He wasn’t far wrong, but I could hardly agree with him. I straightened up, trying to look a little livelier. “Just tired, I think.”
He smiled, but it was off, and I knew he didn’t believe me.
At times it was impossible to know what Mitchell saw in me. Depending on the drama of the day I could be moody, fickle, preoccupied –sometimes simultaneously. It was confusing to both of us, and yet he persevered as if I was worth the effort. When I reached across the bar, he took my hand. “I’m sorry I make you crazy,” I said, making him smile.
“Don’t worry about it.” Mitchell gave my fingers a squeeze. “I like a challenge.”
So did Mimi Traore. Whenever she saw us looking cosy, she made it her mission to put a stop to it. “Let’s go, dumb girl,” she ordered, ambushing me from behind. “Secret business.”
“You’re not even working tonight,” grumbled Mitchell. “What are you doing here?”
Mimi pulled out a handful of beads and leaned across the bar. “Secret business, dumb boy,” she hissed, waving them in his face.
The last thing I needed was another string of bin bin beads hitched to my middle, but that wasn’t Mimi’s objective. It took me two seconds to work out that Mike had sent her to fetch me.
Not even Mitchell was sold on the bin bin ruse. “Don’t you have enough beads?” He raised his eyebrows. “You can say no, you know.”
Mimi was already dragging me off the stool. “We both know that’s not true.”
“I’ll save your seat for you,” he replied.
***
Mimi didn’t utter a word until we reached the privacy of the open beach, and then there was no shutting her up. “The bad man came to my house again.” Her tone was nervous but strong. “He made me bring you here.”
The woman looked terrified, and she wasn’t easily rattled. I grabbed her hands and held them tightly, trying to calm her. “Listen, Mimi,” I said gently. “You’ve done nothing wrong. I knew he was going to send for me.”
She cocked her head, looking past me. “They’re coming,” she hissed, handing me a string of beads. “Be careful, dumb girl.”
“There’s more than one?” I asked, turning to check.
Mimi didn’t answer because she was gone, barrelling through the sand as if she was being chased. I turned my attention to the two dark figures approaching along the shoreline. Mike’s swagger would’ve been recognisable a mile away, but I had no idea who the second man was until they were right in front of me.
“Shiloh,” greeted Mike with a stiff nod. “You remember my colleague, Reyo.”
I cast my mind back to the first time I met Reyo in the Site Services office at the mine. He was friendly, smiley and talkative. The man in front of me was none of these things.
“Of course,” I replied. “How are you, Reyo? Still into the Backstreet Boys?” I had learned a long time ago that undercover operatives had no sense of humour. Reyo was clearly no exception. His stony expression didn’t waver. I turned to Iron Mike. “Glen Harris has gone missing,” I said flatly. “I went to his house today and it’s empty.”
The coldness of my tone bothered me. Was I was becoming immune to my circumstances? If that were to happen I’d be no better than the vile men in front of me.
“He was picked up last night,” said Mike.
I frowned. “By who?”
“Your people.”
“My people?” I wasn’t even sure who my people were anymore. “You mean my aunt?”
Reading their expressions in the dark was difficult, but there was no mistaking the condescending snicker from Reyo.
“Glen Harris is an English citizen,” I reminded them. “If he comes to any harm while he’s here – ”
“My government has no interest in him,” Mike cut me off. “Your people picked him up.” He pointed at me. “They ended the operation based on your information.”
I shook my head, confused but unwilling to admit it.
“You relayed that he was merely a greedy opportunist,” he continued. “No ties to militia groups or any other organisations.”
Glen Harris had many grandiose plans, but none that involved coups d’état or supplying mercenary groups with weapons. Glen was all about Glen, and judging from what he’d told me, the only plan he had was to cash in his diamond haul and live the life of Riley.
“I stand by that,” I replied. “He’s just a thief. Nothing more.”
Mike spread his arms. “Then your work here is done.”
