by Annie Seaton
Connor turned and leaned against the sink. Dru was really bringing out the worst in him; he would have to be careful that her antipathy towards him didn’t make him overreact and taint his judgement.
‘My brief here has a focus on compliance, quality assurance and implementing change and improvement processes.’ Connor bit back a grin as he continued with the spiel he had memorised. After the first five minutes, her eyes had begun to glaze over. Finally he pulled out a chair and sat across from her with a smile. ‘So you understand how all this impacts on your role as chief engineer of the rehabilitation team?’
‘I do.’ She had relaxed into her chair and he sensed a softening of her attitude.
‘Look, I know this can be boring, but it’s all about preventing accidents, fatalities, injuries and occupational disease.’
‘And improving profit.’ The cynicism in her voice sent a ripple of surprise through Connor.
‘Of course.’ He nodded. ‘That’s what business is about. We’d be naive if we thought anything else.’
‘Look, Mr Ki—Connor.’ This time her voice was strong. ‘I love my job and I take pride in doing it properly, and seeing that my team does too. I’m happy to answer your questions and tick the boxes, but I want to do it quickly. Okay? I’ve got a lot of work to get through out there today before it gets too hot.’
‘So as far as you are aware, you follow the mandatory safety procedures that the company has set?’
‘I do. We all do here.’
He picked up the manual and flicked through to the relevant section. He’d prepared well for this meeting because he wanted to catch her unaware. ‘Section three paragraph two: “At all times when working in the field an employee will have a work buddy within sight.” ’
‘And your point is?’ Back to the icy glare.
‘The other night when you were on shift after the card game, who was rostered on with you?’
‘I’m the team leader.’
‘So you are above the policies? I don’t think so, Dru.’
‘Of course I’m not. Wait a minute. How do you know I was out there by myself?’
‘I saw you. You were alone. Apart from the few minutes that Rocky was with you.’
‘Creeping Jesus,’ she muttered.
‘I beg your pardon?’
This time she stood and he had to look up at her as she towered over him. ‘Is part of your brief to spy on the staff while they are trying to do their job?’
‘My brief is to ensure that all staff are complying with safety policies, and it appears to me that your section pays lip service to them.’ He dropped the folder on the table with a thud. ‘Easy to write it down and tick the boxes. A whole different matter when the boss doesn’t follow it. A couple of you seem to be taking your responsibilities very lightly. Do you think you are above them?’
‘No. I don’t.’
‘What if you’d had an accident out there? What if you’d fallen? Been bitten by a snake?’ He stood and she was eye to eye with him. ‘Look, Dru, this isn’t a pissing contest to see who’s the strongest. It’s about safety. It’s about your people not wandering over the site however they please.’
‘I’ll see to it.’ Her voice was as hard as her eyes and that did piss him off. Connor hadn’t been going to come in for the kill but he had exposed her soft underbelly and it was time to strike. Dru had presented him with an opportunity to rattle her and he took a gamble.
‘I have a question for you. Is that the reason you lost your job in Dubai? Non-compliance with company policy?’
Despite her fair complexion, her face paled even more as she took in her breath in a quick gasp. The freckles on her aquiline nose stood out and her mouth stayed open as she stumbled back to the chair and dropped into it. Something akin to sympathy ran through him as she stared up at him, her breath coming quickly. Her hands were still clenched together and for a moment he was sure that it was fear that crossed her face.
Fear that she was going to be found out?
Her eyes closed and he could see her throat working.
Connor moved across to the sink and filled a glass with water.
‘Thank you.’ Her voice shook and her expression was still one of distress as she took the glass from him. ‘How do you know I worked in Dubai?’
He waved a dismissive hand. ‘Someone mentioned it the other night. I can’t remember who it was exactly.’
Even after she had drained the glass her breath came in deep gulps.
