Diamond Sky

by Annie Seaton

  He knew that he’d rattled her, and now that several days had passed, he regretted mentioning it. He’d given too much away. But the damn woman pushed his bloody buttons. She had an answer for everything and he’d wanted to see her reaction. And he’d sure got one. She’d almost dropped her glass when he’d spoken and her cheeks flushed a rosy pink.

  He nodded to the others at the table. ‘Hi everyone, I’m Connor Kirk. I work with Dru down at Matsu.’

  The older man at the end of the table pointed to the empty chair. ‘Take a seat. The more the merrier.’ He introduced the others sitting at the table as Dru sat straight, her face devoid of expression. Connor pulled out the chair and sat down before she could voice the objection that he knew was on her lips.

  Despite what he’d said, he’d known that she hadn’t been on the flight out to Perth. Not only had he pulled up her flight booking from Kununurra to Darwin, he’d slipped a GPS tracking device beneath the bumper on her car before she’d left the mine site, just to make sure she did come this way. Dru’s flight was at one pm. Luckily for him, an earlier flight ran at eleven am on Saturdays to cater for the tourists heading to Darwin for the weekend—it would have been a bit hard to stay out of Dru’s sight on an eleven-seat plane. He’d follow her from the airport and see who she met up with, plus he’d got her Darwin address from the staff database. She was in his sights for the next two weeks.

  He’d had no luck in his investigation of the other staff that John Robinson had flagged. He’d started deep internet searches on them but not yet unearthed anything suspicious.

  There was no other reason to suspect Liam Carruthers apart from the money he’d been bragging about. As a truck driver he had no access to any of the places on site where the diamonds were held. Nothing yet on Rocky Cardella either, but he was still a person of high interest.

  He’d added two more names himself—Adam Hennessey and Don Finlayson—but to date he’d not looked deeply into either of them. Hennessey had been more than co-operative showing him through the security section, and his safety manuals and procedures were the best on site, but there was something not right about him. He had more digging for Greg to do into both Hennessey’s and Finlayson’s backgrounds before he cleared them.

  At the moment Connor’s money was on Porter, with maybe Cardella as an accomplice. Although nothing had come up in the X-ray scan as she’d left the site, he intended keeping a very close eye on Dru.

  Don’t trust anyone. Don’t take anything at face value. If he’d learned that earlier in his career, he’d probably still be in the Federal Police force.

  ‘Connor.’ She nodded briefly and half-turned away from him.

  ‘So you work down at the mine, Dru.’ The older man shot Connor a curious look.

  ‘We thought you were on holidays,’ Chrissie chimed in. ‘Just goes to show you never get it right, Pete.’ The other woman laughed and Dru joined in.

  ‘We took a flight down to the diamond mine last week. It’s a very interesting place,’ Rob said.

  Dru nodded and the couples looked at her expectantly. Connor sat back and folded his arms. Social chitchat always made him uncomfortable. He preferred his own company to spending time with casual acquaintances—people he’d never met before and would probably never encounter again. If he was honest, he preferred his own company full stop. The only time he’d lived with a woman and been a part of her social world had been difficult. In that way, it had been a relief when he’d walked out.

  ‘Yes, it is. There’s a couple of planes come in every day with tours.’ Dru appeared to have regained her composure and the flush had faded from her cheeks. Her voice was soft though, and Connor had to lean forward to hear her response over the buzz of conversation in the bistro.

  ‘What do you do there?’

  ‘I’m an engineer. In charge of site restoration.’ Her voice grew in confidence.

  June nodded and smiled. ‘I really enjoyed the tour but I felt guilty the whole time. As though I was being watched. The security there is amazing.’ Her eyes were wide. ‘The tour guide told us what not to do. You’re not allowed to pick up anything off the ground, or take photos of the security cameras. I was barely game to get off the bus.’ June giggled.

  ‘But you enjoyed your time in the diamond shop, didn’t you, darling?’ Rob’s smile was gleeful.

  June leaned over and nudged her husband. ‘I did.’ She looked across at the other couple. ‘Tell Dru and Connor what my lovely husband bought for me, guys.’

