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‘Is something wrong?’ she pressed, glancing away as if she knew very well that he expected her to be more open with him.
‘Time is short, and we’ve got a lot of ground to cover,’ he said curtly. His questions would have to wait. They had too much to do to waste time on conversation outside the event they were planning. He led the way through a group of trees planted to screen some groundwork and then reined in.
‘What’s this?’ Karina asked, as she stared down at the ugly gash in the land.
It was the only blemish on his otherwise flawless ranch, but it was one that paid for his lifestyle and for everything that visitors to the polo cup would enjoy. ‘It’s an emerald mine.’
‘Are you serious?’ Karina’s shocked gaze flashed to his.
‘Perfectly.’
She frowned and he could almost see her thinking that this answered a lot of her questions about the source of his immense wealth. ‘Is it yours?’
‘I have a major stake in it,’ he confirmed.
‘At least it explains your Midas touch.’ She relaxed as she smiled—with relief, he guessed.
‘So now you know my secret.’
‘One of them.’ She stared at him steadily. ‘Nicky said you had plans for the future. Plans involving the youngsters who come to the ranch?’
He stonewalled her question with a question of his own. ‘No secrets of your own to share?’
‘No,’ she said flatly, clearly irritated that he wouldn’t share the smallest detail with her. ‘My life would bore you, and even if that weren’t the case, I don’t see how it’s relevant to our business discussions.’
‘One ride across the pampas is hardly going to restore the friendship of our youth.’
‘I hope you can trust me in business?’
He raised a brow. ‘So do I.’
‘So,’ she said, clearly keen to change the subject, ‘can we have tours here on the days of the tournament, or would security be an issue for you?’
‘We can have tours,’ he confirmed.
‘Good,’ she said stiffly. ‘I’ll add them to my list.’
‘Shall we move on?’ he suggested.
She was holding out on him. Each time he looked at Karina her eyes darkened and her lips plumped up, as every female hormone she possessed danced with his machismo. She’d pulled back in Rio rather than risk kissing him, and she was still reluctant to share the smallest personal detail with him. Why?
‘You look thunderous,’ she commented, as they cantered along side by side. ‘Has some detail of my planning annoyed you? If you’d rather leave the tour to the emerald mine out...’
A muscle flexed in his jaw as he stared straight ahead. She’d seen his home. She was living under the same roof as him, pelo amor de Deus! And now she’d seen the emerald mine. He was running out of surprises to try and jolt Karina into sharing whatever it was that was eating away at her. What was so bad she couldn’t tell him?
‘Why don’t you tell me more about the mine, Dante?’ she said in an attempt to restore normality. It made his hackles rise even more. She’d pick any topic to stop him questioning her, but for the sake of their working relationship he’d go along with it—for now.
‘Mining isn’t my specialty, though there have always been old workings here,’ he explained. ‘The old-timers talked constantly about the green ice they used to find here—that’s what they call emeralds—so I decided to investigate. I sold the exploration rights and brought in experts. I used the same consortium that revived the Skavanga diamond mine in northern Europe. The deal was that I got to keep a share in whatever they found. It turned out to be one of the richest seams of emeralds in the world.’
She laughed—with relief at the relaxation in the tension between them, or with genuine pleasure at this discovery of unsuspected riches, he couldn’t tell.
‘I’m not really surprised now I’ve got over the shock of you owning an emerald mine,’ she confessed, smiling at him. ‘I can’t imagine you doing anything on a small scale.’
‘Not if I can help it,’ he agreed, tight-lipped. Urging his horse forward, he put some much-needed thinking space between them.
* * *
She allowed her horse to pick its own way down the slope as she considered the tension in Dante. His back was like an unbreachable wall. Suspicion was riding him, and so far she’d told him very little, but she wouldn’t be rushed into anything. She’d choose her time.
