True Love and Other Disasters (18 page)

Faith reached for her purse next to her plate. “I’m tired,” she told Jules. “I’m going to skip dessert.”

Jules looked at her across his shoulder and put his cloth napkin next to his plate. “I’ll walk you to your room.”

“No. You stay.” She stood. “Good night, gentlemen. I had a lovely time. I’ll see you all tomorrow night at the arena.” She left the restaurant and forced herself not to look back. Within a few minutes, she was back in her suite and tossed her bag on the table. She turned on the television and pushed the
UP
button on the remote until she stopped on TCM and
Gentlemen Prefer Blondes
. Virgil had been a big fan of classic movies and starlets like Marilyn Monroe and Sophia Loren.
Faith had never really been all that interested in old movies and continued flipping the channels.

There was a knock on the door and she tossed the remote on the couch. She expected to see Jules, but wasn’t all that surprised that Ty stood on the other side.

“Who is it?” she called out as she stared at him through the peephole.

He raised a brow and folded his arms across his chest.

She was irritated with him. Maybe irrationally so, but she was still annoyed and didn’t feel like letting him in right away.

“I know you’re staring at me. You might as well open up,” he said.

“What?” she asked as she opened the door.

Instead of answering, he stepped inside and forced her to move backward.

“I’m tired and not—” His mouth on her stopped her flow of words as he brought his hands to the sides of her face. The door shut behind him with a soft click, and his thumbs brushed her cheeks. His lips slid over hers with the promise of passion rather than a full-out kiss.

“No skating with Sam,” he said against her lips. “I’ll teach you.”

She hadn’t been serious about learning to skate. “I don’t want to fall and hurt myself.”

“I won’t let that happen. And the next time you
need a whole-body massage,” he said as he kissed the corner of her mouth, “call me.”

She almost smiled. “How? When you’re so good at pretending I don’t even exist.”

He brushed his lips across hers. “I should get an award for that.”

She put her hands on his chest and pushed. “You could at least say hello.”

“No, I couldn’t.” He dropped his hands and leaned his back against the door. “I can’t risk it.”

Faith moved across the room and turned off the television. “What does that mean?”

“It means that when I look at you, I’m afraid everyone within ten miles can see that I have sex with you.”

She tossed the remote on the table. “Oh.”

“And it means,” he continued as he moved toward her, “that I’m afraid everyone within ten miles can see that I’m remembering the last time I saw you naked. That I got a little rough with you and I wish I was truly sorry about that, but it was so good I’m not. Every time with you is good, and I’m afraid that anyone within ten miles will look at me and know I’m thinking about how to get you naked again.”

She bit the side of her lip. All he had to do was show up and she’d be more than willing to get naked. “You took a big risk in coming here.”

He reached for her hands and brushed his
thumb over the backs of her knuckles. “Everyone is still in the restaurant. Besides, none of us are on this floor.” He pulled her toward him. “So you got the muffin.”

“You sent me the muffin?”

“Can’t have you wasting away on bran and Promise spread. I need you full of energy.”

She owned a penthouse in downtown Seattle and an elite hockey team. She had more money than she knew what to do with, yet she couldn’t help smiling like a fool over a two-dollar muffin. “Thank you.”

He reached for the frog buttons closing her dress. “I have an ulterior motive.”

Faith reached up and pulled the jade sticks from her hair. “Shocking.”

“Monday, I played some of the best hockey of my life. I’m not usually superstitious, but I gotta believe it had something to do with the night before.”

She tossed the sticks on the table and her hair fell down her back.

“You have to have lucky sex with me before each game or I could be jinxed.” He popped the buttons closing the dress over her breasts. “I know you want to do the right thing.”

“Take one for the team?” She pulled the tails of his shirt from his waistband.

“It’s your turn.”

“Yeah, but what if…” she raised one hand. “And I’m not saying this is going to happen, but what if we have sex and you lose? Then you’re not lucky.”

