Her face lit up as she returned his smile and for a long, long moment they held eye contact that made the room seem an awful lot smaller than it had a minute or two ago.
It was JJ who finally broke that gaze as her smile faded.
‘Yuk...’ she murmured, dropping the bulk of what she was holding back into the wrapping. ‘At least the soup should be okay.’
Her hand was still covered in a sticky mess. Without thinking, Ben reached out to wipe it clean with the soft fabric in his hands.
Startled, she looked up at him again and, this time, he could actually feel the flash of something igniting. Maybe it was because they were skin to skin where he was holding her hand. Or maybe it was because he could see her eyes darken even more than they were naturally—as if her pupils were dilating. Or...maybe this had just been waiting to happen ever since he’d first laid eyes on this woman.
Whatever caused the spark, it wasn’t going to fizzle out any time soon. It had, in fact, found some real fuel—like that match Ben had been holding against wood shavings in what suddenly felt like a very long time ago. He knew that JJ wasn’t about to break this gaze. He could feel a solid wave of exactly the same level of desire that was currently taking over every cell in his own body.
Ben wasn’t going to break the gaze, either. He held it as he dropped the fabric he was holding and lifted his hand to touch her face. With one finger, he traced the outline of her temple and cheekbone and then down the side of her nose. He watched as JJ’s eyes drifted shut as his finger touched the corner of her mouth and then tracked along her lower lip, so gently he could feel only the tingle of that incredibly soft skin. When her lips parted and he felt the tip of her tongue touch his finger, Ben knew he was completely lost.
So, apparently, was JJ, judging by the way she came up on her tiptoes as he cupped the back of her head and tilted back to offer her mouth to his. And this was no gentle, exploratory first kiss. He’d been right to think that this had been waiting to happen. There was a sense that an unbearable tension was being finally released, here. That this was something they’d both wanted for too long and it couldn’t happen fast enough. Dear Lord, he already had his hands beneath the oversized sweatshirt JJ was wearing. Was it that damp patch that was making her nipple as hard as a pebble from the creek, or was it the touch of his hand that was arousing her so much? And, if it was, he could only dream of how she might react to the slippery warmth of his tongue.
This was happening too fast but it felt like neither of them wanted it to slow down. Or stop it going a whole lot further except...this was breaking a rule that Ben had never broken in his adult life. How could he, when his own mother had told him that her unplanned pregnancy had ruined her life?
‘We can’t do this...’ It was the hardest thing he’d ever done, pulling back from that kiss. That touch. But it had to be done. ‘It’s not safe...’
* * *
Of course it wasn’t safe.
This was the most reckless thing JJ had ever done in her life. She was about to have sex with a real-life bad boy. The kind of man she’d wouldn’t have gone near in a million years in her previous life because she’d known better than to do something wild and be accused of ‘being just like her mother’. She might very well never do it again so she knew that if she didn’t do it now, she would lose a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to see whether real life was anything like the kind of fantasies she’d been playing with.
And it wasn’t unsafe. Not in the way Ben was worried about, anyway.
‘I’m on the Pill,’ she told him.
She could feel his breath on her face as he closed his eyes, leaning in to touch her nose with his. She could feel his hands on her waist, his fingers closing in to shape the hollows just above her hip bones.
‘You want this?’ His voice was so deep it was like the crunch of gravel beneath feet. ‘As much as I do...?’
The shaft of sensation his fingers were creating was moving diagonally from her hips, nosediving to pool in the place she most needed him to touch her.
‘Yes...’ JJ’s voice was as raw as Ben’s. She couldn’t bear it if he stopped. He mustn’t stop. ‘Please...’
They didn’t make it to the dusty floorboards of that hut. JJ felt the rough wood of the wall behind her back by the time the second most astonishing kiss of her life had ended. Somehow, they shifted their clothing enough to get their skin touching exactly where it was needed and JJ was oblivious to the danger of splinters in her back as Ben finally cupped her buttocks and lifted her feet from the floor to perfect their alignment. She wrapped her arms around his neck and her legs around his waist—a move she’d only ever read about before but it felt astonishingly natural. Easy.
And safe...as safe as she had been in Ben’s arms when he’d pulled her from the river. Only this time she could let go and float with the current of a building pleasure like nothing she’d ever known existed.
The cry of ecstasy that came from her throat a short time later was also like no sound she’d ever heard herself make. But, then, she’d never experienced anything like this before, had she? She’d just been taken by a bad boy. In a way that made it feel like she’d just lost her virginity all over again.
Nothing was ever going to be the same.
* * *
‘Wow...’ As post-coital conversation, this wasn’t impressive but Ben was still having trouble finding any words in an almost awkward space of time when they had finally recovered enough to pull themselves apart. He had to lean in to kiss JJ again, though. Softly, this time, because passion that exploded that ferociously couldn’t possibly happen again.
Or maybe it could... The touch—and taste—of JJ’s lips felt familiar now but it was just as exciting. Ben closed his eyes.
‘What just happened there?’ he murmured.
‘I’m not sure.’ JJ’s voice was no more than a whisper but he could hear the smile in it. ‘But...it was...um...really good.’