“What?” I choked out the word. “How can that be?”
“The diamonds were recovered in his house. It was a favourable outcome.”
There was no way it could’ve ended that easily. Glen was days away from fencing the gems, which meant a whole new network of crooks was about to surface – and Iron Mike knew it.
“You’re closing me out,” I accused.
There was no other explanation for it. He’d been relentlessly pushing me for weeks. It made no sense to call it quits just because the diamonds had been found.
Reyo smirked. “You’ve wanted out for a while now,” he reminded me. “Now you have a ticket home.”
I should’ve been jumping for joy. Instead, I felt like I’d been unjustly dismissed without cause. “But … I don’t think this is over,” I tried to explain.
Mike smiled. “Like I told you before, if you come across intelligence that you deem to be more reliable than mine, run with it.” He glanced at Reyo. “But I am telling you your work here is done. It’s over, Shiloh.”
Airhead
MITCHELL
Although we joked about it, there was nothing funny about living on bread and vegetable soup for days on end. Desperate times call for desperate measures, and I was getting desperate. I woke Shiloh early, keen to get her moving before it got too hot.
“Where are we going?” Her sleepy voice gave no hint that she wanted to hear an answer.
I kissed her cheek. “Fishing. Get up.”
She pulled a pillow over her head and groaned. It wasn’t the response I was hoping for, but her protest was short-lived. Ten minutes later she stumbled onto the deck and claimed to be good to go.
“Do you know how to fish, Adonis?”
It was a fair question, all things considered. The messy tangle of line at my feet was hardly the look of a professional.
“I do, as it happens.” I handed her a reel. “Do you know how to fish, MacGyver?”
“No,” she replied, looking a little bewildered. “I’ve never been fishing in my life.”
“No survivalist fishing tips for me then?” She shook her head. “Excellent.” I quickly cut the tangled line and kicked it aside. “Maybe I’ll get to hang on to my man card for a bit longer.”
***
A few hundred metres north of the cardboard village lay a patch of ocean that’s always calm. It was a hopeless place to surf, but a decent place to fish.
“Look how still it is,” said Shiloh, gazing out to sea. “We should be swimming, not fishing.”
“This place is called Deception Pool,” I explained, setting the gear on the sand. “Named after suckers like you who think it’s a nice place to swim.”
“It is,” she insisted. “Look at it.”
“You should never trust calm water,” I replied. “There’s a gnarly undercurrent that passes all the way through here. If you went for a dip in that, the coastguard would be picking you up in Brazil in a week or two.”
Shiloh’s shoulders slumped. “Danger always lurks when things are calm,” she muttered.
“Are we still talking about the ocean?” I asked. “Or have we moved on?”
It was hard to tell. The creepy musing seemed to come out of nowhere.
She twisted to look at me. “What scares you, Adonis?” she asked. “Really scares you?”
“Besides you?” I teased.
Her lovely brown eyes widened. “I scare you?”
Articulating a proper response was damned near impossible. It
wasn’t virgin territory. I’d been in this predicament a hundred times before where Shiloh was concerned. “Sometimes.” Already the conversation was heading in an ugly direction, and I wasn’t hopeful of getting it back on track. “Remember how I told you that Charli left here and went to New York?”
She nodded.
“She was chasing a bloke – an American she met at home the year before.” I sat on the sand and pulled her down beside me. “They broke up and got back together about three million times,” I told her. “It was a train wreck.”
Shiloh frowned. “What does this have to do with us?”
I brought her hand to my mouth and kissed her fingers. “Bear with me,” I urged. “I’m about to make a spectacular point.”
She laughed softly.
“I thought he was a dick,” I said with a smile. “He broke her heart over and over, but she just wouldn’t let go.”
“Why?”
I tilted her face to look at me. “Because she knew he was the one for her,” I replied. “No matter how much of a train wreck it was, she never gave up on him.”