‘Are you all right?’ Fake concern edged his words as he watched her reaction. Not what he had expected at all. Had she twigged that he was on to her? Or was she just a bloody good actress? Putting this on him to gain his sympathy?
‘I will ask you one more time.’ Her cheeks had two spots of colour high on her cheeks and this time her voice was composed. ‘How did you know I worked in Dubai?’
‘I can’t remember.’
‘You’re lying,’ she whispered as she put the glass back onto the table so hard Connor was surprised it didn’t crack. ‘It is none of your business. It’s nobody’s business.’
Connor was left alone as she strode to the door and pulled it shut behind her.
Chapter 11
‘Everything looks good, Jim.’ Connor nodded at the supervisor of the processing plant as they stepped out of the sorting room the next day. ‘And ah . . . your area has been accident free for a twelve month period, and the documents are all in order. Signage is good, and I can’t see a problem with anything here this afternoon.’
‘Thanks, I’m proud of the tight ship we run here. We had a breakdown the other night, but it was mechanical. Nothing to do with the safety procedures,’ Jim said. ‘An absolute pain in this part of the plant because of the security.’
‘How’s that?’ Connor looked at him curiously as they walked past the processing plant. It had been stinking hot in there. The sides of the plant were open to allow the noise and the dust to escape, but even so, the temperature must have already been in the mid-forties. It had been a relief to step into the air-conditioned sorting room.
‘The paperwork takes me hours. Who was on shift when it broke; who dismantled the equipment; where it’s going; if it’s coming back; who took it out; who drove the truck. Bloody ridiculous.’
Connor filed that statement away.
Jim turned to him. ‘Now before we go, we both have to go through the search regime down in the search room.’
‘You too?’
‘Yep. Everyone.’
Connor let surprise cross his face. He’d set up this safety check of this part of the plant specifically so he could go through the sorting room and come out through the search room. After examining every process on site, he’d come to the conclusion that this was the weakest link in the security.
Jim stepped back to let Connor exit the building ahead of him. ‘You probably noticed there is only one entry and exit. Anyone who comes into the building goes through a search regime at the end of shift or whenever they leave the building for any reason. Even the CEO gets searched when he comes to visit.’
Two men were waiting outside a corrugated iron building in front of the exit. It looked more like a barn than a search facility. Jim nodded to them. ‘Sorry guys, do you mind if we jump the queue?’
‘No problem, boss.’
‘You can go first, Connor. I know you’ve got a meeting to get to after this.’
The door creaked as Connor stepped into the search waiting room. Jim waited outside chatting to the workmen.
A tall man in an orange hi-vis vest greeted him. ‘G’day mate, I’m Peter Allendale.’
Connor shook the hand that was extended to him. ‘Connor Kirk, Safety Officer.’
‘You’ve just been through the highest risk building on site, where we recover all the diamonds. This is the search waiting room where all the workers gather at the end of shift. First off we’ll check your boots to make sure you haven’t inadvertently picked up any diamonds in the soles.’
Connor lifted each foot in turn, while the other man checked his boots.
‘All good. Now we go into the search room.’ Peter pointed to a door in the middle of the back wall.
They stepped into a small anteroom and Peter nodded to a man sitting beside an X-ray machine on a small, wheeled trolley. ‘That’s Steve.’
The only other furniture in the small room was a desk that held three metal boxes and one chair. A poster-sized photo of the Matsu mine hung in the centre of the wall beside a clock. Connor nodded at Steve and got a brief nod in return. Peter locked the door and Connor raised his eyebrows in surprise.
‘Policy, mate. Sometimes we do a strip search, so the rule is lock the door so no one can walk in accidentally. We always have a witness to every search,’ Peter explained. ‘Steve will sign off to say that I have done the search, and he’ll also sign that the X-ray is clear if we need to X-ray anything.’
Connor’s mind began to tick over with possibilities. His instincts were screaming that this was the most likely scenario for bypassing the system. And ironically it was where the security was ostensibly the highest. What if there was collusion between the men who were supervising this search regime? He’d ask John about the process of selecting the men who worked here.
