Guarding the Princess(44)
She squinted up, trying to catch her breath. “I need to sit for a minute.”
His jaw tightened.
“Please.”
Brandt relented. “Just for a second, okay? It’s not a good place.”
She lowered herself onto a rock, taking her hat off and dragging her hand over her hair. Despite the dust, it still gleamed rich blue-black in the sunlight. Her skin was glowing from exertion. Brandt felt he was going mad—she was more beautiful to him by the second. It was driving him to distraction—bewitched by the exotic princess.
She looked up with those big liquid black eyes fringed by long lashes.
“What are you thinking?”
He shook himself. “Nothing,” he said, unhooking the GPS from his belt, and rechecking their route, waypoints.
“If you’ve got satellite coverage for that—” she jerked her chin at his GPS “—a satellite phone could have worked out here.”
“Too bad I lost mine while saving your ass at the lodge, huh?”
Her mouth flattened. She glanced away, watched a row of red ants carrying pieces of some dead animal.
He hooked the GPS back. “Ready?”
She said nothing, but got to her feet, clearly spent.
Brandt set a slightly slower pace so she could keep up, but losing time ate at him. The sun was moving in its arc over the sky, and shadows were growing longer already—they needed to get up that cliff before darkness fell.
“What do you farm, Brandt?” Dalilah called from behind after a while. “How much land do you have?”
The question startled him. He’d hoped she’d given up poking into his personal life.
“Big enough.”
“For what? Game? Cattle? Maize?”
Brandt wanted to remain silent, keep to himself, but on another level he knew talking would keep her mind off things. “My land forms part of a privately held game conservation area,” he called over his shoulder. “It’s a block of about ten kilometers by twenty.”
“So...” She jogged a little to keep up, her voice breathless. “You offer game viewing?”
“Not in my segment.”
“But your neighbors do?”
“I never see them.”
“I mean, do your neighbors run safaris?”
Irritation sliced through him. “Yeah.”
“Do you ever plan to?”
He stopped, spun round. “No, because I don’t like people, Dalilah. Running camps for idiot tourists who ask too many stupid questions would drive me mad.”
She had the audacity to smile. “You’re already mad.”
Brandt glared at her. “I’m thinking postal.”
She met his glare. “I bet you weren’t always like this.”
“Like what?”
“Bitter and twisted.”
He wiped sweat from his brow. “And what makes you so sure?”
“I also bet that you’re trying to grow things on your land.”
“So now you’re psychic?”
“You called it a farm.”
He moistened his lips.
“So, what are you trying to farm?”
“Have you forgotten we’ve got killers on our ass? Come on, we need to move.” He resumed marching, faster now, hotter under the collar, part of him trying to escape her, even as he needed to keep her close. He thought of the whiskey in his pocket. What are you seeking alcoholic relief from, Brandt, me?
Yeah, he thought. You got that right.
But relief would not come, not even from the bottom of his whiskey flask until this was over. What unsettled him more was that he actually wanted to answer her last question, tell her what he was trying to do with his land. He never had a need to share, not this stuff. Yeah, maybe he might shoot the breeze and bounce ideas off the blokes in the pub in Gaborone, or around the safari bar while the guests slept before he flew home.
But this woman?
Maybe it was because she knew water-delivery systems, understood the complexities of farming in drought-ridden soil, understood how to deliver solar power. She came from the Sahara herself. She wasn’t just an ordinary woman.
“I put a new tank up last week.”
“What?”
“A water tank,” he said over his shoulder. “And I installed an enhanced solar system for heating the water, with extra panels for the house, and an enlarged security fence to keep wildlife out of my growing area. The solar system will be connected to provide power for lights, radio communications, battery charging, computers, VSAT, cell-phone charging. The works. Got a borehole and windmill system, too. For the fields, I tried pumping water from the river.”
She caught up again. “And what are you trying to grow in the fields?” she said, right behind him now, a fresh energy and curiosity in her voice. Brandt realized the conversation really was helpful to her. And she was truly interested, from an academic point of view.