Just in Time (30 page)

Long and slow, with her rising into every thrust, moaning out his name. And then, finally, increasing the tempo. Up on his hands, moving harder and faster, feeling what that did to her, and seeing it, too.

“More,” she moaned, and he’d never heard anything better. “More. Please.”

Her back was arching again, she was moaning louder, frustration twisting her face, and he’d paused, even though it was killing him, had a hand where she needed it, was stroking, teasing, driving her up again.

“Come on,” he urged her. “Please, baby. Do it for me.”

Her eyes opened, locked on his, her lips formed his name, and he said, “Yeh. Yeh. It’s me. I’m here. Come on. Show me.”

She did. She did it for him, because she’d have done anything for him, and he knew it. She was calling out, tightening around him, the contractions squeezing him, milking him, and that was it. It was tipping him over the edge, and he was on his hands again, riding her waves, surfing that exquisite knife-edge of pleasure, until he was tumbling, falling, groaning. Going deep. Going under.

Faith lay under him, still shaking, her eyes closed, because she didn’t seem to be able to open them.

“Cold?” A gentle hand brushed a wisp of hair from her face.

“No,” she sighed. “Just so…well done.”

She heard the huff of laughter. “Yeh. Hope so. Hope that’s what you are.” He slid down and gave her a soft kiss on the mouth, his tongue brushing against the little gap between her front teeth, and then he shifted position to drop another kiss on her upper lip. “I love this. Been wanting to do this since the first day I saw you.”

“What? Kiss my mole, or…?”

“Both. Absolutely. Both. Dreams come true, eh.”

She opened her eyes and gave him a slow smile. “Told you I didn’t need a vibrator.”

He laughed out loud at that. “You kept me awake that night. Wondering if, somehow, you didn’t touch yourself, or if it was just that you didn’t need any extra help when you did. I was betting on didn’t need it, so you know, but thinking about it cost me some sleep, no worries. When we were in that shop, the way you looked at me, when you had your hands behind your back…” He sighed. “I was betting on that.”

“Hah. I
knew
it. I knew that whatever you said, you loved that ribbon. Or maybe I should say that you loved tying my hands.” She smiled at him some more, and she could hear the hitch in his breath, could almost feel his heart pounding.

“Could be.” His voice had come out a little strangled, and she felt a rush of purely feminine power.

“Mmm. I knew it. And that night, so
you
know? That night,” she said, stretching against him, “I
really
didn’t need any extra help, because the way you were looking at me when you did it—that worked. Oh, man. It worked so well. Besides, I’m fairly…” His hand was on her breast, stroking over it, playing there, the low tingle had started up again, just like that, and she was getting distracted. “I’m fairly responsive,” she managed to say. “I can do it…oh, a lot. A
lot
.”

“Ah,” he said on a long sigh of satisfaction. “Good times. Left you wanting just now, did I? But then, I was in a wee bit of a hurry.” He rolled off her to the side of the bed and pulled the sheets back. “Come on, then. In you go. Give me a challenge like that? You know I need to answer it. Show you what else I can do, and see what you can. Some more of that boot camp, eh. Provided by your very own instructor.”

“You may not be the hurtin’ kind,” she said as he pulled the covers over them both. “But you do a pretty fair line in dark and dangerous after all, don’t you? You’re not quite as easygoing as you pretend to be. You’ve got a little command in you there.”

“Only if I really want it. And oh, yeh. I wanted it.”

One big arm came around her to haul her close, and she had to shut her eyes for a moment at the rightness of being here, being held by him. And then she had to open them, because she hadn’t seen nearly enough of him. All this time, she’d been avoiding looking too much for fear that he would catch her staring, and now it didn’t matter. So she wriggled in closer, put a leg over his, and pillowed her head on his chest.

His hand cupped her head, and she turned her face to kiss the spot where his tattoo ended, a ribbon of deep blue against rich brown. She brushed a hand over acres of smooth, hard muscle with its light furring of hair, swirled a finger lightly over one flat nipple, and felt him respond instantly. His skin quivered at her touch, giving her a thrill that had nothing to do with her own desire, and everything to do with his. And made her want to do so much more.

“Does this mean I get to touch you anytime I want now?” she asked him, then had to kiss him again. Her hand, whatever his answer was going to be, was moving, stroking over his broad chest, across the heavy muscle of his shoulder, down the sculpted contours of his arm, tracing the whorls of the intricate tattoo. But then, what woman would have been able to resist?

“It does,” he said. “Anytime you want. And it means I get to touch
you
anytime I want, too. I also get to kiss you anytime I want. And any
where
I want.”

He had rolled them both, was over her again in one smooth, athletic move, one knee was parting her legs, and her hands had flown up by her head. “Starting right now,” he told her. “You can stay exactly like that, because you’re right, I’ve got a little command in me, and I’m going to use it. And oh, baby.” He sighed. “I have so many places I need to kiss you.”

Will woke to the predawn chorus of the tui in the back garden singing their delight in another new day, the answers to yesterday’s questions staring him in the face so clearly, he couldn’t believe he hadn’t seen them before. Even though he hadn’t got much sleep, not after taking Faith dancing, keeping her out late just to hold her, to watch her move under the flashing lights.