  Chrissie laughed and shook her head. ‘He’s such a generous guy, is our Rob. He bought us all an ice cream!’

  The happy banter continued between the two couples, and it ensued that Pete had been in a similar occupation before he’d retired. ‘But a zinc mine is nowhere near as exotic as diamonds, is it, Pete?’ Chrissie chipped in.

  ‘My work is really not that different to any other site restoration project,’ Dru said. ‘Out in the heat of the desert, and a lot of the work can be boring.’

  ‘Where else have you worked?’

  Dru lifted her gaze and looked at Connor. He could have sworn her chin tipped up a little as she stared at him. ‘I was overseas for a couple of years before I came here.’

  ‘Nothing like seeing the world when you’re young. Then you can see Australia when you’re our age.’

  Pete was greeted by a chorus of protests. ‘Our age!’

  The conversation turned to travel as a waitress brought two large pizzas to the table.

  While the others shared out the pieces, Dru turned to Connor, and her whispered words were terse. ‘What are you doing here?’

  He frowned and pretended not to know what she meant. He gestured to his plate. ‘I’m having dinner. Are you?’

  Dru reached for a slice of pizza. ‘You know very well what I mean. Why are you following me?’ Her whisper was harsh but her voice cracked a little as she spoke.

  Guilty conscience kicking in? he wondered.

  He raised his hands in front of him and played dumb. ‘Whoa, right there. Why on earth would I be following you? I thought you were on the flight out to Perth, remember?’ He shrugged. ‘I was as surprised to see you as you seemed to be to see me. I don’t recall seeing a car in front of me as I negotiated that bastard of a dirt road. Maybe you were invisible?’

  Her expression was closed and her lips set tightly together. He jutted his chin out to match her tilted chin and they were silent as the battle of wills played out.

  Finally she lowered her eyes to her hands. They were clenched in her lap, and she was squeezing them so hard her knuckles were white from lack of circulation. She was hiding something; he had no doubt of that, but an unfamiliar surge of sympathy appeared from somewhere within him. The two men were still immersed in conversation, but the women sent a couple of curious glances their way.

  ‘Sorry, that was a bit rude.’ He shrugged and spread his hands in an attempt to allay her suspicion. ‘Look. I’m on a short break too. I thought I’d have a look at the Kimberley while I’m here at the mine. So I drove to Kununurra. Found the best caravan park, and here I am. Simple as that.’ The lie came easily.

  ‘Where are you staying?’ Her voice was still low. She reached for the pizza and nibbled around the edges as he watched.

  ‘I told you. Here in this park.’

  ‘I got the last cabin.’ Her gaze challenged him.

  ‘I’m on a grass site down by the lake. Camping. In my swag.’ Dru didn’t need to know that he’d tried to get a cabin and when there was nothing available apart from an unpowered site he’d gone into town and bought a swag at the camping store. He was well used to roughing it in Indonesia.

  ‘Oh.’ She put the pizza back on her plate and fluttered her fingers against the patterned fabric on her thigh. The brashness he’d observed in her previously had disappeared completely. The woman sitting in this casual outdoor area was very different to the hard, confident card player the night he’d met her. Softer, more feminine. And putting on a
vulnerable act with the big eyes and the soft voice.

  Maybe she was trying to use her feminine wiles to distract him. But there was Buckley’s chance of that happening. Fluttering eyes, sexy looks and poses, and tears; over the years he’d learned every trick a woman could use to get her own way.

  Maybe it was because Dru was out of the work clothes he was used to, but there was an aura of something lingering around her tonight.

  Sadness? Uncertainty? Vulnerability? Even fear.

  As he fought to kill the sympathy and recover the steely determination that drove him, she stood and placed her hands on the table.

  ‘Well, it was lovely to meet you all. Enjoy the rest of your trip. I’ll pay my share of the meal on the way out.’

  ‘No, our shout,’ Rob said.

  ‘Thank you.’ She nodded to the two couples before turning to him. ‘You too, Connor. Watch out for the midges down near the water. They’ll eat you alive in a swag.’