“Did she wise up in the end?”
“No.” I shook my head. “He did. They’re married with a kid now.”
“I’m glad it worked out,” she replied, brushing sand off her hands. “But I’m not sure what your point is.”
“The point is, Shiloh, she knew that what she’d found with him was the real deal, and she wasn’t afraid of any of the misery that came with it.” On the off chance that she was about to jump up and run away, I took her hand. “I feel like you might be the real deal.”
“But?”
“But,” I grimaced, “unlike Charli, I am afraid of the misery that comes with it – and I can’t shake the feeling that there’s plenty on the way.”
Shiloh blew out a long breath that crumpled her posture. “I would never intentionally do anything to hurt you.” Her voice was tiny. “You have to believe that.”
Using someone else’s life story to get my point across proved just how inept I was when it came to explaining how I felt, but Shiloh’s words were frustratingly hazy and did nothing to put my mind at ease. At that point, I was certain of only one thing: I was going to get my heart broken.
And because I could see it coming, it was my fault, not hers.
***
Three fish wasn’t a bad haul, but by the time we called it quits and headed home neither of us felt like dealing with them. The day had started with a weird vibe and the tension never left, which meant that the damage I’d caused by being honest was probably permanent.
“I won’t miss this when we’re gone,” muttered Shiloh.
“Miss what?” I asked, stepping up onto the veranda.
“Hunting and gathering to get a decent meal.”
I looked at the fish in the bucket and agreed. “It does get old quick.”
“Might I suggest something more substantial?” asked a booming voice from next door.
I would’ve welcomed any distraction at that point – even Melito butting in. “Welcome home.” I grinned. “What did you have in mind?”
“Spoils fit for a king.” He dipped his head at Shiloh. “And a queen, of course.”
“You’re cooking already?” asked Shiloh. “You just got home.”
“It was a long journey,” he wearily explained. “Three days of nothing but maafe and rice.” He shuddered as if he’d been forced to eat poison. “We’re all deserving of a decent meal, don’t you think?”
I raised my eyebrows at Shiloh. “Up to you, lady.”
She turned to Melito. “We would love to come, thank you.”
“Excellent,” he beamed, clapping his hands together. “Dress up. It’s going to be an extravaganza.”
***
Before heading next door for dinner, I decided to take one last shot at making things right between us. The conversation started from opposite sides of the bathroom door. I figured it was safer that way.
“If I hurt you today, I’m sorry,” I said. “I never meant to.”
“You didn’t,” she assured me. “But I don’t think it’s a conversation we should be having here.”
“Because you’re in the bathroom?”
Her soft chuckle had never sounded sweeter. “No, because we’re in Kaimte.”
“Oh.”
“Everything will be different when we get home, Mitchell. We just need to hold on until then.”
I pressed my forehead against the door, feeling confused. “Sometimes I think we speak a different language,” I told her. “I’m trying to love you, and you’re telling me to wait.”
“No, I’m telling you to reserve judgment until we get home.”
“What’s going to change?”
She didn’t answer, which pissed me off. When the bathroom door finally swung open, the urge to argue with her disappeared in an instant. Nothing about her was maddening or frustrating. I couldn’t see anything beyond how beautiful she looked.
I’d never seen the short black dress she was wearing before. It was dressy and classy, and perfectly showcased her beautiful legs. Her long dark hair tumbled over her shoulders in big curls – another first.
“What do you think?” she asked, smoothing the fabric along her sides.
“I think you’re gorgeous.”
“Not too much?”
It was way too much for a shindig with the sleek Greeks, but there was no way I was going to tell her. “You’re perfect.”
“You asked me what was going to change when we get home.”
I nodded, focusing on her lips.
“I’ll show you.” She turned and grabbed a bag from the bathroom, and then upended it on the bed. “When I packed to come here, I was clueless,” she began.
“Everyone is,” I replied, looking at the girly junk on the bed.
