams.

Then he got a look at her, a hint of ankle showing beneath the
djellaba
she wore, and something else was bursting at the seams.

It’d been a lot longer than six months for
that
, and she was none other than Monty’s daughter, the woman whose image had kept him company on many lonely nights.

Soft curls the color of his lantern framed her face and caressed the hollow at the base of her throat, and her lips were moist from the quick dash her tongue had made over them. A dusting of freckles scattered over her upturned nose, and her eyes were so green that they outshone the emeralds one of his masters had given his harem. Samantha was stunning. Even her name was beautiful. If he could grant himself wishes, having Samantha would be at the top of the list.

“I wish I had an aspirin,” she said, gulping down the water.

Aspirin was easy. Kal conjured up two. “Here you go.”

She looked at him as if he had the same number of heads.

Kal hid his laugh. New masters. He’d seen that look before. Half the time they didn’t know what they’d gotten into, and the other half… Well, Kal had never had any say in who his masters would be, but he found that Karma ended up giving most of them what they deserved.

And now maybe Karma had given him what he deserved. He’d certainly paid his dues through the centuries—dues he owed “thanks” to Faruq. That
ibn
el-kalb
had stolen not only Kal’s High Master’s thesis and the job he’d wanted, but also his reputation. So instead of the promotion to vizier Kal had expected all those years ago, his name had been dragged through endless
jeribs
of worthless desert sand and buried so deep that even Mudd was a better name than his.

But now Faruq was the one confined to his lantern, awaiting his own sentencing for trying to double-cross the High Master, which left the vizier position up for grabs. Kal fully intended it to be his. Karma couldn’t be that fickle twice.

Could she?

Kal shook his head, ending that thought before it could go any farther. Samantha was his last master, and no matter how often he’d fantasized about her, he couldn’t allow himself to be distracted. Not when he was so close. “Where’s Monty?”

“My father?” When Kal nodded, she set the glass in her lap and wrapped her fingers tighter around it. She didn’t look at him when she answered. “He had a stroke six months ago and, well, his memorial service was today. Tonight. Whatever.”

Zift
. Kal hadn’t wanted to end his Service to Monty this way; the man was—had been—a decent guy. He would have preferred that Samantha had discovered the lantern on her own and summoned him that way because Monty’s death meant she was now alone in the world.

“I—” Kal cleared his throat when the words wouldn’t come. It’d been centuries, but the pain of losing his family still struck a long-buried chord. He, more than most, understood what her father’s death would mean to her, and he couldn’t rejoice at the end of his sentence when it meant the beginning of one for her. “I’m sorry for your loss, Samantha.”

“You know who I am?”

“Your father talked about you often.” Which had suited Kal just fine. He’d been very appreciative of the photos of Samantha that Monty had had in his office. The ones of her in evening gowns at charity functions had sparked his interest; the one of her in a bikini on a Mediterranean vacation, which he was sure Monty had had no intention of him seeing, had sparked something else—and not because of the scenery. After all, most of the women he’d seen before her had been covered head to toe in
burquas
or Victorian clothing, so those seaside images had made an impression that even her
djellaba
couldn’t squelch.

“So who are you?” she asked.

Right. The job.

Kal crossed his arms and gave her the standard greeting he’d given one thousand times before. “
Salam
wa
aleikum
. I am Khaled, the genie of the lantern. What is your wish, master?”

“Genie? Lantern? Wish?” She held up her glass. “I wish this was a lot stronger than water.”

He’d heard that one before. “As you wish.” Kal waved the fingers on one hand, his Way of doing magic, and turned the water into wine in a shimmer of orange Glimmer. Wish number four. Only nine hundred ninety-seven to go.

Samantha looked at him, then at the glass.

She took a sip.

Which she then spit out.

He’d seen that before, too. There wasn’t much he
hadn’t
seen or heard in his four thousand years.

“I was thinking coffee,” she muttered, mopping the drops from her lap with the sleeve of her
djellaba
. “I wish I understood what’s going on.”

“Ooh, Kal can tell you that even without a wish,” said Dirham, the magical-assistance assistant who’d been assigned to him for the duration of his sentence.

The fox was trying to be helpful, though hopefully not
too
helpful; the little guy did tend to get overzealous on occasion. Kal had had to interrupt Dirham more often than he’d liked because spilling the beans about Kal’s sentence—or the fact that giving a djinni his or her lantern would set them free—would cause Kal to have to start over at master number one, as well as sentence the big mouth to life imprisonment. It was a good deterrent that had the added benefit of keeping Dirham quiet around new masters. He and Dir had learned through the years that rarely could a mortal accept a talking fox
and
the knowledge that Kal was a genie on the first go-round.

“How does your dog talk?”

And there; he was proven right again.

Kal cringed, waiting for Dirham’s tirade. The fennec might be the most accommodating of beings, and quite clueless about a lot of things, but he did know when he’d been insulted, and calling him a dog was the biggest insult in Dirham’s world.

Dir stood on his hind legs and rested his front paws on his hips. It was a ridiculous pose, but Kal had never had the heart to tell him so because the little guy was a sensitive soul.