  She sounded as though she hoped they would.

  *

  Dru’s heart was thudding and her fingers tingling as she hurried back to the cabin. Until Connor had turned up, she’d managed to relax a little bit and had even been beginning to enjoy herself. She should have known better than to let her guard down.

  Was it merely a coincidence that Connor was here? True, he’d been nowhere near her on the road and she’d told no one where she was staying so she had to accept it was just that.

  A bloody coincidence. Of course it would be her blasted luck that something else happened to shake her just when she had started to calm down.

  After she’d changed into her PJs, Dru turned the light off and stood by the window. Lights flickered from a couple of the tents and the soft strumming of a guitar came from the area where three Wicked campervans were parked in a small circle. A bit like a wagon train. She smiled despite the regret that pinged through her; how nice would that be? To be comfortable with friends like that and enjoy being on the road. Good company, safe and secure; confident in your own world.

  It was time to do something about this fear that was always waiting to consume her. She couldn’t spend the rest of her life living like this.

  Dru was about to go to bed when she caught a movement in her peripheral vision. Connor was sauntering casually down the road, and as she watched he turned right at the end of the road onto the grassy verge by the lake where she’d seen the Matsu ute earlier. LJ 203; she memorised the large yellow letters on the side. She still didn’t trust him.

  As he reached a light at the end of the road down to the lake, he stopped and turned around and stared directly at her cabin. Dru stepped back behind the curtain. Her blood turned to ice and she swallowed as her stomach churned.

  He knew which cabin she was in.

  Chapter 14

  Connor slept lightly that night; his acute hearing was attuned to the sound of a car leaving from the direction of Dru’s cabin. What he hadn’t counted on was the mass exodus of RVs, campervans and caravans from sunrise on. He grabbed his towel and strolled up to the amenities block. Dru’s blue car was still in the carport next to her cabin, and the curtains remained firmly closed.

  An hour later, they were still closed and there was no sign of life as he packed up the swag and placed it in the back of the work ute he had borrowed. John Robinson had cleared him to use any of the mine facilities, although the security guard at the gate had raised an eyebrow when Connor had signed the vehicle out.

  ‘You’re lucky. Unusual for a newbie to get a work ute to take off site on their break.’

  ‘Good to hear.’ Connor had stared the man down until he looked away. ‘I’m pleased that policies are being followed.’ Let him think what he liked, Connor reported to no one apart from the CEO. But he knew it would cause talk, so he tempered his words with a casual comment and a wide smile. ‘And yeah, it makes my life easier. Had to get to Darwin for some personal business and the boss agreed as a one-off.’

  He waited in the ute until he saw the curtains open in Dru’s cabin. He knew that he had made her uncomfortable and he wanted to allay any suspicions she might have. Last thing he wanted was to have her watching him. He kicked himself; for the first time in a long time he’d let a suspect get under his skin. Despite her height and confident bearing, Dru’s strength was overlaid by an air of vulnerability. A sadness that seemed to be a part of who she was.

  For God’s sake. He was letting his emotions be affected. It was threatening his judgement.

  Connor started the car and cruised slowly past her cabin towards the gate. He wasn’t going to give her any more reason to be wary of him. He’d seen her flight booking and he’d booked a seat on the plane that left two hours earlier. Once they got to Darwin, he’d make sure that she didn’t see him at all. His surveillance would be much more discreet.

  He knew her address; but he was going to hire a car and follow her from the airport and track her movements. For all he knew she could meet someone there before she went to her apartment, though he hoped that wouldn’t happen. Once she parked her car at the airport at Kununurra he had no way of tracking her. He’d have to wait at Darwin airport and follow her when she disembarked. He’d have plenty of time to collect the car before her flight landed.

  Outside the caravan park he turned left and drove into town, parking the car in a car park in the middle of the shopping precinct. Being a Saturday morning, there were markets in the town park and he soon lost himself in the crowd. At the edge of the park, a coffee stall was set up and there were a few vacant plastic chairs beneath the huge trees. He ordered a coffee and positioned himself in a chair up against one of the wide tree trunks. Pulling out his smartphone, he logged in and opened the tracking software. Dru’s car hadn’t moved. She was still at the caravan park.

