Just Joe (4 page)

The slamming of the back
door drew Mattie from her introspection to find Joe jogging toward her with a
football in one large, capable hand.

Mattie tilted her head
curiously to meet his determined gaze.

"I am going to teach
you a little bit about football," Joe decreed.

Mattie jumped to her feet
excitedly, eyes gleaming. "We're going to play a game?"

Joe regarded her sternly.
"Football," he intoned with some degree of pomposity, "is not
like Chinese Checkers. There are some rules to learn first." He trotted to
the center of the yard and motioned her to follow.

"Now I'm a
quarterback. Quarterbacks throw the ball." He raised his eyebrows
admonishingly. "I do it very well."

Mattie muffled a giggle.
She'd thought she had gotten to him with that one.

"You, on the other
hand," Joe continued repressively, "are going to play wide receiver.
You'll catch the ball."

Mattie studied her own
slender form doubtfully. "I don't know, Joe. I'm not all that wide."

"I suppose I should
be thankful I didn't assign you to play tight end," Joe muttered beneath
his breath so that Mattie couldn't hear. "Okay, when I throw the ball to
you, you try to catch it, and then reach that tree-“ he pointed to a giant pine
behind him "—for the score."

"What are you going
to be doing?" Mattie demanded suspiciously.

"I'm going to be
trying to stop you from reaching that tree," Joe explained patiently.

"Then why throw me
the ball in the first place?" Mattie demanded with what she considered to
be perfect logic.

Joe regarded her blankly
for a moment, then spent the next five minutes explaining to her about offenses
and defenses and opposing teams and their lack of players at the moment.

"So we have to double
up, you understand?" he finished hopefully.

Mattie told him solemnly
that she did, indeed, understand. It seemed so important to him.

"Okay," Joe
exclaimed with boyish excitement, "let's play ball. Go out for the pass,
Mattie."

Mattie turned and ran
downfield for the pass as she had seen the Conquerors do during the game she
had photographed. She turned just in time to see Joe release the ball— with
considerable less force than he normally did—and screeched to a halt. Closing
her eyes tightly, Mattie opened her arms and waited for the ball. It was hard
to tell who was more surprised when it landed neatly in her arms. Mattie opened
one eye incredulously to study it there. Then, with a fatalistic shrug, she
closed her arms around it and began to streak toward the pine tree and Joe.

When Mattie drew within
two feet of Joe, she stopped abruptly, bared her teeth at him and snarled
ferociously.

Joe was so stunned, he
simply stood there, watching her incredulously. Finally he found his voice.
"Uh...Mattie?"

Mattie growled again for
good measure.

"What the hell?"
Joe muttered resignedly, and growled back.

Mattie feinted to the
left, then the right and Joe followed, bending low for a gentle tackle. It was
just the opening Mattie was waiting for. She sprang agilely into the air,
planted one foot on Joe's shoulder and leapfrogged over his back in fine
fashion on her way to the goal. Once there, she spiked the ball expertly and
assumed a pose of lofty nonchalance.

"I scored," she
pointed out with a great deal of gentleness, leaning against the tree.

Joe, from his vantage
point on the ground, with a footprint on his back, eyed her disbelievingly.
"Good Lord," he muttered blankly. "She scored."

Mattie danced back
downfield to stand over Joe's flattened form. "Let's play again!"

Joe picked himself up from
the cold hard ground in silence. "Okay," he conceded finally.
"You play quarterback."

Mattie nodded agreeably,
feeling incredibly calm and competent with one score under her belt, and ran to
retrieve the ball. "Go out for the pass, Joe."

It was Joe's turn to trot
downfield and turn for the throw. The ball bounced about five feet in front of
him, and he caught it on the run. When he faced Mattie he stopped, shrugged and
roared like a bad-tempered lion. Mattie was silent for a moment, then burst
into peels of laughter. Grasping her sides, she fell to the ground and rolled
with hilarity.

Joe studied her in
exasperation. "Okay, sweetheart." He dropped to the ground beside
her. "Let's establish some rules. No more growling."

Mattie nodded solemnly,
tears of mirth running down her cheeks.

Joe bounded to his feet
and reached down to pull Mattie up, but she ignored his hand and got up
herself.

"You know, Joe, you
were right," she observed happily.

Joe raised one eyebrow
expressively, pretending he hadn't noticed the evasion of his touch.
"How's that?"

Mattie smiled demurely.
"This is a fun game."

Joe shook his head, gentle
affection in his eyes. "You are a nut."

"But a
winning
nut,"
she pointed out mischievously.

Joe's eyes gleamed
purposefully. "We'll just see about that. Go out for another pass."
Joe pumped the ball once, then dropped his arm. "And, Mattie—"

She stopped running and
turned to face him.

"Remember... no
growling."

Mattie stuck out her
tongue. "Spoilsport."

Joe laughed and threw the
ball. Hard.

"Uhf." She
trapped the ball against her ribs and wheezed for breath, shooting Joe a
threatening glare.

Joe smiled innocently and
shrugged with a "who me?" gesture. "You're playing with the big
boys now."

"Big boys,"
Mattie muttered beneath her breath. "Huh! Big boys."

Charging downfield, Mattie
came upon Joe swiftly. When she was mere inches from him, she faked to the
right, but Joe was on to her and followed her dive to the left.

Sweeping Mattie, ball and
all, into his arms, Joe began to trot toward his own end zone with her. He
ignored Mattie's struggles as part of the game and carried her triumphantly to
the pecan tree that served as his own goal.

