diff --git a/test/integration/targets/win_fetch/tasks/main.yml b/test/integration/targets/win_fetch/tasks/main.yml
index 78b6fa02c9b..b5818352ccc 100644
--- a/test/integration/targets/win_fetch/tasks/main.yml
+++ b/test/integration/targets/win_fetch/tasks/main.yml
@@ -176,8 +176,13 @@
       - "fetch_missing_implicit.msg"
       - "fetch_missing_implicit is not changed"
 
+- name: create empty temp directory
+  win_file:
+    path: '{{ remote_tmp_dir }}\fetch_tmp'
+    state: directory
+
 - name: attempt to fetch a directory
-  fetch: src="C:\\Windows" dest={{ host_output_dir }}
+  fetch: src="{{ remote_tmp_dir }}\\fetch_tmp" dest={{ host_output_dir }}
   register: fetch_dir
   ignore_errors: true