Just My Luck (Escape to New Zealand #5)

by Rosalind James

“What?” she whispered. “This?” Then she was over him, wriggling, slowly impaling herself on him. And it was so good. She pressed her body to his, leaned down to kiss him, her breasts against his chest, her mouth sweet and soft against his. And then she started to move. And that was the best thing yet.

  “Know what I’m doing now?” she asked a few minutes, or an hour, later. He couldn’t tell. He’d lost all track of time. She was starting to pant, and he could feel the difference, the way her excitement was rising, the force of it. “I’m touching myself. I’m riding you, and I’m touching myself. And oh, Nate. Oh, God. I’m going to . . . I’m going to come.”

  And then she did. And the way it felt . . . She was contracting around him, and she was riding him hard, crying out her pleasure. And he’d lost control. He was shouting, unable to form words. His arms were pulled tight over his head, and he was on his heels, his hips leaving the bed, thrusting to meet her with every bit of force he had, and it was so intense, it was almost painful. And it was incredible.

  She untied his hands first. Had to work on the knot for awhile, he’d pulled it so tight, straining against his bonds. But she got it loose eventually, and he pulled his arms down, reached for the scarf over his eyes. And looked at her. Kneeling over him in the warm glow of the flickering candles, naked except for those stockings.

  Bloody hell. Those stockings. Her dark hair was loose around her shoulders, her cheeks flushed, and if he’d been in charge, he knew what he’d be doing right now. It had been so hot, not being able to see her, not being able to touch her. But when he could . . . it was going to be so good. He was going to make the most of his time. He was going to wear her out.

  She sat back, stretched a leg in the air, began to roll a stocking down her thigh.

  “That looks like something your sex slave should be doing for you,” he said.

  She stopped what she was doing, looked at him. Then smiled slowly. “You know, I think you’re right. Why don’t you come down here and do it?”

  He knelt between her legs, put his hands around her thigh. Stroked it for a bit, and then carefully, slowly, began to pull the delicate material down. She was leaning back on her elbows, her dark eyes luminous in the candlelight, her gaze intent on him.

  “Can I ask you a question?” he asked her, pulling the silky item off her foot and handing it to her, then moving to her other leg. Getting in a fair amount of touching in the process of taking hold of the second stocking. Doing some things that, he saw, were having their effect on her.

  “What?” she asked, sounding a bit breathless.

  “Just how flexible are you? I’ve always wondered.”

  “Very flexible,” she assured him. “Maybe not quite ballet-dancer flexible, but I can do the splits.”

  “The splits, eh,” he said speculatively. He had the second stocking off, and she’d set both of them carefully down next to the bed, rolling over to do that, showing him that backside again. Which was adding yet another item to his list for the next day.

  “And you’re getting a little ahead of yourself, aren’t you?” she asked, back on her elbows again, shaking her hair back. Looking sexy, and wicked, and nine kinds of dangerous. “You’re still on my time. I’m still in charge, or did you forget that?”

  “Nah,” he said, drinking her in. “I didn’t forget that. D’you have some more orders for me, then?”

  “Oh, yeah,” she smiled. “I think I do. I think you’ve got another job to do before you’re finished for the night.”

  He let her wear the stockings the next day, when it was his turn. But only the stockings. Made her cook him breakfast that way as her first job, which she found pretty distracting, especially with him sitting at the table watching her do it. And when she set their plates down, she was startled to find herself pulled into his lap, her plate moved next to his. Which made it just way too difficult to eat. She kept losing her focus on her eggs, especially when his hands began to roam and she was squirming in his lap, lying back against his chest as he fondled her. But by the time he laid her down and had her for dessert . . . she wasn’t exactly hungry anymore.

  By the end of the day, Kristen’s poor silk scarves were never going to be the same again, because Nate had managed to be a whole lot more inventive with them than she had.

