Diamond in the Desert

by Susan Stephens

  ‘He didn’t waste any time,’ Britt said numbly. While she had been in bed with Sharif, he had been seeing the deal through and speaking to her brother. This had to be the ultimate betrayal, and was why Sharif hadn’t been at her side when she woke this morning. He was already on his way to Skavanga. What could she say to Leila—to either of her sisters? Sorry would never cover it.

  ‘It’s such a shock,’ Leila was saying. ‘We still can’t believe this is happening.’

  There was no point regretting things that couldn’t be changed, Britt reasoned as she switched quickly to reassuring her sister. ‘Don’t worry about any of this, Leila. Just stay out of it until I get back. I’ll handle it.’

  ‘What about you, Britt?’

  ‘What about me?’ She forced a laugh. ‘Let me go and pack my case so I can come home.’

  She had been betrayed by her feelings, Britt realized as she ended the call. She was to blame for this, no one else. And now it was up to her to make things right.

  She spun around as the tent flap opened, but her hammering heart could take a break. It was the smiling women with her clothes. And whatever type of man their master was, these women had been nothing but kind to her. Greeting them warmly, she explained with mime that although she would love to spend more time with them, she really couldn’t today.

  * * *

  It was as if she had never been away, Britt reflected as the cab brought her into the city from the airport. But had the streets always been so grey? The pavements were packed with ice and with low grey cloud overhead everything seemed greyer than ever. After the desert, she reasoned. This was her home and she loved it whatever the climate might be. This harsh land was where she had been born and bred to fight and she wasn’t about to turn tail and run just because the odds were against her. Nothing much frightened her, she reasoned as the cab slowed down outside the offices of Skavanga Mining. Only her heart had ever let her down.

  Her sisters were waiting for her just inside the glass entrance doors. Whatever the circumstances she was always thrilled to see them. Knowing there was no time to lose, she had come straight to the office from the airport with the intention of getting straight back in the saddle. Thank goodness she’d had a non-crease business suit and stockings in her carry-on bag. She needed all the armour she could lay her hands on.

  ‘Together we stand,’ Britt confirmed when they finally pulled apart from their hug.

  ‘Thank God you’re here,’ Eva said grimly. ‘We’re overrun by strangers. We have never needed to show a united force more.’

  ‘Not strangers—people from the consortium,’ Leila reassured her. ‘But he’s here,’ Leila added gently. ‘I just thought you should know.’

  ‘Tyr’s here?’ Britt’s face dropped as she realised from Leila’s expression who her sister was talking about. ‘You mean Sharif is here,’ she said softly. Better she face him now than later, Britt determined, leading her sisters past Reception towards the stairs. ‘With his troops,’ Eva added as a warning.

  Britt made no response. Troops or not, it made no difference to her. She would face him just the same. She could only hope her heart stopped pounding when she did so.

  How the hell had he got here ahead of her?

  His private jet, of course—

  Get your head together fast, Britt ordered herself fiercely. She was strong. She could do this. She had to do this. She had always protected her sisters and the people who worked for Skavanga Mining. That was her role in life.

  Without it what was she?

  Nothing had changed, she told herself fiercely.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ she said. ‘I can handle this.’

  Eva was right. The first-floor lobby was bustling with people Britt didn’t know. Sharif’s people—the consortium’s people—Sharif had moved them in already. Her temper flared at the thought. But she had to keep her cool. She had lost the initiative the moment she allowed her emotions to come into play, and that must never happen again.

  * * *

  So, Tyr definitely wasn’t coming. Sharif had tried to persuade him, but now he put his phone away. Their conversation had been typical of the type Sharif had come to expect from the man who was a latter day Robin Hood. If a worthy cause had to be fought Tyr would drop everything and swing into action. He couldn’t blame the man, not with everything that was going on in Tyr’s life, but his presence here today would have softened the blow for Britt, whose arrival was imminent. Britt’s campaign to save the company was on track, but a happy reunion with the brother she hadn’t seen for years was not on the cards. So now she would just be bewildered by what she would see as Tyr’s betrayal and his.