He looked up from the frog buttons as if he hadn’t thought of that. “Honey, having sex with you makes me one lucky son of a bitch.”

“Thank you. I think.”

He shrugged and continued with the buttons. “If we lose, it just means that someone else on the team fucked up. Not our fault. We did our part.”

She laughed. “And we have to do ‘our part’ before each game?”

He nodded. “At least once.” He pushed the dress down her arms and it pooled at her feet.

She pushed at his chest as she took a step back and kicked her dress aside. “Don’t go anywhere.” Wearing nothing but her black lace bra, matching thong, and red Valentino pumps, she left the room, only to return a moment later with an armless vanity chair. She set it in the middle of the room and said, “Sit down, Mr. Savage.”

“What are you planning?”

“My part to make sure the captain of my hockey team isn’t jinxed.” She walked to the sound system and tuned the radio to a hard rock station. A perennial favorite of every strip club across the country poured from the speakers. Faith had danced to “Pour Some Sugar on Me” more times
than she could recall. This time, she didn’t have to slip into character. She wanted to please him and herself. She wanted to spin his head around and leaving him gasping for breath. Just as he’d done to her. She turned to look across the room at Ty, still standing by the chair, watching her.

“I told you to sit.” She ran one hand behind her neck and lifted her hair as she slid her other hand across her stomach. It had been years since she’d danced for a man, but she hadn’t forgotten. She moved toward him,
step step pause…step step pause
, touching her body as she looked him up and down, and letting her gaze turn all hot and sensual.

His gaze slid down her body, stopping at her hands before continuing to her feet. “I like the shoes.”

“Thank you.”
Step step pause…step step pause.
“I’m sure you are well aware of the rules.”

“There are no rules,” he said as he sat.

A sexy smile touched her lips. “No touching,” she informed him as her fingers slid upward and she cupped her breasts. “I can touch you. You can’t touch me.”

His brilliant blue eyes stared up at her. “Ah. Those rules.”

She grinned as she walked around him, trailing a hand across his shoulders. From behind, she leaned forward and ran her hands down his
chest. “I’m hot. Sticky sweet,” she whispered along with the words of the song into his ear. “From my head, to my feet.” She continued around him, then straddled his lap, facing him.

He ran his hands up the backs of her legs to her bare behind and pressed his face into her cleavage.

“No touching,” she reminded him and removed his hands from her behind. She sat with the skimpy crotch of her G-string inches away from the zipper of his pants. She ran her hands over his chest, rocking her hips, coming close to touching the bulge in the front of his pants, but always pulling back.

He groaned deep in his chest and sucked in an agonizing breath. “Touch me, Faith.”

“I am.”

“Lower.”

Instead of doing as he asked, she stood and teased him with her hands and body. She took off his tie and shirt and rubbed against him, turning up the heat and turning them both on, her hard nipples grazing his chest through the thin lace of her bra.

He reached for her and she danced out of his grasp. “This is killing me,” he said, his voice a lusty gravel. “Come slide your little hand into my pants, and I’ll slide my hand into yours.”

“That’s real tempting, but I’m pretty sure that’s
against the rules.” She turned with her back to him and sat, grinding her bare behind into him. His palms slipped up her back and he unhooked her bra.

“That’s definitely against the rules.”

“Fuck the rules.” He kissed her spine and slid his hand up her stomach to cover her naked breasts. “We don’t play by the rules.”

Y
ou’d be surprised at the number of men who slipped their number in my G-string.”

Ty wouldn’t be surprised at all. Faith lay with her head on his bare chest, brushing her fingers across his stomach. The tips of her short nails spread fire to his belly and groin and if he had the time, he’d make love to her again. If he had time, he’d damn sure have her dance for him again. She’d been beautiful and erotic and he’d loved it. “Did you call any of them?”

She looked up at him and rolled her eyes. “Sure. Like I would ever date a man I met in a strip club.”

“I’ve hung out in a strip club a time or two.”

“I’m not surprised. Strip clubs attract jocks and musicians like ants to a picnic.”