Ben groaned. ‘I know...and it shouldn’t have been.’
‘Why not?’ There was a wary note in her voice now. ‘Because it was...boring?’
His breath came out in an incredulous huff. ‘Are you kidding me? Boring is the last word on earth I’d use to describe what we just did.’
‘But you thought it shouldn’t have been good?’
‘Yeah...’ He wasn’t about to admit that he’d hadn’t believed a real sexual encounter with JJ would be anything like as good as any fantasy he might or might not have considered. ‘Because...no offence, JJ, but you’re so not my type.’
This time there was a hint of laughter in her voice. ‘And you couldn’t be further from my type. You’re right, it shouldn’t have worked at all.’
Ben opened his eyes to catch her gaze. ‘But it did, didn’t it?’ He kissed her again. ‘Okay...if I’m honest, I’ve been wanting to do this for a long time.’
‘Mmm...’
That sound was pretty much an admission of the same thing, wasn’t it?
‘So...’ Ben knew they both needed to move closer to the fire and start getting properly warm but JJ wasn’t shivering any more and he could feel the warmth of her skin against his own. ‘Did we get it out of our systems, do you think? Enough to go back to our usual “types”?’
There was a flicker in JJ’s eyes that could have been amusement. Or possible a desire to do it all over again?
‘I’m not sure,’ she said. ‘What do you think?’
Ben could feel his mouth curling on one side. ‘I’m not sure, either. But I do think we should pick somewhere more comfortable for next time.’
Oh, yeah...that was definitely desire he could see in her eyes. But she broke her gaze, as if she didn’t want him to see how much she wanted a ‘next time’.
‘It’s not as though it’s going to last,’ she said, slipping away and pulling that sweatshirt down to cover herself properly. ‘I
’m only here until things settle down for Zac and he’s back on deck full time but, even if I was here for ever, it wouldn’t last, would it? Not when we’re so completely incompatible.’
‘True. I’m not even going to be around that much longer. I’ve been thinking of moving on for a long time now. I’m determined to get some helicopter rescue training in at some point in my career.’
Ben knew that the extraordinary physical pleasure they’d just discovered with each other was purely down to lust and would burn itself out in no time but it was a relief to hear that JJ recognised that, as well. He’d been curious about an unexpected attraction and, while it had been infinitely better than he might have imagined, of course it wasn’t going to last.
It never did. Even with the women who were a hundred percent his ‘type’.
But who wouldn’t want to enjoy it for as long as it did last?
* * *
How weird was this?
JJ was acting as though nothing momentous had just happened. Like she had casual sex with bad boys all the time. She was even getting that Thermos of very ordinary tomato soup out of her pack like they were about to have a picnic or something but maybe she just needed to do something with her hands.
Other than touching Ben Marshall.
Maybe she needed a distraction from the words that were echoing in her head but that she could feel deep down in her belly.
Next time...
It wasn’t as though she was behaving totally irresponsibly here. She was just doing something she’d never considered doing before so maybe it was simply a delayed teenage rebellion. Something everybody needed to do before they really knew what they wanted from their life?
Finding that out had been the reason she’d come here in the first place, wasn’t it?
And maybe this was it, in a nutshell?
Passion.
Something she’d never dared to play around with. A glimpse into what life could be like if she wasn’t so bound by the rules and expectations she clung to. A glimpse into the kind of person her mother had apparently been and...maybe that wasn’t as bad as she’d grown up believing? Being adventurous, spontaneous, passionate wasn’t necessarily a recipe for the destruction of lives, was it? She’d seen other people not only get away with it but experience a joy in life she was unfamiliar with. It wasn’t as if she’d want to spend her future with someone like Ben, of course, because they both knew that could never work.
But, oh, boy...it could be fun for a while.
JJ had worked so hard and diligently all her life. Followed every rule and made sure that nobody thought she was anything like as irresponsible as the mother she knew only from faded photographs. She deserved a bit of fun, didn’t she? She and Ben were both adults and it wasn’t as if anyone was going to get hurt.
She turned her head to smile at Ben, who was rearranging their wet clothing over the chairs by the stove.
‘Soup? It’s still nice and hot and I reckon it’s probably just as good as your nan used to make.’
The smile she was getting in return as Ben walked towards her felt like it was reaching right inside her body. Lighting it up.
Oh, yeah...who wouldn’t want to make the most of this kind of fun while it lasted? And if ‘next time’ was even half as good as the first time, how could she possibly resist?
She couldn’t, of course.
For the simple reason that she didn’t want to.
CHAPTER EIGHT
FOR SOMETHING THAT should never have worked in the first place, it was quite remarkable how it could not only continue to work but to get better.
Every single time.
Right from that first day when they’d only stayed in the hut long enough to have a hot drink and get properly warm because an hour’s hike back to Ben’s vehicle wasn’t a big problem, even wearing still-damp clothes. There was a long, hot shower waiting for them back at JJ’s cottage, after all, not to mention a chance to deal with the astonishing level of desire that had apparently already rebuilt—on both sides. That ‘next time’ wasn’t half as good as the first time.
It had been twice as good.