  Oh, sure, he’d got around to using one of them to tie her wrists behind her back. But after that, he’d made her stand there while he used the other one on her, the smooth silk rubbing over her faster, then slower, harder, then softer, until her legs were shaking, until she was begging him. Until she would have done anything for him if only he’d finished it. By the time he’d let her drop to her knees, put a pillow down on the floor and gently pushed her forehead down onto it, she’d been nearly incoherent. And when he’d finally been inside her, one hand bracing himself against the floor, the other stroking her, allowing her to let go at last while she shuddered and moaned out her gratitude . . . at that moment, she really had been his.

  At last, though, her hands were free, her body was her own again, and she was lying in bed, her head on his shoulder, stroking his chest.

  “So how was your birthday?” she asked him.

  “Sweet as,” he said with a grin. “Best birthday present ever.”

  “Hmm,” she agreed languidly. “I thought about giving you a sweater, but . . .”

  He laughed. “Yeh. This was a much better choice. And I’d still like to pay for it. For this place, I mean. I think I may have got a bit more present than you intended.”

  “Well, maybe,” she admitted. “You’re very creative, aren’t you? Especially without advance notice. I’m so impressed. But I enjoyed it too. And no, you can’t pay for it. It was my present, and I gave it to you.”

  “You certainly did,” he agreed.

  “But you can buy Kristen a couple new scarves. And you can buy me a new pair of stockings, too, since you destroyed those, making me wear them while I . . . while I did all that. And who knows? I might want to wear that outfit again sometime.”

  He bent and kissed her on the top of the head. “I’ll do that,” he promised. “Because I may want to see that outfit again myself.”

  Wedding Song

  “Is this all right?” Kristen asked as soon as she opened the door. “I looked it up, but I wasn’t positive. Am I OK?”

  Liam smiled. “You’re more than OK.” He leaned forward and gave her a kiss on the cheek. “You’re beautiful.”

  “But for the marae. Are there any rules? And you look very handsome, by the way.”

  He glanced down at the black suit, custom-tailored to his broad frame. “Cheers. But for you . . . Just the same rules you’d have for any wedding. No different on the marae. Though come to think of it, you are breaking one rule. Reckon you’re going to outshine the bride.”

  “I tried not to be too flashy.” She ran her hands nervously down the pretty blue-and-green dress she was wearing over black tights and ankle boots in deference to the rain. “Is it still too much?”

  “Nah.” She’d really worried about it, he could tell, and as always, her vulnerability pierced his heart. “You can’t help being beautiful. It’s OK. And we should go.”

  Despite his words, Kristen was definitely feeling some butterflies during the short drive. She’d be meeting Liam’s parents today, and some of his family as well. But just as a friend, she reminded herself. They didn’t have to love her to accept her as his friend.

  Liam held the door for her, held an umbrella over her head as she emerged from his car into a rain-soaked carpark behind Wellington University. She took his arm for the walk to the shelter of an overhang where a group of thirty or forty people waited, and was comforted, as always, by his solidity and strength.

  “Liam. Darling.”

  This had to be his mother, a statuesque woman with Liam’s eyes, the same warm smile, coming forward to hug and kiss him. And about half the rest of the group, she found, seemed to be related to him too, in one way or another. His father, an
older and broader version of him, greeted his elder son with a fierce hug that communicated his love and pride.

  Kristen met one of his sisters and her husband, the other sister and a brother, she knew, working across the Ditch in Australia. Then an aunt and uncle, and innumerable cousins. How could one person have so many cousins?

  She tried to remember names at first, but soon gave up. Marika and Vernon, she could manage those. But between the size of the group and the many Maori given names and surnames, she was quickly lost.

  “I’m sorry,” she said with a laugh. “I hope you don’t test me on names, because I’m afraid I’m already overwhelmed.”

  “That’s all right, darling.” Marika reached a broad arm around Kristen’s waist, gave her an encouraging squeeze. “We’ll take care of you, no worries. Is this your first time at a marae?”

  “It is,” Kristen said with a grateful smile. She should have known that Liam’s parents would be warm and loving. He had to have got it from somewhere. “And I’m excited, but I’m not sure what to expect or what to do, so I hope you’ll tell me. Are we waiting here for something?”

