The Cursed Genie

VERITY

He greeted me so casually, like we did this every day.

My jaw worked, but still nothing came out as I stood rooted to the floor. After a few more tries, I finally found my voice. But before I could even make a sound, he disappeared from his seat in the blink of an eye and reappeared right next to me with a hand clamped over my mouth.

My body immediately stiffened at his touch.

“Please don’t scream. I’m not a ghost. I’m a genie. If you just stay calm, I will explain everything.” All the words came out in one breath. He spoke so fast, I barely registered anything.

I blinked multiple times, trying to process what was happening. He took advantage of my disoriented state and repeated what he’d said, this time at a slower pace.

The gears turned sluggishly in my brain as he steered me toward the seat across from him and made me sit down. He took his seat and waited until my face showed some sign of comprehension of what had transpired.

I stared at him long and hard while his expression remained unreadable, giving nothing away. I kept pinching my right arm with my left hand under the table, hoping to wake up from this bizarre situation. Abruptly, I halted as something occurred to me.

That’s right. His voice. It was the one calling my name at the garage sale.

My brain started to connect the few dots available: Strange things started happening yesterday at the garage sale, the thing I bought looked like a genie lamp, and now I had a genie sitting in front of me. I must’ve turned it on while cleaning it somehow.

Finally, after what seemed like forever, I spoke. “So…you’re the genie from the lamp I bought and I’m…your new master?”

He gave a curt nod—nothing more, nothing less—as his purple sapphire eyes studied me with interest.

“Does that mean you’ll be granting me wishes?”

“Yes. When you rubbed the lamp last night, you activated the process. And now I’m here to grant you three wishes.” He spoke without any emotion, like we were doing a simple business transaction. “Well, technically, two, since you’ve already used one.” A devilish smile graced his face and my cheeks burned with embarrassment without even knowing what he meant.

“What? When?”

Wait. No, no, no. Please don’t say—

“When you asked me to kiss you.” His lips twitched with amusement while mischief danced in his eyes.

I audibly gasped and mentally slapped myself.

The freaking jerk!

“You…you tricked me!” I accused and planted my palms on the table.

“How?” His eyes were laughing at me and my whole body flushed. “Tell me, how did I trick you?”

I had the urge to avert my gaze, but fought hard to keep our eyes locked. I didn’t want to give him the satisfaction that he had won.

I’m the master here.

“You tricked me when you didn’t tell me who you were. You tricked me into using my first wish without realizing what I was doing.”

He laughed and my ears perked up at the wonderful sound. “I didn’t trick anyone. You simply didn’t ask, and I simply didn’t have a chance to tell you.”

Uh-huh. Likely story. I don’t believe that for one second.

I crossed my arms over my chest and huffed in annoyance at his smugness.

He’s a sly one. I don’t trust him, genie or not.

“Isn’t there a rule somewhere that says you’re supposed to tell your new master who you are and what you can do? Before you grant the wishes?”

“Nope.” He shrugged his broad shoulders, and I couldn’t help but admire them. “All my previous masters knew who I was and what I could do for them the moment they rubbed the lamp. Besides…” He smirked. “Don’t you think it’s ironic that you didn’t know genies existed a minute ago, and now you’re angry that I didn’t follow genie protocol?”

That’s not fair. I pouted. “Can I have a do-over? I didn’t know who you are, and I wasted a wish on a dumb kiss.” I could’ve used it on something way more important.

He shook his head and tsk-tsked as he wagged a finger at me, apparently enjoying my irritation at the injustice. “No do-over. What’s done is done. And was the kiss that bad?”

No. It was the best damn kiss I’ve ever had, but was it worth a wish? No!

“Yes!”

He dramatically held his heart, like I had shot him. “My pride.” But he didn’t look hurt one bit—more like he found this whole thing entertaining, which only made me more annoyed.

“How about this?” He pretended to look thoughtful. “Since we were interrupted last night and I didn’t completely fulfill your wish, we can continue from where we left off and—” His gaze flicked shamelessly down to my groin under the table. “I’ll kiss you there…”

Son of a gun.

His eyes slowly drifted back up to my face and added seductively. “And everywhere. On. Your. Body. Like you wished.”

He really knew how to turn up the knob on my discomfort.

My cheeks heated ten shades darker at his conceited smile, and I fidgeted in my seat. My skin tingled as his gaze raked over me, making me conscious of my body under my huge T-shirt. My heart started racing, and stomach butterflies fluttered happily as memories of last night came flooding back.

My lips burned as his eyes lingered on them too long with blatant engrossment. Whether that engrossment was positive or negative, I couldn’t tell.

Suddenly, I felt super vulnerable.

I had woken up with untamed hair and no makeup, in a shirt that swallowed me to mid-thigh, and no bra underneath. I probably looked quite unattractive at this moment.

Just my freaking luck.

Compared to him, our differences were like night and day. He looked sharp in his fitted black tee and black joggers. His silky waves stopped a few inches above the shoulders in different layers. The volume of his hair would make any woman with thin hair jealous.

My hands itched to comb through my crazy hair, but I didn’t want to move and draw more attention to where I didn’t want it. I also had a strange urge to snatch my scrunchie back like a petulant child.

Instead, I jutted my chin out defiantly with feigned confidence. “I’ll pass.”

It was one thing when I thought he was a dream. Now that I knew he was real, I couldn’t go through with it. Especially not with a stranger, and a mythical one at that.

He chuckled as if he had expected my answer. “All right. Don’t say I didn’t offer.” He winked.

I couldn’t figure him out. He switched from easygoing to serious to playful so easily, like it was all a game.

“Now, shall we move on to the next step?” His face lit up with excitement as he rubbed his palms together. “What is your second wish? Ask and you shall receive.”

If I didn’t know any better, I would think he was trying to rush me so he could be done with it.

“I don’t know yet. You just sprung this on me and I haven’t had time to really think it through. It will take some time, because I don’t want to waste my two precious wishes.”

His face crumpled at my reasoning. “What’s there to think about? Just do the usual. You know, wish for money, power, beauty, or immortality. You probably don’t care for ‘youth’ since you’re still young.”

“No.” I leaned back against the chair and analyzed him. It was my turn to look smug and his to be confused.

“No? What do you mean, no?” His spine straightened and his eyes narrowed like he couldn’t understand why anyone would say such a thing. “Don’t you want money, power, beauty, or immortality? Everyone wants those.”

“I do.”

“Then what’s the holdup?”

“I want to wait for the right time to make the right decision.”

He seemed even more baffled than before.

“What’s the difference if you wished for money now, versus later?” He was starting to lose his composure and almost sounded desperate.

“Okay.” I placed my elbows on the table and clasped my hands together as I leaned forward. “Let me put it this way, since you can’t seem to grasp the why of it.”

His eyes bored into mine with intensity, letting me know I had his full attention.

“I want to save my two wishes until I really need them. If I wished for money now and got into a bad car accident later, then I’d have to use my second wish. The money might help with the bills, but not the physical healing. Then what would I do when something even worse happens later? Like if I have cancer, or someone I love has cancer—I wouldn’t be able to save myself or that person.

“As much as I want money, just like everyone else, I don’t want to waste my wish on it. I can get money. As long as I work hard, I can obtain money. And I don’t care to live forever, I’d be happy if I could make it to eighty since some don’t even make it past the first twenty years of life.

“As for beauty, I’ve learned to accept myself, flaws and all. It took a lot of hard work to get to this point, and now that I’m here, I don’t want to reverse the whole process.

“If I were to squander my wish for beauty now, all my effort would be wasted. And I intend to find someone who will love me for me, and not for the beauty that you can give me.

“As for power…”