Read Online Wishing in the Wings by Mindy Klasky - Free Book Online Page A

came up while she and I were working together. We finished our business relationship before I left for MAGIC.”
    “No,” I said, frustrated that I hadn’t made myself clear. “She knew about you. About genies in general.”
    “Well I should certainly think so. Didn’t she say anything about what we accomplished the last time I was out and about in this godforsaken place?”
    “God-forsaken place?” I was surprised at the scorn in the genie’s voice. “What do you have against New York?”
    “Well, shine my lamp! She finally left that frozen pit!”
    Minneapolis. Where Kira had landed her dream job. Where she had met John McRae. And, apparently, where she had met Teel. Met our genie.
    “Kira moved here about three years ago.”
    “Three! Well it took her long enough, then, to pass along the lantern.” Teel clicked her tongue. “Seven out of ten wishers pass on their lamp within one month. Remember that.”
    “Um, I will.” What? Was I going to be quizzed on these statistics? Or was I just supposed to feel a little pressure, an obligation to conform to everyone else who’d been granted magic wishes.
    Like Kira, apparently. Maybe I wasn’t crazy after all.
    I picked up the contract again, seriously considering signing on the proverbial dotted line, even though I couldn’t begin to comprehend the document. Beggars couldn’t afford to be choosers.
    Of course, Dean would have handled all this differently. He would have taken all day and all night to mark up the pages, scribbling minute notes in the margin with his fine-point red Bic, asking endless questions. Well, I wasn’t Dean. In fact, screw Dean.
    I waved the pages at the genie. “What’s in here? What are my obligations to you?”
    For an instant, she got a crafty look in her eye. She turned her head to one side, arching one expressive eyebrow. I could feel her measuring me, trying to decide if I would buy whatever answer she made up. “You have to make all of your wishes within a twenty-four hour period?” she said.
    That sounded like a question, though. Not an answer. “How many wishers do that?”
    Teel frowned. I suspected that she was accustomed to using statistics to her own advantage. “Some?”
    Another question. I wasn’t willing to push for actual numbers, though. Instead, I asked, “Did Kira make all of her wishes in a single day?”
    Teel pouted, and I could see with perfect clarity the petulant teenager that the blond woman once had been. “No,” she admitted. I could almost imagine her digging the toe of her pumps into my office floor before she flounced out of the room mid-temper-tantrum. “She took a lot longer than that.”
    “So, what was Kira’s deal? She signed the contract, got her three wishes, and then you waltzed off to your conference?”
    “Four,” Teel said.
    “Excuse me?”
    “Four wishes.”
    That didn’t make much sense. “Every book I’ve ever read says genies grant three wishes. Isn’t that in all the fairy tales?”
    Teel seemed a bit put out. “It’s a good thing life isn’t a fairy tale, then, isn’t it? You get four wishes, okay? I’m bound to you until I’ve granted all four.”
    I actually felt a little sorry for her. It had to be a drag, waiting around to grant that one extra wish to every single person who rubbed the lamp. I suspected that the delay could really screw up her completion statistics.
    But four wishes? All mine? Who was I to insist that the standard was three? Gift horse, and all that.
    I turned to the last page of the agreement and signed my name, looping the letters with a little more authority than I customarily used.
    “Wonderful,” Teel said. “And initial here. And there. And at the bottom of that page, there.” What did I have to worry about, really? It was the devil who stole souls, right? Not genies. As I finished adding my last scribble and set down my pen, my attention was drawn back to Teel’s fiery tattoo. All of a sudden, the ink wasn’t quite as