Again and again Ryan got Lily into rehab. Again and again she went back on the junk.

Like every father, Ryan wanted to shield his child from pain, to protect her from every evil in the world. Lily made that impossible, and the toll on Ryan was heavy. One casualty was our relationship.

No matter. Ryan loved his little girl with every fiber of his being.

Dear God. I was worried about Katy joining the army, and Ryan’s daughter had resumed shooting poison into her veins. I was mortified.

“Is there anything I can do?” I asked.

“Listen?”

“Of course I will. You know I’m always here.”

“Where?” A ghost of the old Ryan grin.

“What?”

“Yellowknife? The Explorer? Trader’s Grill?”

Eye roll. “You know what I mean.”

“I do.” Ryan stroked my hand, then gestured at the books. “Planning to invest in a diamond mine?”

“I’m trying to educate myself on the history of the place.”

“What have you learned?” Ryan signaled for a refill.

“I’ve learned why bling is so bloody expensive. First you have to find the diamonds. Then you have to do a feasibility study to determine how much the mine will cost and how to build it. Then there’s the red tape: environmental agreements, land-use permits, water licenses, impact-benefit agreements, socioeconomic agreements. Approval involves dealing with federal, territorial, and aboriginal governments, regulatory agencies, landowners—everyone from the local farmer right up to the pope.”

The waitress poured Ryan’s coffee.

“Then you have to build the mine, which, in this climate, is a nightmare. The sites are so isolated that all personnel and supplies have to be flown in or transported over winter roads.”

“Ice road truckers!”

“Do you know what it costs to operate an ice road?”

“I do not.”

I flipped to a page in my book. “Lupin runs for almost six hundred kilometers, from Tibbitt Lake, east of Yellowknife, to the Lupin mine site in Nunavut. Construction and maintenance cost roughly six-point-five million dollars annually.” I looked at Ryan. “And the ice roads are only open maybe ten weeks a year.”

“Big bucks.”

“That’s just one budget item. Landing strips, power stations, machine shops, sewage and waste disposal, water treatment plants, telephone networks, storage buildings, offices, processing plants. And the workers can’t exactly drive home each night. The mines have to provide housing, food, recreational facilities. A lot of the miners work two-week rotations. That’s a long time to have nothing to do. Listen to this.”

I gave him no opening to opt out.

“Ekati construction cost nine hundred million dollars. Diavik cost one-point-three billion—that’s billion—dollars. They drained a whole damn lake!”

“Isn’t that the kind of thing that infuriates Mr. Squeeters? By the way, I saw him yesterday. When Rainwater and I drove past, Tyne was pulling out of the Giant gold mine.”

“I thought it was closed.”

“It is. But there are arsenic issues.”

“Arsenic?’