Two Deals: a Djinn Paranormal Romance (Blackwell Djinn) Read online

  Two Deals

  Blackwell Djinn Series

  Nikki Kardnov

  Tortoise House Press

  Copyright © 2019 Nikki Kardnov

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  This is a work of fiction. Similarities to real people, places, or events are entirely coincidental.

  Cover design by Natasha Snow Designs

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Epilogue

  Also by Nikki Kardnov

  About the Author

  Chapter 1

  WILLA

  Willa Locke was not a very good bartender.

  She was not a very good anything.

  Hell, she’d been born psychic, but she couldn’t even manage to do that right.

  “I said I wanted a blueberry martini,” the bottle-blonde girl yelled over the pounding bass music. “This tastes like lemons.”

  “It’s limes,” Willa yelled back.

  The girl scrunched up her nose. “WHAT?”

  “It’s limes. A blueberry martini has lime juice in it.”

  “But I wanted just blueberry.”

  Willa snatched the drink from the girl’s hand and tossed it down the drain. “Blueberries it is,” she said. If the girl wanted blueberry vodka and orange liqueur, then far be it for her to argue.

  As the DJ switched tracks, Willa slid the new drink across the bar top. “There you go!” she said and plastered on her biggest smile. She needed the tips, damn it. She had to keep her snark in check.

  The girl sipped the drink and cringed. “Do you not know how to make a blueberry martini?”

  Willa gritted her teeth. “How about I shove that blueberry martini—”

  “Perhaps I could be of some assistance.”

  The sound of that voice, the smooth tenor of it, the British accent, made Willa’s heart go skipping in her chest like a lovesick idiot.

  Willa and the bottle-blonde turned to face the newcomer like moths turning to flame.

  Poe Blackwell had somehow made space at the bar even though it was several people deep.

  That was the way of Blackwell djinn.

  The oceans practically parted for them.

  Willa wished, not for the first time, that her gift was in wit and charm and not divine messages. Because whenever Poe came around, she had no idea what to say or how to act. All of her usual snark and confidence flew right out the window.

  Around Poe, she was just another supplicant practically worshipping at his altar and she absolutely hated it. It had been that way ever since she met him two years ago in almost this exact same spot. At the time she hadn’t known he was djinn, but she’d immediately recognized something other about him.

  Willa had grown up with a witch for a sister, after all. She knew otherness when she saw it.

  “You don’t want a blueberry martini,” Poe said.

  The bottle-blonde blinked up at him with doe eyes. “I don’t?”

  “Are you a woman of class? Or a woman of trash?” he said.

  “Ummm…” The girl actually had to think about it!

  Willa nearly choked on a laugh.

  This was one of her favorite things about Poe—his lack of filter or care.

  “A classic martini is simple and elegant,” Poe added with a smile. The shine of his teeth could melt an anthill.

  The girl leaned into the bar and pushed out her chest. “I’ve never been a fan of regular martinis, but I guess I could try again.”

  Poe winked at Willa like they were sharing a secret. “A martini, please, love.”

  A flush raced up her neck. She liked it when he called her love. She liked that it implied they were on some kind of intimate ground, even if that ground was the ground of a nightclub on the lower east side of the city.

  But at least she knew him more than the bottle-blonde.

  Willa set to work. The sooner she got the girl out of there, the better. She needed to clear the bar as quickly as she could so she could take her break. Her little sister Raina was here in the bar somewhere and it’d been over an hour since Willa had checked on her.

  Raina might only be fourteen months younger, but she and Willa were worlds apart. Willa didn’t trust her not to get into trouble. Especially considering how Raina had been acting lately. She’d been slip-sliding into old habits. Habits that had nearly cost them everything.

  When the drink was finished, the bottle-blonde took the glass stem delicately between her fingers and sipped. As she did, she stared at Poe as if she were performing a sex act on the rim of the glass.

  God, sometimes these girls were just too damn obvious. Like, yeah, Willa could agree that Poe was sexy as hell and also rich and also powerful, but she was not about to throw herself at him.

  You wouldn’t have to anyway if you told him the truth.

  Stop that.

  Don’t complicate your life any more than it already is.

  The girl wrapped her hand around Poe’s bicep. “You’re Poe Blackwell, right?”

  “As of right now, yes.”

  The girl giggled. Did she know what Poe was? Did she know that she flirted with someone who was several hundred years old? Willa doubted it. While Club Drav was a hot spot for supernatural beings, the world at large didn’t know they existed.

