“Cassie, tell me you weren’t caught trespassing on Fire Cloud property again.”

It was just after five in the morning, and Aisha was driving me to the airport. The first light of day glimmered faintly in the distance, and the air held that peculiar smell I would forever associate with waking up for classes. By the end of the day, I would probably be eating some lavish dinner on the rooftop of a palace while fireworks spangled the night sky. Somehow, the prospect had lost all its excitement.

“It wasn’t nearly as bad as it sounds,” I said. “There’s no way I could have known that all that open land in the middle of the desert was their property. There were no signs, no barbed wire—”

“And what was Icarus doing out there?” she asked, half to herself.

“I don’t know, Aisha. Sometimes, it really feels like he’s just following me around, trying to make my job hard. I should never have gone out there alone.”

“Was he rude to you?”

“He threatened me. Took my camera. And—something else.” I told her about his veiled warning and how it seemed to have been directed at Salman. “But then, I think, how would he even know who Salman is?”

“Well, if you’ve ever interacted with him online, they probably have a record of it,” Aisha pointed out. “Fire Cloud is a behemoth. But you’re right; I don’t know how Icarus would have access to those files. I think maybe you’re just reading too much into it. You do that, sometimes, you know.”

“Do you really think so? Because I was seriously considering canceling my trip to Qia. I don’t want Salman to get hurt on my account.”

“It’s sweet that you’re worried about him,” said Aisha, patting my knee gently, “but after this weekend, you won’t ever have to see him again, and it won’t matter.”

She turned onto the exit, the lights of the airport illuminating the desert for miles in all directions. My flight didn’t begin boarding for another few hours, so I’d probably nap in the terminal while I waited. Hopefully, I wouldn’t sleep through my flight, but I was so tired already. Even now, it was tempting just to have Aisha turn around and take me back to Patricia’s.

“Do you think I’ll ever not be tired?” I asked her, clutching the handle of my rolling suitcase firmly in one hand. “I just—I can’t remember the last time I felt awake and refreshed and fully rested.”

“Maybe you need a vacation,” said Aisha with a look of concern. “A real one, this time, where you don’t have to worry about funerals or grieving or nasty men who only want your money.”

“My money and my body,” I said wearily. “I could use a real vacation, but somehow, I don’t think this trip is going to be it.”

“Well, try to enjoy yourself. You know, some of us would commit actual murder to be able to go on a trip like this—any trip.”

“I do.” By now, Aisha’s truck had come to a complete stop. I leaned over and gave her a hug. “I’ll take you to Paris someday, I promise. The moment I sell my first book.”

“When are you going to finish your first book?” Aisha asked. “Anyway, don’t worry about it. I hear Paris is really dirty and I’d probably hate it.”

At first, I was stunned to hear her say this, until I realized the spirit behind it.

“Oh sweetie, you’ll go someday. I swear. I feel like Paris has been asleep for centuries, just waiting for your arrival. When you finally go, you’ll be received like a queen.”

“I’ll need to get some nicer dresses, in that case,” said Aisha sadly, and ushered me out of the truck before I could object.

* * *

Not wanting to miss my flight, I managed to keep awake in the terminal by pacing and watching the sunrise through the windows, turning the sky from dark mauve to lilac to pale pink. Before turning off my phone, I sent Salman a quick text, letting him know that my plane was boarding and that I would be arriving in about sixteen hours.

After the week I’ve had, you can’t imagine how much I’m looking forward to getting out of Phoenix for a couple days, I told him sincerely. I’ll tell you all about it when I get there.

But, I wondered as I prepared to board, would he even be interested in hearing about it? Salman had been gregarious and attentive during that first dinner, but the meeting at the lawyer’s, and my subsequent offer, had irrevocably altered the dynamic between us. We would both be going into this next encounter with only one thing on our minds.

I arrived in London at midnight, local time. The wristwatch I had brought with me, a gift from my late mother, displayed the time in Phoenix: four p.m. After a layover of an hour and a half, I boarded my flight to Qia and landed at Jubal International Airport at ten a.m. According to the watch, it was now eleven p.m. in Phoenix.

As I shuffled off the plane, I wondered, with a bleary feeling, what had transpired at home that day during my absence—how Patricia was faring being at home alone, whether Clay had broken up with Leah like he had said he was going to, and if Irene had started on the follow-up assignment for Taos.