Whirling around in a
circle, he smiled down into her face. "There! Now I scored a touch-up.
What do you think of
 
apples...?"

The abject terror in
Mattie's eyes stole the words from his throat.

"Mattie?" His
arms tightened in instinctive protection, and Mattie flinched violently.

"Let me go,
please." Her voice was achingly taut, emotionless, but her lips were
trembling. She seemed to be shrinking into herself, disappearing behind a wall
Joe could only feel.

Gently he lowered her feet
to the ground and released her from his arms. The football, forgotten by both,
bounced once, then rolled to the right.

"I have to go home
now." Mattie told him carefully, not meeting his questioning green gaze.

Joe's hands dropped
awkwardly to his sides, and his eyes focused on her averted face.
"No," he protested. "No, Mattie. Don't go. Talk to me."

Mattie shook her head
jerkily. "I... I can't, Joe—"

"It's because I
picked you up, isn't it?" The insistent tone cut across her stammered
words, demanding an answer.

But Mattie was incapable
of answering. She was choking on her own fear. And to think, she derided
half-hysterically, not twenty minutes ago she had mentally compared Joe.to a
brother! He was a man—a strong, hard,
frightening
man. First, last and
always. And he could hurt her without even thinking about it, without even
noticing. The way he had carried her in his arms...

"Isn't it?"
Joe's insistent voice drew Mattie's terrified attention to him. He took an
instinctive step forward, then stopped abruptly as Mattie backed away like a
hunted animal.

"Mattie, talk to
me," he pleaded. "I want to understand."

This is Joe, Mattie
reminded herself sternly. Her friend, Joe. Don't run away. Don't lose... his
friendship.

"You scared me."
Mattie's voice, when it came, was small and rusty, and her eyes evaded his.

"I was only
playing," Joe told her carefully, desperately wary.

"I—I didn't know...
you were so strong."

"Mattie, I'm a man.
And a professional football player. I have to be strong." Joe felt
ridiculous, defending his very masculinity, until suddenly a thought occurred
to him. "Did I hurt you?" he demanded, concerned. She was so small,
so delicate. Had he hurt her without realizing it?

Mattie thought about it
for a moment, then shook her head jerkily. "Noooo," she conceded
doubtfully, confused. "But you would have. Touching always hurts."

"Physically?"
Joe probed, intent. "Do you honestly think I would ever physically harm
you, Mattie?" There was a curious, naked vulnerability in his eyes, but
Mattie did not look up to see it. She was wrestling with her own demons.

"I don't know, do
I?" she broke out in self-directed anger. "There are all kinds of
pain."

"Let's concentrate on
the physical, then," Joe suggested quietly. His large hands rose to echo
his words, cupping her face gently. "No..." he soothed as Mattie
tried to shy away. "No, I'm not hurting you, am I?"

Mattie trembled delicately
beneath his touch and forced herself to remain still, breathing shallowly.
"No," she admitted, her voice strained.

Joe nodded, his eyes as
impersonal as if he were conducting a scientific experiment. "Good. And
this?" His thumbs moved to caress the corners of her mouth. Mattie
instinctively drew her bottom lip between her teeth and gnawed at it nervously.

"Sweetheart,"
Joe murmured softly. "Don't do that." His thumb brushed against her
pearly teeth and across her jaw.

"It's—it's starting
to hurt," she lied breathlessly, her gaze locked on his.

Joe's fingers drifted
lower, gliding against the delicate skin of Mattie's neck caressingly.
"Where does it hurt, Mattie?" he probed, his eyes losing their
distant expression, warming and softening in a way that oddly reassured her.

"My...my
stomach," Mattie answered hesitantly, trying to identify the ache that was
centered in some deep, unfamiliar part of her.

Joe smiled quietly.
"Your stomach? I'm not even touching you there."

Mattie shifted restlessly.
"Not my stomach, exactly," she admitted vaguely.
"But—somewhere."

"What kind of
hurting?" Joe asked, his eyes serious, but still with the warm gleam
lurking just below the surface.

Mattie was aware that his
hands continued to move on her body lightly, drifting from her shoulders and
down the length of her back soothingly.

"It kind of...
aches," she murmured distractedly.

Joe's hands slid softly
between them, gliding gently over her rib cage, his fingers delineating each
bone separately. "Where exactly did you say it.. .ached?" His voice
was growing progressively huskier, but Mattie, in her dazed state of seduced
serenity, barely noticed.

"I don't know,"
she managed blankly.

Joe's hands settled just
beneath her breasts. "Here?"

"No," Mattie
answered weakly. "Lower."

Joe's hands inched down
her rib cage to settle on the slight swell of her abdomen. "Here?"

"Lower," she
whispered uncertainly, dazed.

But when Joe's hands began
a silken descent, Mattie panicked. "No!" she protested wildly,
wrenching herself from his touch. "Don't. Oh, please don't...!"

Joe backed away carefully,
his hands at his sides. "Mat-tie, what are you running from?" The
question surprised Mattie as it tumbled from his lips and she jumped, despite
the steady, soothing tone.

"Running?" she
scoffed nervously. "I'm not even moving."

"Not
physically," he agreed admonishingly. "But here, Mattie," he
tapped her temple lightly but drew back immediately when she flinched.
"Here, I can see you putting a great distance between yourself and the
rest of the world. And in your eyes," Joe shook his head sadly. "I
can see the walls go up. Every time I start to get close to you, you pull
away."