  “Come sit with us,” the girl said and squeezed him. “Maybe later you could come to our penthouse.” She bit her bottom lip. “There are three of us girls.”

  “Tempting.” Poe looked down at his phone. A small, wicked part of Willa loved it when he rebuffed this type of woman. “But I have other business to attend to. Perhaps another night.”

  The girl pouted.

  “Well if you change your mind,” she said.

  “I doubt I will.”

  The girl frowned, clearly thrown by the curve ball insult. Still, when she walked away, she made sure to put a swish in her hips.

  Poe barely noticed. He turned to Willa and ratcheted up the wattage on his smile.

  Her insides quaked.

  When he set those green eyes on her, she had to fight the urge to turn into the kind of girl the bottle-blonde was—desperate and hungry.

  Poe’s eyes were the color of the Rine River flecked with golden sunlight. When he laughed, they glittered. When he was angry or annoyed, they glowed
neon green with magic.

  “You’re welcome,” he said, the club lights flashing behind him, highlighting the purposeful disarray of his blond hair.

  Willa wished she could steal a drink off the bottle of tequila. Anything to settle her nerves. “I had it handled.”

  “It looked like it.” He tossed a fifty-dollar bill on the bar. “Keep the change.”

  “You haven’t ordered anything.”

  “Oh, right. Glenmorangie. Neat.”

  Willa moved the bar’s stool over so she could reach the top shelf 18-year scotch. She poured two fingers in a tumbler and then added a shot of ginger.

  Djinn could only feel the buzz if a drink was spiked with the spice. Willa didn’t know the reason behind it and when she’d asked Poe once, he didn’t know either.

  “All that matters is that it works,” he’d said.

  At least ginger was nontoxic to humans. When a werewolf came into the bar wanting a buzz, they requested wolfcaine. The special herb oil was fatal to humans at a certain dose. Or at least that’s what Willa had read. The effects weren’t immediate, but they were pretty brutal. Just to be on the safe side, she always poured it wearing latex gloves which made her feel silly and weak.

  Poe threw down another fifty. “Keep that change, too.”

  Her face heated up. It was too much money. But yet she really wanted it. No, she needed it.

  The longer her and her sister were here in Blackwater, the more trouble Raina would get into. She was already in too deep. Willa blamed Caleb fucking Corvin for that. He’d led Raina down a path that Willa had been trying to steer her away from for years.

  Willa eyed the two fifties, her fingers itching to take them. “I can’t,” she said and turned to the next customer.

  “Two rum and Cokes,” the customer said.

  Willa flipped over two glasses and tossed in a scoop of ice in both. The cubes clinked together.

  Poe shoved the fifties closer. “I insist.”

  Somehow, Poe always knew what Willa wanted in any given moment. Djinn could sense a desire. They knew how to exploit it. But Poe was really, really good at it.

  And it wasn’t like they were making a deal. He had no reason to over tip her, other than for the sheer fact that he could.

  “Fine,” she said and quickly shoved the bills in her back pocket.

  “To repay me,” he said, “you can do a reading for me.”

  She nearly dropped the bottle of rum. Amber liquor splashed across her white t-shirt as she fumbled with it. The temptation to say yes was practically fire in her veins. To do a reading for a djinn? To see what secrets might bubble to the surface?

  But no.

  Absolutely no no no.

  Unlike most psychics who got their information about the future through dreams or visions, Willa could only find insight via tarot cards.

  But the last time she did a reading for herself…well, her life had practically imploded.

  “I regret telling you I’m psychic,” she said.

  “You didn’t have to tell me. I can sense these things.”

  She narrowed her eyes at him. She never was sure if he was being serious. She’d done her fair share of research on the supernatural world trying to better understand it, but literature on djinn was scarce. Probably Poe did have the ability to sense the otherness about someone just like she could, but she’d never been able to accurately pinpoint just what a person was. Vampires were hard for her to detect as were shifters. Their magic was a unique kind that Willa didn’t understand.

  But djinn…they were a little closer to witches and Willa knew a lot about witches.

  And demons.

  “I already told you,” she said, “I don’t do readings anymore.”

  “But you never told me why.”

  “And I’m not about to.”

  Cardi B started playing through the sound system. The crowd pulsed with the music. Pink and blue and yellow lights flickered through the club. The floor vibrated beneath Willa’s feet.

  “Besides,” she said and finally met his eyes, “what could someone like Poe Blackwell want to know of his future anyway? Don’t you already have everything you need?”