As I walked through the airport, I looked around suspiciously, wondering if David Icarus had sent Fire Cloud security personnel to spy on me in Qia. What would they even look like? Would they wear trench coats and sunglasses? Jeans and black T-shirts? I’d be sure to keep an eye out for anyone who appeared to be following me.

I texted Salman to let him know that I had arrived and seated myself on a bench to await his response. Remembering how busy he had been when I’d first met him, I expected him to send someone to fetch me. Undoubtedly, I would find him at home, busily poring over spreadsheets with a tumbler full of bourbon in one hand. “Let’s make this quick,” he would say, and lead me without fanfare into the bedroom to complete our ill-advised business arrangement. That done, I would be handed the book, escorted unceremoniously out of the room by palace guards, and shown the door.

So, it came as a surprise when he texted back to say, “I’m outside.”

When I asked him what he was driving, he said, “You’ll know it when you see it, I think. It’s hard to miss.”

Faintly puzzled and half-expecting to find him parked in a helicopter hovering like a black beetle just over the parking lot, I stepped outside into the bright sunlight. There on the curb sat an immaculately polished limousine, impossibly long, and Salman himself stood leaning against it, flashing his white smile and looking as elegant as ever.

“How was your trip?” he asked, coming forward and giving me a chaste peck on the cheek. The irony of the gesture, given our plans, was not lost on me. “Not too long, I hope.”

“Hard to say.” I handed him my suitcase, shielding my face against the scorching sun. “After a few years, I forgot my own name and where I was from. Eventually, I forgot that there had ever been a world outside the plane.”

“I’m glad you landed before I died,” Salman said, grimly bemused.

“Yeah, so where are we headed?”

“I thought you might like to go back to my place first.” Seeing the flicker of disappointment in my eyes, he added, “Just to get cleaned up and rest, if you need it.”

“Right. Of course.” As before, he was taking more thought for me than I was for myself. “But you know, we don’t have to rush this. Since I’ve traveled all this way—”

“You’re welcome to stay for as long as you like, of course,” Salman said. “And as long as you’re here, you’ll be treated like royalty.” Seeing that we were both breaking a sweat, he added, “But we can discuss this on the way to the palace—or at the palace. We’ve got the whole day ahead of us. And the whole night.”

I should have guessed that there would be a certain level of mistrust between us, given the circumstances. He knew I wanted something from him, and I knew he wanted something from me. The knowledge made us each a little wary of the other.

He opened the back door of the limo, and I stepped in, taken aback by the extravagance on display. It was the first car I had ever seen with wooden flooring and its own movie theater-style screen and chairs. There was room enough in the back for an entire football team to sit comfortably. I both envied and resented it at the same time; there was something unseemly about the extravagance of it.

“It’s not much,” he said modestly, “but it was the best I could find on short notice.”

“Are you joking?” I asked, more rudely than I’d intended. “Are there people riding around in fancier limos?”

“Some members of my extended family, if you want to know.” A shadow seemed to pass over his face, but it brightened as he added, “I’m glad you like it. I assume everyone in Phoenix has a limo like this.”

“No. No one in Phoenix that I know of has a limo, especially one with its own alcohol cabinet.”

“Too bad for them.” Reaching to open the cabinet, he added, “Would you like something?”

I shook my head. “No, it’s still too early for me, thanks.”

The curtains in the limousine completely blocked out the sunlight, so one could have been forgiven for thinking it was midnight outside. If I shut my eyes, I could almost imagine we were back in Paris on that first night. Except that, now, we were seated on opposite ends of the car with a cavernous space between us.

Salman seemed to be conscientiously attempting to keep a respectful distance, as if afraid of overwhelming me. I could have been having a really lovely time, if not for the knowledge of what awaited us at the end of the trip.

Sliding back the curtains with the press of a button, Salman pointed out various places of interest in Jubal, Qia’s capital: a museum of antiquities containing some of the oldest surviving cuneiform tablets and an early fragment of the legend of Inanna; a bronze statue of the goddess Al-Uzza that had spent decades in the British Museum before being brought back to Qia; a twelfth-century merchant vessel.

“If you’re a lover of myth and folklore, as I am,” said Salman, “this place is a kind of paradise.”

