The Cowboy Genie's Wife: A Paranormal Romance (The Dirty Djinn Series) Read online

  “Thought of that. Thought of going to the cops too. But the one thing you drilled into me all these years was to keep our secret safe. What if they started checking into my background?”

  Her shaking stopped, and the quiver in her voice faded away. He offered her more wine, and she guzzled it down.

  “I check the news on my phone every eight seconds. So far, nothing.”

  “What about his wife?”

  “On vacation.”

  “What about the cleaning crew?”

  “I am the cleaning crew.”

  Under different circumstances, the look on her face might have been funny. He moved on. “I’ve got contacts in the area. There are enough Others on the force, vampires or weres, depending on the precinct. I can’t promise anything, but I’ll get started on making some calls tonight.”

  “I guess not even my wishes can change the past, huh?”

  “You know it doesn’t work that way.” But not for the first time, he wished it did. He had a lot of fixing to do. Might as well start with this. “Write down this address.”

  As her pen scratched across the paper, his gaze locked on the woman he’d married a lifetime ago. She’d been small then, in so many ways. The twenty-year-old he’d met then was far different than the one before him eighty years later.

  Well, he supposed she was twenty-five now. She’d matured to a confident, self-assured thing ... aside from this. Though, killing a man with a plastic stick might do that to a person. “A stylus?”

  She looked up, a crooked, sheepish grin on her face, before breaking into a yawn. “I’m kinda a boss.”

  “No kidding. I’m proud of you.”

  The eyebrow went up. “I come here with blood on my hands, and you’re proud of me? I’m not the girl you married, Fazil.”

  “You’re better. Even though you may not believe it, I’m not the man you married either.”

  “Right.” Her fingers dragged up and down the stem of the glass, before reaching into her purse at the counter’s edge. She put down the pen and handed over the paper “Here’s the address. So what happens now?”

  He waited until her frenzied writing slowed and then snatched the pen from her hands. He used it to point upstairs. “Now, you get some rest. I’ll handle this.”

  “Fazil—”

  “You’ve already done the hard part. I’m just cleaning up.”

  Despite her protestations, she followed him upstairs and into the largest guest room. She’d wanted to stay and speak to his contact, but Others were rarely accepting of her. Vamps and weres changed their mates, while she remained very much human.

  She turned against the doorframe, leaning against it before going in. “Tomorrow we’ll talk about...”

  He hoped for an “us,” but instead, she twirled her fingers above her head.

  “... this salt of the earth alpha-man ranch of yours.”

  “Yeah, sure.”

  No hug. No kiss. Just a shrug and a door slammed in his face. Fine. He’d deal with it.

  It hadn’t gone unnoticed she’d never divulged the reason she needed the extra money in the first place. You didn’t push a woman like Rosa. The last time he’d tried, she’d left him.

  She couldn’t know what that’d done to him. An eternity of waiting for someone to love completely, only to have the ferocity of your love scare them away.

  What she called controlling, he called protection.

  That was his job, damn it, to protect her, and because he’d slipped, she’d shown up on his doorstep with cuts on her face and pain set deep in her eyes. The dull gnaw in his gut that he’d lived with since she’d slipped away amplified to an intensity which left him sick to his stomach.

  Never again.

  By all that he knew and held dear, she’d never leave him behind again.

  Chapter Three

  He spent the night making phone calls and calling in favors.

  Rather, offering them.

  Not a single damned creature minded having a djinn owe him something, but all that didn’t matter if it saved Rosa.

  She was home.

  Finally.

  Step one was keeping her safe. Step two was keeping her here.

  He’d given her the perfect life before. Sure, he’d kept her under close watch, but her only valid complaint was that she missed normal life. All the cars and vacations, all the jewels, hadn’t satisfied her in the end.

  Then, she left, and everything changed. From then on, he threw all his energy against the wall of normalcy. The ranch? His finest hour. Couldn’t get more unglamorous than that. To be totally honest, he was better being average than Rosa was.

