My ride would be here to pick me up in less than fifteen minutes, and of course I’d be a whole-ass mess when he got here. I jumped out of bed and got myself packed up for my trip. Since I’d barely taken anything out of the bag to begin with, I was done in a couple of minutes. I did a quick wash-up in the bathroom and was stepping out onto the guesthouse parking lot with my shoes in my hands when a white SUV pulled up next to me. The top of the truck was piled high with what looked like footlockers, which probably held supplies for the field offices and some of the materials we would need to run our survey. I smiled to myself at the familiar sight, which promised weeks of adventure and hard work.

When the driver jumped out of the vehicle and came around to my side, I finally got a good look at him.

He was not what I was expecting. For some reason, I’d envisioned Elias as some sort of Tefare doppelgänger. And why my stupid mind decided all Ethiopian men were seventy years old with Don King hair would remain a question for the ages.

No, Elias was beautiful.

He was very tall. Had at least five to six inches on me, and his movements were easy and fluid as he approached.

“Hi Mr. Walker, my name is Elias Fikru.” He smiled as he shook my hand, and all I could do was stare. “I’ll be driving you today and for the time you’re in the field.”

His eyes were a deep brown, like dark roasted coffee, and his smile was warm and friendly. I needed to look away. One thing I was very aware of was that same-sex relationships were still very much illegal in Ethiopia. I had researched before coming, and as far I could tell there didn’t appear to be outward violence like in other countries, but it certainly didn’t mean it was okay to make eyes at guys I was working with.

Checking out a colleague within thirty seconds of meeting him definitely did not qualify as proceeding with caution.

A colleague who would apparently be driving me for the whole trip. And because my caffeine-deprived brain was a hell of a liability, I opened my mouth without thinking. “I thought you were the logistics coordinator. Why are you driving me the whole time?”

He laughed, and I felt the ripples of it in a place that had no business waking up for this. “I’m used to driving in the areas we’ll be working in and I need to be there anyway, so I usually drive when the projects are in the south.”