by Rula Sinara
“No, I don’t.”
She tipped her chin down and eyed Pippa.
“You can’t fool me. Sit. I’ll make some chamomile tea. It’ll calm you.”
“I’m fine, Auntie. I swear.”
She was fine. The moment of pain had passed like all the others before it. It had been worse when she’d first returned home after living in Europe for a year after the breakup. The fact that Busara was home to both her and Haki and their respective families made it impossible to escape the memories entirely, but she’d learned to cope. Sort of. Spending long daylight hours teaching and, now, taking care of the twins helped.
“Well, it won’t hurt you to drink it.” She set a pot of “safe” water to boil for tea and took a bag of homegrown and dried chamomile out of the cabinet. “How is this job you have with the twin girls going?”
Her mom had asked her the same question earlier.
“Fine, I guess. They’ve settled down a bit.”
“Anna told me about the henna. You always were creative.”
“Their father wasn’t too thrilled with my creativity, at first.”
“And now?”
Now? Dax hadn’t brought it up since. Come to think of it, he had stopped harping on her as much about running late, too. Maybe the savanna’s slow and undulating energy had tempered his mood. The important things in life really stood out when you were surrounded by life and death and the natural cycle of things.
The important things in life. Like telling the truth.
“I guess he got used to my ways.”
Niara smiled as she poured water into two mugs.
“He trusts you now.” She placed a mug in front of Pippa and sat down at the large wooden table that could seat ten at a time. It had been hand built for both families, since they shared the main areas of the house and had separate wings for their bedrooms. Everyone here dined together at the end of the day. It was a tradition. A coming together. One she used to share with Haki.
Trust. Did Dax trust her? Maybe he did with the twins, but apparently he didn’t trust her enough to tell her the truth. Why couldn’t she just get him out of her head?
“I suppose. I hadn’t really thought of it that way,” Pippa said.
Dax did trust her. Niara was right. He’d barely mentioned their school schedule lately. He never questioned her about taking the girls to the villages. Or what she did with them all day. How she kept them safe. It was humbling. It was an honor. A wave of warmth spread through her chest, and she hadn’t yet sipped her tea. A man like Dax letting go of some control was no small thing, and the fact that it concerned his daughters made it monumental. He trusted her.
But he’d lied.
Haki may have cared about her, but he’d worried about her too much. He hadn’t trusted her to be able to take care of herself, let alone keep anyone else safe. He was a good man. An exceptional one at that. But he could never seem to forget the carefree, spontaneous child he’d grown up with enough to see the woman she’d become. And yes, she still hated rules and boundaries, something that drove Haki crazy in terms of potentially endangering herself out in the wild, but that didn’t mean she was reckless. She was just overly courageous.
“You’re lost in thought.”
“Oh. I’m so sorry,” Pippa said, blinking and taking a sip of her drink. “I’m tired, and there has been so much going on. Instead of getting to rest on my day off, I feel like my mind is in overdrive.”
“Those girls must have made quite an impression on you if you’re thinking about them instead of relishing the time off.”
Their dad was on her mind, too, but no way was she going to point that out. She wasn’t even sure if she should tell her family what he actually did for a living. What if they discouraged her from returning to care for the twins? Her issue was with their father, not them.
“They are not easily forgotten,” Pippa said with a smirk.
“You should bring the girls out here. Let us meet them. Let them see the elephants. They’d love it.”
“I should.”
“Yes.” Niara took her mug over to the sink and washed it out. She hesitated, then leaned on the counter and gave Pippa a knowing look. “You should bring their father along, too.”
* * *
PIPPA HAD SLUMPED her entire body over the sink in Dax’s half bath as soon as he’d left for work that morning. Then she’d splashed water on her face to calm her nerves and wake herself up. It did nothing to quell the unsettled feeling in her stomach. She hadn’t slept much last night because the fight between them over his work kept playing over and over in her head. She needed to push through the fatigue. The last time she’d fallen asleep on the job, Dax had ended up washing her hair. That wasn’t happening again. Not ever.
But here she was, hours later, struggling to stay awake. The girls had also been acting subdued and almost too focused on homework all day. Pippa walked back to their room after using the half bath, since Ivy was in the other bathroom, and found Fern crouched face down on her bed. Her shoulders shook with sobs. Ivy was curled up beside her sister, like twin fetuses nestled against each other in their mother’s womb.
Ivy looked over at Pippa.
“Why won’t you just leave now! Get it over with. You’re no different from the rest. They always leave. Even Mom left. Just go.” Her last words came out on a soft, despondent, agonizing sob. Stoic Ivy, crying. Pippa felt her chest rip open.
Their nannies always left, but wasn’t it because Ivy and Fern had wanted them to leave? They’d pushed every one of them away. They had done everything they could to try to scare Pippa off, too. And all this time she’d been so sure it was only because they’d wanted Dax to themselves. They wanted a father who was present.
But that wasn’t all, was it? Even Mom left. Pippa covered her mouth and swallowed back salty tears. It had never been about pushing anyone away. It was about testing them to see who would leave. They’d tested her, and she had almost passed. Almost.