He paid close attention as Peter reached over to the desk and handed him a small plastic cylinder with a handle on the top. ‘What we have here is a shaker. Grab the handle. Give it a good shake and turn it upside down over the desk.’
Connor took it and gave it a shake. A yellow ball bounced out of the shaker onto the desk and Peter scooped it up.
‘Yellow, Steve.’
Steve made a note on a card.
Peter turned to Connor with a grin. ‘You’re in luck. Yellow means lowest level search, a partial removal. All you have to do is take off your shoes and socks and I’ll give you a pat down.’
‘Not what I expected.’ Connor nodded at the shaker.
‘It’s a random way of checking. Blue ball means shirt off search. Green is a strip down to your undies.’
‘I guess I’m in luck then,’ Connor said. ‘Although it seems like a bit of an archaic system.’
Peter shook his head. ‘The shaker is sealed. The result is totally random. It can’t be tampered with or predicted. And we’re being recorded.’ He jerked his head towards the cameras in each corner.
Connor nodded but remained unconvinced.
‘Okay, shoes and socks off. Shake your socks; make sure there’s nothing in them.’
Connor rested his hand on the desk and obliged.
‘Okay, all good. I’ve checked the soles of your boots again. Boots are clear.’ He nodded to Steve who made another note on the card. ‘Now turn your pockets out, and then I’ll do a pat down search.’
Connor put the keys to the work ute and his iPhone on the desk, along with his handkerchief and a packet of gum.
Peter picked up the gum and ran his fingers over the flat wrapped strips. ‘Still sealed.’ He nodded as he commented to Steve.
‘Now put your arms out, and I’ll run around your collar, across the back of your shoulders, down your back to make sure there’s no belt or anything strapped around your torso.’
Connor obliged as he was patted down. When Peter finished, he turned around to face him and Connor looked at him curiously. ‘Can I ask you a couple of questions?’
‘Sure can.’ Peter smiled at him. ‘We heard that there was a compliance check across the whole site. Too many accidents lately. His grin widened. ‘I guess we’re a part of it too but there’s not much chance of accidents in here.’
‘Unless you fall over taking your boots off,’ Steve said.
Connor laughed. ‘Don’t worry, Jim’s already passed over the workplace safety policies for the search regime process.’
‘Great.’ Peter nodded.
‘So from a safety point of view, when do you use that?’ He gestured to the X-ray machine.
‘If anyone has a packet of loose tobacco or a tube of cream or the like that’s impossible to search, they get put through the machine. If your gum had been opened, we probably would have run that through too. Any diamonds will fluoresce under the X-ray.’
‘Have you ever picked anyone up in here with a diamond on them?’ Connor waited as Steve handed the card over for Peter to sign.
‘Never.’
‘So no X-raying of workers themselves?’
Peter shook his head. ‘No, under health regulations we can’t do that.’
‘What do you do about someone who leaves the building a few times a day?’
‘Doesn’t matter if it’s once or ten times. We go through this search regime with everyone leaving the building, every time they leave.’ He handed the card to Connor for his signature. ‘Sign the search report here and then you can put your shoes and socks back on.’
‘Thanks.’ Connor signed the card and then bent over and quickly pulled on his socks and shoes.
‘Any more questions?’ Peter filed the card in a small metal box on the desk.
‘Just one. Do you ever do a body cavity search?’
Peter laughed. ‘With the gloves and the works? No mate, not on your Nellie. If it got to that stage of suspicion, the police would be called and a medical officer would do that part of the investigation.’ He pointed at the door marked exit. ‘You’re right to go. Good to meet you, Connor. Might see you over in the mess later.’
Connor walked out slowly. He was going straight back to his room to log his thoughts. This had been a worthwhile exercise.
