Backfield in Motion (27 page)

He’d given her comfort tonight, and she’d do
her best to reciprocate. “Let me take the lead this time.” Mac
stood and pointed to the lounge chair.

Bruiser didn’t argue. He stripped off his
clothes, rolled on a condom, and lay on the chaise lounge, his
tanned, ripped body visible in the moonlight. Damn, he was a fine
specimen, from those blue-gray eyes, the muscles rippling in broad
shoulders, down to his flat, ridged stomach and strong thighs. The
man even had sexy feet.

Mac tugged her T-shirt over her head and her
bra followed. She shimmied out of her jeans and underwear.
Straddling the narrow lounge chair, she lowered herself onto him,
sitting back on her haunches and resting her ass on his stomach.
His erect penis pressed against one butt cheek. Mac groaned as his
muscular chest pressed against her breasts, her nipples
hyper-sensitized. She arched her back, pressing her crotch into
his, but not letting him penetrate, not yet. Tonight wasn’t about
wild animal lust, tonight was something gentle and fragile like a
rare and delicate orchid blooming for the first time.

She leaned down, planting her palms on his
chest, and gently kissed each corner of his mouth, inhaling his
minty breath, and reveling in the controlled power underneath her
thighs. She sucked on his lower lip and slipped her tongue inside
his mouth, slow and easy, taking her time, tasting, exploring,
cherishing.

He held still, his hands resting on her
hips, his eyes closed. His tongue mated with hers, but nothing else
on him moved but for the not-so steady rise and fall of his chest
under her palms and his wildly beating heart. The deeper the kiss,
the more sanity escaped her, but sanity was highly overrated
anyway.

Mac raised her head and studied his strong
features. His incredibly long lashes feathered across his
cheekbones. His eyes opened, deceptively lazy, yet alert.

“Make love to me, Mac,” he whispered as the
words flitted off in the breeze, carried on an angel’s wings like a
promise given and a promise received.

Mac raised her hips and lowered herself back
down on his waiting cock. Bruiser watched with hooded eyes. She
sheathed him inside her, deeper and deeper until her crotch pressed
against his. Hands braced on his shoulders, she threw back her head
and closed her eyes, savoring the fullness of him, the hardness
held inside her wet softness. She changed the angle of his hips to
feel him higher inside her and wiggled on top of him, only to draw
a guttural groan from the man.

He gripped her hips and raised her up,
slowing lowering her back down, continuing the erotic, slow torture
until their last shreds of sanity were obliterated by one final
deep eternal thrust which bound them together in ways neither could
imagine or prevent.

Bruiser’s body convulsed with hers as their
releases came in pulses of pleasure, wringing every last bit of
energy from them until she collapsed against him, body to body,
soul to soul, heart to heart.

Bruiser filled in all her missing puzzle
pieces, those empty spots waiting for the right person to come
along and complete the beautiful picture hidden in all the bits of
joy and tragedy that make up a life.

Now that she’d found those missing pieces,
Mac didn’t want to give them up.

Chapter 19

Elliot glanced up at Mac and Bruiser. They’d
rescued him for the evening from the “Hippos”—his secret name for
his aunt and uncle. He didn’t really care that they were both
grossly overweight, but he did care that they were hypocrites,
parading him out when guests came over to illustrate what good
people they were to take in this hideously scarred orphan.

That’s what he heard them call him when they
thought he’d gone to bed.

Bruiser told him that appearances didn’t
matter to good people, so Elliot figured that ruled out the Hippos
as good people. Aunt Ruth couldn’t even look at him. When she
talked to him, she stared at the floor or over his head.

Mac and Bruiser looked at him with love, not
horror or pity. They also really
looked
at each other,
thinking he probably wouldn’t notice. They’d been giving each other
looks all night long. Obviously, they were hot for each other, not
that he had much personal experience with stuff like that.

Before the crash he’d preferred books and
gaming to girls. Now girls screamed and ran away when they saw him,
and his burned fingers made it hard to play video games.

After dinner, they played Monopoly. He
hadn’t played it since his parents were gone. It was tough at
first, but Mac and Bruiser made it fun. Elliot bought Boardwalk and
Park Place and filled them with hotels. Mac landed on Park Place,
and Bruiser landed on Broadway. It was all over after that.
Moneybags Elliot, as they called him, kicked their butts. He was
still gloating about that.

