Chapter Seven
Felicity peeked out the door before exiting. It was a Sunday, which was sleep-in day, but she couldn’t sleep. Hadn’t slept well since Dimitri had come into her life.
She liked him. A lot. But she couldn’t get around the truth.
He was the last man on earth she deserved to like. To—
Nope. Not going there.
Liking was bad enough.
Dimitri had insisted he was fine often enough that she’d finally put on a happy face, letting him assist her non-magically while she encouraged him to build a new life.
But she felt like the worst human being ever.
It just didn’t sit right, knowing she was somehow a part of Dimitri’s imprisonment, though it hadn’t been by choice.
She’d tried doing research on the internet, late nights when Dimitri had gone to his bottle, but besides the fact that search engines had been effectively destroyed by generative AI and grifters, there just wasn’t anything definitive.
Genies had legs, or they were half smoke.
They were tricksters or benevolent spirits.
Free or bound. Playful girls or furious men.
And there was nothing, not even in the very last page of DuckDuckGo results, that suggested how she could set him free.
So all she could do was pretend he was just a roommate and never say the W-word, not even as a joke. If she couldn’t free him, at least she could refuse to use him.
But she hadn’t accounted for the fact that treating Dimitri as a roommate meant that, well, he was around all the time.
And while he’d taken to wearing jeans and tight T-shirts—when he wore a shirt—instead of his belly-dancing rig, it didn’t make him any less attractive.
He rocked T-shirts like nobody’s business, and his butt in jeans? Whew!
Worse, it made him seem approachable. Like an ordinary guy she’d met and invited to take her empty room.
A friend who helped her out, watched TV with her, joked with her, told her stories about faraway places and long-ago events.
He was fun. He had a smile like the sun.
Eyes like gemstones. Hair that made her want to grab his braids and pull him down and—
And he was absolutely forbidden.
She crept into the kitchen in bare feet, hoping to make her coffee and retire to her room before Dimitri emerged with his latest cup of sin. But she had just taken down the can of Folgers when a throat cleared behind her.
Dammit.
She turned with a bright smile. “Good morning”
Dimitri stood behind her, dressed in his red genie attire, as he preferred on days off, but he wasn’t smiling. “Good morning, Felicity.”
God, her name sounded nice in his voice, all rich and chocolatey. “Got any plans for today?”
His lips thinned, and he strode toward her, taking the can of coffee from her and placing it back on the shelf. “Today, I am making you coffee,” he growled.
It was unfair of him. Unfair to have a sexy voice and then to make a sexier sound with it. “Be my guest.” She stepped back and Vanna Whited toward the coffeemaker.
“Not here,” he said low. “Do you trust me?”
“I...” She swallowed. Another unfairness. How could he ask her that when she was the one who... “I trust you.”
“Take my hand,” he commanded.
She shouldn’t touch him at all, she shouldn’t, but she also couldn’t stop herself. His hand was warm and strong and—
A fizzy tingling took over her body, all at once, and she shuddered—or at least she felt the shudder in her mind but her body didn’t... Her body was...
Where was her body?
The only thing she could feel was the grasp of Dimitri’s strong hand, and she clung to that sensation, clung to what she’d said. I trust you.
She did trust him. And so whatever was going on, whatever the fizzing was, or the tingling, she knew it would be all right. He would never hurt her.
And the tingling began to fade, and she found herself hand in hand with Dimitri in a round room whose walls curved out and up to a chimney in the ceiling.
The walls glowed with light that filtered through gauzy drapes hung all about.
The floor was mounded with pillows, and right in the center was a clear space that held odd pieces of metal and glass.
A pair of small porcelain cups rimmed with gold sat on a small tray.
There was music coming from nowhere, delicate strings of some unknown instrument, and the room smelled of spice and musk.
Of Dimitri.
Felicity turned to him, squeezing his hand tighter. “Where are we?”
“This is my home,” he said softly. “Do you like it?”
“It’s...” She swallowed sharply. “It’s your prison.”
“Not now,” he said. “You made it not a prison.” He turned to face her, taking up her other hand. “Come. Sit. This is a gift freely given. A service from a friend.”
She could not resist the look in his eyes or the persistent draw of his hands. She followed him to the center and awkwardly knelt where he placed her. He sat across from her, the implements and tray between them.
“Be comfortable,” he purred. “The preparation is part of the pleasure.”
