A Diamond For Del Rio's Housekeeper. Susan Stephens

she thought, deflating somewhat when she caught sight of Don Xavier’s unsmiling face.

      Dipping down, she reached into the freezer to pull out the boxes of ice cream. The air in the kitchen seemed to have frozen harder than the ice cream in the tub.

      Whatever happened next, she wasn’t going to be railroaded into making any decision that didn’t feel right. She might have everything to learn about being a landowner, but Doña Anna had taught her not to be silent and accepting, but to question everything.

      ‘Vanilla,’ she announced, prising the lid off the tub. ‘And Doña Anna’s favourite—fresh strawberry. I picked the fruit from the garden this morning—’

      ‘I haven’t come here to eat ice cream,’ the towering monument to privilege and wealth currently occupying her kitchen coldly stated.

      He hadn’t expected Rosie to be so relaxed on this second meeting, Xavier realised. She’d had time to think about things, and must surely realise the hopelessness of her situation. He was stationed at one end of the kitchen table, while she was at the other, and she didn’t seem concerned at all. As she opened a drawer to reach for a serving spoon he put the documents he’d brought with him very prominently on the table.

      She didn’t look at them once—or didn’t appear to, but then she baited him with a level stare. ‘These look official,’ she said, moving them out of the way so she could arrange her dishes. ‘They look like the type of papers that won’t bring anyone any happiness. “Beware of lawyers, ” Doña Anna used to tell me. “Trust no one but yourself, Rosie.” So...what flavour would you like?’

      He was taken aback for a moment. He had dealt with many difficult situations in business, but nothing like this. ‘What else did Doña Anna warn you about?’

      ‘Honestly?’ she said, pulling an attractive face as she thought about it for two seconds. ‘Nothing. Not you. Not anything. I think she must have trusted me to get on with things. And at the end, when she was dying, and I knew I was about to lose the best friend I’d ever had, the last thing on my mind was lawyers, or wills.’

      He believed her.

      ‘I’ll look at the documents later,’ she said, ‘if that’s all right with you?’

      And if it wasn’t all right with him, she would still look at the documents later, he guessed. In fairness, nothing would bounce him into doing anything in a hurry, so he couldn’t argue with that.

      ‘There is one thing I feel compelled to do,’ she said, ‘and I hope you’ll go along with me in this one little thing...’

      ‘That depends what it is,’ he said.

      If they never did anything else together, they would do this, Rosie determined. The ceremony she had in mind held as much significance for her as toasting the life of a loved one in champagne at a wake. Taking a moment to celebrate the life of a very special woman, who had done so much for both of them, before normal hostilities were resumed shouldn’t be too much to ask. It was time to find out.

      ‘No ice cream for me, thank you.’ Don Xavier put up his hand as if to ward off the scoop of ice cream she was offering him.

      Her stomach was clenching with apprehension, but she’d started so she’d finish. ‘I’m afraid I must insist.’

      ‘You must insist?’ he said, scanning her face as if he thought she’d gone mad.

      ‘I don’t have any champagne to toast your aunt,’ Rosie explained, ‘and as Doña Anna loved ice cream, I thought we could both take a moment to remember her.’

      Her throat was so tight by the time she’d finished this little speech she couldn’t have argued with him if she’d tried, so it was a relief when he reached for the bowl. Lifting her own bowl, she proposed huskily, ‘To Doña Anna...’

      A muscle flexed in Don Xavier’s jaw, and then—and she was sure she wasn’t mistaken—the faintest hint of amusement sparked in his eyes. So he was human after all. ‘I’m sure if we do this together, we can do more things together,’ she prompted as she waited for him to start eating. She had to stop herself exclaiming with relief when his firm mouth closed around the spoon.

      ‘Doña Anna,’ he murmured, holding her gaze until heat flared inside her.

      ‘Doña Anna,’ she repeated, trying not to meet his eyes as she wondered what else he could do with that sexy mouth. He was just so unreasonably hot. She had never been alone with such a good-looking man before, let alone so close to him. Her ideal was based on the heroes in the books she used to read to Doña Anna, and they were all big and dark and dangerous too.

      And that was quite enough rambling off-track for one day, Rosie warned herself firmly. If Don Xavier had made the slightest move she’d have run a mile.

      ‘Are we done here?’ he asked, dipping his head to bait her with his piercing stare.

      ‘Yes, I think so. Thank you for that.’ Her body thanked him very much. She was tingling with awareness.

      * * *

      He wanted to smear her with ice cream and lick it off slowly. He wanted to lay her down on the kitchen table and attend quite thoroughly to Señorita Clifton’s every need. He wanted to explore every hungry part of her body slowly. He could certainly see some use for the ice cream. The contrast of heat and cold would be a torment to her—to him too, but that torment would end with pleasure so extreme, they would never forget it.

      ‘The tour?’ he prompted, shaking himself around.

      ‘Of course.’ She smiled primly into his eyes, but he couldn’t help wondering what was going on behind that lambent gaze.

      Why did the one woman in the world he needed to eject from his life as efficiently and quickly as possible have to be so desirable, and so ready for seduction?