I forced a laugh. “Don’t be. It’s totally normal. Don’t people always bring you presents after you sign with their firm?”
“No. Because that borders on bribery.”
“What?”Is it?“Ha. No. It only would have been bribery if I’d given you thisbeforeyou signed. Just open it.”
He ripped the paper and immediately looked bewildered. “What am I looking at here?”
“Socks.”
“Socks?” His bottom lip quivered. “I never thought anyone would set me free…”
“Really?” I had to pick my jaw up off the floor.
“No, I’m not a house elf. And I’m not a vampire or a werewolf or a demon. But if you promise not to tell a soul, I’ll tell you my real secret.”
“Sure.”Is he really going to tell me?!I was cautiously optimistic.
“I mean it. Do I have your word?” He seemed strangely serious. His acting skills combined with my gullibility was a dangerous combination for my sanity.
“Fine. I won’t tell a soul.”
He hesitated for a moment, like he was wondering if he could trust me. But then he leaned in and whispered, “I’m a genie.”
I laughed. How stupid did he think I was? “Touché. I deserved that.”
“I’m serious.” Tanner walked over and shut his office door. “That’s why we can’t be together.” He sighed as he sat back down, as if his confession was a weight off his shoulders.
Fine. I’ll play along.“Oh of course. And let me guess - your previous master wished for you to torture me?”
“No. Ava wouldn’t have been that wasteful with her wishes.”
“Well, Mr. Genie, can I have three wishes?”
“Yes.” He leaned back in his chair with his hands behind his head as if this were the most normal, casual conversation in the world.
“Okay then. I’d like a magic carpet ride.”Let’s see you act your way through this one, genie boy.
Tanner nearly fell out of his chair as he sprung forward. His eyes narrowed. “Dear Lord, why would you wish for that? Magic carpet rides are freaking terrifying. Imagine flying around thousands of feet above the ground on a floppy piece of fabric. With nothing to hold on to.”
I didn’t know what to say. I felt like I should laugh or have something witty to add, but I had nothing.
“When I got caught being unfaithful to the evil Princess Karima,” he continued, “the sultan almost sentenced me to death by magic carpet ride. But then he reconsidered and sentenced me to an even worse fate: eternal life as a genie.”
Sultan? Evil Princess? What?“Well that’s a convenient story to avoid granting my wish.”Definitely a demon.
He laughed.
And suddenly the tension that had been like a wall between us the past few weeks started to dissipate. The tests hadn’t revealed anything about his secret, but his willingness to joke about genies put me completely at ease around him. So at ease that I felt comfortable asking, “So why does being a genie prevent us from being together?”
“A lot of reasons. Are you familiar with the brown recluse spider?”
“A little.”A lot.I had been bitten by a spider a few years ago. The little bastard had gotten away, so I was left to look up symptoms online. That led me to a Google image search of brown recluse bites…
“So you’ve seen the pictures of how their bites eat away at your skin cells?”
I nodded. The images of the zombie-like bites were permanently seared in my brain.
“That’s what would happen to you if you ever were to come in contact with uh…me.” He glanced down at his crotch. “The technical term isalqadib almushtaeilat aljaniyu, which roughly translates to flaming genie penis.”
