Kingdom Come

No explanations, no excuses and definitely no deference to the boss’s wishes. Just a no.

She was half-tempted to go down to his cottage and give him a good tongue-lashing for such insubordination, but then her Inner Bitch reared her head and argued that the best revenge in this scenario would be compliance. She’d seen the acute distaste in his eyes when he’d touched her yesterday, which meant that he wasn’t a big fan of her company. For whatever godforsaken reason. So, what better way to avenge her piqued ego than by making him suffer her presence for as long as she could? And that made her mind up and she only sent a single Cool back.

And her last thought, before she slid into deep dreamless sleep was the way his eyes had gone absolutely still when he’d been looking at her. And the way that stillness had touched off something inside of her. A tiny explosion of … something. An explosion for a man who couldn’t even look her in the eye.

So, she consigned him to the deepest bowels of Hades and slept dreamlessly.

The next day, more of the amazing spring weather continued, as Ziya woke up at six a.m.

The sky was so blue it was unreal, and the world looked so fresh and silent, Dada Akhtar’s roses were in vivid Technicolor against the green of the garden. There was a river of fog winding down the ground, and she leaned out of her window and breathed deep. Closing her eyes, just … glad to be alive. Glad to be here and living this moment in Goonj.

Echo.

She opened her eyes and looked straight at the gamekeeper’s cottage. By some twisted uncanny coincidence, the cottage’s owner stepped out of the entrance at the same time and into his Jeep. Ziya shut the window closed with an audible snap. He was not the first thing she wanted to see any morning.

But, two hours later when she was packing for her overnight trip, he was what she thought of and she couldn’t understand her hopeless attraction at all. Especially, because asking Noor about it would be an exercise in futility and awkwardness since she already suspected some deep love-story schtick between Ziya and her taciturn assistant, incurable romantic that she was. And Noor would never keep her trap shut if she caught even a whiff of the tumult and confusion and plain anger running through Ziya’s mind.

“Hey, babe,” Noor said as she came in, without bothering with the knocking. “I have to borrow your earmuffs since …” She stopped dead as she saw the mass of jumbled clothes on her best friend’s bed.

“Did a tornado just pass through here?”

Ziya raked a hand through her short hair and kicked at a stray white tee that had fallen off the pile on her bed.

“It’s a business meeting. But we are going sightseeing later on and I have no fricking clue how to dress up and down at the same time.”

Noor manfully kept her full lips from splitting into a wide grin at the outraged picture her friend made, standing in her flannel pants and cute T-shirt. Ziya dressed more for comfort than she did for style.

“Want some help?”

Ziya gave her a speaking look through dark eyes. “No. I want to not go on this stupid meeting and then have to listen to you whine about how Sam is messing with you for the rest of the day. I have the harvest reports to get through, and the labor union is breathing down my neck and—”

Noor bounded over to her side of the bed and slapped her once. On the cheek. Lightly.

“Shut up,” she advised mildly.

Ziya’s eyes flashed, but she shut up. She rubbed her cheek and said, “I am going to talk to Sam about the benefits of staying single.”

Noor stuck her tongue out and retorted, “You need my help, you thrift store ragamuffin. So let’s not make idle threats here. Capisce?”

Ziya’s shoulders slumped and she conceded defeat.

“I am in your hands, Mistress Gabbana.” She was the undisputed expert on style and fashion as much as the state of politics in 19

Century England, the time period of her doctorate.

Noor grinned, ran a friendly hand on Ziya’s shoulder. “Make that Mistress Dolce. It just sounds better, doesn’t it?”

Ziya sighed and agreed. Because right now she needed Mistress Dolce’s help and she was running out of time because the Crypt Keeper without a watch would arrive on the dot of nine and she didn’t want to deprive him of her presence a second longer than she had to. And because no one was there to counter argue the point with her, she absolutely believed in its logic.

Pehelgam was a small town on the national highway, a tourist hub, just like most of the state’s territory was, and it had many focal points of sightseeing that were a must-see for everyone who visited the place. There was Chandanwadi, an ice cave that never melted through which the river Lidder flowed. Betaab Valley, which was about four acres of parkland where a very famous Bollywood movie had been shot. And, in the beautiful distance, one could see the Himalayan ranges in their majestic splendor.

Since, tourism was the biggest trade for the town; out-of-town vehicles were not allowed to operate inside city limits. Recently though, security had been upped in this sensitive spot because of IED bombings in nearby Sonmarg and Gulmarg in 2008. Pehelgam had, by the grace of God, escaped terrorist attacks but the tourists, army and visitors alike knew that was just fate and not coincidence.

