Page 17 of Luck Be a Genie

Nick met me at my door at 9:30 sharp, and I answered his shining self with a smile and a roll of my eyes.

“You’re really bright today. Is there any way you can tone that down? I might need sunglasses to even look at you.”

He rubbed his hands together in excitement. “We’re going shopping today!”

I laughed, grabbing my purse and making sure my room card was in there. “We are. You sound excited. I’ve never met a guy excited to shop before.”

He took my hand and hurried down the hall. I had to walk quickly just to keep up with him. “I love shopping. I can’t wait! Where should we go first? Clothes? Home goods? I can send them all straight to our houses, so we don’t even have to worry about lugging them on the plane home with us.”

I patted his hand, and then had a horrible idea, and planted my feet, trying to stop Nick’s momentum. But of course he was like a train, and he just pulled me right along with him until he realized I’d stopped walking.

“What?”

I eyed him suspiciously. “Who are you excited to shop for?”

Nick’s expression turned guileless, which deepened my suspicions. “Both of us?”

“And I get to spend my own money on my things, right?”

“Cross my heart,” he said.

I frowned. Nick wouldn’t lie, but I didn’t fully trust that look in his eyes either. “Fine. Let’s go shopping.”

“Shopping!”

I laughed.

“What about this dress?” Nick asked. It was purple with a white hibiscus print. The sleeves were ruffled, and it was in a cute, form-fitting style.

“Ooh, I like that one.” I frowned down at my overflowing cart. “But I think I’m probably at my limit.”

“Eh, when you try them on, some won’t work, so we need to get extra.”

“That sounds strangely logical.” I eyed him in confusion until he huffed and gently nudged my hand away from checking his temperature.

“I can be logical, Lucks. I’m a detective. We have to be logical.”

He wasn’t wrong. Nick just had such a playful personality, I often forgot that his work mode was a hundred percent focused and dialed in.

“Okay,” I said, grabbing the dress from him and adding it to my cart. “But that’s it. I’m getting maxed out.” Aside from the credit card my grandfather had slipped into my bag at airport security with my name on it, but I didn’t want to use that unless it was an emergency. I hadn’t even brought that card with me to the store. It was in a safe in my room. The magical security on that card was probably more than the security for a bank vault.

Leprechauns did not mess around.

“But this cute shorts set!”

I groaned, making the older lady next to me chuckle. “Take the win, hun. Most women would love to trade places with you right now. A man who loves to shop?” She made a humming sound, and patted my shoulder. “He’s something, doll. I would keep him.”

I thanked her and she moved away. When I turned back, Nick was waggling his eyebrows and holding up the cute ruffled shorts and matching tank top.

I sighed in defeat. “Put them in.”

He whooped and added them, then herded me quickly to the dressing rooms. After helping me unload all my things into my dressing room, he took the one next to me and loaded all of his clothes into it. His cart had been just as full as mine, so it would take us a while to try everything on.

Except, as I was just getting my clothes off, and trying to figure out how to put the first dress on—the straps were weird—I could hear Nick talking to himself. “Nope. Nope. Oooh, I like that one!”

“Nick?” I called softly, not wanting to disturb the other people in the dressing rooms around us.

The ruffling of clothes stopped. “Yes, sunshine?”