  He pulled away from the window when he saw Britt’s cab arrive. However angry she was he had to keep her on board. Skavanga Mining needed her—

  He needed her—

  He would protect her from further distress the only way he knew how, which was to say nothing about Tyr, just as he had promised, and allow the blame to fall on the ruthless Black Sheikh instead. He would live up to his reputation. Better she hated him than she blamed Tyr for throwing in his lot with the consortium. Tyr had seen it as the only way to save the company in a hurry, and Tyr was right, though Sharif didn’t expect Britt to be so understanding; and with Tyr and the other two men in the consortium tied up half a world away, it was up to him to handle the takeover. There had been time to leave a brief message for Britt with the women at the encampment, and he hoped she’d got it. If not he was in for a stormy ride.

  ‘Britt.’ He turned the instant she entered the room. His response to her was stronger than ever. She lit up the room—she lit up his life. She forced him to re-evaluate every decision he had ever made, and he always came to the same conclusion. He would never meet another woman like her, but from her expression he guessed she hated him now. ‘Wait for me outside,’ she told her sisters in a cold voice that confirmed his opinion.

  ‘Are you sure?’ the youngest asked anxiously.

  ‘I’m sure,’ Britt said without taking her eyes off him.

  She looked magnificent—even better than he remembered. A little crumpled from the journey, maybe, but her bearing was unchanged, and that said everything about a woman who didn’t know the meaning of defeat. He’d made a serious error leaving her behind in Kareshi. He should have brought her with him and to hell with the consequences. He should have known that Britt was more than ready for whatever she had to face. Her steely gaze at this moment was unflinching.

  ‘Please sit down,’ she said, and then she blinked as if remembering that he was in charge now.

  ‘Thank you,’ he said, making nothing of it.

  Crossing to the boardroom table, he held out the chair for her and heard the slide of silk stockings as she sat down and crossed her legs. He was acutely aware of her scent, of her, but, despite all those highly feminine traits that she was unable to hide, she was ice.

  He chose a chair across the table from her. They both left the chairman’s chair empty, though if Britt felt any irony in sitting beneath portraits of her great-grandfather, who had hacked out a successful mining company from the icy wastes with his bare hands, or the father who had pretty much lost the business in half the time it had taken his own father to build it up, she certainly didn’t show it. As far as Britt was concerned, it was business as usual and she was in control.

  Even now she felt a conflict inside her that shouldn’t exist. She had entered the room at the head of her sisters, determined to fight for them to the end. But seeing Sharif changed everything. It always did. The man beneath that formal suit called to her soul, and made her body crave his protective embrace.

  So she might be stupid, but she wasn’t a child, she told herself impatiently. She was a grown woman, who had learned how to run this company to the best of her ability when it was thrust upon her, whether she wanted it or not. And nothing had changed as far as she was concerned. ‘I called the lawyers in on my way from the airport.’

  ‘There’s
no point in rushing to do that,’ he said, ‘when I can fill you in.’

  ‘I prefer to deal with professionals,’ she said.

  He couldn’t blame Britt for the bite in her tone. The way that things had worked out here meant she could only feel betrayed by him.

  * * *

  She searched his eyes, and found nothing. What would he find in hers? The same? If her eyes contained only half the anger and contempt she felt for him, then that would have to do for now. She could only hope the hurt and bewilderment didn’t show at all.

  ‘I’d be interested to hear your account of things,’ she said coldly. ‘I believe my brother’s involved in some way.’ For the first time she saw Sharif hesitate. ‘Did you think I wouldn’t find out?’

  ‘In an ideal world I would have liked things to take their course so you could get used to the idea of Tyr’s involvement. As it was he stepped in to prevent a hostile takeover from any other quarter.’

  ‘And this isn’t a hostile takeover?’

