Death is Forever

well,” she murmured.
    “Erin doesn’t.”
    “Why don’t you teach her as I taught you?”
    The question was simple, but Lai’s voice evoked an image of two lovers endlessly intertwined, teaching and learning things that had nothing to do with language. The same vivid sexuality ran through Lai’s graceful hand, the fingers slightly curled as though to plead or to hold a man’s sex in her palm.
    The implied intimacy of the gesture was so great that Erin looked away.
    “Call your brother,” Cole said in a clipped voice.
    Expressionless, Lai nodded and withdrew into the house.
    “What happened?” Erin asked.
    “Dirty fuel.”
    “What?”
    He unscrewed one end of the filter assembly and pulled out a paper cone. “Feel it.”
    She ran her fingertip over the cone, then rubbed her fingers together. At first she felt nothing but the fuel. Gradually she became aware of a vague, almost gritty texture. She looked into his eyes, silently questioning.
    “You expect some dirt to get into the fuel,” he said. “That’s why you have filters. But it looks like half the grit in the Oscar Range ran through the system.”
    “How did the fuel get that dirty?”
    “I could have left the cap off,” he said neutrally.
    “Not bloody likely.”
    “Thank you.”
    She shrugged. “It’s the truth. You’ve watched that helicopter like a mother hen with one chick.”
    “It was our best chance of finding the mine before the wet. Somebody else knew it and buggered the fuel.”
    “Sabotage?”
    “It’s what I’d do if I was trying to slow somebody down.”
    “Or kill him?”
    “Yes.”
    She shivered at the certainty she saw in his eyes.
    “They’ll try again,” he said flatly. “Walk away from it, Erin. From the mine, from the station, from Australia. Nothing is worth dying for, not even God’s own diamond strike.”
    “The arctic taught me that walking away is another way of dying. I came here to find a new way of being alive. I’m staying.”
    He didn’t hear any doubt in her voice. There wasn’t any in her eyes. Arguing with her would be worse than useless—it would increase the distance between them, making her even more vulnerable to an assassin.
    “Who did it?” Erin asked with a calm she didn’t feel.
    “It could have happened before the fuel was delivered to the station. More likely, somebody did it right here.”
    Without thinking, she turned and looked at the door where Lai had retreated.
    “Possible, but I doubt it,” he said. “Not that Lai wouldn’t kill for her family. She would. Hell, she did. But we’re the Chen family’s best hope of getting a piece of the diamond tiger, and she’ll do whatever her family tells her to do.”
    “Lai killed someone?”
    “She was seven months pregnant when Uncle Li ordered her to abort my child and marry another man, a Chinese man who would solidify the Chen family’s position in Kowloon. She did it and never looked back.”
    Erin opened her mouth, but no words came. “I’m sorry,” she whispered.
    “Why? It wasn’t your doing.”
    She simply shook her head, unable to explain why Cole’s past pain was hurting her now. Before she could find words, Lai appeared in the doorway.
    “Wing wishes to speak with you.”
    Cole looked at Erin. “I can’t see you from the radio room. Come with me.”
    Although her eyes widened, without a word she stood and followed him into the stifling rooms of the station house.
    “What else has gone wrong?” Cole asked Wing as soon as he picked up the phone.
    “Jason Street is on his way to the station.”
    Cole raked his fingers through his black hair and made a sound of disgust. “What happened?”
    “We suspect the Americans threw the Australians a bone.”
    “Not good. Street was a lucky prospector before he took up running a mine security business.”
    “There is one welcome factor. Satellite photos don’t show any break in the weather. The monsoons have not materialized yet.”
    “Damn good thing. Prospecting by Rover is a hell of a lot slower than by chopper. Anything else?”
    “No,” Wing said.
    “Think hard, because I won’t be checking in with you tonight,” Cole said. “In fact, I won’t be checking in at all until we find Abe’s mine or until the wet begins, whichever comes first. Erin had an idea I want to follow.”
    “The diamond mine?” Wing said instantly. “Are you close?”
    “Not as close as we were before the fuel was buggered. Go over the files on your men, Wing. At