Just Rules

by Anna Casanovas

  Mac wasn’t stupid and he knew perfectly well that in order to rebuild an area, simply playing football wasn’t enough. But he had to start somewhere, right? Trying to remain anonymous was increasingly more difficult; that’s why he hired a lawyer who was responsible for all of the paperwork, but the one who made the decisions was Mac.

  Until now, The Best Play had rebuilt many abandoned football fields around the city and sponsored a few local teams, kids’ leagues, and several championships. But what Mac was working on now was trying to buy a site that had become available right in the middle of four buildings taken over by drugs dealers. If he were able to make it happen, he would build not only a football field, but also a mini stadium so that the youngest players could play, and he would also make a small library. It was a very ambitious project, but there was a big obstacle in the way; a real estate company from Boston was interested in building a shopping center on the site.

  These past few weeks had been very intense. The real estate company had been approved by one of the city councilmen, and if Mac didn’t find a way to stop them and convince the mayor that his project was better, he would end up losing the site. He and his lawyer had presented all of the possible arguments against building the shopping center, and they’d also presented the most favorable outcomes from football fields that had been revamped by the city. The results showed a decrease in crime and an increase in school attendance in the area, but they didn’t, however, show economic return.

  It did no good.

  City hall put the site up for auction and the real estate company made an offer they couldn’t refuse.

  Mac was in his lawyer’s office when they got the news. He could have stayed for a while to weigh his options, but he was too furious and too tired. He needed to think, so he said goodbye to his lawyer, headed for the street, put his hands in the pockets of his coat, and started walking aimlessly.

  Walking helped him concentrate. It was something his first football coach taught him. His feet trailed quietly, one behind the other, and in his mind he started to focus on what was worrying him the most. City hall’s decision wasn’t for sure. There was still the possibility that they could reject the builder’s bid, but there had to be an endless number of conditions. It made him furious knowing that because of a few money-hungry, short-sighted city councils, he wasn’t able to move forward with his project. Surely any economics student could explain to them that they were making a mistake. Economics student? Susana. She had a PhD in economics and knew what she was talking about more than anyone. She was even capable of making the financial news easy to understand. But she would never agree to help him, and he would never ask her anyway. He would find another economist, an internationally known, tenured university professor. And he would have him, or her, write up a report to present to city hall. This probably wouldn’t do any good either. Maybe he should just forget about that site and look for another one. He decided that the smartest thing would be to do both. He would keep fighting for that damn site but he would look for another one, too.

  Mac didn’t like to give up, and maybe that’s why when he looked up he wasn’t surprised to see that he was right in front of Susana’s apartment.

  It was twelve o’clock noon and Susan was at home baking a cake. Cooking wasn’t her forte, but she refused to admit it. She loved the smell of vanilla and since she couldn’t spend her life inside of a bakery, once and a while she dared to make a cake or some cookies. She always gave half to Pam, who yelled at her for ruining her figure, and she always ate the other half herself little by little, usually after getting off work and before going to bed.

  She whipped the butter and thought that it was strange that she hadn’t realized until now that she’d never made a cake for Tim. It had never even occurred to her to share her little pastime with him.

  What other things had she not told him?

  The more days that passed since their breakup, the more Susan doubted if they ever would have been happy together. And at the same time, she had to admit that when she thought about Tim, she did so with care, but not with love, desire, or lust.

  Why hadn’t she realized it before? Why had she convinced herself that she loved him when now it was so obvious to her that she didn’t?

  She brushed a lock of hair off of her forehead and concentrated on the recipe. She added the eggs, flour, sugar, and vanilla extract. And later she poured the batter into the cake pan and put it in the oven. Today she had chosen a simple cake; simple but delicious and the one that went best with the tea she was having at night. She set the oven timer and heard a knock at the door. She wiped her hands on a kitchen towel and went to open the door, convinced that it would be the doorman since she had bought some books on the Internet that she was expecting any day.

  But it wasn’t the doorman who was darkening the doorway with a box of books in his hands. It was Mac. And he was furious. And he wasn’t holding any books.

  “You made me come all the way here,” he said, convinced that it made sense. He placed one hand on the door, pushing it open all the way and pushed his way past Susana.

  “I didn’t do anything,” she answered, not taking her eyes off him as she watched him move about like a caged animal.

  “Oh yes you did. The last two weeks have been a complete nightmare. I’ve done nothing but work myself to death, and at night, do you know what I’ve been doing at night?” he asked, moving closer to her. “At night I’ve been watching you on T.V.”

  “I…,” stammered Susana.

  “You nothing. You sent me that horrible message apologizing, as if you had keyed my car or something. Shit, Susana, did you have to be so cold?” He frantically ran his fingers through his hair. “Did you have to go out with that guy? Fuck, Susana. You let him touch you,” he said through clenched teeth.

  “Don’t speak like that in my house. I’m not going to allow it. And Parker is just a friend.”