Because of Sam’s pull with the local authorities, all Krivi had to do was flash a Military Vehicle pass and they were allowed to pass through without incident. Noor noted the action and some of the animation died from her excited face.

They stopped at the Paradise Inn, which was one of the circuit houses in town which select guests could use. Local businesses from Srinagar were one of the privileged few. Noor took off for a nap and made Ziya promise that they would do the cable car ride before sunset today. Since Gulmarg was a good two hours away, it was going to be a little tight.

Ziya and Krivi arrived at the Jaan-e-Bahaar estate where the saffron fields were located and their owner Bashir Khan awaited them.

The fields were on the highway itself, and were blooming with healthy orange strands and little purple wildflowers that made her want to run out and gather up an armful. Krivi braked smoothly at a convenient spot off the shoulder of the road and Ziya hopped down before he could do much more than engage in neutral.

His eyes followed her slim, jeans-clad figure as she ran nimbly between the rows of saffron and wildflowers and suddenly knelt down and just touched a single bloom. His heart thudded uncomfortably, once, and he gripped the steering wheel tightly before deliberately loosening his muscles one by one. He went out and joined her at a brisk pace and was once again caught off-guard at the sheer, unguarded pleasure visible on her face.

Ziya Maarten didn’t know the first thing about camouflage. And he couldn’t understand how she’d survived without getting her heart shattered into a million pieces given her rough childhood and adolescence. Either she was the most deluded creature he’d ever come across, or the strongest woman.

Ziya, unaware of the conflict inside her assistant manager’s brain, just smiled goofily at him as she knelt between the sea of flowers. Breathing in the heady scent of one of the costliest spices on earth. In a reputable restaurant in London, a pound of saffron would be bought for a cool three hundred pounds without a flicker of an eyelash. Not to mention its dollar equivalent in the rest of the world. Ziya already had feelers out in a couple of places in downtown Mayfair and a place in Manhattan that were in desperate need of saffron.

Milking them was not in the plans, but a healthy profit was nothing to sneeze at. Business School Tenet number twenty-three.

“It’s goddamn gorgeous, isn’t it?” she asked.

Krivi stuffed his hands in his pocket, a dark, unreachable shadow of a man in the bright noon sun.

“Yes,” he answered. Because saying otherwise would have been a lie.

Ziya stood up, brushing the mud off the knees of her jeans and smoothed the siren-red blouse she wore tucked into the waistband. It billowed out fashionably against her slim waist, and on her feet she wore smart black boots. Low-heeled that made for easy walking and she carried a black blazer that she slipped into when she caught sight of Bashir Khan coming their way.

Krivi noted the way she fluffed out her short hair against the collar of the jacket but kept his eye on Khan too. And the way the blond streaks shimmered golden in the afternoon light.

He struck his hand out to Bashir Khan before she could.

“Krivi Iyer,” he said briskly, in Hindi. “We are representing Goonj Enterprises. This is Ziya Maarten, Operations-In-Charge.”

Bashir Khan, a local Kashmiri who smelled of the saffron he grew and cigarette smoke shook hands with Krivi, sizing him up instantly. He regarded Ziya for a moment and then smiled as he shook hands with her too.

“Welcome, Miss Maarten. And may I say you are as lovely as your voice,” he added in perfect English.

Ziya smiled, pleased but her silver-gray eyes were cool. The man might have charm but this was still a business meeting. She nodded at the rows of flowers below them and said, “You have a beautiful set-up, Mr. Khan. The sunlight is adequate, your irrigation system seems to be in perfect working order and the harvest seems to have been particularly kind to you this season.”

Bashir smiled modestly, his light green eyes cooling too.

“Allah is kind, Miss Maarten. And please, let us not be formal. Call me Bashir miyan.” Brother, in Urdu.

“Bashir miyan,” Krivi said politely, “I was wondering if we could take a look at the property. Photographs haven’t done it any justice.” He tacked on a smile at the end, but caught Ziya’s frown before she hid it.

Why was she frowning when he was trying to be agreeable?

“Absolutely, Mr. Iyer. This way, please.” Bashir invited them on a well-worn pathway between the hedges. “And later on, if you are satisfied with what you’ve seen, maybe we can have a cup of kahwah.” A local tea brew that tasted delicious and smelled even better. “And talk terms.”