Khem Villas
Ranthambore, Rajasthan
Great expanses of grassland and jungle. Mountains on the horizon. Luxury tents, walled in cloth but with huge queen beds and a full set of furniture. Bamboo bathroom enclosures.
When you arrived, your client was not in her tent, but out on safari in the Ranthambore tiger reserve. So you drove out to meet her, bouncing down the dusty road in a Jeep, through the gates of the fortification. Deer stopped to look at you; peacocks stood at the roadside.
For a while it seemed like this might be a wild goose chase: your client had set out ahead of you, and maybe you were never going to catch up with her. But finally you found her, parked by a tree, watching a tiger cub through binoculars.
You drove up alongside her and passed the jewels across.
She received them with an impish smile. "I didn't want to make it too easy for you," she says, arranging the necklace around her neck. "But I see you managed."
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