And yet, she couldn’t get the shop owner’s warning out of her head. Choosing to wear the Firebrand opens yourself to consequences you may not yet foresee. Be sure it is a risk you are willing to take.
She pushed out of her chair, went into the kitchen, made herself a cup of tea. On the street below, cars honked in the Pearl District of downtown Portland. She should be at work, but she’d taken the afternoon off after visiting that shop, and she knew there was no way she could work from home right now. Not when the opal was all she could think about.
The microwave beeped. She pulled the steaming cup out, dropped the tea bag inside. Looked back at the necklace on the table and tried to think logically.
What consequences? What kind of magic did it really have…if any? Mira had a degree. For a while in school, she’d been pre-med. She knew all about the placebo effect. About sugar pills tricking patients into thinking they were receiving medications that were helping them. In her head she didn’t doubt this necklace was the same sort of mirage. If someone who wore it believed it had power, it gave them a confidence they wouldn’t otherwise have.
She blew on her tea. Winced when her subconscious said, Okay, then why did you go all the way down to that shop? And why do you now have the gemstone?
She brought the tea back to the table. Didn’t sit but stared down at the necklace as she debated her choices. Just because she was aware of something didn’t mean she wasn’t open to trying it. After all, she was also “aware” that the power of persuasion was a big one. And she wanted Devin. Had wanted him for a while now. She’d finally just reached a point where she was tired of waiting for him to realize she was his perfect match. If wearing this silly necklace somehow gave her the confidence to take things with him beyond friendship, then she was willing to give it a try—whether it had real power or not.
She set her tea on the table, lifted the necklace. And told herself to stop being such a pansy. As she slipped the chain around her throat and closed the clasp, then brushed her fingers across the opal nestled just above her cleavage, she reminded herself that she was a smart woman. A successful architect. She wasn’t desperate. She didn’t need a man to complete her, but she wanted one. And if this didn’t work, well, it wasn’t the end of her world. Nothing bad was going to happen, as that shopkeeper had cryptically led her to believe.
“Your wish, my command.”
Mira whipped around at the sound of the deep voice and stared through the archway at the man standing in the middle of her living room. Fear raced through her chest. She took one step back toward the kitchen counter behind her and the knife block she knew was there. “Wh-who are you, and how did you get into my apartment?”
A slow, mesmerizing smile slinked across his deeply tanned face. “My name is Tariq. And you wished for me. That is how I came to be.”
Mira’s heart pounded so hard beneath her ribs, she was sure he had to hear it. She bumped into the counter, inched her hand backward until her fingers knocked into the knife block. “I—I didn’t call for anyone. Leave. Now. Or I will call the cops.”
His gaze dropped from her face to her chest. “Did you not put on the necklace?” He stepped into the kitchen, and Mira’s eyes widened when she took a good look at him in the light streaming through her kitchen window. Shoulder-length dark hair, ebony eyes, a strong, square jaw covered in a dusting of scruff, and a body sporting jeans and a light blue T-shirt that didn’t hide the fact it looked as if it were carved from marble. “Azizity, I am from the opal.”
Holy hell, the guy was psycho. Mira stared at him with wide eyes. He didn’t make another move toward her, only stared back with a knowing and heated expression, one that, for reasons she couldn’t explain, shot warmth straight to her center.
No way this was real. She glanced past him to the door, which was still locked, the chain exactly where she’d left it when she’d come home, then to the windows that didn’t show any evidence of having been opened.
“What…? How…?”
“Have you ever heard of a race known as djinn?”
Mira’s eyes grew even wider as they swept back to him. “As in Arabic folklore? Are you saying you’re a genie?”
Correction, not just psycho. This guy was off the flippin’ charts insane.
“Folklore to humans,” he said with only the slightest narrowing of his fathomless eyes. “And genie is such a derogatory word.”
She looked around again, knowing she was either about to get sliced and diced by some escaped mass murderer, or that she was hallucinating. Big-time.
She had to be hallucinating. “I—I don’t see a lamp.”
One corner of his lips turned up in amusement. “We don’t use lamps. Another myth.” He took one small step closer to her, and even from across the distance, she felt the heat of his body stir the air around her. “I am Tariq from the Marid tribe and the Kingdom of Gannah. And I am here to fulfill your wish.”
Tariq waited for the woman to say something—anything—but she only continued to stare at him with those unbelieving eyes. Eyes that were a unique mix of green and brown, rimmed in gold.
As those pretty eyes grew wider and she still didn’t say anything, he fought from frowning. She had summoned him, dammit. She was the one who had gone looking for the Firebrand opal, and now she was standing stock-still before him as if she’d seen a ghost? He would never understand humans. They wished for things they didn’t want, and then when they had them, they wished for something else.
Bile churned in his stomach over the fact he was being forced to do this yet again, but he reminded himself what was at stake here. For his brothers, he would seduce again. As many times as he had to until they were both free. This one wouldn’t be a total hardship, he realized as he took in the strawberry-blond hair that fell to her shoulders, the high cheekbones, the small mouth, and seductive mole just to the right of her lips. But he’d done this too many times during the long years of his imprisonment to be anything more than only slightly intrigued by the woman in front of him. And until she cooperated and stopped looking at him as if he’d sprouted a second head, he couldn’t get this thing started then finished so he could focus on a plan to destroy Zoraida for good.
“Azizity?” he asked, careful not to touch her, at least not yet. “Are you all right?”
“I—” Her gaze raced over his features; then her face paled, and her eyes rolled back in her head just before her whole body went limp.
“Humans.” Tariq wrapped his arms around her before she hit the counter and fell to the floor. The scent of peaches assailed his nostrils. Smooth skin and sensuous curves filled his hands as he lifted her into his arms. She was lighter than he thought but still deadweight against him as he carried her into the living room and laid her out on the couch.
No, he would definitely never understand this race. Even with the shock he was used to seeing on their faces when he first appeared, he’d never had one pass out on him.
He wasn’t sure what to do, so he went back into the kitchen, grabbed a towel from the drawer, and ran it under a stream of warm water. After ringing it out, he came back to the living room and sat on the edge of the couch next to her.
Soft waves fell across her cheeks. He brushed them back, felt the satiny strands against his fingers, and marveled at the contrast between his dark flesh and her much paler skin tone. Long lashes feathered the skin beneath her eyes, making her look almost angelic. And her mouth—plump and pink—drew his attention. A mouth he would soon be taking, soon be licking, soon be tasting.