  ‘How can it be when Tyr is involved?’

  ‘I wouldn’t know since I haven’t heard from him.’

  ‘He is still on his travels.’

  ‘So I believe. I heard he took the coward’s way out—’

  ‘No one calls your brother a coward in my hearing,’ Sharif interrupted fiercely. ‘Not even you, Britt.’

  Sharif’s frown was thunderous and though she opened her mouth to reply something stopped her.

  ‘You realise Tyr and I go back a long way?’

  ‘I don’t know all his friends,’ she said. ‘I still don’t,’ she added acidly.

  Ignoring her barb, Sharif explained that Kareshi was one of the countries Tyr had helped to independence.

  ‘With his mercenaries?’ she huffed scathingly.

  He ignored this too. ‘With your brother’s backing I was able to protect my people and save them from tyrants who would have destroyed our country.’ He fixed her with an unflinching stare. ‘I will never hear a wrong word said against your brother.’

  ‘I understand that from your perspective, my brother has done no wrong. Tyr knows how to help everyone except his own family—’

  ‘You’re so wrong,’ Sharif cut in. ‘And I’m going to tell you why. If Tyr had added his golden shares to those you and your sisters own, the company would still go down. Add those shares to the weight of the consortium and the funds we can provide—not some time in the future, but right now—and you have real power. That’s what your brother’s done. Tyr has stepped in to save, not just you and your family, but the company and the people who work here.’

  ‘So why couldn’t he tell me that himself?’

  ‘It’s up to Tyr to explain when he’s ready.’ Sharif paused as if he would have liked to say something more, but then he just said quietly, ‘Tyr’s braver than you know.’

  She felt as if she had been struck across the face. There was no battle to fight here. It had already been won.

  ‘A glass of water?’ Sharif enquired softly.

  She passed an angry hand over her eyes, fighting for composure. She felt sick and faint from all the shocks her mind had been forced to accept. The structure of the business had changed—Tyr was involved, but he still wasn’t coming home. And mixed into all this were her feelings for this man. It was too much to take in all at once.

  Thrusting her chair back, she stood.

  Sharif stood too. ‘We want to keep you, Britt—’

  ‘I need time—’

  ‘The consortium could use your people skills as well as the mining expertise you have. At least promise me that you’ll think about what I’ve said.’

  ‘Ten minutes,’ she flashed, turning from the table. She had to get out of here—now.

  One foot in front of the other—how hard could that be?

  That might be easy if she didn’t know she had let everyone down. She allowed herself to become distracted and everything had changed. The company might have been thrust upon her, but she had given it all she’d got, and had intended to continue doing so for the rest of her working life. So much for that.

  Bracing her arms against the sink in the restroom, she hung her head. She couldn’t bear to look at her reflection in the mirror. She couldn’t bear to see the longing for Sharif in her eyes. Everything he’d said made sense. He wasn’t even taking over and booting her out. They wanted her to stay on, he’d said. And she wanted Sharif in every way a woman could want a man. She wanted them to have a proper relationship that wasn’t just founded on sex. She had run the gamut of emotions with him, and had learned from it, but this was the hardest lesson of all: the man they called the Black Sheikh would stop at nothing to achieve his goal—even recruiting Britt’s long-lost brother, if that got him where he wanted to be. And Sharif didn’t even want the part of her she wanted to give, he wanted her people skills. The only way she could survive knowing that was to revert to being the Britt who didn’t feel anything.

  Sluicing her face down in cold water, she reached for a towel and straightened up. Now she must face the cold man in the boardroom whom she loved more than life itself, and the only decision left for her to make was whether or not she could stay on here and work for Sharif.

  She could stay on. She had to. She couldn’t abandon the people who worked here, or her sisters. And if that meant her badly bruised heart took another battering, so what? She would just have to return it to its default setting of stone.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  BRITT RETURNED TO the boardroom to find Sharif pacing. Caught unawares, he looked like a man with the weight of the world on his back. For the blink of an eye she felt sorry for him. Who shared the load with Sharif? When did he get time off? And then she remembered their time in the desert and her heart closed again.