The final discovery that day had been that even the comfort of a soft mattress and warm duvet—the only kind of environment JJ had considered appropriate for this kind of activity in her previous life—didn’t make the sex any less exciting. If anything, it revealed that her partners in the past had been either sadly lacking in expertise or she simply hadn’t been attracted enough to flick a switch she’d never known existed. A switch that seemed to open a connection that encouraged her to be more adventurous than she could have believed and enabled her to not only receive unimaginable pleasure but to give it, as well.
JJ had expected the novelty to wear off, of course. Or for Ben to get bored and move on—probably to another one of those gorgeous blonde adrenaline junkie visitors to this part of the world—but it didn’t happen. Maybe that was because Ben crammed so much into his life he was almost always busy and that meant he could only find a night or two a week to visit JJ at her cottage and he never stayed the whole night, not just because they wanted to keep their connection as private as possible but because Ben always seemed to have an early start the next day for a shift or a meeting or a fitness session.
A week sped past and then another and another. Until neither of them were counting. Until Shaun had become a small sheep rather than a lamb. He didn’t need bottle-feeding any longer and was earning his treats of sheep nuts by wearing a collar and chain and being a lawnmower around the cottage.
Locals were getting used to seeing him trotting behind JJ when she went for a run along the road and they weren’t surprised when Ben began to be seen regularly in her company. It was common knowledge that he was helping her with her fitness levels, after all, but Cutler’s Creek’s ambulance station manager was working hard to get everybody who was involved in the emergency services around here up to speed in both fitness and bushcraft skills. He had even inspired others to jump in and help.
Everyone had splinter skills, it seemed. Bruce was an expert in creating shelters by using whatever materials might be at hand and the group that his training day attracted included people from as far away as Queenstown and the West Coast—a surprising number of whom were already becoming familiar faces to JJ. When Bruce produced a map of the huts that were available on public land and she and Ben exchanged a very private glance, she felt even more a part of this group.
It turned out to be one of the best days ever, learning how to use fly sheets or natural features like big rocks and overhangs and gather dead tussock grass, fern fronds or moss to create a surprisingly comfortable and warm mattress. You could even pull some of the dry material over your head, apparently, to trap air and retain body warmth.
Bruce also had an old school mate who’d worked in the Meteorological Service before retiring back to Central Otago and he gave a fascinating lecture in the town’s school hall about how to read weather maps or the clouds and spot an approaching front that could develop into a potentially dangerous storm. Wispy clouds that were called ‘mares’ tails’ were a sign of high-level winds and were often the first sign of bad weather. Fluffy, cumulus clouds could develop ominously dark bases and go on to signal the imminent arrival of a low-pressure system that could bring high winds, heavy rain and even snow at almost any time of the year.
JJ herself had given a talk about first aid kits—what to put in them and how to use the contents—that had also attracted interest from all over the area and, on that occasion, she not only felt a part of the group but that she was making a real contribution to this community.
Each new training session, in addition to every new or returning patient treated at the hospital, made local faces more familiar and personalities better known. JJ could look back at her arrival here and be amused by how she’d felt like a fish out of water and that she’d worried about how
isolated and potentially lonely a sparsely populated area could be for a city girl like herself. She’d been far lonelier in that crowded apartment building in Wellington. Cutler’s Creek was beginning to feel very much like a real home and creating a sensation of belonging that was something very new for JJ.
It felt like she was putting down tendrils of roots that could ground her for ever if they were allowed to keep growing. She was coming to love being near the mountains and the feeling of freedom that came from the open farmland. She liked these people and she admired their spirit of adventure, ingenuity and their generosity in spending so much time and effort on things that were designed to let them help others who might get into trouble in the great outdoors.
Not that she could stay here for ever, given that Don Donaldson wasn’t showing any signs of wanting to retire yet, but maybe she could find something similar. New Zealand was a big enough country to need lots of doctors in rural areas. She might need to make the move before those roots got any deeper, mind you, because it was only going to get harder to pull them out.
‘What’s that face all about?’ Ben was in the kitchen of Cutler’s Creek Hospital as JJ walked in for a cup of coffee mid-afternoon, after the outpatient maternity clinic that she’d and midwife Debbie had been running had finished.
‘Just thinking.’ But JJ’s heart had lifted as soon as she’d seen him and she could feel her frown evaporating.
‘Hard work, was it?’
Oh...that cheeky grin. It was something else she was going to miss about this place, that was for sure.
‘I’m just wondering if I’ll be able to take Shaun with me when I leave Cutler’s Creek, that’s all.’
Betty dropped the pan she was scrubbing in the sink with a clatter. ‘You’re not planning on leaving us, are you?’
‘I was only ever here on a locum basis, Betty.’ JJ poured herself a cup of coffee and then sat down at the table. There was a basket, lined with a tea towel, full of freshly made date scones and a big pat of butter on a plate beside them. ‘Doc Donaldson tells me that the mighty Hugo is doing so well he’s going to come home in the next week or so and that means that Zac will be back onboard full time very soon.’ JJ reached for a scone and tried to keep her tone cheerful. ‘I might have to start looking for a new job sooner rather than later.’
Unlocking the Rebel's Heart Page 9