“I haven’t been in a few years,” he defended himself, although he wasn’t quite sure why he felt the need to. He ran his hand down the smooth skin of her back. “My father still loves the strippers.”

“Which explains his attraction to my mother.”

“Your mother was a stripper?” Again, no big surprise.

“Yep. She was a stripper and sometimes a cocktail waitress.”

“Sounds like she worked hard.”

“She did. She played hard too. I was alone a lot.”

“Where is your father?” She rubbed her foot on the inside of his calf and came dangerously close to kneeing him in the nuts.

“I haven’t seen him since I was little.”

He rolled her onto her back and looked down into her face. “You’ve never tried to find him?”

“Why? He didn’t want to know me. Why would I want to know him?”

Good point.

She pushed a piece of blonde hair from her face. “What about your mother?”

He fell onto his back and looked up at the ceiling. He didn’t like to talk about his mother. “What about her?”

“Where does she live?”

“She died about five years ago.”

“I’m sorry.”

He looked across the pillow at her. “Don’t be.
She wasn’t.” He ran his gaze across her beautiful face. Her green eyes and long lashes. Her perfect nose and the bow of her full pink lips. “My father has always said that she was crazy, but that’s because he never tried to understand her.”

She turned on her side. “Did you?”

He shrugged. “She was very emotional. Laughing one minute, crying the next. She never got over the divorce, and I don’t think she had a real interest in living after that.”

“When did your parents divorce?”

“I was ten.”

She looked into his face and her smile was sad when she said, “I think my mother was on her third divorce when I was ten. I used to ride my bike to dance classes at the Y so that I didn’t have to think about it.”

He pictured a little girl on a pink Schwinn, her blonde ponytail flying behind her. “I played hockey twelve months out of the year.”

“Well, all that hard work paid off.”

He’d had great coaches to fill the voids in his life. Good men and mentors. He wondered if she’d ever had anyone. He bet not. “So did your dance classes.”

She laughed. “Yeah, but not with the moves I learned as a kid. I had to learn all new moves.”

He liked her moves. Especially tonight. While it was true that he’d played great hockey Monday
night, he really didn’t believe it had anything to do with sex. He’d just used it as an excuse to be with her. He loved the touch of her skin beneath his hands and the look of pleasure in her eyes when he was buried deep inside her. He was quickly becoming addicted to the sound of her pleasure and knowing he was the one giving it to her. Even on days when he told himself he didn’t have time for her, he managed to hook up with her anyway.

Ty sat on the edge of the bed and scrubbed his face with his hands. She was an addiction. Why else would he risk everything to be with her? How else could he explain it to himself?

“Are you leaving so soon?” she asked as she moved behind him and wrapped her arms around his shoulders. Her breasts pressed into his bare back and he fought the urge to turn and push her back down on the mattress.

“I have to go before I’m missed.” He wanted to ask more questions about the little girl on the bike. To spend all night discovering all the moves she’d learned.

She softly kissed the side of his neck. “I’ll miss you.”

“I’ll see you tomorrow night after work.” He looked into her eyes a few inches from his and wondered how much she’d miss him. “I have a game to win. And a few more after that.”

She sat back on her behind and wrapped her
arms around her knees. She looked up at him as he stood and got dressed. “What are you going to do after you win the cup? Are you going to take a long vacation?”

“I never think that far ahead.” He stepped into his boxer briefs and adjusted his package.

“You never think about what you’re going to do after you win?”

“Sure. After I win, I’m going to skate around with the cup over my head.” He pulled up his trousers and looked at her, sitting in the middle of the bed, naked and perfect. “My focus has always been on winning. For as long as I can remember, that’s been my goal.” He’d never really thought beyond that. “I’ll work out and keep the body in shape so I won’t show up at camp fat and out of shape like some of the guys.” He reached for his dress shirt on the end of the bed and shoved his arms inside. But as he worked the buttons, he thought about Faith in a bikini, lounging on a sandy beach beside him. The sun warming her smooth skin. Maybe she’d have on a floppy hat and big sunglasses.

