Susan Stephens - The Purest of Diamonds?

‘What are you doing?’ she said when he took the glass from her hand.

‘I think we should go to the party. Have you seen the time?’

‘No. Goodness me!’ she exclaimed, springing up. ‘I have been boring you!’

‘Not at all,’ he insisted. ‘Far from it. This evening has turned out far better than I anticipated, and we haven’t even reached the party yet.’

We?

She laughed as Raffa smiled back at her. Even if he was just being polite, she was having a great time. Raffa Leon was so much more than she had expected in every way. It was hard not to be attracted to him—impossible. Which was in itself crazy. Who invited trouble, unless they were completely mad?

She did, apparently.

‘So, are you completely recovered after your tumble?’ he said as he escorted her across the crowded lobby.

‘Completely,’ she confirmed. ‘And thank you for the drink. I feel ready for anything now.’

When Raffa laughed at this, she realised he must think her quaint and old-fashioned; sheltered, certainly.

‘If I were as honest as you, Leila, I would never have succeeded in business,’ he confided to her obvious alarm. ‘Meaning everything shows on your face,’ he was quick to explain when she frowned. ‘I’m not quite the big bad wolf I’m reported to be.’

‘But close.’ She laughed.

He laughed too. It was good to see Leila relaxed. And he wanted her to know he did have principles. He didn’t want her fretting about some rogue buying into her family business. Leila had certainly brought out the best in him. And that was a first.

‘And now to find your sisters,’ he said, realising that with any other attractive woman, finding her sisters would be the last thing on his mind.

‘Must we?’

* * *

Leila had spoken without thinking, he realised as her cheeks flushed red. She was enjoying being relaxed. She’d never been keen to join the pre-party scrum in Britt’s suite.

‘We don’t have to go up to Britt’s suite,’ he reassured her. ‘We can meet your sisters in the ballroom at our table. I’m looking forward to seeing the three of you together. Life is never boring with a Skavanga sister, so they tell me.’

‘They’re right,’ Leila admitted wryly. ‘Just your bad luck you got landed with me.’

‘Am I complaining?’

She flashed him a mischievous look, and as her mouth curved in a smile Leila’s eyes lit in a way that made him want to know more about this youngest Skavanga sister. It hit him out of nowhere that his grandmother would love her. His abuelita, as cute little grannies were known in Spain, was never off his case, always insisting he must find himself a good woman. He would do a lot of things for Abuelita, but not that, though his grandmother would put the bunting out if he brought a girl like Leila home.

And hadn’t Leila said she wanted to meet his grandmother?

He glanced at her, thinking the best thing about Leila was she had no idea how attractive she was, and in his world that was definitely a breath of fresh air.

They were halfway across the ballroom when she got a call on her phone. ‘Britt,’ she mouthed. As she pressed the receiver to her ear her cheeks turned scarlet. He gathered she wasn’t having the easiest of conversations with her sister.

‘She wanted to know where I was,’ Leila explained when she ended the call.

‘I hope you told her, living dangerously?’

‘With the big bad wolf? Yes, I did, as it happens.’

‘And your sister hit the roof?’

‘Pretty much.’

They shared an amused look.

‘Do you believe everything you’ve heard about me, Leila?’

For a moment she didn’t speak, but then she said quite bluntly, ‘I don’t know you well enough to pass judgement yet.’

He laughed at that. ‘When you do—you will let me know?’

‘I’ll make sure of it.’

She hadn’t told Raffa the whole truth about her conversation with Britt, who was clearly worried about her, and who had yelled in alarm at the prospect of her baby sister spending even one minute alone in the company of the notorious Raffa Leon. Worse luck, Raffa had turned out to be the perfect gentleman, though it might be fun to tease her sisters. It wasn’t often Leila caused comment.

‘You did reassure Britt?’ Raffa commented as they approached the table.

‘Actually, no,’ she admitted. ‘For once in my life, I was enigmatic. I was only having a bit of fun, but I couldn’t resist it. My sisters tease me constantly, so this was my chance to get them back.’

‘Well, I’m happy to go along with however you want to play it,’ Raffa assured her, his dark eyes glinting in a way that filled her mind with all sorts of outrageous possibilities.

‘I might take you up on that.’

‘Please do.’

His smile could travel to places she had forgotten about, in no time flat. ‘Then I will,’ she added with a smile and a shrug, thinking this evening was going to be fun.

‘Tonight will see Leila Skavanga come to the fore,’ Raffa promised as he held her chair.

‘But I don’t want to upset them,’ Leila was quick to add. ‘Britt has gone to a lot of trouble to arrange the party for Eva, and I don’t want anything to spoil Eva’s night.’

‘I promise you, it won’t,’ Raffa agreed, ‘not through anything I do, anyway, though there’s nothing to prevent us having a bit of fun. I just hope with all the Skavanga Diamonds glittering at once you don’t dazzle me into a stupor.’

‘No chance of that,’ Leila said, laughing at Raffa’s expression as she sat down.

Warmth flooded her as Raffa sat down in the next chair, close but not too close, almost touching but not touching, in a way that made her thighs tingle.

‘You can rely on me to back you up with enough smouldering looks and dirty dancing to shock your sisters out of their killer shoes.’

‘Wonderful.’ Did she mean to say that? Yes, she did. ‘That should make my home life a whole lot easier,’ she commented dryly.

‘Any time I can be of service...’

And this was a really bad time to be holding Raffa’s stare. His eyes were dancing with laughter, which told her nothing about his thoughts, but if this connection between them was only for tonight, it was the most fun she’d had in a long time. And now Britt and Eva had arrived in the ballroom on the arms of their handsome partners, bringing an end to their conversation as every head in the ballroom swivelled round.

‘Don’t look so worried, Leila,’ Raffa murmured, leaning in close. ‘I promise not to do anything that might upset them.’

Once she stared at Raffa it was hard to look away. ‘Something tells me Eva and Britt aren’t going to believe we’ve been sitting, chatting in the lounge all this time.’

And the truth was even more complicated than that, Leila realised. Both of them had touched on subjects she guessed neither of them would dream of discussing with a stranger, and the connection she’d sensed between them at first had grown stronger because of it.

‘You’ll just have to put up with your sisters’ suspicions,’ Raffa said pragmatically, leaning back as he prepared to stand to greet their dinner companions.

‘Just so long as we don’t take this too far,’ Leila agreed, already wondering what she’d got herself into as Raffa turned to bestow a lingering look on her face.

‘You and I know what went on.’

Precisely nothing, she thought as the most handsome man in the room went on to list their harmless pastimes. ‘You drank juice. We talked. We relaxed. But there’s no way on earth your sisters are going to believe that, so unless you’d rather pretend we haven’t been together every second since you arrived at the hotel—’