She started to sit next to them, but both girls scooted off and onto the floor between the two beds.
Fern sat in the corner gasping between sobs. Ivy’s face was scrunched painfully tight as her tears fell silently.
Pippa moved around the bed and sat on the floor with them, grabbing their hands when they tried to move away from her again. She tugged them down and wrapped her arms around them both.
How could she promise not to abandon them when it wasn’t in her control? Even if she stayed for however many months Dax was assigned to work here, they’d eventually move back to America. Pippa’s life was here. Letting them get this attached to her had never been her intention. She’d never expected to love and care for them so deeply. She kissed each one on the top of her head.
“As long as you’re in Africa, I’ll be here with you.”
“But we heard you tell Dad that he needed to find someone else soon,” Ivy accused. She tried swiping her face dry, but more tears fell.
“This is all my fault,” Fern wailed. “I shouldn’t have said anything. My big mouth.”
“It’s not your fault, Fern. I would have found out sooner or later. Honesty means a lot to me. You’re not a big mouth. You just love the truth.”
“I didn’t mean to make you mad, Fern,” Ivy said, trying to steady her breath. “Or you, Miss Pippa.”
“Girls. No amount of mud in my hair or identity tricks or stolen batteries is going to scare me away. You’re too special to me. You’ve made this summer the best I’ve had in a long time, and no matter what the future holds, or wherever you are, I’ll always be here for you. That’s just the way it’s going to be, so you can both stop fighting it.”
“We can still be friends after we move back home?” Ivy asked.
“Absolutely. There’s that little thing called technology. It has its pluses. Maybe you dad can set you each up with em
ail accounts so that you can contact me as often as you like.”
“You think he would?” Fern asked.
“It never hurts to ask. And I have a feeling he’d say yes,” Pippa said.
They snuggled against her, and she sat there with them until the sobs softened into hiccups and their eyes closed. She leaned back against the side of the bed and stroked their hair gently as they slept in her arms.
Here she was asking them to be strong, but she wasn’t even sure she’d be able to cope when it came time for them to go. Was this what it was like to be a mother? To worry and hope and love a child as if your life depended on it? To be ready to sacrifice that life in an instant if it meant protecting that person?
She finally understood part of the reason why her mother had been determined to keep Pippa’s birth a secret for so long...and why her father had been determined to raise her when he found out she existed. Thank goodness they’d come to realize that they not only loved her, they loved each other.
Ivy and Fern’s parents would never be together again. Dax was all they had. Her family at Busara were all the orphaned elephants had, at least until they got older.
Her lids felt heavy, and the sound of Ivy and Fern’s soft breaths was sedating. A few minutes of sleep. That’s all she needed. Just a few minutes.
CHAPTER NINE
TODAY WAS THE DAY. Dax marched through the dry grasses, careful not to disturb any of the cables or geophones they’d laid out. The receiver grid was finally complete and they were ready to start registering readings.
He hadn’t been planning to be here. He’d even warned his crew of the possibility of his nanny not showing up and that he might have to stay with his daughters if she didn’t. But Pippa had come that morning.
Something overpowering had gripped his chest when he opened the door and saw her standing there. She’d simply said that she was there because she’d given the twins her word. He didn’t care that she was there for the twins and not him. Just seeing her again was enough. And it wasn’t because he had to work. In fact, a part of him wished he was back at the lodge with them now.
Three Vibroseis trucks sat in line waiting for the green light to begin inching their way along the grid, while stopping at intervals to pound vibrations into the earth. The seismic reflections generated were what Dax needed for developing maps. He preferred this technique over dynamite charges because it didn’t pose a chemical threat to the environment. Ironic, since he was surveying for an oil company. At least he was doing what he could do to mitigate damage. Not that these massive trucks didn’t leave a trace. There would be surface damage, for sure. There was no way around it.
His team had their computer systems running and ready to take in data. Dax started to put his ear protection on but stopped. The truck hadn’t turned their engines on, yet he could feel ground vibrations.
From the way the entire crew startled and looked around at each other, they were all feeling it. The tremor increased in intensity slightly before it suddenly stopped.
Less than a minute and just strong enough to feel.
Even Steven looked up and held out his hands for everyone to wait, in case the shaking resumed, but it didn’t. The quake was brief and fairly weak. Had Pippa and the girls felt it back at the lodge?
“Hold off on the test,” Dax called out. Now wasn’t the time to have the trucks sending acoustic pulses down. It wasn’t the time to gather readings for the mapping, either...but Dax sure as heck wanted to see what his seismograph had picked up. “Don’t try to tell me that one wasn’t worth noting,” Dax said to Steven.
“That was definitely not one to ignore. They’re disposing down at the field. I was just there earlier,” Steven said.
Dax wanted to curse but bit his tongue. Steven had volunteered the information, but Dax still didn’t trust him entirely.