The clock ticked closer to nine o’clock,
when he had to return to his aunt and uncle’s house. His stomach
cramped up. Really bad. He must have eaten some rotten pizza or
something. Maybe they’d let him stay here if he didn’t feel like a
car ride.

Elliot hated his cousins’ pitying stares,
his uncle’s indifference, and his aunt’s open dislike of him. As
far as he could tell, the only reason they had him around was to be
their errand boy.

Get me this, Elliot. Get me that, Elliot.
Feed the cat, Elliot. Put the dishes in the dishwasher. Elliot,
don’t go outside and play, you scare the neighbors’ little
girls.

Bruiser stood up and smiled one of those
fake smiles, and Elliot’s stomach went into convulsions, or at
least it felt like that. “Hey, buddy, it’s time to get you back
home.”

“Can’t I stay here?” Elliot hated begging,
but he did it anyway.

“Sorry, buddy, we have to get you back just
like we promised.” Bruiser didn’t want to take him back. Elliot
could tell. So why did he have to do it? Bruiser could do anything.
He was like a superhero. Why couldn’t he do this if he wanted
to?

Because he doesn’t want to?

Elliot lashed out. “I hate it there. They
don’t want me, and I don’t want them. Besides, I don’t feel good.”
Elliot held his stomach and rocked back and forth on the couch,
wailing and moaning like he’d seen the kid do on
Two and Half
Men
reruns.

A quick look passed between Mac and Bruiser,
but Elliot couldn’t figure out what the heck they were trying to
tell each other without speaking the words. Maybe he’d overdone the
stomachache because they didn’t seem to be overly concerned, and
they were usually the concerned type. Maybe too much moaning and
wailing. It’d worked on TV.

“We’ll do something after the game on
Sunday. Mac’s going to pick you up. You can watch in the suite with
her.”

“That’s five days away.” He didn’t like
football much, but he liked being with Mac and Bruiser and all of
Bruiser’s teammates, especially Tyler. Tyler slipped him really
awesome gourmet chocolates when no one was watching.

“Yeah, I know. But hang in there. The time
will pass faster than you can imagine.”

Elliot thought that was a whole lot of bull.
After all, Bruiser didn’t live in the Hippo house with kids who
called him Baby Frankenstein.

“Maybe I could just stay over tonight.”

“Elliot, you have to go home.” Bruiser’s
voice got stern, like he was starting to lose patience, not that he
ever did with Elliot, but Bruiser liked to make it sound like
that.

“That’s not my home. I don’t have a home
anymore.” A lump clogged his throat at the memory of the old
two-story home with the big front porch that his mother and father
had lovingly restored until it was a showplace. He bit back a sob
because he didn’t want them to see him behaving like a pussy. He’d
already been a whiner.

“Why can’t I live here? Don’t you want
me?”

“Elliot, it’s not that easy. They’re your
relatives.”

“You can do anything. And you promised
you’d—” Elliot stopped when he saw the mad look on Bruiser’s face.
If he gave them too much grief, they’d go away, like everyone else
he’d ever loved, and he’d be left with nothing. He glanced at Mac,
who’d been pretty quiet. She smiled at him like she liked him and
was sorry they had to take him home.

Elliot heaved a dramatic sigh—another tactic
he’d learned on
Two and a Half Men
. “Okay.” He gathered up
his stuff and steeled himself for the end of the evening and his
return to the Hippos’ wallow. His mother had been neat and tidy,
but this dump he lived in now had crap everywhere, and it stunk.
His uncle gave him weird looks that scared Elliot, even though he
wasn’t sure why.

He really hated it, and he knew he’d have to
do something about it because he couldn’t keep living there.

* * * * *

Bruiser sat in the car and stared at the door
as Elliot disappeared into the house. He shook his head in
frustration, hating this helpless feeling. He kept his face turned
toward the driver’s-side window so Mac wouldn’t see how much
Elliot’s return home affected him.

