Kiwi Rules (New Zealand Ever After Book 1)

by Rosalind James

  Geez, she made me smile, even when she was heating me up. “I don’t think I ever yelled much. And I like well women even better, if this is about you. Ones who jump off waterfalls with me and make love like they’ve thrown their heart over that fence already and are sending their body after it. No limits. I could have had a few moments, though, when I wanted to show you what I was thinking. You’re a bit . . . frustrating. I’m keeping score, no worries. As for Poppy? I’m guessing it wasn’t her idea. My dad’s, more likely.”

  “So are you going to let him know how you feel?” She put a hand on my thigh below my shorts. It was my left one, but her hand didn’t feel like it was assessing an amputated limb. It felt like a woman who wanted to touch you, and was doing it. “By the way—I thought that ‘no limits’ thing, after the first time. I thought I shouldn’t say it, though. I thought it would put you off. Why are you always saying exactly what I’m thinking?”

  I cleared my throat. “I’m going to have a discussion with my dad, yeh. And in what possible world would I be put off by you saying, ‘No limits’? Also, that’s a bit distracting, what you’re doing there.”

  “Yeah?” She ran her hand under the edge of the shorts and stroked it up my inner thigh. “How about now?”

  We were headed across the bridge into Mount Maunganui. Unfortunately, that meant we still had five minutes to go. I asked, “How are you feeling?”

  I tried to ask it neutrally. I probably wasn’t entirely successful, because she laughed, leaned across the center console, kissed my neck, sending a shock wave through me and seriously endangering both of us, and said, “I’m feeling like I want to touch you. I’m feeling like I want you to touch me a whole lot more than that. I’m feeling like I’m ready to be done being sick. You have a beautiful body. Have I mentioned that?”

  “Yeh,” I managed to say. “I think you have.”

  It felt like a very long time before I was pulling into the underground garage. When I’d eased the car into its space at last, Karen didn’t wait for me to kiss her, like I’d expected her to. Instead, she jumped out. I climbed out myself, but I caught her hand as she headed off toward the lifts, pulled her back, got a hand behind her head and an arm around her waist, and kissed her. Harder than I had before, because if I’d ever had an invitation to do it, this was it. And she made a noise under my mouth and let herself be kissed just like that.

  I’d have done it against the car. I was in that deep that fast, my hands tightening on her, the need pounding in my body. Footsteps on concrete, echoing from around a corner, brought me back to myself, and I pulled back a fraction and said, “Upstairs.”

  She pulled my head back down, kissed me again, got a hand under my T-shirt and sent it up my side, moved her mouth over until she was kissing my neck, and said, “I don’t want to wait. I can’t wait. Jax. Come on. I’m better.”

  I was a self-disciplined man. It wasn’t easy to remember that. I got my hands on her shoulders, set her away from me, and then, because I possibly wasn’t as self-disciplined as all that just now, I gave her a slap on the bum, did my best to smolder, and said, “Upstairs.”

  This was going to be hard. Hard to remember that whatever she said, she was still fragile in all sorts of ways. Hard to be everything she needed right now. Hard not to get carried away.

  Fortunately, I was good at hard.

  Karen

  How had he jumped so fast to exactly what I needed? How did he always know? Right now, he was pushing the floor button, then shifting his gaze to me. I thought I’d hear something sexy, but instead, he picked up my arm by the wrist and inspected it. The scrapes were still bandaged—he’d changed the dressing for me, in fact, before we’d gone to the hangi—but the visible skin was only a little pink and mottled now. I said, “It doesn’t hurt.”

  He said, “It does, though. I’ve noticed you lie.” In a remote sort of way that was weirdly sexy, or maybe that was the excitement rippling through my body. I shuddered, he smiled, the elevator doors opened, and he took my hand and said, “Come on.”

  I didn’t know what I was going to get, but I had a feeling it was going to be good. When he was opening the door to his apartment, I kicked off my jandals and said, “I hope you bought condoms.”

  He shut the door behind us, got his own shoes off, put his arm around me, kissed my mouth, ran his hand down my neck until he was holding my shoulder, and said, “You’ve had a pretty rough few days. Maybe it’d be a good idea to let me take over now. All right?”