  “Just for the whole group to come,” Marika explained. “So they only have to karanga once. But I think we’re good now.”

  Kristen moved forward with the group, grown to at least fifty by now, as they walked down the strip of pavement surrounded by green lawn toward the building, open at both front and back, its overhung, steeply pitched roof edged by two intricately carved beams painted a bright red. The wharenui, the ceremonial meeting house where the wedding would take place.

  At least it had stopped raining, which was fortunate, because a group of women had come out from the sheltering roof to stand in front of the building, and the visitors had stopped some meters away.

  One of the women facing them stepped slightly forward and began a . . . not a song, exactly, more of a call. She continued the call, or chant, or whatever it was, for some minutes, moving her hands in accompaniment to the Maori words. When she finished, Liam’s mother stepped forward and performed her own call in return, then took a pace back into her group. Silence fell for a few moments, until the woman in front of the building performed one final brief call and motioned them inside.

  “The karanga,” Liam told Kristen quietly. “Greeting us, welcoming us. Mum thanking her in return. And both of them clearing a pathway for our ancestors to meet as well.”

  The group of visitors stopped beneath the overhang, and everyone bent down to remove their shoes before stepping inside, where rows of chairs with ribbons on the back were set up, looking like any wedding anywhere. But the surroundings, Kristen saw as she took her seat with the rest of the visitors on one side of the aisle, were unlike anything she’d ever seen.

  The roof was supported by beams, a carved, stylized figure at the bottom of each. Jutting bellies and big heads, faces and thighs marked with traditional tattoos, long-fingered hands on bellies, oversized tongues displayed. Each beam painted above its supporting figure with curving designs in red, white, and black. The space between the beams paneled with flax woven into geometrical designs of white and brown, every panel boasting a different but harmonious pattern. Kristen’s aesthetic sense was at once stimulated and soothed by the beauty of the woven designs, the contrast between their elegant simplicity and the elaborate carvings and paintings, the harmony of it all. Men carved, women wove, Liam had told her, and both skills were valued and proudly displayed.

  She was diverted from her study of her surroundings by several men standing and moving forward from each side of the aisle, facing each other at the front of the room. Several rounds of speeches followed, host first, then guest, followed by a second man from each side, then a third.

  Kristen let the melodious language wash over her. More welcoming, she guessed, part of the protocol Liam had told her was always followed at the marae. She was beginning to realize that Maori could talk.

  And sing, because as soon as the speeches ended, the entire group burst into song, everyone on both sides of the aisle chiming in with full-throated enthusiasm and smiling faces. One song, then another, both seeming to be perfectly well known to all present, including young children. And sung so beautifully, even without accompaniment, Kristen got chills.

  The second song ended, and Liam got up with the rest of the men on the guests’ side and lined up before moving forward, one at a time, to greet the man Kristen guessed was the host. Each man placed his left hand on the host’s shoulder, the host placing his own hand on his guest’s left shoulder, touched foreheads and noses twice, then moved on. Marika pulled Kristen up by the hand with a smile and stood with the other female guests, where they got in line behind the men to greet the host in their turn.

  Kristen couldn’t help feeling a little shy and awkward doing her own hongi, wondering if it could really be all right for such an obvious outsider to participate, but was reassured when the host smiled at her in welcome.

  “Just don’t head-butt him, and you’ll be right,” Liam had laughed when he was explaining the process to her. And practicing with her too, which had felt . . . good. His big hand on her shoulder, and having an excuse to put her hand on his shoulder at last too, to feel all that solid muscle under her palm. And to touch her face to his, even if what she had wanted was to kiss him. To keep holding him, and to feel him holding her too.

  She pulled her mind back with an effort, took her seat again. And finally the welcoming was done, the tapu was removed, and the ceremony could begin.

  There was none of the solemnity she’d expected. Instead, it was joyous, and fun, and warm, and . . . beautiful. A Christian service conducted by a minister, with a few songs thrown in just because, Liam had told her, Maori needed to sing.