A frown settled between his brows. She didn’t even want to have dinner with him at a secluded restaurant in Bellevue. She’d made it real clear what she did want, and she was right. There could never be more between them than clandestine sex. And really good lap dances. Especially now with
those billboards plastered all over Seattle. He’d never been featured in a tabloid, but he imagined that a photo of him lounging on the beaches of Mazatlan with the owner of the Chinooks might make it into the pages. So why was he even thinking about it?

Faith watched Ty’s big hands close his shirt over his hard abs and defined pecs and wondered what had put the frown on his face. “I understand about single-minded goals,” she said as she rose from the bed and grabbed a hotel robe from the closet. “My whole goal in life was to have so much money that I didn’t ever have to worry about how I was going to pay the bills.”

“I’d say you pretty much exceeded your goal.” He closed the last button, then tucked the tails into his trousers.

“Yeah. I did, and once I reached it, I was kind of aimless. I didn’t realize how aimless until now.” She slid her arms into the rich terry-cloth robe and tied the belt around her waist. “Now I have a new goal. A better goal, and one that I never even dreamed I’d ever have in a million years. It’s really scary, but I’m enjoying it. Which is kind of scary too.”

He glanced up, then returned his attention to his black leather belt. “What’s that?”

“The Chinooks. I certainly never thought I’d own a hockey team. And if I’d ever even given it
a thought, I wouldn’t have ever thought I’d actually come to like it.” She folded her arms beneath her breasts. “It’s a huge responsibility, and for the past few years I’ve been all about letting someone else take care of everything. Now, I’m learning to like the responsibility. I like owning the Chinooks so much, that I’m actually looking forward to the drafts.”

He looked up at her. “Who are you looking at?”

“A few top prospects. When I get back, Darby and I are viewing some tapes of two-way defenders.”

He chuckled as he gazed across the room. “Do you know what a two-way defender is?”

“Someone who can defend and score.” She shrugged. “At least that’s what I
think
it means.”

“You’re right. That’s pretty much what it means.” He moved toward her. “Keep your eyes open for a big, hard-nosed checker. Don’t worry so much about the kid’s speed. Skating can be improved.” He wrapped his hand around the robe’s belt and pulled her against him. “If I don’t talk to you again until we get back to Seattle, don’t get bent out of shape again.” He pressed his lips to her forehead.

“You’ll be thinking about me?”

He shook his head and his lips brushed across her skin. “I’m going to try like hell
not
to think about you.”

The different tones and pitches of more than thirty snoring men filled the cabin of the BAC-111 as it circled Boeing Field and prepared to land. Hours earlier, the Chinooks had suffered a crushing 3–4 loss to Detroit. Game Five of the series was two days away and Faith figured Ty would need the full two days to recover from a brutal hit he’d taken at center ice from Detroit enforcer Darren McCarty.

A few plays later, Ty had put a hit on McCarty in the corner that had crumpled the Red Wing to the ice. “McCarty caught me with my head down,” Ty had told the press later that night. “Then I caught him with the puck.”

Later that night, Faith saw firsthand the extent of Ty’s bruises. He was black and blue on his right side and red across his back and hard stomach. It looked like he’d been hit by a baseball bat instead of a hockey enforcer. Ty was sore and battered and when they made love over the next few days, Faith was thoughtful enough to climb on top.

By Game Five Ty had healed somewhat, and the Chinooks managed a 3–1 win in their own house. Game Six was back in Detroit at the Joe Louis Arena and went into double overtime. With three seconds left on the clock, Daniel scored and the Chinooks advanced to the final round to face off
against the Pittsburgh Penguins in their battle for the cup.