  Rosa never knew this normal. She relied on the memories of the West her parents dragged with them to the big city. But, whatever. He’d built the place of her father’s stories—one she couldn’t possibly turn down. And, because she could be a bitch about the whole thing, he’d done it the hard way: hands, shovels, backhoes, and plows.

  Mostly.

  He used a little magic to get the property in his hands.

  And occasionally feed the animals when he was tired.

  And he’d had a line of crude oil swerve through the edge of his farthest field, but that was it. Otherwise, he was as self-made as any other red-blooded Algerian-American. If this didn’t prove to her he was a changed man, then the woman was too pigheaded to see how much he’d tried.

  He fell asleep at his desk, waking up a few hours later as Butch the Rooster crowed good morning to all his little hens. After throwing some water on his face and yawning all the way downstairs, Fazil got the coffee and toast going.

  Mrs. Hate-All-Mornings came down fully dressed for the day, with a fanned-out bun across her head, and sleep still in her eyes. Her? Up before noon? “This is new.”

  She chuckled and dropped her forehead against folded arms on the counter. “Two sugar cubes.”

  “I remember. We’ve done this once or twice.”

  She mumbled out a “yeah” before plopping her chin on her hands. “So, this ranch is real?”

  “As real as the horse crap you’re going to help me shovel.”

  “I refuse to believe you don’t wish it away.”

  “That’s something else you’d be wrong about,” he said, pouring her coffee and handing over the sugar service tray. “It calms me. It’s not like I have anything else to do. I can’t sit around watching TV all day.”

  “You did before.”

  “I was a different djinn then. You never bothered to get to know your husband, Rosa. It wasn’t always like this. Our parents taught us hard work.”

  “Yeah, right.” She frowned and blew across the top of her coffee until the steam rolled across the table. “I bet they hate me.”

  “I never told them about our little fight.”

  “I left you.”

  “For like five years.” He tossed a sugar cube in the air and caught it in his mouth, slamming the table with his saccharine success. “No big deal.”

  Completely wrong thing to say. Rosa shoved away from the table, grabbing her cup so fast the coffee spilled out of the top. She howled in pain but didn’t wish it away. He only grazed her hand before she snatched it back. “You cocky son of a bitch.”

  “Let me fix your arm.”

  “No big deal? This was all a joke for you, wasn’t it? You don’t think I can make it on my own.”

  “You’ve proven that you can, all right. I’m sorry. Now, give me your arm.”

  She stepped back, head shaking and bun bobbing like an angry buoy. “This whole thing is a game to you. Let’s see how long the puny human can hack it. Well, I did just fine.”

  “Tell that to the dead guy.”

  Everything about her froze but her quivering and misting eyes. Shit. “I didn’t mean that, Rosa. I’m being a realist though. I mean, c’mon, baby. You grew up in a different time, and you don’t have the tools—”

  “Shut up. I survived without you once. I’ll do it again. I can’t believe
I came here.”

  “You needed my help, and it was the smart thing to do.”

  “The smart thing would have been to walk away the first day I met you.”

  She turned for the door again, but he ducked around to block her escape to the hallway. “You’re still my hamdullah.”

  “You’re still an arrogant prick who doesn’t have the tools to deal with a modern woman. Here’s what’s up. I can do anything I want. Live my life how I want. Being here with you reminded me of that. So, thanks for your help, but—”

  “You realize that you’ll die without me?”

  “That’s your plan? Blackmail me into staying? News flash, everyone dies. I should have aged and died years ago with the people who love me and—”

  “I love you!”

  “We haven’t talked in almost five years. All your wall punching and shouting won’t change that.”

  “Whose fault is that, Rosa? Not mine.” Hands in the air, he pulled back swearing. “When you live as long as we do, fights last a few years. Nishan hasn’t spoken to his hamdullah since the Boer War, doesn’t mean he loves her any less.”

  “That’s insane. You’re insane.” She tried to slide out a third time, but again, he refused to budge.

