Before Claudia could elaborate anymore, Mateo and Ricardo came back with the beers and placed the perfectly poured ale on the table. Mateo then tossed down a plastic menu.
“In case you are hungry,” he said.
I picked it up and looked it over. There were English translations beneath the words in Spanish.
“What the hell is a nome-made mam and chess sandwich?” I asked as I read it over.
Claudia started giggling. “Sometimes our translation isn’t the best. Everyone should take the Las Palabras program.”
Mateo pressed a groomed finger to the menu. “Perhaps you should order the chorizo to hell? Or the sepia to the iron with ali smelt.” His eyes slid to my puzzled, somewhat disgusted face, and he grinned. “Flame-grilled chorizo or grilled cuttlefish with garlic mayonnaise. I have no idea what nome-made mam and chess is.”
I stared back at him, enjoying the little moment between us. It was hard for me to imagine him being all passionate and hot-blooded…or was it? When I imagined us in bed together, he wasn’t cool and collected then. He was extraordinarily physical and frenzied with lust. Perhaps I always figured there was a bit of an animal underneath the suit.
He cocked his head to the side and eyed me quizzically. “What are you staring at? Do I have something on my face?”
“Only your nose,” I said before turning away and having a sip of beer.
He rubbed his nose and made an adorably sad face.
Because we just had a bit of time before the game, we were only able to stay at the bar for one beer. But man, I wanted to just keep sitting and drinking, the sweet sunshine spilling over the tops of the red-roofed buildings and bathing us in it. Being with Claudia and Ricardo made it feel like we were on a double date with close friends. I felt like I was dating Mateo. We were just able to sit back and relax and laugh and enjoy each other’s company in a different way than we were used to.
But, as seemed to be the theme of things, there just wasn’t enough time.
We started off for the Acantilado school and eventually found it past some crumbling buildings outside of town, despite Jerry’s terrible directions. We were the last to arrive, and I was kind of buzzed thanks to not eating a mam and chess sandwich when I should have. Jerry was waving at us to “hurry our arses.”
“Have a good game,” I said to Mateo and Ricardo as Claudia walked off to the sidelines.
Mateo grabbed my hand, and I watched in shock as he raised it up to his mouth and quickly kissed it. He smiled against my knuckles. “I will try not to kill you,” he said devilishly. Then he turned and jogged across the field with Ricardo.
“Vera!” Wayne yelled. “Come on!”
Damn it! Couldn’t anyone just leave me in peace? That was the closest Mateo’s lips had ever come to my own and I needed a moment. Of course, I didn’t get a moment. More people started yelling.
I growled and ran off toward my stupid team.
After I quickly got changed into my shorts, and though I didn’t have a sports bra with me—obviously—I put on my most supportive bra and several tank tops just so I didn’t have to have the same conversation with Lauren again. I’m sure she was just waiting to shoot her mouth off about how inappropriate it was that he kissed my hand.
The field was the type of soccer field we had at home, which should have put me at ease but didn’t, because of course I didn’t play soccer. After a quick huddle with Wayne, which consisted of, “Vera, go for the ball. If he looks like he’s going left, go left,” and, “Sammy, when the ball comes to you, just get out of the way and let Ed take it,” I was sent to my goalpost.
Ugh. Standing there, with the huge distance between the posts, I knew this was going to be an impossible game, and even faking it, I was probably going to end up with shredded knees and turf up my nose. To make matters worse, spectators emerged out of nowhere and started lining up at the sides of the field. Suddenly it seemed like our game had turned into Acantilado’s hot-ticket event. Even Mateo had somehow changed into what looked like an actual soccer uniform: white shorts and a white jersey. I had to admit that was another good look for him. I wasn’t one to notice men’s legs, but his were dark bronze like the rest of him and sculpted with beautifully strong muscles.
Jerry managed to get a whistle and blew it to signal our start. The first period, playing for the regulated forty-five minutes, went by as well as you’d think it would. Mateo and the Spaniards (which kind of sounds like a band name) dominated the ball, and the Anglos tried their hardest to stop them. Unfortunately, that didn’t mean much and Mateo would always get the ball down toward me. In Atletico I guess his job would have been to defend but because he was the best ball player here, he was the one who did everything.
Because I had to save face, every time he kicked, I went for it. Every time I missed. Anyone would have made me miss but he was good. He was on fire, on wings, on air. He was all confidence and bravado and physical fitness. He made it look easy. And maybe it was easy. But I didn’t for a moment think that he didn’t see me as a rival opponent. He went after the goals like he needed them to survive, and I did the best I could until the whistle blew signaling the period was over just as I was flying through the air after another ball.
I lay there for a moment, face in the grass and my boobs just aching. The last shot nearly took my face off—I guess I should have been happy that it was still intact.
“Are you okay?” I heard Mateo’s accented voice ask softly from above me.
I waved him away with my hand and grunted into the grass.
I felt his palm on my lower back, pressing lightly. Sweaty. Wonderful. “You did really well, Estrella,” he said. “You impress me every day.”
I turned my head to the side and looked at his handsome face, the beads of perspiration dropping off his brow and nose, and into the grass. “Thanks.”
“Come on,” he said, picking up my hand and pulling me up until I was on my feet. He looked down at my grass-stained knees in concern. “You should have worn pads.”
“Apparently, I also should have worn a sports bra,” I said dryly. “I’ll live.”
He gave my hand a squeeze before he jogged down the field, his step springy, always such an athlete.
There wasn’t much time between periods. I was able to get a bottle of water into me and a deli sandwich that Sammy had pilfered from somewhere. Her blonde hair was sticking out like a mad scientist and she was sweating up a storm. Even though Wayne had warned her to let Ed take the ball if it came to her, she never listened and would try her hardest to kick the ball to someone. Usually though, it ended up being someone on the other team, and more often than not, it was Angel, which made me think she had some outrageous crush on the innocent nerd. I wondered if the whole “Sammy said she’d show me hers” thing actually happened after all.
I mused that over while I finished the sandwich (not bad, but needed more mam and chess), and then it was back to the second period. By now it seemed like the whole elementary school had just let out, so now there were oodles of children watching us, children who, no doubt, could play a better game than us Anglos.
We weren’t far into the second period—the Spaniards obviously winning—when the impossible happened.
Tragedy struck.
Shit went down.
No bueno all over the place.
I couldn’t really tell what happened from my distant keep, but from what it looked like, Mateo was storming towards Ed. Ed had the ball. Ed did a sudden fake out to the left, then a fake out to the right. Mateo followed in the same way, except when Ed went right, something in Mateo’s left leg went out.