He’d spent almost every night with Mac for
the past few weeks. Neither of them had actually addressed what
their relationship was or wasn’t. Other than sleeping together, he
been buried with training camp and games, while she worked late
hours and continued her brother search.

“That was tough,” Mac said.

“Tell me about it. It’s getting tougher
every time.” Bruiser put the car in gear and pulled away from the
curb. “I hate leaving him here. It’s gotta suck being with people
who don’t want you around and treat you like you’re less than
human.”

Bruiser had to do something. Elliot
considered him his hero, and what kind of hero had he turned out to
be? The kid needed him, and now the chance to make some of his past
wrongs right was dumped in his lap. He didn’t save Brice, but he
could pay it forward and save Elliot. Somehow.

“Yeah, I wish there was something we could
do.” Mac sounded sincere and Bruiser jumped on it before he wussed
out, a little drunk with emotion, rather than common sense.

“Do you? Really?”

Something in Bruiser’s tone had Mac looking
wary. “Uh, yeah, I think so.”

Marry her, idiot. It’d work well for all of
you. You’d pay for Mac’s school. She’d be there for Elliot. And
you’d have a ready-made family.

Problem was, he’d never wanted a family of
any kind. He didn’t spend time with the one he had; why get a new,
needier, one?
Because you’re lonely and something’s missing and
it might well be them.

Marriage had been a crazy-assed idea when
his moronic teammates brought it up, yet an engagement to a nice
girl—not some model or movie star—might convince Aunt Ruth to give
him the guardianship, in trade for a generous amount of money, of
course. Bruiser knew her type. In fact, he pretended to be her
type, the type that did everything for appearance’s sake. Ruth
Jones wanted to look like a pillar of her church by taking in this
poor, disfigured orphan. Bruiser just wanted to repay a debt and do
the right thing for Elliot.

Steeling himself for Mac’s reaction, he
jumped in with both of his big feet. “Elliot wants me to become his
legal guardian. I told him I’d try.”

Mac started to laugh as if she thought he
had to be joking, which he found somewhat insulting. She sobered
quickly at the look on his face. “You think you can manage an
eleven-year-old by yourself?”

“Not necessarily by myself.”

Mac regarded him warily, as if he’d just
told her he had a bomb in hidden in the car.

Bruiser stared straight ahead, driving the
speed limit for once. “The Joneses don’t want Elliot, but they have
an image to maintain with John’s church. Ruth can look like a
self-sacrificing hero if she allows Elliot to live with the right
couple, a couple with the means to take care of Elliot and his
physical issues.”

“Who is this couple?”

Bruiser took a deep breath and slowly let it
out. “The guys think you and I should raise him.”

Mac’s head snapped in his direction.
“What?”

Bruiser needed both hands and all his
attention on this subject so he glided into an empty bank parking
lot and shut off the engine. He turned to Mac and took her hands in
his.

“I know it sounds insane, but they think
together we’d do a fine job of raising Elliot.”

“Define ‘together.’” Mac tried to pull her
hands from his, but he wasn’t about to let go.

Moment of truth time. “You
know—
together
together.”

“Like ring on my finger together?” Mac
seemed to be having a hard time wrapping her head around the
concept.

“Uh, yeah, like married.”

“Are you drunk? Should you be driving?”

“I am
not
drunk.”

“Then you’ve lost your mind. You and me?
Married?”

Bruiser found that somewhat hurtful. He
wouldn’t be
that
bad of a husband. “Well, yeah. I mean we’re
good friends, we like to do the same things and I think we’re
compatible, especially in bed.”

“But marriage?” Mac shook her head in total
denial. “Have those idiots been sniffing too many cleaning products
or gone off their meds or something?”

“I know it sounds like the stupidest idea in
the world, but—” Did it ever. Bruiser couldn’t believe he’d even
proposed it, yet once he had, he charged for the end zone, ignoring
every linebacker in his way.

“It doesn’t just sound like it, it is the
stupidest.” Mac shook her head and yanked her hands from his,
hugging herself like she always did when she was feeling vulnerable
and upset. Vulnerable was good. He could work with that, play on
it, because this “stupid” idea was gaining traction in his
mind.

“Think about it, Mac. We could be good
together, and we’d be helping a kid out who really needs our
help.”