  He kissed me again, and it was like his lips carried electricity. Not like a shock. More like a buzz of silver energy. I said, “All . . . right.”

  I should say something about how this was only in bed, and probably something about limits. I didn’t, because I didn’t want to.

  He said, “Go on into the bedroom, then. When you’re ready, you can lie down on the bed for me.” He ran a hand up my thigh. I’d worn the halter dress that was my swim cover-up today, because it was the prettiest thing I had with me, and right now, I was glad I had. He kissed my neck, sent his hand a little higher, then brushed his fingers lightly between my legs, making me quiver. He smiled some more and said, “Leave all this on.” Like he couldn’t wait. Or like I couldn’t, and he was going to make me do it anyway.

  Oh, yeah.

  I brushed my teeth, washed off my feet and a few other necessary areas, feeling jumpy and off-balance, wondering if he’d come in and watch me do it. When he didn’t, I wondered what he was doing. I couldn’t hear him, but surely he was out there. And finally, when he didn’t come in, I went to sit on the edge of the bed. And burned.

  He came in, finally, with a couple bottles of beer, sat down beside me, handed me a beer, and said, “You liked it the first time, eh.”

  Well, this wasn’t exactly sexy. Then he said, “Thought I said to lie down, though,” which was.

  I took another sip of beer, shrugged, and said, “If I lie down, I can’t drink my beer. Your plan has flaws.”

  He ran a hand over my hair, traced the hair at the nape of my neck, then leaned down and kissed me there. Gently. He whispered in my ear, “Suppose we make a new rule for tonight. No talking.”

  He was kissing my nape again, not touching me anywhere else, and I was having a hard time focusing. “A little hard to communicate what we want, maybe,” I said.

  “Oh, I can talk,” he said. “This rule only applies to you.”

  I froze. He said, “If it hurts your arm, if I do something you don’t want—tell me. Otherwise?” He kissed my lips again, smiled into my eyes, and said, “Shut up and do what I tell you.”

  The jolt of heat went right down my body. It was like he saw straight into me. I took another sip of beer. My hand was shaking, though, and it was hard to hold the bottle. Jax took it from me, set it down on the bedside table, sighed, and said, “You can start by taking off my leg.”

  I saw something in his eyes, then. Something that said, I need to know you will. I need to feel like it doesn’t matter. And, maybe, that he needed to feel like a man. That worked for me, because I needed him to feel like one, too. So I did it. I got off the bed, knelt in front of him, found the button to take the leg off, and pushed it. He put his hand on my head, and when I looked up, there was an expression on his face I couldn’t read. I leaned over, kissed his thigh above the white sleeve, and started rolling it down. I took his leg apart like foreplay, and when I had all the pieces off, I rubbed my hands over the stump, up his thigh, tried my very best to let him know with my touch that he was the most beautiful man I’d ever seen, and waited.

  His voice was strained when he said, “Matches in the kitchen. Candles, too. Drawer by the fridge. Bring them in, light the candles, and turn out the light.”

  How could it be so hot, I wondered when I was touching the match to the second one, then going to the door and flipping the switch, simply not to be able to talk? How could I already be soaking wet, longing for one more touch of his finger? I knew why he’d chosen to do it this
way. Because he was afraid of hurting me, but he wanted to excite me. I wanted to say, Hey, buddy. It’s working. Could we get the show on the road? But I couldn’t, so I just came back and stood in front of him. He put his hands on my waist, looked up at me, his expression hard in the flickering light, and said, “Take off your dress.”

  I did it. Slowly. I still wasn’t voluptuous, and I was still ribby. I was wearing a thong, but I was also wearing a sports bra. It was the black one with the extra straps between my breasts, because it was the cutest—but still. It was a sports bra. And when I pulled the flimsy cotton fabric of the dress over my head and dropped it on the floor, Jax’s hands went to those ribs of mine, traced over them, one by one, like they were beautiful, pushed the thrum in my body up another notch, then pulled me forward and kissed me just under my breastbone before he moved over and did some more kissing. Gently. And I thought fuzzily, How can it feel this hot to have a man kiss your midriff?