“Ron told me he’d pass my concerns to senior management about the readouts we were getting,” Dax said. That was when he’d gotten suspicious readings the first few days he was here. This tremor was a game changer.
Hydraulic fracturing generated anywhere from hundreds of thousands to millions of gallons of wastewater per well that had to be disposed of somewhere. So the company routinely injected the wastewater into holding cells dug deep into the earth, a method already under fire back in the United States.
Most of his colleagues had believed there was a link between wastewater injection and an increase in earthquake activity for years now. Studies were finally starting to come in showing a strong link.
But what concerned Dax was whether Erebus would risk trying to reach oil trapped next to a fault. That had a high risk factor for causing tremors or even larger quakes. Were they doing that now? Were the tremors from fracking to access oil where the permeability was low, or from wastewater injections? Either way, they were far too close to a fault as far as he was concerned, but that’s what happened when decisions were left to bureaucrats and science was ignored.
Oil companies hired seismologists all the time to help them find the best drilling locations. But environmental groups and those in academic research also wanted experts to back them up—seismologists who would give expert testimony and evidence on their behalf. In effect, counter studies.
And he was walking a tight rope between money and morals by being here. He knew in his gut what they’d just felt was related to the injections. He wasn’t an idiot.
“Guys, come with me. I want to see this,” Dax said to his team. He purposefully looked to his men...not Steven. He needed to see whatever had been recorded during the tremor. He needed a sign. Was this a precursor event? An isolated one?
God help him...were the twins safe? They were with Pippa. She knew the land. She understood geology. If she felt something or thought they were in danger, she’d protect them. He didn’t doubt that for a second. But he wanted to be with them right now. All three of them.
“I called our main office,” Steven said, running over. “They want a report by the end of the day. Marked confidential.”
Steven had called? Who? Ron Swale, or someone else? And why’d he go over Dax? Man, the guy irritated him. And it wasn’t just because of his loyalties. He was passive-aggressive and a subtle manipulator. Dax spared Steven a quick glance.
“It’s the only way I send them,” Dax said. He’d make his own call. He wasn’t going to overlook his protocol just because Steven had overstepped.
And if he didn’t get a response—or he didn’t get the response he wanted—he’d take matters into his own hands.
Sandy’s face filled his mind.
She’d given up on him because he’d become obsessed with figuring out how to save lives, to the point that he hadn’t been living his own...at least not with her and the babies. She’d left him because he’d immersed himself in his research.
Yet, now he couldn’t help but sense her disapproval, even in spirit. The environmental advocate in her would have hated this. If she were alive and well right now, she’d probably leave him all over again for giving up his soul to Erebus. To darkness.
Guilt settled in the pit of his stomach like black sludge. God help him, he felt like he really was caught in some dark realm between earth and Hades. He couldn’t seem to do anything right. Pippa’s face replaced Sandy’s, and her words came back to him. Sandy had begged him to be there for the twins, and Pippa was telling him he wasn’t there enough.
And his own conscience said he needed to do whatever it would take to halt Erebus’s drilling. At least until experts could figure out what was going on before it was too late.
True, he’d decided to work with oil companies because he could earn more. But he had needed that money to support his daughters. He’d made that career choice, now he had to live with it. But had he made the right one? What kind of example was he setting for the twins? Money over morality? Short-term results over long-term consequences?
He needed to make things right.
He wiped the sweat from his neck with a small rag he kept in the back pocket of his jeans. The air was dry and the sun was merely warm, but every cell in him felt like it was simmering beneath his skin. Maybe his instincts were trying to warn of a larger quake in the future. Or maybe it was his conscience burning him up.
If the universe was testing him, he was failing miserably.
He removed his hard hat, raked his hair back and replaced the protection.
Pippa. He’d had a handle on things before she’d entered their lives. He’d been doing fine with raising the twins, hadn’t he? Well, apart from the high nanny turnover.
He blinked up at the sky and hoped the guys would think he was deciding whether or not it would be safe to proceed with the trucks.
The nannies. Sandy used to say that everything happened for a reason. He hated that saying. It meant that the death of his friend and even Sandy’s passing had a purpose...that all the losses he’d suffered had been necessary.
It wasn’t. Not to him. It was as senseless now as it had been then. But a part of him couldn’t help but wonder if the departure of each nanny had led them to Pippa. Or Pippa to them. No. He was losing it. That sun had to be hotter than he gave it credit for. Or maybe the tremor had shaken up his senses. The stress of working among people whom he disagreed with fundamentally was getting to him. He was also a hypocrite. Even Ivy and Fern had called him out on lying about his job.
But they weren’t parents. Someday they’d understand that everything he did, he did with them in mind. He lived to give them better life.
If only life wasn’t so complicated.
* * *
DAX LEANED BACK and raised his legs onto the empty wicker chair on the other side of the garden table as he peeled another fig. The air was heavy with the scent of fruit. He watched as Ivy and Fern picked mangoes from a small grove of trees on the outskirts of the lodge perimeter, with Alim’s guidance. They were growing on the old waiter.