  Shit. What if someone was meeting her there? He had left too much to chance here.

  Keeping half an eye on the screen, he sipped his coffee and took in his surroundings. It appeared that many of the people who’d left the park early were here at the Kununurra markets. A long convoy of caravans and RVs filled the side of the road from the edge of the park out to the highway.

  He expelled a relieved breath as the blue circle on his screen finally began to move. She probably wouldn’t go straight to the airport; there was plenty of time before she needed to check in and the airport was only a couple of kilometres west of town. He concentrated on the screen as the software tracked her route. She was heading towards town. If she ran into him, so be it, but he would try to stay out of her sight. He could only claim so many meetings as coincidences.

  The blue dot stopped a couple of streets away from where he was sitting in the park. Connor switched his screen to street view and let his breath out in a low whistle.

  A coincidence?

  Dru had parked in the car park outside Pentecost River Fine Diamonds. Pushing his chair back, he threw the coffee cup into a nearby bin and took off for the store at a brisk walk. Maybe that was the connection. He was certain she had no diamonds with her this trip—she’d cleared the X-ray point—but there could be a link. Maybe that was where she usually dropped them off?

  By the time he reached the front of the shopping mall across from the diamond outlet there was no sign of Dru, but her vehicle was in one of the parking spaces out the front. Connor stood outside a real estate agency focusing his interest on the window, keeping the reflection of the store in his sight. As he watched, the light caught the sliding doors as they opened and Dru walked out with a short man. Connor stepped back to the side of the building and stood in the shadows observing the interaction.

  She held up a small bag and put her other hand on the guy’s arm. An animated conversation ensued until with a final wave, Dru crossed the road and headed in the direction of the markets, the bag clutched firmly in her hand.

  Connor waited until she turned the corner and was out of sight, and then crossed the road to the store. He slipped his phone into his shirt pocket and walked through the automa
tic sliding doors. They closed noiselessly behind him. The air pumping from the air conditioner was cold and the room was bathed in bright light. Two L-shaped showcases were at the back of the store and tall glass cabinets lined each side wall. Four three-tiered free-standing display units were placed symmetrically in the open space in the centre of the store.

  Crossing to the first cabinet on the side wall, he let his eyes move from the top of the case to the bottom. The shelves glistened with a variety of jewellery and he held back a whistle of surprise. The pink diamond necklace draped over a stand on the top shelf held a discrete price tag of over three hundred thousand dollars. Not what he expected in a small town at the edge of the Kimberley. He glanced up, not surprised to see three cameras placed at regular intervals along the top of each wall. Turning slowly he looked up. Four more cameras were positioned above the door, and he was sure there would be smaller cameras hidden throughout the store if that necklace was an indication of the value of the jewellery in here.

  ‘Can I help you, sir?’ A woman in a black skirt and pale pink shirt had appeared by his side. The other women behind the counter wore the same uniform. Elegant and understated. There was no sign of the man that Dru had been speaking to outside the store.

  ‘Yes, I’m looking for a present for my mother.’

  Her perfectly plucked eyebrows rose as she nodded, and he was enveloped by a cloud of nauseatingly strong perfume.

  ‘Jewellery?’

  He followed the direction of her arm as she gestured to the showcases in the middle of the room.

  ‘We also sell diamond-based cosmetics, as well as an array of accessories such as business card holders and clutch bags with pink diamond chips set into the edge.’

  ‘No, definitely a piece of jewellery.’

  ‘Certainly. Our diamonds are all local pink and violet diamonds, with some cheaper cognacs in the counter display. Do you have any particular piece in mind?’

  ‘Perhaps some earrings?’ Connor smothered a grin. His mother would have laughed at the idea of him spending money on ‘baubles’ as she called them. Never leaving her alternate lifestyle behind as most of her friends had done when it was no longer trendy to be a hippie, she’d be happier with a necklace made with string and a couple of beads.