She scooped up the fine sand in her hands and looked wistfully at the waves.
“My first New Zealand beach.”
He leaned his head against her soft hair tumbling down over her shoulder.
“The first of many, I hope. How about when I finish up here, we take off and tour the country? The summer’s nearly here, we could head over to the Bay of Islands and then down to the bubbling mud places and the mountains in the South. What d’you think?”
“Shaun.”
Something was off. He tried to see her face but she’d turned her head away from him.
“You don’t have to do this. Honest.”
“What?”
He was confused.
“Claire, please?”
She twitched her neck.
“You don’t have to be with me, because of this.”
“Claire?”
He moved his arm to try and touch her face, to see her, but she flinched and he held off.
“Shaun, you’re a decent guy. You feel bad about me. I get it.”
Shaun rubbed his eyes and took a deep jagged breath, trying to quell all the emotions welling up inside. Love, hurt, fear, it all felt the same.
“Is that what you think?”
Turning her head to face his, her hand caressed his cheek.
“How would I ever stop worrying that I’m your charity case every time you look at me?”
She searched deep into his eyes.
Could she not see how he felt? How much he loved her?
Leaning tentatively towards her, his lips gently found hers and feathered across them and along her face.
“Is this charity?”
He nuzzled her ear with insistent kisses that sent her skywards.
“Or this?”
His hand carefully lifted her long silky tresses off her neck.
“Do you trust me to do this?” he breathed, his lips still on her ear.
She nodded.
Healing her with his mouth, his lips gently felt their way over her scar, brushing her skin, gently, coaxingly over her neck. Then, up along her defined jawline until his lips finally and tantalisingly found hers.
“Do you truly trust me, Claire?” he whispered, his lips against hers.
“Yes,” she gasped.
He edged apart. His eyes hooded with desire.
“So, now you trust me, do you believe me when I say that I love you, Claire?”
He flicked a lock of her hair tenderly off her face.
“Not because of your wounds, or any sense of guilt or duty because the men were after me and you got hurt.”
She let out a sob deep within and he answered it with a light kiss.
He cupped her face in both of his hands, his eyes meeting hers and burning with the passion he felt.
“I’m in love with you because you’ve gotten to be my best friend. And, if I’m being brutally honest, I fancy the pants off you. So much, it hurts.”
She breathed out a small sigh. Her eyes still lost in his.
“Good answer.”
Lifting her hands to his chest she pushed him gently back flat onto the sand.
Taking his mouth hungrily, she kissed him deeply, opening up to him as a tide of emotions flooded through her, drowning out all her doubts and fears.
Surprised, relieved, overjoyed he responded ravenously; their tongues becoming wrapped in delicious desire for each other as they became a torrid tangle in the sand.
The low pop-popping of a bike engine suddenly brought Claire to her senses.
“Woah…”
She pulled herself free from below him.
“I think we might be drawing an audience.”
She giggled, drawing away from Shaun.
“Making out on the beach in broad daylight. See, they’re taking photos of us.”
Shaun turned around and then jumped up when he saw them.
“Shit! That’s Rawiri,”
Three Harley Davidsons revved and pulled away, one with a boy on the back still dressed in his ceremonial clothes.
???
Shaun sidles up closer to me, shoulder to shoulder, his thigh touching mine as we sit on the grass, our bellies full of sweet potato and lamb from the hangi.
We’ve been watching the girls perform with the poi. They’re like balls that they move about and spin as they sing. It’s so clever and they’re all so strikingly beautiful in their traditional woven dresses.
And it’s been party-party all day after the waka launch and I don’t want to go.
“I need to be heading, I don’t want to be travelling back through the forest after dark.”
He gives me a smouldering look that I’m finding impossible to resist. What is it about him? My body thrums as I feel him next to me. I think about our kiss on the beach, about him bare-chested. His tan, muscular body.
I clear my throat.
There are parents and kids everywhere, this is not the time or the place. And as much as my body aches to stay, I can’t. It wouldn’t be right to sneak into the hostel.
He stands up and offers me his hand.
“Walk you to the ute?”
We make our way out of the party and wander back towards the car park.
“It drives okay?”
“Yeah. Good choice.”
He seems suddenly a little nervous too. And when I get out my car keys, I’m not sure either what to say beyond, I can’t keep my hands off you. Or I want you right now, here in the car park.
So, I opt to say nothing and the sile
nce becomes edgy between us, electrically charged.
He feels it too, I can tell.
My hand is on the truck’s door.
“I better be off, then.”
“Okay,” he mumbles, “Call me when you get back.”
I turn to open the door.
“Claire.”
He sweeps me into his arms, his hand cradling the crook of my neck, his mouth tasting soft and sweet. A groan rumbles from deep within him as I feel the silky softness of his tousled hair and our tongues dance together in a hot, fiery kiss.
Feeling the flames building deep within me, my hands roam over his broad shoulders following the contours of his back and down onto that spectacularly muscular chest.
So much for Mr Nice. He presses me back against the door of the truck, kissing me intensely, passionately, ravenously. I feel his hardness against my stomach, and his hands under the slits of my dress, stroking their way up inside my thighs.
“Easy, soldier,” I mumble, suddenly coming to my senses.
He pulls away suddenly and punches his fists into his trousers to stop himself from touching me. It’s still broad daylight, but this time thankfully there’s no one around.
“What is it with you?” he says shakily. “I’m sorry. I can’t help myself. You do things to me.”
I take a deep breath, feeling the unspent desire still pulsing through my core.
“I wish you could come back with me. I want you. All of you.”
He rakes his hand through his hair.
“Me too. But I can’t.”
Ari’s off duty and with the waka celebrations, a couple of the boys are staying over through the weekend.
“I guess, I’ll see you at the lake lodge, then.”
I get into the truck a little unsteadily.
“I can’t wait,” he says huskily, leaning into the ute and finding my lips for another toe-curling kiss.
“I love you, Claire.”
I get lost in his hooded eyes; my heart thumping, my body aching for him.
“I love you too.”
Chapter 16
---------?---------
“Bingo! Fuckin’ Bingo! YES!”
The photos were undeniable.
Claire Williams. There she was, in the crowds talking to a bloke wearing a grass skirt. Then another one of her, this time snogging him. Then, and this was the hattrick in the back of the net, a full picture of the same bloke in shorts jumping up to look straight at the camera. And man, did he look pissed off.