“I was extra clueless.” She held up something that looked like a pair of tongs. “I brought a little black dress and a curling iron. I thought I might need them.”
“Cool.” I grinned at her. “You like ironing.”
“It’s for hair.” When she flicked the end of her brown curls, a picture of Jasmine flashed through my mind.
“Don’t ever make that move again,” I warned her.
“Airhead, right?”
I nodded. “Total airhead.”
“I felt like an airhead when I got here – totally unprepared for this place,” she explained. “You don’t have the full picture of who I am because I can’t show you. I am who I am in order to survive my time here.”
Unlike me, Shiloh never had a problem when it came to making her point. My push to get to know her better wasn’t misguided, just ill-timed.
“I get it,” I murmured, slipping an arm around her. “I do.”
She flattened both palms on my chest. “Sooner or later you’re going to know everything there is to know about me,” she said softly. “But it won’t happen here.”
Options
SHILOH
Melito and Vincent were the rock stars of Kaimte, and tonight I felt like we’d crossed the velvet rope and entered the VIP section of their club.
I hadn’t seen a properly set table since I last had dinner with the Kellys in Western Australia, and I had never seen pearl encrusted napkin rings. “Do you think they’re real?” I whispered to Mitchell.
“I’m not sure.” He motioned to the ceiling with a discreet nod. “Do you think that’s real?” When I saw the chandelier hanging from the ceiling, my mouth gaped. This was unfathomable. Our shack was practically falling down around our ears, and the Greeks’ home wasn’t much better.
“It’s Swarovski,” claimed Vincent, gazing upward. “Beautiful, isn’t it?”
“Lovely,” I choked.
“We brought you gifts on our travels,” announced Melito, recapturing our attention.
“You didn’t have to.” I could tell Mitchell felt awkward. I wasn’t sure how I felt, mainly because I was hopeful that the presents were food related.<
br />
“Nonsense,” he replied. “Who can one spoil if not their friends?”
Vincent handed Mitchell a small box. Reluctantly, he stripped the green ribbon off and lifted the lid. “A bottle opener,” he said, sounding relieved. “It’s great, thanks.”
Melito turned and handed me a box. “Your turn, dear Shiloh.”
Inside was the ugliest pair of stiletto shoes I’d ever seen in my life.
Disappointment hit me hard, but I hid it well. “Thank you,” I crowed. “They’re perfect.”
Melito flapped his hand at me. “Put them on. Put them on.”
Knowing there was no way around it, I slipped off my flip-flops and held on to the back of the dining chair for balance as I stepped into the six-inch heels. “I don’t normally wear heels this high.”
I didn’t normally wear yellow sequins either, and the damned things were covered in them. Unfortunately, the shoes were a perfect fit.
“Of course you don’t,” said Vincent, clasping his hands. “You’re very tall.”
Melito grabbed Mitchell’s arm and pulled him to his feet. “But not too tall for Adonis,” he said, manhandling him into position next to me. “See, darling? He still towers above you. You don’t have to miss out on dressing like a goddess.” He pointed at Mitchell with both hands. “You’ve found your perfect match here.”
“Like Cinderella,” interjected Vincent in a weird dreamy tone.
I wasn’t exactly up to speed on fairy tales, but I couldn’t remember Cinderella favouring the hoochie look.
“Can we sit now?” asked Mitchell.
“Tell her how lovely she looks first,” prompted Melito.
Buying into the theatrics was our only option, and Mitchell realised it too. He dropped to one knee and grabbed my hand. “You, my darling, are a goddess.” A bad case of the giggles overtook me, but he pressed on. “Most women would look like a streetwalker in those shoes, but not you.” I continued my shameless giggling. “You wear them with class – like a high-priced call girl with a fixed address.”
I put my hand to my heart. “My god, that’s the most romantic thing I’ve ever heard.”
“It is?” asked Vincent, sounding slightly worried.