  ‘There is a problem,’ he said, holding her stony gaze trapped in his.

  ‘Oh?’ She felt for the wall behind her as wasted emotions dragged her down. She could fix her mind all she liked on being tough and determined, and utterly sure about where she wanted this to go, but when she saw him—when she saw those concerns she couldn’t know about furrowing his brow and drawing cruel lines down each side of his mouth—she wanted to reach out to him.

  She wanted to help him, and, even more than that, she wanted to stand back to back with Sharif to solve every problem they came across, and she wanted him to feel the same way she did.

  ‘I’ve had to make some changes to my plans.’

  ‘Trouble in Kareshi?’ she guessed.

  ‘A troublesome relation who was banished from the kingdom has returned in my absence and is trying to rally support amongst the bullies who still remain. It’s a basic fight between a brighter modern future for all and a return to the dark days of the past when a privileged few exploited the majority. I must return. I promised my people that they would never be at the mercy of bullies again, and it’s a promise I intend to keep.’

  Sharif really did have the weight of the world on his shoulders. ‘What can I do?’ Britt said. Whatever had led them to this place was irrelevant compared to so many lives in jeopardy.

  ‘I need your agreement to stay on here. I need you to do my job for me while I’m away. I need you to ease the transition so that no one worries about change unnecessarily. Will you do that for me, Britt?’

  Sharif needed her. The people here needed her. And if he didn’t need her in the way she had hoped he would, she still couldn’t turn her back on him, let alone turn her back on the other people she cared about.

  ‘I really need you to do this for me, Britt.’

  Her heart hammered violently as Sharif came closer to make his point, but he maintained some distance between them, and she respected that. Her heart responded. Her soul responded. She could no more refuse this man than she could turn and walk away from her duties here. But there was one thing she did have to know. ‘Am I doing this for you, or for the consortium?’

  ‘You’re doing it for yourself, and for your people, Britt, and for wh
at this company means to them. Hold things together for me until I get back and we can get this diamond project properly under way and then you’ll see the benefits for both our people.’

  ‘How long will you be away?’ The words were out before she could stop them, and she hated herself for asking, but then reassured herself that, as this concerned business, she had to know.

  ‘A month, no more, I promise you that.’

  The tension grew and then she said, ‘I noticed a lot of new people were here when I arrived. Will you introduce me?’

  Sharif visibly relaxed. ‘Thank you, Britt,’ he said. ‘The people you saw are people I trust. People I hope you will learn to trust. They moved in with the approval of your lawyers and with your own financial director alongside them to smooth the path—’

  ‘Of your consortium’s takeover of my family’s company,’ she said ruefully.

  ‘Of our necessary intervention,’ Sharif amended. ‘I hope I can give you cause to change your mind,’ he said when he saw her expression. ‘This is going to be good for all of us, Britt—and you of all people must know there’s no time to waste. Winter in the Arctic is just around the corner, which will make the preliminary drilling harder, if not impossible, so I need your firm answer now.’

  ‘I’ll stay,’ she said quietly. ‘Of course, I’ll stay.’

  How ironic it seemed that Sharif was battling to keep her on. He was right, though, she could handle anything the business threw at her, but when it came to her personal life she was useless. She had no self-belief, no courage, no practice in playing up to men, or making them see her as a woman who hurt and cared and loved and worried that she would never be good enough to deserve a family of her own to love, and a partner with whom she shared everything

  ‘And when you come back?’ she said.

  ‘You can stay or not, as you please. You can still have an involvement in the company, but you could travel, if that’s what you want to do. I have business interests in Kareshi that you are welcome to look over.’

  A sop for her agreement, she thought. But a welcome one—if a little daunting for someone whose life had always revolved around Skavanga. ‘I’d be like you then, always travelling.’