Diamond in the Desert

‘Was the hotel okay?’ she asked him politely when they were both buckled in.

‘Yes. Thank you,’ he said, allowing his gaze to linger on her face

She shot him a glance and her cheeks flushed red. She was remembering their time in the boardroom. He was too.

She drove smoothly and fast along treacherous roads and only slowed for moose and for a streak of red fox until they entered what appeared to be an uninhabited zone. Here the featureless ice road was shielded on either side between towering walls of packed snow. She still drove at a steady seventy and refused his offer to take over. She knew the way, she said. She liked to be in control, he thought. Except when she was having sex when she liked him to take the lead.

‘We’ll soon be there,’ she said, distracting him from these thoughts.

They had been climbing up the side of a mountain for some time, leaving the ice walls far behind. Below them was a vast expanse of frozen lake—grey, naturally.

‘The mine is just down there,’ she said when he craned his neck to look.

He wondered what other delights awaited him. All he could be sure of was that Britt hadn’t finished with him yet. She liked to prove herself, so he was confident the test would include some physical activity. He looked forward to it, just as he looked forward to a return bout with her in the desert.

* * *

Emir seemed utterly relaxed and completely at home in a landscape that had terrified many people she had brought here. She knew this place like the back of her hand, and yet, truthfully, had never felt completely safe. Knowing Emir, he had probably trialled every extreme sport known to man, so what was a little snow and ice to him?

‘Penny for them,’ he said.

She made herself relax so she could clear her mind and equivocate. ‘I’m thinking about food. Aren’t you?’

She was curious to know what he was thinking, but as usual Emir gave nothing away.

‘Some,’ he murmured.

She glanced his way and felt her heart bounce. She would never get used to the way he looked, and for one spark of interest from those deceptively sleepy eyes she would happily walk barefoot in the snow, which was something Emir definitely didn’t need to know.

‘The food’s really good at the mine,’ she said, clinging to safe ground. ‘And the catering staff will have stocked the cabin for us. The food has to be excellent when people are so isolated. It’s one of the few pleasures they have.’

‘I wouldn’t be too sure about that,’ he said dryly.

‘There are separate quarters for men and women,’ she countered promptly—and primly.

‘Right.’ His tone was sceptical.

‘You seem to know a lot about it,’ she said, feeling a bit peeved—jealous, maybe, especially when he said,

‘It’s much the same for people who work in the desert.’

‘Oh, I see.’

‘Good,’ he said, ignoring her sharp tone and settling back. ‘I’m going to doze now, if you don’t mind?’

‘Not at all.’

Sleep? Yeah, right—like a black panther sleeps with one eye open. There was no such thing as stand down for Emir.

Emir could play her at her own game, and play it well, Britt realised as she turned off the main road. She could be cool, but he would be cooler, and now there was no real contact between them as he dozed—apparently—which she regretted. He wanted her to feel this way—to feel this lack of him, she suspected.

‘Sorry,’ she exclaimed with shock as the Jeep lurched on the rutted forest track. The moment’s inattention had jolted Emir awake and had almost thrown them into the ditch.

‘No problem,’ he said. ‘If you want me to drive...?’

‘I’m fine. Thank you.’ She’d heard that the ruler of Kareshi was introducing change, but not fast enough, clearly. Emir probably resented her running the company too. He came from a land where men ruled and women obeyed—

She gasped as his hand covered hers. ‘Take it easy,’ he said, steadying the steering wheel as it bounced in her hands.

‘I’ve been travelling these roads since I was a child.’

‘Then I’m surprised you don’t know about the hazards of melting snow.’

He definitely deserved a session in the sauna and a dip in the freezing lake afterwards, she concluded.

* * *

‘We’re nearly there,’ she said.

‘Good.’

Why the smile in his voice? Was he looking forward to their stay at the isolated cabin? She squirmed in her seat at the thought that he might be and then wondered angrily why she was acting this way. It was one thing bringing her city friends into the wilderness for a rustic weekend, but quite another bringing Emir down here when there could only be one outcome—