  “We have an eternity to make this right.”

  “You only love me because you have to.”

  He couldn’t see her face, but the timbre of her voice shifted. It still carried a steeliness to it but without any bite. “That’s the only reason anyone loves another person. The only difference is I know I’m meant to be with you. You’re hurting as much as I am, Rosa. And I’ve changed.”

  “You said something about horse shit earlier.”

  He huffed at her play on words but let it go. As long as she was willing to get inside his lamp, they had another eternity to work out their pretty freaking miniscule issues. Once she got it through her head he’d done nothing wrong, they could move on. “Come on. I’ll give you the formal tour of the place.”

  * * * *

  She didn’t have an eternity for him to work his issues out.

  The past quarter century had all been based on his timeline, his needs, and his wants. A home full of children had been her dream growing up. But His Majesty had claimed they needed time together. He consumed her days with trips to Thailand and Cyprus and threw diamond bracelets at her, but these things hadn’t filled her heart.

  But that was always his answer. More stuff. More rings, more clothes, more everything but whatever she actually wanted. Despite his protestations, he didn’t know best.

  And she didn’t need him.

  She’d learned. Taken night classes. Bettered herself. Her work wasn’t easy, but it was honest, and she was fine with it.

  Mostly.

  She was less fine with being coddled and spoken down to. Her love for Fazil birthed a mad, crazy existence, full of outrageous moments. That was the problem. In a life of magical absurdity, they’d abandoned the “little” moments other couples took for granted.

  There was nothing mundane in a baby’s snore or sitting on a balcony and letting the breeze hit you. Yet, all that was a touch too boring for Fazil.

  Which made this ranch of his even more insane. A place like this allowed for ... well ... moments.

  “You coming? Here’s the living room.”

  A proper tour of the place revealed Fazil hadn’t completely turned over a new gold-encrusted leaf. “I can honestly say I’ve never seen a log mansion.”

  “It’s not so big.”

  “Yeah, right.” The living room’s massive fireplace was second in size to a television which popped out of a concealed wall. How many log homes had a pool in the back and a movie theatre in the basement? She wasn’t sure.

  He pointed out the stairs to the wine cellar when his face scrunched up. “What?”

  “It’s a little much, don’t you think?”

  “I’m in the middle of friggin’ nowhere. I ought to be able to relax. So, no. I don’t think it’s a bit much.”

  “Course not.”

  He sighed and led her through a back door. Now this place fit her imagination, as if it were something out of a Wild West show. Two stables emerged with fencing buttressed against each other, though only one stable had its massive red doors open. “Okay, barns. Got it. What are the other half dozen buildings for? More unnecessary djinn excess?”

  Fazil slapped his hand across his jeans. “I don’t even know why I try.”

  “Let me guess. That barn holds two machines of every type. That one has them in silver. And that one has them in gold. I’m not far off, am I?”

  He looked over and arched his eyebrow. “Sheep shelter, greenhouse, cow shed, chicken coop, and yes, unbedazzled machinery. One harvester. One tractor.”

  “Oh.”

  “Yeah.”

  “I’m...”

  “Sorry?”

  “Shocked.” But he kept going. Fazil also pointed out a beehive, a vegetable garden, pasturelands, and an orchard. “This is totally self-supporting, isn’t it?”

  “Yep. I’ve got solar and wind power running through. I, or rather, the animals make my own fertilizer. I cheated in the beginning and hired all kinds of folks to help. But I learned. I consider it a big-ass Zen garden.”

  “This isn’t like you.”

  “You don’t know me.”

  “I was married to you.” And still was, but he got massive points for keeping that to himself. She followed him to the barn.

  Spotted, snorting pigs ran up to the fence line, and she gave their juicy noses a pat. “You’re serious about this, aren’t you?”

  “These guys need to be fed at exactly the same time. They’re smart and ornery like you.”

  “Funny.”