Dancing with her eyes closed, her body swaying to the pumping music. Running her hands down her sides, feeling exactly what he was, he could tell. So aware of her body, of every aching, tingling centimeter of it, and so aware of his, too. Opening her eyes again to smile at him, to move into his arms. The feeling when he’d wrapped her up in them, had held her, and had known he had the right to do it. That he wasn’t pretending, and neither was she.

They had stayed until after midnight, then had stepped out of the doors of the club and walked the short kilometer home, and despite the fact that they had still been in the city, there’d been stars.

She’d tipped her head back to look at them. “A sky full of stars.” And she’d sounded so happy.

“Not as good as it’ll look when we’re out in the bush,” he’d told her. “On the coast, or out on a boat, maybe. Do a bit of a cruise, and I can really show you something. But still. Good, eh.”

“Good.” She’d snuggled a little closer, one hand tucked into the crook of his arm. “And you’re right. The moon’s upside down.”

“Or right way up. I like to think of it like that.”

They’d reached the house again, had climbed the stairs and got ready for bed together with no pretending, and no pillows.

They’d spent some time there, navigating in the dark. Sighs and murmurs, languid touches and slow, sweet kisses. Learning the curves and hollows of each others’ bodies, eager explorers mapping their newfound terrain with hands and mouths, steering by sound and sigh. He’d slid his hand over the curve of her waist, down the swell of her hips, into that most wonderful indentation where her thighs began, feeling the shiver that ran over her skin at his touch. Over the slight curve of belly, then, and up over her sensitive midriff to the delicious roundness of her breasts. Over everything that had told him he was touching a woman. That he was touching Faith.

He’d kissed his way down her neck, had lingered again, had felt her hands on him, holding his shoulders, caressing the muscles of his back, his arms, and had known that she felt exactly the same way. That she wanted to touch him, because when she did, she knew he was a man, and she knew that it was him. And then, as he moved down her body, those eager hands were stroking over his nape, curling into his hair as if she couldn’t stand not to. As if she couldn’t bear to let him go.

So, no, he hadn’t had much sleep. But then, sleep was overrated.

“Hmm?” Faith stirred now, rolled over, and opened her blue eyes, and he almost changed his mind about getting up.

“Go back to sleep.” He tugged the duvet up a bit to cover her more snugly.

“Is it morning already?” she murmured, her eyes drifting shut again.

“Yeh.” He smiled at her, because she was so pretty, all mussed and sleepy like that. “But early, eh. I’m going to the gym, and then the rest of the day, I’m all yours.”

She didn’t even hear that, because she was already asleep again. He’d worn her out, he guessed, and that was fine by him.

He headed downstairs, the house still Saturday-morning quiet. He didn’t stop for breakfast, but he stopped in the kitchen all the same. His grandmother was in there having an early-morning cuppa, and that made his morning a lot less complicated, because she had the information he needed.

“Want me to fix you breakfast?” she asked after he’d got his intel from her and put his phone back in his pocket again.

“No, thanks. I’ll get it at the café before the gym.” He gave her a kiss on one soft, finely lined cheek and headed out the door, feeling as light as the birdsong all around him.

He reached his destination, a shabby house at the edge of town with grass that needed cutting. Not so different at all from the house he’d grown up in, except for the garden. Koro had cut the grass, or Will had. Their house might not have been flash, but it had always been tidy.

He got out of the car, walked up the concrete path, and a dog barked from behind a chain-link fence.

“No worries,” Will told the animal. “Purely an exploratory journey.”

He leaped up the steps to the porch and rang the bell, waited long seconds until he sensed movement inside, and then the front door was opening.

He smiled at the middle-aged Maori woman. Dressed in black leggings and a long T-shirt, her figure heavy from a bunch of kids, her hair in its knot, her face a bit careworn. She had a toddler on her hip, dressed only in a red shirt and nappy. A grandson, probably.

Not an easy life, and he knew it. He wasn’t going to add to her cares, not if he could help it. He was here to make sure he wouldn’t have to.

“Morning,” he said. “I’m here for Chaz. He around?”

She blinked at him. “Will Tawera, isn’t it?” The baby on her hip stared in fascination, fingers stuffed into his mouth, black ringlets springing up in wild profusion all over his head.

“Yeh.” Will smiled again.

“He’s not awake yet. He works nights.”

“I know. I’ll just nip in and have a chat all the same, if it’s all right.”

“Course,” she said, because she was too polite to say anything else.

Will stepped into the little entryway with its worn lino flooring, and she waited while he bent to take off his shoes. “Down here,” she said, leading him to a narrow passage. “Second on the right.”

“Brilliant. Cheers.”

She nodded and disappeared into the back of the house, and Will knocked on the wooden door.

“Bugger off,” he heard. “It’s Saturday.”

Will opened the door and stepped inside, into musty air and a carpet made of dirty clothes strewn across the floor. A beer can lay on its side on the bedside table, another one sitting beside it. Chaz was a slob and no mistake.

“Nice way to talk to your mum,” Will said, shutting the door behind him.

“What the hell—” Chaz was sitting up, blinking, groping on the floor for something to cover himself. “What are you doing here?”

“Came to talk to you. Get dressed and come outside.”

“You think I’m bloody stupid?” Chaz gave up the search for the nonexistent shirt and crossed his arms across his pathetic excuse for a chest instead. “I’m not doing that.”

“Then I’ll open the door, get your mum in here, and say what I’ve got to say to her, too. That sound like a plan? Or better yet, I’ll drag your skinny arse out there myself. Get dressed.”