  “What!?” Mac threw his hands in the air, exasperated. “Seriously? You showed up at my house at three o’clock in the morning and practically threw a box of chocolates at my head. You were half drunk, or half sober, and came at me with that speech of everything you know about me. And then you threw yourself at me before I could even answer you. I haven’t finished!” he warned her, as he noticed she was about to say something. “You had sex with me against the door and you left, and then you sent me that message. And a few days later you went to the opera with Mr. Perfect because, apparently with him, you don’t mind being seen. You, Susana, did all of these things, and now you’re not going to allow me to swear in your house? It was just a word, Susana. In my house you did much worse.”

  Susan’s heart was beating so strongly inside her chest that she could barely hear anything he said. Mac was furious, she was sure about that. However, judging by his eyes and the corner of his mouth, you could tell that he was also frustrated and exhausted, and something told her that it wasn’t all her fault.

  Something had happened to him, something rather serious that had affected him deeply.

  “Did something happen, Kev?”

  “Did something happen, she asks,” he said sarcastically. “Of course something happened. You came to my house, Susana.”

  “I meant today.”

  “Today, yesterday, tomorrow. I can’t think. After seeing you at the opera with that idiot, I thought I was going to be able to forget you, that my mind would get the message, but I can’t stop thinking about you. Why have you done this to me?” Mac had no idea those words were going to come out of his mouth, but he still couldn’t stop them. He was tired of trying to stop them.

  “I didn’t do anything to you! It wasn’t as if I had to force you. You seemed to be more than willing to…to…,” she swallowed. “To just go along with it.”

  “Fuck, Susana, how can you be so smart and so stupid at the same time!”

  “If you’re going to keep insulting me, it’s best that you leave.”

  “I’m not insulting you.”
r />   “Oh, no?”

  With each phrase they kept throwing at one another, they kept getting closer and closer to each other. Mac was the first to realize that he had her within arm’s reach and saw that her pulse sped up and that her eyes were shining.

  “To hell with it,” he muttered, deciding that being so worked up like they were wouldn’t help to solve anything.

  He grabbed her by her forearms and at the same time lowered his head to devour her lips. Susana, despite her pride, moaned when she felt Mac’s lips pressed against hers. He moved his tongue with rage inside her mouth and lifted his hands up until they cradled her face. Susana firmly held his wrists for a few seconds with her fingers, but he kissed her repeatedly and pressed his torso against hers and let her see just how much he wanted her.

  Susana let go of his wrists and brought her hands down to his waist so that she could pull him closer to her. Mac also brought his hands down so that he could pick her up.

  “The bedroom,” he said moving away from her only for a few necessary seconds.

  Susana, surprising herself completely, responded to him.

  “At the end of the hall.” She wanted to take his clothes off so bad she began pulling on his t-shirt.

  He carried her there and kicked the door open. They both fell on the bed, frantic to figure out how to undress each other without having to stop kissing and touching one another. Mac was the first to have his t-shirt off, basically because he tore it off, and Susan followed his lead instantly. She clawed his back, and he pinched her and kissed her breasts through her bra.

  Why was it that he only lost control when he was with her? Mac used to be a thoughtful and refined lover who only got rough whenever a woman asked him to, and it didn’t really turn him on. However, with Susana, his technique was reduced to that of a teenager and his only objective was to get inside her as soon as possible and stay there for as long as she would let him, and make her moan and tremble from pleasure.

  He pulled Susana’s pants off and threw them on the floor while she fumbled with the button on his jeans. Mac pushed her hand away because if she touched him, even by accident, he’d finish and embarrass himself. He held her hands on top of her head and keep on kissing Susana. He unbuttoned his jeans but didn’t take them off. In order to take them off, he would have had to pull away from her, to stop kissing her, and to stop touching her, and he didn’t think he was capable of doing any of that. Her underwear bothered him. Her bra was just going to have to stay on though because there was no way he was going to stop long enough to take it off, but her panties were a different story. He was capable of ripping them off, that he could do it, and he was about to do when he remembered he had already ripped one of her pairs. And if he wanted Susana to give him even the slightest chance, maybe he should show her that he could be more sophisticated than a wild animal. He breathed out of his nose and started to pull down her underwear. She lifted her hips and tried to move her arms, but Mac wouldn’t let her. Susana took her lips away from his and bit him on the neck.

  Mac trembled with pleasure and a guttural sound escaped from his throat.

  What was he turning her into? She had never bitten anyone before, or rather, she had never felt the sudden urge to bite anyone, and much less a man in her bed. But with Mac she went crazy. She lost all inhibitions and her body took over. Not only did she want to bite him, she wanted to grab him by his hair and pull him against her. She wanted to lick that enormous back of his and explore his pecs and abs of steel with her fingernails to see if she could make him tremble.

  His hand went up her thigh in search of her sex. And without warning, he slipped a finger inside her. Then he stopped.

  “Kev…” moaned Susana.

  To hear her say his name calmed Mac down a bit and he opened his eyes. He didn’t even remember having closed them. He had gone to Susana’s apartment to ask her for help with the financial report for the foundation, not to take her clothes off. But when he got near her, he began to feel like he’d die if he never got to touch her again.