  “Just saying.” His fingers dotted the air, counting. “I’m missing one. Rosa? Rosa!”

  She tapped his shoulder. “Stop screaming. I’m right here.”

  “Not you. The pig.”

  “You named your pig after your wife?” Equal parts rage and amusement battled for dominance within her. In the end, legitimate surprise won out. “The least you could do is lie about it.”

  “She’s a mean sow who screeches for no damned reason.”

  “Oh, you!” She took a swipe, but he ducked, grinning, and pulled her toward the barn. “Something isn’t right. She never misses food.”

  What was not right ended up being something good. The three-hundred-pound, wiry-haired creature tiptoed soft as angel hair around five cuddly piglets. Rosa reached for one, but Fazil stayed her hand. “Too soon?”

  “Rosa’s got a mean streak with strangers. She only comes for me.”

  Whether he’d intended the double entendre or not, she didn’t know, but she sure didn’t have the nerve to look up and check. He hovered beside her for a few seconds and sighed, but soon, the heat of him was gone. She kept pace several steps behind.

  Fazil disappeared to a workstation of sorts. A tall, long table had an assortment of bags and bottles. He waved her over and pointed to several see-through vats. “Horse, pig, goats, and chickens.”

  “Goats?”

  “I’m sure as hell not going to mow the lawn. They’re on a little looser schedule than the pigs. Just watch out for the black one. His name’s Tig, and he likes to head-butt.”

  She glanced over her shoulder to the stall of the mother and her children. “Shouldn’t we call a doctor?”

  “About?”

  “The newborns.”

  He snorted, an almost cute grin on his face, and handed her a billion-pound feed bag. “It’s not like they need birth certificates. Motherhood is the most natural thing in the world.”

  “Oh, my gosh. You’ve done this before, haven’t you?”

  He withdrew some tablets and pulverized them with a mortar and pestle. “Vitamins,” he said. “And yes. Ehh, I was rusty after a few centuries, but I got the hang of it. Back then, it was camels, goats, and falcons. I’ll admit the bees scare the hell out of me. Gettin
g ‘don’t sting me’ wishes out here takes more prayer than magic. The fresh honey’s worth it though.”

  “I bet. Fazil, I had no idea this was out here.”

  “If I’d have told you, you wouldn’t have believed me.” He mixed the vitamins with a handful of food and dragged the bag over to the sow. “And if you had believed me, what would you have thought about it?”

  That he’d planned the whole thing, just to get her back. She didn’t dismiss that outright, but still...

  Still, to say she wasn’t impressed would be a bold-faced lie.

  He moved with a surety that whispered Fazil had plenty of experience with this. She almost asked what had happened to her tuxedoed city boy but bit back her tongue. Her Fazil preferred high-rise condos and urban life to anything like this. “You always told me to blend in. Can’t really do that out here.”

  “Yeah, well I distinctly remember you telling me the East Coast wasn’t big enough for the both of us. You told me to go to—”

  “Fazil—”

  “I chose Arizona instead of fucking myself. You’re right though, the thing about living in the middle of nowhere is that the second you head to the closest somewhere, everyone’s in your business. I’d forgotten that along the way. It’ll stay in the family though. When, uh, if we have kids, they can run it and their kids and by then, we can come back.”

  Lotta nerve. Who jumps from not speaking to planning for grandkids? “I wondered where the cocky bastard was.”

  Fazil jumped from the squealing pig and recapped the syringe before throwing it across the way into a bin. “I’m not being ... listen ... what do you expect me to do?”

  “Respect my decisions, for one. I didn’t come here to rekindle anything. I’m here because ... because...” She didn’t have the words to finish it. The weak, insipid ones sprang to mind. She came because she was scared. She came because she panicked. She came because... “I came because I didn’t have anywhere else to go, and that’s your fault too.”

  “’Course it is. Why don’t you sit your pretty little ass in the house and think of reasons to hate me, while I finish up out here. When I’m done, I’ll come in and play superhero again.”