There was a glow of satisfaction in his eyes as I gazed out the window, feeling drawn into the mystique of this ancient city in spite of myself. What he couldn’t have known was the relief I felt at being able to focus on something other than our relationship…whatever it was.

“And there’s more back at the palace,” he said, “a lot more. I have one of the most extensive libraries of folklore collections in the Middle East.”

“Do you have The Hundred Doves?” I asked.

“Not an original copy, but I’m working on it. I recently acquired an early written copy of the Panchatantra, an Indian epic that was originally composed in oral form around the fifth or sixth century.”

“Oh, fantastic.” I remembered studying the Panchatantra for an oral traditions class in my third year of college; it was like the Indian version of Aesop’s fables. “I still can’t believe you have the time to do all this.”

“Well, I think it’s important.” Salman rubbed the back of his neck. “Life can’t be all about money—not entirely. You need a certain amount of imagination if you’re going to thrive in this world.”

An uneasy silence followed this last statement. It was hard to take Salman’s musings about money seriously when he had taken my father’s entire estate. It was a measure of how conflicted I felt about him that I had been willing to overlook this, if only for the duration of this trip. It was infuriatingly hard to stay mad at him, even when he richly deserved it.

“You okay?” he asked with a look of sincere concern. “You’ve gone quiet.”

I nodded, not entirely truthfully. My tongue felt dry and heavy and clung to the roof of my mouth like peanut butter. I had spent the past few weeks rehearsing what I would say to him if we ever met again, and now that the moment had come, I was too flustered to speak. If we stayed in the car any longer, I was either going to hit him or make out with him. I wasn’t sure which one would be the more disastrous choice.

“I realize it’s a lot,” Salman added with characteristic insight. “Traveling, being in a new country for the first time, having a…meeting like this.” Being utterly smitten with someone who screwed you out of your inheritance, he could have added. “I think we both feel jitters, but we’ll get through it.”

“You don’t look even remotely nervous,” I pointed out. “You carry yourself with such grace.”

“Do I really?” Salman shrugged roguishly. “I guess I’ve just been looking forward to seeing you. I’m pleased that you’re finally here.”

And then, he leaned over and brushed the hair out of my face so that he could kiss me, and I made no effort to object.

As his lips connected with mine, and I began to get lost in his kiss, a new thought occurred to me: maybe this was more to him than just a business arrangement. Maybe Salman really was beginning to like me. Why else would he even consider parting with a book of such value, unless the prospect of a romantic evening meant more to him?

But how much could a romantic evening be worth?

As we began kissing more passionately, as he lifted me up and twined his arms around my back, I made a quick series of mental calculations. Either Salman was really interested in me, or he wasn’t. If he wasn’t, if he just wanted me for the sex, he was holding the book hostage in order to get it. If he did, if he really liked me as much as his kisses suggested, then I had been leading him on this whole time. Neither possibility offered much comfort.

“Salman,” I said, breaking away.

Stiffening, he pulled back. “What’s wrong?”

“I—”

I couldn’t bring myself to say what I wanted to say: that I was sorry for misleading him, that I didn’t want him to make this into more than it was, that I was here for the book and nothing else. But when I saw the concerned look in his eyes, my resolve melted and the words caught in my throat.

“Uh…never mind.”

“You sure?” He stroked the side of my face with the back of his hand, his eyes never leaving mine.

I hated myself for how much I enjoyed the feeling. I felt totally exposed to him, like he could sense my fear and evasion and eagerness to be anywhere else. The worry on his face seemed to deepen as he studied me closely.

“Anyway, we’ll be home soon. I had Fazul take the long way round, because I wanted you to see the city.”

“It’s lovely, really. I spent a week in Lebanon last year, but this is the first time I’ve ever been to Qia. They seem to be near polar opposites.”

“Yes, I remember reading that article—on the night we met, I immediately went home and dug up some of your old reporting for the Hornpipe.”

“Seriously?”

“If you’re wondering why I seemed so tired the next morning, that’s part of it,” he admitted with a chuckle.

There was something oddly gratifying in knowing that he appreciated my work as a journalist. If he was going to like me, he could at least do it for the right reasons, and I was fiercely proud of those old articles.

“But when I first met you, you asked why I had become a reporter. You tried to tell me that print journalism was dying.”

“I said a lot of things that night,” he said, blushing, “not all of which I’m proud of.” He leaned forward to kiss me again, and this time, I didn’t resist.