Jinn and Juice (24 page)

He was sitting on a low stone bench in a small room off the throne room. I could hear Tamina yelling commands from somewhere nearby.

One of the two adult half-vamps guarding my erstwhile Master blinked at me in surprise. I walloped him, a smack with my Fire that sent him flying across the room to land against the wall with a thud. The other one turned just as I reached for one of my swords, only registering my presence a second before I whacked him in the base of the skull with my pommel. He, too, dropped like a sack.

“Find her!” I heard Tamina rage from the other room. “Find her now! She’s all that matters! Find her!”

“I freed you,” Oz said, staring at me mulishly. “Go away.”

I rolled my eyes. “You’re welcome. And you’re an idiot.”

Using my sword, I cut through the ropes binding his hands before I stored it Sideways again. I looked around the little room—no exits, except for a high window that overlooked empty sky.

Damn, I thought. Oh well…

“You have to Bind me again,” I told him. “Quickly.”

“No,” he said. “I freed you. You’re free. Go away.”

“Stop being an idiot,” I hissed, keeping one ear on Tamina still tantruming in the other room. “You have to Bind me. Otherwise
she
can Bind me.”

“Oh,” he said. “I forgot about that part. I just wanted you safe.”

“It didn’t work,” I hissed. “Bind me!”

He scrubbed his hand through his hair. “Do I have to? I hate having you Bound. And I forced you to find that girl and she turns out to be evil, and intent on Calling back to earth the one creature that gives you nightmares every night.”

I narrowed my eyes at him. “How did you…”

“I was your Master,” he said, softly. “I know.”

“So Bind me, otherwise that girl will,” I said.

“I could just keep you Bound, and send you away again.”

I took a deep breath. He didn’t get it. “I’m rescuing you, you idiot. There’s no way I’d leave you here and if you send me away again, I’ll just come back. We can keep playing this stupid game over and over, or you can just stop being a fucking moron.”

He blinked. “Maybe if you stop calling me a moron…”

We both shut up as we heard Tamina’s voice getting closer.

“I will kill him,” she screeched. “I will kill him slowly, and mail the pieces to that shit-hole nudie bar…”

I admired Tamina’s grasp of English slang even as I raised an eyebrow at Oz.

“You were saying?”

He gulped. “Are you sure?”

“Yes, ohmigod, if you don’t Bind me right now I’m going to…”

He Bound me, faster than I’d ever been Bound before, the words harsh but welcome in the air around us.

My jinni swelled within me, saturated with power once again as the door to the little stone room popped open.

“What the…?” Tamina started.

“Tell me to get us the fuck out of here,” I said to Oz. Until he’d told me to get myself out of there, I hadn’t known apparating all the way Sideways would be an option. I’d never used that much power before.

Now I really hoped we could make it work a second time, for two people.

“Get us out of here, now,” he commanded, his whole Will behind his words. My jinni answered him
tout suite
.

She pulled like I’d never felt her pull before, reaching so deep that, if the Node had been a person, I’d have been tickling its tonsils.

The last thing we saw was Tamina’s face as I took us all the way out of Sideways and back to the mortal plane.

W
e popped out into my living room and I automatically added the last bit of magic coursing through my system to my wards, beefing them up to hide our presence from outsiders.

We’d be safe from Tamina’s minions, at least for a while. Which was good, because I was going to be about as useful as balls on a lady-fish in about two seconds.

“Oh,” I groaned, as the first wave of pain swept through me. If I thought I’d fried my channels before, now they were burnt to a crisp.

“Lyla!” said Oz, panic lacing his voice, as I swayed on my feet, my knees buckling.

He caught me, and then swore, his half-healed ribs flaring in a pain so sharp I felt it through our bond.

Together we stumbled to my couch, collapsing in a heap, our arms entwined around one another.

“Heal you,” I mumbled, reaching out to the Node, then hissing as the magic washed over my raw magical wounds.

“Heal yourself,” he said, taking my chin in his hand and looking at me with both pain and concern. “Now. I command you.”

And like that I felt the magic transmute into something soothing, through the mysterious machinations of my jinni. I sighed, a rough sound of pleasure that made Oz’s pupils dilate.

“Now you,” I said, when I was healed enough to do the same for him. He didn’t complain as I pushed my cold hands up his shirt, against his overly warm ribs, and began pummeling him with healing magics.

It was his turn to sigh, after a minute or two of pained grunts. I hated hurting him, but healing always hurt.

When I was finished, we were left lying against the back of the couch, sweating and sore, our eyes locked on each other’s gaze.

I mustered up just enough strength to text Charlie, “we’re safe. need to rest. Loretta turncoat. B&Y on way to u. shields up till am.”

He’d know to circle his wagons till the morning, wherever he was at. I threw my phone somewhere near the coffee table and leaned back next to Oz again.

My Master raised a hand to my cheek, giving me a gentle, almost wondering caress.

“We need to talk,” he said.

“We need to sleep,” I said. “And then we can talk.”