“I speak the same way you do, with my mouth.” The fox circled a paw around his snout. “And for your information, I am
not
a dog.”

“Oh? What are you? A bat? A cat? A jackalope?”

Score one for Samantha. That was one Kal had never heard before.

Dirham fell onto all fours, his eyes as big as his ears. “A… a…
jackalope
? I don’t have antlers.” He veed his tiny eyebrows.

Kal had to step in. He didn’t want Dirham getting any more insulted than he already was. The little guy took everything to heart, and no matter how many times they’d been through this, Dirham never understood why a mortal didn’t believe them right off the bat. “Dirham is a fennec. A desert fox, native to the northern Sahara.”

“Ah.” Samantha set the glass on the ground and then stood up, his lantern still clutched in her hand. “Now I get it. I’m dreaming. Thank God that’s cleared up since I don’t remember going over any rainbow.”

“That’s because Kal ran out of mist-paint so I couldn’t paint one,” Dirham said, sniffing the glass.

“Rainbow?” Kal was glad these two knew what they were talking about because he didn’t have a clue, and Izaaz was definitely not looking rainbow-ish. Matter of fact, it was looking damned sorry. What in the cosmos had happened here?

“You know,” said Samantha. “As in Oz? Somewhere over the…?”

Kal raised an eyebrow. It never boded well when mortals quoted mythology to him; it just made it harder for them to accept what he was.

Samantha shook her head. “Never mind. What I mean is, the Sahara, the fox, you, my father, the memorial… I’m missing Dad. I opened the safe, and when I saw this…” She held up the lantern. “I thought I had a handle on his passing, but maybe I saw this and the memories overwhelmed me.

“And with Albert’s crap, I probably put my head down and cried.” She shrugged, talking more to herself than to him. “Wore myself out and fell asleep, and this is just a dream. An
Arabian Nights
kind of fairy tale.” She cocked her head and looked at him. “So does that make
you
Prince Charming?”

He could be whatever she wanted him to be—and that was without the benefit of a wish. But, still, there were rules.

“Is that what you wish, Samantha?”

She chuckled. “Oh, yeah, right.
That’s
what I wish. That you’re my Prince Charming, come to kiss me awake.”

Her wish was his command. Gods knew, he’d thought of little else since the first time he’d seen a picture of her.

Actually, he’d been thinking of a lot more, but he’d start with a kiss.

He tilted her head ever so slightly and kissed her before she realized what he was doing and wished him to stop. Kal didn’t think he could stop. It’d been so long, and Samantha was just… tantalizing.

And her lips… He’d dreamed of them more than he should have, and now… Now, they were a dangerous combination of softness and sensuality. The hint of lilac that clung to her hair was a temptation to linger. And the feel of her in his arms…
jannah
.

It’d been so long since he’d held a woman in his arms.

Truly, he’d had no intention of kissing her. Interest, yes; intention, no. She was his master. His
last
master. He couldn’t afford any distractions and she was one giant one.

Well, not so giant; she fit in his arms perfectly.

Kharah!
No wonder it was said that the road to
Al-Jaheem
was paved with good intentions; Kal was already burning.

Then she made a tiny, soft sound at the back of her throat and the hell with his intentions—they were all good anyway.

And so was this. Kal swept her up in his arms so that she was at just the right height, her lips at just the right angle to be claimed, her arms at just the right spot to encircle his neck, and her breasts… ah, her breasts were perfect no matter where they were.

And when she gasped, the warmth of her mouth was just as perfect when his tongue slipped in to taste hers.

She tasted as sweet as he’d imagined. And imagine he had. Those pictures of her had gotten him through many a long and lonely night, and this kiss was turning his world upside down more than that last carpet ride he’d taken over the Himalayas.

Kal angled his head the other way, her curls sweeping across his cheek. He’d always liked lilac.

His hand slid to the small of her back and pressed her closer, her tongue dancing with his.

“Kal? Should I reserve a hoodoo for the two of you?”

Dirham. Leave it to Mr. Conscientious to be willing to help out by finding them a room.

Need played havoc with Kal’s common sense. Her wish had been hypothetical, but by the letter of The Djinn Code, he was honor-bound to grant it.

And he’d wanted to. The minute he’d materialized in her father’s office, saw that she was his new master and heard her wish, he’d started fantasizing about this.

Dirham cleared his throat. Kal was surprised that the troll behind her hadn’t chimed in. Although, given Orkney’s problem, he’d probably missed the entire thing.

Kal gripped her arms and allowed himself one last taste of her lips before breaking off the kiss. It took her a moment to open her eyes. And when she did, Kal saw the flash of desire in them.

But then he saw the confusion.

She ran a shaky hand through her curls, and Kal allowed himself to bask in the knowledge that he’d put that tremor there. A hundred and sixty-plus years of celibacy, and he still had it.

“I guess it wasn’t a dream after all.”

Orkney snorted, and a rope of his mud-brown dreads blew across the back of the chair to rest in the seat. “First time anyone’s ever called me a dream.”