  Kristen found herself tearing up as the couple exchanged their vows, looking so happy to embark on their life together with their huge extended families around them. How would it feel, she wondered, to be surrounded by all that love and support?

  She felt the familiar wrench of her heart at the memory of her own wedding, nobody but Hannah and Drew, her brother Matt there to represent her family. A winery wedding, the ceremony conducted beneath a rose arbor in a vineyard she’d never been to before, by a celebrant she’d never met before, in front of people who’d mostly meant nothing to her. A hundred or so of Marshall’s business contacts, with a few of her own friends sprinkled in. Marshall’s parents, his younger sister too, none of them seeming all that enthusiastic about her entry into their family. They must have known, she’d thought later, that there would be no point in getting attached, because it wasn’t going to last.

  What she would have given, that day, to have been part of a family like this. To have had a father to walk her down the aisle, maybe cry a little at the thought of his baby girl growing up. A mother to help her get dressed, to reassure her. Parents and grandparents to tell her that they were proud of her, that they loved her. She’d had Hannah and Matt, and that was all. She’d thought she had Marshall too, but she’d been so wrong.

  She reached for a tissue in her bag, wiped the tears away as the bride and groom walked down the aisle, husband and wife now, and the entire congregation began to sing a song she recognized. Pokarekare Ana, the most famous Maori love song, a song of the love of a man for a woman. A man who thought he could die if he wasn’t allowed to marry his beloved. A man who would love her forever. A man who would die for her.

  Liam’s big hand, then, coming around hers as she continued to cry. Not demanding anything of her, just holding it. And it was as if all the strength and comfort she felt every time she was with him was passing from his hand into her own. As if he were holding her close, holding her tight, exactly the way he held her rope at the gym. Letting her know that he was there, that he had her. That he would never let her go. And that he would never, ever let her fall.

  Self-Control: Sadly Overrated

  Ally awoke early on Sunday morning, stole quietly out of the bedroom. Nate was still sleeping, but she
was feeling so energized, she had to move. It had rained on and off all throughout the previous day, and she’d woken at night to hear more of it, drumming hard on the roof of the bach. Perfect weather to stay indoors and be Nate’s sex slave, she thought with a happy shiver of remembrance as she stepped off the porch and ran across the road to reach the break in the dunes that offered access to the beach on the other side.

  Today, the clouds had parted, the sun was shining, even if not warmly, and she was on a kilometers-long, deserted stretch of beach, feeling like the only person in the world. She kicked off her jandals, chose a direction at random and began to walk. And when that wasn’t enough to release her fizzing spirits, began to run. The sand was firm under her feet near the edge of the surf, and when a lone wave came up higher on the beach, she didn’t run away from it. She embraced it, letting the cold water wash over her feet and ankles, glad she had worn her shorts so she was free to play.

  She turned at last, began to run back the way she’d come. Still nobody else around, she saw with pleasure, none of the little town’s few hundred residents fancying an early-morning beach walk. She ran past the spot where she’d entered, then gradually slowed. Put her head back, into the wind. Listened to the pounding of the surf, stretched her arms wide, and twirled. Around and around, feeling six years old again, able to surrender herself completely to the magic of the moment.

  She took a final spin and saw Nate coming through the break in the dunes towards her. She waved at him, an extravagant gesture, her arm sweeping above her head. Laughed out loud. Saw him start to jog towards her, the economy of motion, the controlled power, as always, impressing her. Thrilling her.

  She wasn’t quite ready to give up on her outdoor fun, though. She didn’t want to talk. She wanted to move. She started to run. But not towards him. That would be too easy. No, she ran away from him.

  Faster and faster, loving the feeling of stretching out, skimming along the sand. And of teasing him, she realized as she looked back over her shoulder, saw that he was chasing her, gaining fast. She began to sprint, putting all her effort into it. Cast another quick glance back, and saw that he was closer still. Her heart was pounding, her breath coming hard. And still she ran, until she could hear his footfalls behind her.