Chapter 12
After Connor had left the office earlier that week—when she finally convinced him she wasn’t going to pass out like a weakling—Dru had managed to catch up with the team. They’d worked hard all week, the guy from Darwin had great ideas, and even Rocky had approved of his amendments to the revegetation plan. Now the schedule for the next two weeks was prepared and the three landscapers had a plan to follow until she came back on site after her two-week break.
If she came back after her break.
Dru had barely slept since Connor had asked her about Dubai. Her stomach had been churning, and her hands wouldn’t stop trembling. She’d been clumsy and slow out on the site, and that had pissed her off even more. She’d called Mum like she’d promised Emma, and had pretended to be fine, but the whole time her thoughts had been on Connor.
How the hell did he know she had worked in Dubai, and what did it have to do with a safety officer? What did he mean by how she’d lost her job there? No one at the mine knew where she had come from before this, and no one apart from Zayed and his personal assistant knew why she had left Dubai so suddenly. Well, Meg knew a little, and Sam knew a bit less, but they wouldn’t have told anyone.
Dru hugged her privacy to her like a protective cloak. All she had shared with the other staff was that she lived in Darwin, and some of her rehab team knew she’d done her degree at James Cook University. Not even Rocky knew about her time in Dubai.
The only Matsu staff who knew her background—and a sort of reason why she left Dubai—were the HR people in Perth who had interviewed her. All she had told them was that Dubai had not been what she expected. Whether they had believed her or not was irrelevant; her immediate supervisor had given her a glowing reference when she’d left—of course she hadn’t asked Zayed for one—and she’d nailed the interview. She had explained to the Matsu Human Resources officer that she would prefer that her previous employment be confidential due to the confidentiality agreement she’d signed when she had joined the Ain Dubai project. There was to be no link from Dubai to Matsu. As far as she was concerned, that time of her life was gone and she’d attempted to wipe it from her mind. What she buried deep, she couldn’t talk about in error. In hindsight, she realised she had been naive. Human resource records these days would be electronically stored on a staff database. Anyone with the right clearance could access them.
She had become too complacent. Someone had accesse
d her information.
On Friday afternoon Dru stood at the window of the staff building and pressed her forehead against the hot glass. What did it have to do with Connor? There’d been no safety breaches or accidents in her section since the day she commenced work at Matsu. Over the months, her time at the mine had fallen into a pattern. A pattern that soothed her and kept her calm and she didn’t want anyone threatening that.
Day shift, sleep at night.
Night shift, sleep by day.
Pretend to be sociable when she had to. Converse with her team. Play cards once a week. Try to keep the fear locked away. That was the hardest part.
Now her past had followed her. No matter how much he had insisted someone had told him, Connor was not speaking the truth. He must have accessed her staff records, but why would a safety and compliance officer need to do that?
For one irrational moment, Dru wondered if Zayed had sent him, but she gave a hollow laugh. That wasn’t his style at all. He wouldn’t send someone in under the guise of a compliance officer. If Zayed knew she was working at Matsu, and if he still wanted her, he could have sent one of his henchmen in to deal with her. Or to take her back to Dubai. That was the greatest fear that hung over her, day and night. And that was why Dru had kept her mouth shut and continued to do so.
Zayed’s beautiful dark eyes had burned into hers that last day. ‘This is my choice and it is the best thing for you,’ he’d said. ‘You’ll love life here with me.’
How had she ever found him attractive? She’d fallen for his charm like the naive woman she was, and stayed for two years until the emotional manipulation had her trapped in a cycle.
No more. She would trust no one.
Goosebumps rose on her arms and she blocked Zayed’s face from her thoughts. Despite the forty degree heat, by the time she had clocked off and driven back to the apartment to get changed and collect her bag, Dru was still shivering. All she wanted to do was get away. Put distance between her and the events of the week while she thought about what she should do. As much as the mine was her safety net, and kept her cocooned from the outside world, when she drove out through the security gate near the airstrip today it would be a relief.