Free East of the Sun by Janet Rogers Page B

something they wanted to keep hidden from Prism and the wider mining industry. Is that right?’
    Amelia nodded, not only impressed with his ability to distil the chaos in her head into such neat concepts, but also relieved that he’d understood so quickly. At the same time, she couldn’t help but wonder how many scenarios she was simply not seeing.
    ‘What’s your plan? Where are you starting? Do you know who was involved in the initial negotiations?’ he asked.
    ‘No, I don’t. I hope to find out. I’m starting at the obvious places – the police, the Canadian embassy and Prism. I’m not sure Sibraz would be willing to talk to me.’ She watched him closely, then asked carefully. ‘Do you have any ideas?’
    He regarded her for a long moment and to her surprise she found herself anxious to hear his opinion. In the last half hour something seemed to have shifted subtly, perhaps between them or perhaps merely in her mind. His solidity and quiet concentration appealed to her. For a few seconds he stared into space, his face unreadable, but when he turned his eyes back to her, she could see that he’d made the decision to help.
    ‘I have a few contacts. If you’d like me to, I could ask some questions. Maybe someone knows or remembers something.’
    ‘I’d appreciate that. Thank you.’
    An awkward moment followed. Neither said anything. To acknowledge that she was actually enlisting his help seemed too obvious and since she didn’t know quite how far she’d be willing to let him in, she didn’t want to say something she’d regret later.
    She got up. ‘More coffee?’
    ‘Eh, sure, thank you.’
    She started to turn away towards the coffee counter, but then stopped, wanting to ask if he took sugar. Before she could speak, however, she caught the expression on his face. For a moment she held his gaze, trying to decipher the change in his demeanour.
    ‘You’re going to have to be very careful, Amelia.’
    The sudden gravity of his words took her by surprise. As he continued to keep his eyes on hers, she nodded slowly and walked away, filled anew with an uneasy sense of the unseen dangers surrounding her.

9
    T his time Amelia asked the taxi to drop her right in front of the Canadian embassy. After having been forced to wait the whole weekend before she could continue the hunt for answers again had made her impatient. She felt a sense of urgency now, a feverish compulsion to keep moving. Yuri, the friendly security guard, was busy explaining something to a visitor, so she waved briefly in his direction, relieved to be spared from a long conversation with him, signed in and hurried up the stairs to the ambassador’s office. She was early for her appointment, but didn’t want to waste any more time.
    Anger had been her first reaction after hearing from detective Kiriyenko that the Canadian embassy had withheld information from her. She couldn’t understand why they would choose not to relay the news to her that Robert’s driver had been found, irrespective of how fruitless the Russian police’s interview with him might have been. Her first instinct had been to rush over to the embassy to confront Patrick since he had supposedly been the one who had received the news. On second thought, however, she’d been able to see the wisdom of verifying Kiriyenko’s account before she attacked Patrick or anyone else. Patrick was an old friend and she needed loyal people around her. Besides, he might not even have been the one who received the news from Kiriyenko’s office. Not only did she know the realities of how an embassy functioned, one of which was that information could fall between the cracks very easily, but she also believed that any claims made by Kiriyenko had to be taken with a considerable dose of scepticism.
    ‘Phew, woman!’ Ratna exclaimed as Amelia rushed into the office. ‘Slow down!’ She stopped typing and looked at Amelia over the top of her computer screen. ‘Is everything all right?