I pulled him with me as I listed sideways, grateful my sofa was wide, and soft, and accommodating. And even more grateful for the afghan that lived on the back of the couch, which I pulled over us.

My back was to Oz’s chest, his knees tucked into mine. Humans called it spooning, and it felt perilously good.

“You came back for me,” Oz mumbled sleepily into my ear.

“I did,” I said, no less surprised than he was.

“Thank you,” I heard him say.

I lay quietly, not knowing how to respond, but he wasn’t expecting anything. His breath, hot against my scalp, grew longer, and then a gentle, whuffling snore told me he was asleep.

Healing took a lot of energy out of both parties, and he’d sleep till his body recovered.

But despite my exhaustion, I didn’t join him and Morpheus as quickly as I’d thought I would. Instead I lay, listening to him breathe, wondering what I’d just done and what it meant.

“Two days,” I told myself. Then I registered the soft light creeping into the room and realized it was dawn. “Less than two days.”

I had less than forty-eight hours before my curse was lifted. After that, Tamina would have no use for me.

But until then?

I knew Oz would free me. All my skepticism about him was gone. He was exactly what he seemed—a genuinely good man. But that no longer mattered.

For Oz couldn’t unBind me until the very last second, or I’d be vulnerable to Tamina’s Call.

My Master’s arm tightened around me and I tried not to think about what we’d do next. Instead I tried to imagine what it would be like to be human.

As I drifted off, scenes of human life drifted through my mind. They weren’t much different from my daily routine as a cursed jinni: brunch at my favorite restaurant, dancing at the job I loved, spending time with my friends.

The only difference was that Oz was there and we were both human, and equal, and nothing stood between us.

He was what I dreamed about when I finally did sleep; my Master with his silver gaze and anchor tattoos, whose goodness I knew was more precious and rare than his magic.

I woke up when I hit the floor, my eyes snapping open in panic. I froze, recognizing my living room ceiling, but having no idea where I was or how I’d gotten there.

Registering that the shape next to me was my couch, I realized I must have fallen off it. A theory confirmed when Oz’s bleary-eyed, whiskery face came into view above me.

“What’re you doing down there?” he mumbled sleepily, extending a hand.

“Fell off,” I said, taking it without thinking. He pulled me in his direction and I followed till I was back on the couch. Then he manhandled me down and against him, and I remembered falling asleep just like that, him holding me as we spooned.

It felt different, now that we were rested. Not to mention after the dreams I’d had.

His breathing was slow and even, and I wondered if he’d fallen asleep again. But then he spoke.

“Thank you for coming back for me,” he said again. His arm around me tightened, pulling me closer.

It felt good. Too good. I pulled away, sitting up on the edge of the sofa and then getting to my feet.

“Coffee,” I said, in both explanation and apology, and went to the kitchen. When I’d set the coffee maker percolating, I went to the bathroom to take a quick shower and brush my teeth. I came out wearing my bathrobe, to find Oz sitting at the kitchen table, sipping from one of my oversize mugs.

He smiled when he saw me. “You look okay,” he said.

“Damning with faint praise?” I asked, raising an eyebrow.

He shook his head. “Not at all. But you looked pretty done in last night. I was worried about you.”

“Yeah, well, you didn’t look so hot yourself.” I poured my own cup of coffee before digging into the fridge.

Oz stood, nodding ruefully. “And I bet I still don’t look much better. If you’ll excuse me…” With that he headed toward his bedroom. While I pulled bread from the freezer and eyeballed the “use by” date on a carton of eggs with trepidation, I heard the bathroom door shut and the water run.

I made us some breakfast, just scrambled eggs and toast. By the time it was ready, Oz had emerged, wearing a black T-shirt and soft gray-and-black pajama bottoms. He looked so clean and casual as he took his seat at the table, and as I served us breakfast, I had a flashback to my dreams last night. Us being normal, being human—a breakfast scene, dressed in our comfies, eating in companionable silence.

“We have to talk,” I said, trying to bury those images. We were anything but normal: he was a Magi, I was cursed to be a jinni and Bound to him.

“I know,” he said. “First of all… Tamina.”

Her name dropped between us like a brick. We stared down at our plates.

“Well, she sucks,” I said.

“Yep. What should we do?”

“No idea,” I said. “We need to talk to Charlie. Get his advice.”

Oz nodded. “Fine. But what about you? I hate having you Bound again.”

My heart twinged.

“Thank you,” I told him, meeting his silver eyes with mine. “But I have to be, for right now.”

“Tamina?” he asked.

I nodded. “Yes. If I’m not Bound to you…”

“She can Call you,” Oz finished.

“And Bind me to herself.”

“Since she’s a Magi now.”

“We had to do it,” I said. “Live to fight another day, and all of that. Incapacitating her was our only way out, and Initiating her was the only distraction I could think of. And it worked. Sort of.”