  The smile fell from his face. His eyes flashed vibrant green.

  Willa shivered.

  Magic was a thing felt, not seen, but that whole thing about eyes being the windows to the soul? Sorta accurate. Djinn eyes glowed the color of djinn magic. Demon eyes were white. Vampire eyes glowed vibrant blue when they went into predator mode.

  Had Willa offended Poe somehow?

  “You’re right,” he said, and the mask was pulled back into place. “I’m rich, I’m powerful, and I’m dashingly handsome. What more could I need?” He tipped his drink at her, slung it back and drained it in one go. He slammed the tumbler to the bar top. “Thanks for the drink, love.”

  He slipped away.

  Willa tried to watch him before he was gone, but all it took was one blink of her eyes and the crowd had swallowed him whole.

  “Hello!” a customer shouted at her. “What’s the hold up?”

  “Sorry.” Willa tried to pull herself back in. Focus on the work. Make the money. Escape with Raina.

  “Here you go,” she said and set the drinks in front of him. The guy grumbled and tipped her one measly dollar.

  Willa hated being a bartender. But it was about the only job she could get with her mediocre skills. She’d barely graduated from high school. She’d had hopes of attending college, but adding school to work just meant she was away from Raina even longer.

  And Club Drav was the only place she’d ever crossed paths with Poe.

  If I quit, I’d never see him.

  Not that she could stay here forever. They would have to leave the city eventually. Sooner rather than later, the way things were going…

  Probably for the best anyway.

  It wasn’t like someone like Poe would ever go for a girl like her. At least not without something to gain from it.

  She was human. Barely psychic. And she had a 125-pound albatross hanging from her neck in the shape of her sister.

  Speaking of Raina…where had she disappeared to?

  “Hey! Can I get a beer?” a man shouted in her face.

  “Sure. What kind?”

  “Ummmm…”

  Good God, if she believed in curses this would be hers—waiting for someone to decide what to order.

  As soon as she was through this line of customers, she’d slip out from behind the bar and check on Raina, praying that until then, her little sister stayed out of trouble.

  Chapter 2

  POE

  The city of Blackwater was known to be a melting pot of supernatural beings and creatures. And as djinn, Poe was at the top of the hierarchy.

  But sometimes he wanted to mix with the dregs.

  Club Drav gave him all of that and more.

  Here, he was king.

  Unlike at home at Blackwell House where he was second eldest, but somehow least respected.

  Probably because he did not have an innate talent like his brothers. Like Dae, who was the prince of illusions. Or Mad, who had won more wars than history could record. Or Thorin, who was practically a berserker if you riled him up enough.

  Power was currency and in the Blackwell family, Poe had the least of it.

  But when it came to the art of making a deal, Poe reigned supreme.

  The one ability he seemed to possess above his brothers was the ability to sense a desire. Not just that one existed, but the shape of it, the feel of it, the way it pulled at a mark like an anchor.

  Djinn nature was to be able to spot a viable mark from across the room, but most had to work hard to figure out the thing that would entice a person to suspend their disbelief long enough to say the right words. Djinn could only make a deal with a human and most humans didn’t know djinn or the supernatural world existed.

  Poe had come to Drav tonight thinking he might like to strike a new deal.

&
nbsp; When a djinn was invoked, the flood gates swung open on their magic.

  For however long a deal was in play, a djinn could manifest just about anything they wanted. And they had the ability to vade—to leave one place and reappear in another in the matter of seconds.

  He’d come to Drav thinking any mark would do.

  If that was the case, he would have picked the tarty blonde.

  In the moment, though, the thing she’d wanted most was to fuck Poe and he would have gladly made a deal with her and granted that wish.

  But then he looked at Willa and he felt the shifting banks of her desires.

  When he’d met her two years ago here at Drav, she’d wanted nothing more than to protect her little sister. It was something Poe found boring and predictably human.

  But tonight...tonight something had changed.

  The one thing burning in her veins was the need to flee. Why? What was she trying to run from?

  He took the club’s stairs up to the open second floor. He found a shadowed spot next to one of the brick support columns and leaned against it. From here, he had a perfect vantage point to watch Willa as she worked.

  Her cinnamon red hair was wound up in a messy bun that sat atop her head. Several wispy strands had broken free and lingered around her face like a whisper. Her pale skin glowed in the UV lights strategically dotted around the club.

  Poe liked the way the V of her shirt collar hung just low enough to suggest something sexy. He liked the way she craned her neck to hear a drink order, baring the delicate curve of her throat.