Hallie and Pop, her foster parents, and the gaggle of loved ones she’d grown up with, bonded into sisters and brothers by the love of two wonderful people. There were in-laws now, and nieces and nephews...
True family.
The next plane was smaller, though more luxurious, but it wasn’t until she boarded the third flight of what was beginning to seem like a never-ending journey that she met real luxury. Not a big plane by any means, but beautifully appointed, with armchair-like seats, and attentive stewards offering tasty delicacies and tantalising sweets.
The novelty of it kept her going until one of the attendants leant over her to point out the window.
‘We are coming in to land at Karuba Airport now and as we circle you will see the rugged mountains, the dunes on the desert plains, and the pink flamingos on the lake. You will see how beautiful our country is, and it will welcome you like a lover.’
The seriousness in the man’s eyes—the obvious love of his country shining through the words—told Lila he meant nothing personal in the words.
But a country that would welcome her like a lover?
Poetic, that’s what it was!
And poetic was how it looked. Great slabs of rock, thrown by giants, built up into mesas and pyramids, smooth and brown, with glowing green foliage showing in the deep valleys—were they oases? But the flamingo lake eluded her, and the sand she saw was golden brown, not pink.
No, the pink had to be a confused memory—a pink toy on beach sand—it had to be.
The plane kissed the runway, settled, and taxied to a pristine white building, with many domes and minarets, their spires tipped with gold.
A fairy-tale palace for an air terminal?
The passengers disembarked smoothly, moving through a tunnel into the cool air-conditioned building, the usual immigration and customs checks lying ahead.
From her place in the queue, Lila studied her fellow travellers. Some were locals returning home, the women in burkas with bright flashes of pretty clothing visible beneath them. A number of the men wore robes, black decorated with intricate gold embroidery, while others wore beautifully cut and fitted business suits.
A cosmopolitan place, Karuba?
It was her turn at the immigration counter. She handed over her Australian passport with the completed immigration form and waited while it was examined—and examined again—just as she was examined, the man behind the counter looking from her picture to her face as if somehow she’d changed her appearance on the journey.
He studied the immigration document she’d filled in before disembarking, while the people behind her shuffled uneasily in the line, and concern began to bloom in her chest.
Had the official pressed a bell of some kind on his desk, alerting the second man that appeared? Clad in an immaculate dark suit, pristine white shirt and bright red tie, he smiled at her through the window.
Not an especially welcoming smile, but a smile nonetheless.
Not that it eased the concern...
‘Dr Halliday, we must speak to you,’ he said smoothly—too smoothly? ‘If you would like to come this way?’
Should she ask why?
Refuse?
She’d just landed in a foreign country and who knew what might be happening?
‘Do you need help?’ the passenger behind her asked.
‘I don’t think so. I’m here to work at the hospital. It might be that someone on the staff is waiting to meet me,’ she told him. ‘But thank you.’
Lila gathered up her carry-on luggage and prepared to follow the man who’d summoned her, he behind the wall of immigration windows, she in front of it.
It’s just the hospital doing a special welcome thing, she told herself, but the fingers of her right hand went to the locket she wore around her neck and she twiddled with it as she always did when nervous or uncertain.
‘Just through this way,’ he said when they came together at the door into a long passage. ‘We will not detain you long.’
Detain?
Detain was not a nice word—it had bad connotations—detainees were prisoners, weren’t they?
She was shown into a comfortable enough room, and the well-dressed official offered her a chair and sat opposite her.
‘You have been to our country before?’ he asked, so carefully polite Lila felt a chill of fear feather down her spine.
‘Never,’ she said. ‘I have come to work in the hospital, in the paediatric section. That’s my specialty, you see.’
Perhaps she should have added that she thought her parents might have come from Karuba, but as everyone at home had told her it was a long shot—all she’d seen was a vaguely familiar box—she decided not to mention it.
The man seemed to be studying her—discreetly enough—but the attention was making her more and more uneasy.
‘I have the details of the doctor at the hospital who employed me,’ she said. ‘Perhaps you would be good enough to contact him for me.’
She dug in her handbag for the email she’d received from the man, confirming her appointment, and as her fingers touched the piece of paper, she remembered just what a presence he had had, even on a fuzzy computer screen.
Tariq al Askeba—either the head of the hospital or head of Paediatrics, she hadn’t quite managed to get that straight.
She handed the email to the official, and was surprised to see the frown that immediately gathered his eyebrows.
‘You are to work with Sheikh al Askeba?’ he demanded.
‘Yes, I am,’ Lila responded firmly. ‘And I’d like you to contact him as soon as possible so he can sort out whatever is going on here.’
The man looked even more upset.
‘But he is on his way now,’ he said. ‘You are perhaps a friend of his?’
‘I am about to be his employee,’ Lila countered.
‘Then he will be able to sort it out,’ the man assured her, although his increasing nervousness was now making her very worried indeed.
Fortunately, the worry was diverted when the door to the room opened silently and a tall, regal figure in a snowy white gown, and a black circlet of braid holding an equally white headdress in place, strode in.
An eagle was Lila’s first thought. Were there white eagles?
But the deep-set eyes, the slightly hooked nose, the sensuous lips emphasised by the closest of beards told her exactly who it was.
Even on a fuzzy video image, Dr—or Sheikh?—al Askeba had radiated power, but in full regalia he was beyond intimidating—he was magnificent...
Magnificent and, if the lines of fatigue around his eyes and bracketing his mouth were anything to go by, exhausted.
She stood, held out her hand and introduced herself. Long, slim fingers touched hers—the lightest of clasps—more from manners than in welcome.
Neither was there welcome in the dark eyes that seemed to see right through her, eyes set beneath arched black brows. Or in the sensuous mouth, more emphasised than hidden by the dark stubble of moustache and chin.
‘Dr Halliday, forgive me. I am Tariq al Askeba. I am sorry you have been inconvenienced. I had intended being here to meet you but—well, it’s been a long night.’
The words were right—the apology seemed genuine—but the man was studying her closely, confusion now adding to the exhaustion she could read in his face.
He