High from the win and advancement into the final round of the playoffs, the team boarded the BAC-111 and celebrated by popping Bollinger champagne. Once the jet reached cruising speed, Coach Nystrom stood, slightly bowed forward to accommodate his height. “Two months ago when Virgil Duffy died,” he began when everyone had quieted, “we all worried how the new ownership of the team would affect our run at the cup. Any time there is a change, there is cause for concern. After tonight, I think we can safely say that Mrs. Duffy has successfully filled Virgil’s shoes. I think he would be proud of her, and we want to officially welcome her to the team.” He turned to his left and Darby handed him a dark blue jersey. He turned it to show her name, DUFFY, written across the shoulders and the number one on the back in dark green. “We officially want to welcome the newest Chinook.”

Faith stood and stepped into the aisle. She took the jersey and the backs of her eyes stung. “Thank you, Coach.” She turned and looked at the scruffy faces looking back at her, at their beards that now ranged from Geico cavemen to patchy fuzz. She met Ty’s gaze and both corners of his mouth slid up in a rare smile. Her heart pinched and her eyes stung and she didn’t want to cry like a girl.
“When I discovered that Virgil had left me his hockey team, I was as stunned as all of you. I was just as worried as everyone else that the responsibility would be too much for me and I’d mess things up.” She swallowed and folded the jersey across her arm. “With the help of my assistant, and everyone else, I’m proud to say I’ve done all right. I’m proud of all you guys, and I know that Virgil is proud of us too.” She thought she should give some sort of inspiring speech, but her vision blurred. “Thank you,” she said before she embarrassed herself by crying in front of her guys. She sat next to Jules for the remainder of the flight home and wished she could curl up in Ty’s lap and bury her face in his neck.

At three in the morning, when a black Beemer pulled up to the curb in front of her penthouse, she wore the new jersey beneath her raincoat. This time, however, she packed her Louis Vuitton hatbox with extra lingerie and a change of clothes.

Over the next five days, until the first game against the Penguins, their lives fell into a comfortable pattern, as if they were a real couple. Ty practiced during the day while Faith viewed rookie tapes or met with Miranda Snow of the Chinooks Foundation. She had lunch with Jules or her mother, and at night she either drove to Ty’s or he came to her home, depending on Valerie
and Pavel’s plans. The only creature on the planet aware of Ty and Faith’s covert relationship was Pebbles. The second the dog set her beady eyes on Ty, she instantly fell in love, much to the 240-pound hockey player’s discomfort. The second he would walk in the door, Pebbles circled his legs so he could hardly walk and jumped in his lap when he sat. Ty would give Faith a look, expecting her to do something, but when she tried, the dog snapped at her. Pebbles was a total slut for Ty, but Faith supposed she couldn’t blame the evil little mutt.

The one and only time she and Ty argued, it was about Virgil. It happened at his house during a golf lesson when he was teaching her to “waggle.” She wore a red corset and little panties that tied at the sides, and instead of getting turned on like she’d planned, he’d just gotten irritated.

“When are you going to stop wearing that ring?” he asked as she lined up a shot.

“Does it bother you?”

He shrugged and placed his beer on the bar. He wore a pair of worn Levi’s and a ripped-up tank top. His hair was disheveled from her fingers and he looked good enough to lick up one side and down the other. “It’s a constant reminder that you’re Virgil’s wife.”

She set the club in a rack and turned to face him. “Obviously, that bothers you.”

“I think it would bother most men. I’m having sex with you, and you’re wearing another man’s ring.”

She looked into his blue eyes, brittle with anger, and she didn’t understand it. “Virgil’s only been dead two months.”

“Exactly. You can come here and have sex but you can’t take off that damn ring?”

“I already feel guilty about the sex, Ty.” Suddenly she felt naked and exposed and she moved past him toward her dress, lying on his couch. “He was my husband for five years.”

“He was your roommate.”

“He took care of me.”

“He bought you because he could.”

“Well, I sold myself to him.” She grabbed the dress and turned to face him. “Which makes me no better than him.”

“You weren’t the one in the relationship with all the power. He was.”

Which was true. She and Virgil had been friends and gotten along very well, but he’d always been in charge. “He was good to me. Better than any man I’ve ever known.”