Gradually she relaxed into the cushions, watching Dimitri as he worked with a mortar and pestle. The scent of coffee filled the air, and she inhaled it ravenously. Coffee always smelled better than it tasted.
Dimitri did not look at her as he worked, not one glance, and she was grateful, because it meant she could watch her fill.
The way his long fingers wrapped around the pestle, clenched as he worked it through the powdered coffee.
The focus as he poured water into a pot with the fine powder, mixing it and setting it on a small brazier.
The flames illuminating his bare chest, glinting off his gold jewelry, warming his dark braids.
His eyes flickered up to her then, regarding her through his dark eyelashes. “How do you desire it?”
“I...” Her entire body was tingling again, but in a different, familiar, forbidden way. “I don’t know.”
“Here, I will help you choose.” Dimitri took up another tray arrayed with small puts and bottles, then somehow stood, stepped around the brazier, and seated himself beside her without the bottles even quivering. He wasn’t touching her, but she could feel the heat of his body.
“How do you not drop things?” she murmured, shifting slightly away. “Magic?”
“I know how to treasure precious things,” he replied. “Spices and flavorings are precious.”
She couldn’t deny that; she knew how much she could spend in the seasonings aisle. She made to sit up.
He touched her shoulder, preventing her from rising. “Be at ease,” he said, then held one of the pots before her face. “Do you like this?”
Felicity inhaled lightly. “Maybe.”
He smiled down. “Test them all before you decide.”
She sniffed all of the bottles he held up, some floral, some spicy, some sweet. Cinnamon she recognized, and roses, but finally she chose one that smelled exotic but approachable.
Like Dimitri in jeans.
Forbidden, she reminded herself.
“Cardamom,” he said warmly. “An excellent choice. I do prefer the Turkish spice blends myself.”
Felicity expected him to do his magic stand-move-sit again, but instead Dimitri settled into a comfortable cross-legged position where he was, close to her head.
He resumed his stirring, adding the cardamom to the simmering water and humming faintly as he worked, finally serving up the coffee to her in one of the porcelain cups and pouring another for himself.
She sat up. “Now what?”
He gave her a wry look. “The same as always. We drink our coffee and talk.”
Okay. Okay, she could do this. Even if her whole body was simmering now with the heat of Dimitri’s nearness. She lifted the cup and took a cautious sip.
“Oh, my god.” She took another sip, one hot enough that it scalded the roof of her mouth. She didn’t care. “What is this?”
“It is coffee,” Dimitri said, drinking his own.
“Yeah, but I’ve had coffee before. This is...coffee.”
“Indeed.” He smiled at her. “It is my pleasure to gift it to you.”
She couldn’t guzzle it down like she usually drank coffee, desperate for caffeine.
She had to savor it, sip by sip, aware that Dimitri was beside her.
God. How was she supposed to say words when her mouth was clearly meant for one thing and one thing alone—to drink the miracle of coffee Dimitri had made for her?
When it was gone, she gazed sadly at the bottom of the cup. Some dregs of coffee grounds still sat there. Could you read them like tea leaves? What would they say her fate was?
She looked up at Dimitri, and whoa! He was close. She hadn’t noticed him shifting, but bare millimeters separated her shoulder from his bare chest. She was still in her pajamas, a tank top and sweats, and she suddenly realized how little clothing that was.
“Thank you,” she whispered, preparing to edge away.
But he leaned in, pressing his forehead to hers, and oh, the gap was gone. His skin was against hers, and she had to move, but then he was kissing her and the world fell away.
Nothing existed but his mouth, his tongue, his hands clutching her bare shoulders. He kissed her like he was starving, drowning, like she was the elixir of life, and she couldn’t resist anymore.
“Ah, Felicity,” he murmured against her lips. “I have been dreaming of this. Desiring this. I need you. I need to taste you, devour you, bring you to ecstasy over and over and—
Forbidden.
Felicity jerked away, rolling to her feet. “We can’t!”
“Why not?” He shifted into a leonine sprawl, leaning on his elbows.
“Power! Differential!” She began to pace, kicking pillows aside so she had a path. “I can’t take advantage of you. How do I know you’re not forced to...to submit to me! That’s gross. I can’t do it!”
Dimitri let out a frustrated growl. “Because you cannot force me!”
She blinked at him. “What?”