He shrugged, but he dug into the breakfast I’d made. We ate in silence. When we were finished, he took our plates to the sink and rinsed them off before putting them in the dishwasher.

Then he came back to the table with the coffeepot and filled our mugs.

“I feel like this is all my fault,” he said.

“What do you mean?” I added sugar and milk to my coffee; I drank mine as sweet as a child might like.

“Tamina, and you, and everything. If I hadn’t been so stupid…”

“We were set up. And one of those people who set us up was
my
friend,” I said bitterly, stirring my coffee with unnecessary aggression. “Truth be told,” I said, putting down my spoon with care, “I’d rather this went down with you as my Master than anybody else.”

His hand closed over mine, clutching my mug.

“I’m glad you feel that way and I’m also glad I met you, circumstances be damned. But I hate that I can’t free you,” he said.

I shrugged, meeting his eyes. “I appreciate that. But it’s not possible… not with Tamina running around.”

He sat back, his turn to frown down at his mug. “Well that sucks.”

My head cocked. “Oh yeah? Are you that eager to be rid of me?”

Oz looked up, his eyes Flaring. He put down his coffee and turned to me, pulling my chair toward him. I squawked, putting my own mug down before I spilled on myself.

“No,” he said, his voice very deep and low. “I’m not eager at all to get rid of you. But I
am
looking forward to setting you free.”

“And why is that?” I asked, my voice sounding breathy even to me. I leaned back in my chair as he leaned forward, until I couldn’t go any farther back and we were nose-to-nose.

“Because I want you to be mine by choice, not magic. I want you to choose me, Lyla. For your bed. For your life. For good.”

My stomach clenched, a flash of heat shooting through me, lower down.

I almost made a joke, then. I thought of a thousand things to say that would be defensive, and snarky, and would rebuild that wall between us that his freeing me yesterday had torn down.

But I didn’t. Instead I raised my hand to his rough cheek. His silver eyes Flared at my touch, their glow fractionally dimmed, however, by the dilation of his pupils.

He turned his face to nuzzle my wrist and his lips kissed my pulse point, so gently.

“Fuck it,” I said, articulate and romantic as ever. My hand slipped farther back, getting a firm grip on his hair and pulling him toward me.

Our kiss wasn’t gentle, our lips pressed against each other in a rough, wide-mouthed clash. My other found his hair and he pulled me forward, chair and all, till he could wrap his arms around my ribs and pull me closer still.

With a low moan that sounded suspiciously like a growl, I kissed across his jaw, toward his neck, sucking and biting at his
smooth skin. He replied by clutching at my hips, sighing my name in a way that made both me and my jinni shudder.

I half-stood, still kissing his neck, moving up to suck and bite at his earlobe. His hands moved around to my ass but he murmured in surprise when I swung one leg, then another, over his thighs so that I straddled his lap.

“Lyla,” he murmured, again, as I moved back to his mouth. I growled something inarticulate as I reached down to stroke that hard heat between us.

Then he grabbed my hand, pulling his mouth away from mine. He was breathing hard, lust suffusing his features, but he shook his head no.

“We can’t,” he gasped, his voice dark and rough. “Not like this.”

“If you’re not a kitchen fan, we can move to the bedroom,” I said, going in to kiss him again.

“No, it’s not that.” He pulled his face away again, reaching up to cup my jaw in his palm. “I don’t want it to be like this.”

I felt heat rising in my face. Was I crazy? Was he leading me on? I went for the dismount, wondering how—at over a thousand years old—I’d been reduced to the discomfiture of a teenager by a boy.

But Oz wouldn’t let me off his lap. His arms closed around my waist, his lips curling in a smile.

“I want you, Lyla,” he whispered, moving underneath me just enough to remind me how much. “But not when you’re Bound to me. I meant what I said about wanting to know I’m yours by your own choice.”

I blinked at him. “You are, Oz. Believe me. Otherwise you’d be fucking a melon right now.”

“Huh?”

“Never mind about the melon. But seriously, I have my ways. I’d never sleep with you if I didn’t have to.”

He smiled, stroking his hands through my hair, playing with it in the light.

“I’m happy to hear that,” he said. “But it doesn’t change how I feel. While I trust you, I can’t trust your jinni. It would break my heart if, when all this is over, you regretted me. You regretted us. I’d rather wait.”

I sat back in his lap, shaking my head. “Motherfucker,” I said, before I burst out laughing. I leaned forward to muffle my giggles in his chest.

He stroked his big hands over my hair, down my back. “What’s so funny?”

“You. Me. This whole thing…

“I finally meet a decent Master. One whom I’d sleep with. But you’re so decent, you won’t sleep with me.”

His hands squeezed my hips. “That’s not true, honey. I’ll sleep with you all right. And I’m going to do a lot more than sleep with you, when you’re free. You can count on that.”

I looked regretfully down at his lap. “Are you sure? That looks super-uncomfortable…”

He caught my hand before I could touch. “Bad Lyla.”

I blinked innocently up at him but he caught my other hand, too. He was quick.