  He couldn’t think. He couldn’t let Susana condemn him to a life of not feeling anything anymore.

  He was furious and frustrated so he had gone to see her to tell her that she could continue to go out with the idiot from the opera and that she could take her message and shove it; he wasn’t just any guy that she could brush off with a little message. He had gone to see her to tell her that he didn’t want to repeat what happened the other night either and that the best for everyone would be to never tell Tim about it. In the end, it was just casual sex.

  But then he saw her wearing that t-shirt and those pants, smelling like vanilla and with flour on her face and completely forgot the speech he had prepared and became even angrier. And Susana’s reaction was completely unexpected, which was so Susana.

  And Mac decided that talking to her was a complete waste of time, and that what he needed to do was kiss her. Kiss her and take her to bed. Maybe then they would both calm down enough to have a civilized conversation.

  He needed to be inside of her, to make love to her again, to feel her near him. Susan trembled and moved below him, but everything was happening very fast, and he’d rather die than do something that she didn’t want to do.

  “Are you sure you want to do this?” he asked in a gravelly voice, sliding his erection slowly over her.

  Susana couldn’t, and wouldn’t, deny the need that was crawling her skin apart.

  “Yes! You are an arrogant idiot,” she said, although she added the second part of the phrase so that the first part didn’t seem so overzealous.

  Mac nodded and clenched his jaw to gain control, and when he thought he had it, he grabbed his manhood with one hand and without taking his jeans off, started to push inside her. He breathed deeply and they were both quiet for a second, looking each other in the eye.

  He let her wrists go, but Susana kept her arms where they were. Kev moved his and entwined his fingers with hers. Then, and only then, he began to move slowly, Mac moaned from the depths of his soul. He went in and out, little by little, making sure she felt every inch of him, making her aware of connection between them, which was much more than just lust or attraction.

  She got lost in his eyes and in a desperate attempt to hide how confused she was at the feelings he was waking up in her, she let herself be swept away by the pleasure. At the moment, it was the only thing she felt she’d be able to confess about how she was feeling…having him inside of her was too much for her emotions.

  For a year, she had been with another man, almost got married to him. And she would have spent the rest of her life denying that Kev MacMurray was the only one capable of waking up her most deep and secret emotions.

  Susana squeezed Mac’s hands and gave in to him with a sigh of desperation.

  Mac clenched his teeth when he slid his hard dick through the wet lips of Susan’s sex. He pressed himself against her and forced himself to remain calm while the rest of his body was concentrated on the extreme pleasure from being inside Susana. The way she was breathing was, without a doubt, the most erotic sound he had ever heard. Mac was burning from head to toe. His hair even felt like it was on fire, and as soon as a layer of sweat got dry, he was drenched again.

  He needed to touch every inch of her. He pressed his forehead to Susana’s, and caressed her nose with his, working his way down to her lips.

  “Susana,” he sighed, moving one of her legs to the side so he could penetrate her even more. “I’m only capable of feeling when you’re touching me.”

  Susana moved her hips in a way that was so pleasurable that Mac could barely stand it.

  “Kev…”

  Hearing her moan like that made his whole body tremble.

  “Damn it, stop moving like that or I’ll end up losing what little control I have left.”

  “You call that control?” She sighed and lifted her hips to provoke him, unaware of how much he was suffering inside. “What the hell do you do when you lose it co
mpletely?”

  Mac smiled for the first time in weeks, he let go of her arms and held her tightly to his body. He kissed her and began to slowly move his hips. His only objective was to make her feel the fire that was burning between them. He would have liked to have been completely naked, to have felt Susana’s thighs beneath his, but making love to her with his jeans on was also very sensual and it made it so he couldn’t move freely or move his hips as much. He had to do it more slowly, with even more determination. Susana lifted her legs and wrapped them around his waist. He gobbled up her moans while his got lost somewhere in his throat. He felt the exact moment when Susan climaxed; the lips of her sex closed around him and she dug her fingers into his back. Mac didn’t want to keep holding back his orgasm, nor could he do anything about it, so he and Susana both surrendered to each other at the same time.

  When they both stopped trembling, Mac remained on top of her for a few seconds, but then he feared that he was squishing her so he lifted himself off of her a little. He did it slowly, carefully, telling himself that if she gave him a cold look he could handle it. Susan’s head was tilted and the back of her neck and forehead were covered with sweat. Her mouth was half open, and she licked her lips, trying to catch her breath.

  Little by little she turned her head toward Mac’s.

  “You’re beautiful,” he muttered, and she smiled at him. However, then some sort of bell sounded, and Susana’s expression completely changed.

  Shit.

  Susana blushed from head to toe and looked the other way. Mac didn’t move and kept staring at her, determined to keep her in the moment.

  “The oven,” she explained. “The cake is going to burn. I’ll be right back.”

  Mac didn’t let her move, because he knew that if she left the room without admitting what was going on, she’d find a way to put up again that damned wall between them.