  His hand touched each of the four shiny jewels in my belly, one at a time, and then his fingers drifted, light as smoke, on down to the edge of the thong. He said, “Take off the bra,” and I did, being careful over my bandaged arm and wincing anyway.

  He said, “Hurts, eh,” and I nodded.

  “Feeling all right?” he asked. “Need to lie down?” When I shook my head, he smiled and said, “Take off my shirt, then.”

  I did, even more slowly than I’d removed my dress, my hands brushing over the ridges of his abs, up his chest, over his shoulders and back. And when he said, “Take off the rest,” I did that, too. Slowly, and with plenty of attention.

  Was he beautiful? Yes, he was, and I wanted to touch everything, but I wanted him to touch me more than that. My hands went to my thong, and his hands closed around my wrists.

  “Oh, no,” he said. “You’ve got to earn that. We’re not getting there for a long, long time.”

  The arousal was a steady pulse now, making me shudder. He said, “Seems to me you’ve been standing up long enough. Maybe you should get on your knees instead, start doing some of that earning. Nice and slow. Make it last.”

  I looked in his eyes. I dropped to my knees. And I did it.

  He didn’t touch me. He didn’t push. He gave me directions, and that was all. And I was practically coming already. I wanted to touch myself. I needed it. And I didn’t do it. I focused on him instead, and there were some whimpers in the back of my throat while I did it.

  He’d begun breathing harder as soon as I started, but was he whimpering? No, he wasn’t. The man had some serious self-control. I could feel the rigidity in his thighs, though, the tension in his body, and when he finally said, “Stop,” it was a gasp.

  I did, sat back, and looked up at him. He had both hands on the bed and his head bowed, his chest rising and falling. He looked at me, tried to smile, and said, “You’re killing me. Come get up on the bed. We’re going to play with you now.”

  He was still careful. When he said, “Put your arms up over your head, baby, and keep them there,” his voice was gentle, and when he took my nipple into his mouth, that was gentle, too. But the second he did, my hips started to move. I started to say, “Please,” and he lifted his head and said, “Don’t talk. In fact, we’ll make another rule. Don’t open your mouth. I don’t want to hear any noise.”

  Oh. My. God. The spasm went straight through my body, just like that. Over and over again, slamming into me like when the wave hit you wrong and you lost your breath and your strength, overtaken by the wall of water. I had my mouth closed, muffling the sounds, my hands stretched over my head. My back arched, my legs stiffened, and Jax was swearing, yanking down my thong, and shoving a finger up inside me. And I did it all again.

  Jax

  I’d been selfish. I’d been demanding. And all she wanted to do was obey me some more.

  I wanted to make her come again. I wanted to keep on doing it. I needed to be inside her. All of that at once. I was rolling over, grabbing a condom from the drawer, getting it on with fingers that insisted on trembling, and she had her mouth and eyes screwed shut, her legs shaking, her thong not even off, and some noises coming out of the back of her throat. Absolutely unself-conscious. Absolutely gone.

  I got the thong off. It was an effort. Her legs were long. After that, I took her inner thighs in my hands and spread them slowly apart, and she didn’t open her eyes. Her pink-tipped breasts were right there, so I sucked on them a little more, and she bit her lip to keep from calling out. Did she turn me on? Oh, yeh, she did. And when I slid inside her at last, I was the one who moaned.

  Doing it slow and easy took even more effort of will than not coming in her mouth had. If I’d made her ache, she was doing it to me and then some. When I got on my palms and was driving deep, looking down at her spread out underneath me, her eyes closed, her head flung back, her hands trying to grab the sheet overhead, her long, slim thighs tightening again? I wanted to get there right the hell now, but I needed to get her there again first. And I needed to make her wait just a little more to do it.

  I wanted to flip her over, too. I wanted it more than I’d ever wanted anything. I said, still moving inside her, my eyes trying to roll back in my head at the pleasure of it, “Can you do . . . hands and knees? Without . . . hurting?”

  She didn’t open her eyes. She just nodded.

  I pulled out of her with the effort of a lifetime and said, “Then do it.” And she did.

