Cordinas Crown Jewel by Nora Roberts

“You’re telling me you’re a farmer’s daughter? Give me a break.”
    “We have a farm.” Vaguely irritated, she picked up the shaving cream. Two farms, she thought. One in each of her countries. “My father grows soy beans, corn and so on. And raises both cattle and horses.”
    “You never hoed a row with those hands, kid.”
    She lifted a brow as she smoothed on the shaving cream. “There’s been a marvelous new invention called a tractor. And yes, I can drive one,” she added with some asperity.
    “Hard to picture you out on the back forty.”
    “I don’t spend much time with the crops, but I know a turnip from a potato.” Brows knitted, she lifted his chin and took the first careful swipe with the razor. “My parents expected their children to be productive and useful, to make a contribution to the world. My sister works with underprivileged children.”
    “You said you had brothers.”
    “One sister, two brothers. We are four.” She rinsed the razor in the bowl, meticulously scraped off more cream and stubble.
    “What do you do, back on the farm?”
    “A great many things,” she muttered, calculating the angle from jaw to throat.
    “Is that what you’re running away from? Hey!”
    As the nick welled blood, she dabbed at it. “It’s just a scratch—which I wouldn’t have made if you’d just stop talking. You say nothing for hours at a time, and now you don’t shut up.”
    Amused, and intrigued that he’d apparently hit a nerve—he shrugged his shoulder. “Maybe I’m nervous. I’ve never had a woman come at me with a sharp implement.”
    “That is surprising, considering your personality.”
    “Tagging you as Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm’s surprising, considering yours. If you grew up in Virginia,where’s the French pastry part come from?”
    Her brows lifted above eyes lit with humor. “French pastry, is it? My mother,” she said, ignoring the little twist of guilt that came from not being completely honest. Because of it, she gave him more truth—if not specifics. “We spend part of our time in Europe—and have a small farm there as well. Do this.” She drew her top lip over her teeth.
    He couldn’t stop the grin. “Show me how to do that again?”
    “Now he’s full of jokes.” But she laughed, then stepped between his legs, bent down and slowly shaved the area between his nose and mouth.
    He wanted to touch her, to run his hand over some part of her. Any part of her. He wanted, he realized, to kiss her again. Whoever the hell she was.
    Her thumb brushed his mouth, held his lip in place, then slid away. But her gaze lingered there before it tracked up to his.
    And she saw desire, the dangerous burn of it in his eyes. Felt it stab inside her like the fired edge of blade.
    “Why is this, do you think?” she murmured.
    He didn’t pretend to misunderstand. He didn’t believe in pretense. “I haven’t got a clue—other than, you being a tasty treat for the eyes.”
    She nearly smiled at that, and turned to rinse the razor again. “Even attraction should have more. I’m not sure we even like each other very much.”
    “I don’t have anything against you, particularly.”
    “Why, Delaney, you’re so smooth.” She laughed because it eased some of the tension inside her. “A woman hasn’t a prayer against such poetry, such charm.”
    “You want poetry, read a book.”
    “I think I do like you.” She considered as she came back to finish the shave. “On some odd level, I enjoy your irascibility.”
    “Old men are irascible. I’m young yet, so I’m just rude.”
    “Precisely. But you also have an interesting mind, and I find it attractive. I’m intrigued by your work.” She turned his face to the side, eased in close again. “And your passion for it. I came looking for passion—not the sexual sort, but for some emotional—some intellectual passion. How strange that I should find it here, and in old bones and broken pots.”
    “My field takes more than