  If there’s a better sight in the world than the woman you want most, naked on her hands and knees, head down, waiting for you, I don’t know what it could possibly be. I ran a hand slowly down her spine, and she shuddered. I caressed her pretty bum, and she shook. I spanked it two or three times, and she started to moan, then stopped. Being quiet for me. I got on my knees behind her, spread her wide, and said, “You don’t listen. You don’t do what I say. You push it every time. Right now? I’m pushing you.” And then I did. I fucked her until she was shaking, until she was panting, until she was so swollen around me, I could feel her grabbing hold there. And finally, I got my fingers around that little nub, started to press them together in time with my thrusts, and said, “No noise. I don’t want to hear a thing.”

  I didn’t. But I felt her spasms all the way through my body. And when the sweet sin of it spread over me and inside me the same way I was over her, inside her, and I was wound up so tight, it nearly hurt? When I finally let go? I called out loud. I went down deep, and she shook with it, but she took it.

  I lit her up. I burned her down. I made her mine.

  Karen

  Jax’s hands were gentle on me, afterwards, when he helped me turn over, taking care of my arm. His lips were gentler than that when he kissed my closed eyes, one after the other, my cheeks, and, finally, my mouth. He stroked a hand down the side of my face, over my neck, my shoulder, and asked, “All right? Not hurting?”

  I nodded, then shook my head, still with my eyes closed, and when he said, “You can talk now,” his voice was amused. I opened my eyes, and he grinned, looking entirely too self-satisfied, and said, “Worked, eh.”

  I tried my best to glare. I had a reputation to uphold. I asked him, “How could that be so hot? I should be so mad at you right now, except that’s part of the thrill of it. How are you so good at that?”

  “Dunno.” He kissed me again. “Maybe because you turn me on like you were made for me.”

  I wound a lazy arm around his shoulders and did some kissing of my own. “Mm. Way to be dominant without hurting.”

  “It was a challenge,” he said. “Fortunately, I’m good at challenges. I think you came about three times there.”

  “I can’t even count. And you sound ridiculously smug. Want a glass of water?”

  “Yeh.” He hoisted himself up against the pillows. “I’m going to let you get it, too, so I can watch you do it. Tomorrow, I’ll do some babying again. Tonight, you’re still mine, and you’re staying naked as long as I want you to.” He watched me, and when he saw the shiver, he sm
iled, slow and satisfied, and said, “Pity I know so many of your dirty secrets. And the ones I don’t know? I’m going to make you show them to me.”

  Jax

  I didn’t actually push her any more, of course. If she’d been well, I’d have done it, no worries. I’d have kept her up, and I’d have shown her plenty. She wasn’t well, though, and she’d had a long day, so I didn’t.

  I didn’t let her put on her PJs, though. There was a limit.

  She was lying on her side, her bandaged arm propped on a pillow, and I was wrapped around her spoon fashion, my arm across her chest, when her voice came out of the dark, after I’d thought she was asleep. Sounding soft, and not like Karen at all. “Jax?”

  “Mm?” I kissed the back of her head.

  “Can you just . . . not promise anything? Not tell me you love me, or anything like that? You might think you’re supposed to. You’re not. I don’t need to hear that.”

  Something was twisting in my chest. I held her a little tighter, kissed her again, and asked, “Why not?”

  A long hesitation, and then she said, “Normally, I’m strong. I’m kind of . . . off balance right now, though. Anyway, I don’t live here, and neither do you. I don’t have a plan for my life anymore, and I’m not sure what yours is. So could this just be a . . . a good time?”

  The same thing I’d told myself. My body and my mind were going in two different directions, or rather, they were going in no clear direction at all. I waited a minute, but nothing magically got any clearer, so I said, “I don’t know. It should be that, but it doesn’t feel like it to me. Maybe we don’t get to have a plan right now. Maybe we just have to roll with it. Jump off that waterfall. Could feel a little scary, but I’m not sure we’ve got a choice.”

  “I always have a plan, though. A plan helps you get through the hard things.”

  She sounded so sad, and my chest hurt. Physically hurt. I asked, “What happened to you? When you were fifteen, sixteen, whenever it was?”