True Love and Other Disasters

Chapter 11

Faith spent the morning before the PR meeting going through her closet and getting rid of clothes she figured she’d never wear again. She piled all her cashmere sweater sets and sedate suits in boxes and called Goodwill.

She was ready to explode, or collapse, or something, from aggravation and lack of sleep. Not only had the Chinooks lost last night in overtime, but she’d also had to hear her mother make love all night. To add insult to injury, Pebbles took up the whole dang bed. How could one small dog take up so much space? Every time she tried to move Pebbles, the dog seemed to gain ten extra pounds and become dead weight.

And why was she allowing it? she asked herself as she got dressed for the PR and marketing meeting. Any of it? Her mother had apparently decided to move in without asking and was sneaking her boyfriend in at nights like she was sixteen. A dog Faith hated slept with her most nights and hogged the bed. She didn’t recognize her life anymore. It wasn’t the life she’d had in Vegas before Virgil or her life with him. She’d been cramming her head full of hockey and trying to learn as much as possible. She didn’t want to make a mistake and fail, but there was still so much she didn’t know. And to be honest, she wasn’t so sure she’d ever know more than she didn’t know.

The clothes she’d had shipped from California had arrived the day before, and she dressed for the meeting in a pair of jeans and a pink Ed Hardy T-shirt with a red heart and wings on it. She’d found a cute pair of shearling Uggs that laced to her knees and she stuffed the straight legs of her jeans inside. It was late April and still chilly and wet in the Emerald City.

The traffic to the Key Arena was heavy and it took her ten minutes longer than she’d expected.

“We think this one is fun,” Bo said as Faith took her seat beside Jules and pointed to one of the photos she’d taken with Ty. “It’s kind of playful yet has an edge to it.”

Faith looked at the photograph with her foot between Ty’s thighs. Her face was to the camera, looking all happy and smiling while Ty looked up at her as if he was totally annoyed. Which he had been. The blue of his jersey made his eyes even more startling, and the tight set of his strong jaw brought out the thin white scar on his chin. He was gorgeous, everything good and yummy in one pissed-off package. He was every catch in a girl’s breath, every hitch in her heart, and every flutter in her stomach. He didn’t need a poster or billboard or silver screen to make him larger than life. All he had to do was breathe.

The last time she’d seen Ty had been on television when the San Jose crowd had booed him for goalie interference. He’d argued with the ref and hit his stick on the ice, but as he’d skated toward the penalty box, the crowd’s boos turned to cheers and a little smile twisted one corner of his mouth. Which, for Ty, represented full-blown rapture.

“I think the one on the left is better,” Jules pointed out. While Faith had dressed down for the meeting, Jules wore a bright orange dress shirt with black stripes. He kind of looked like a pumpkin. “Faith standing in front of Ty gives it more depth. And for billboards, you want something with a bit more dimension.” He shrugged. “And the Saint is never going to go for the other one.”

“How do you know which one Ty would prefer?” Faith asked. Had the two been bonding when she wasn’t around?

“Because it looks like you’ve got your foot on his nuts.”

Oh. That wasn’t good. Was it?

“Well, as a graphic artist with a bachelor’s degree in advertising,” Bo stressed as she pointed to her favorite, “I think this one tells a better story.”

Faith looked at her assistant and then at Bo. The two stared daggers at each other and Faith wondered what she’d missed.

Tim, the PR director, stepped forward. “I’m leaning toward the one with the more playful edge first. If it gets a good reaction, we’ll keep the momentum going and put the other one up in a month.”

Faith was not a graphic artist, nor did she have a degree in anything, but she agreed with Jules. “If we’re going to put these up back to back a few weeks apart, it makes sense to go with the picture of me standing in front and Ty behind me looking mad and belligerent.”

“I wasn’t mad,” Ty said as he walked in and the room felt suddenly smaller. He wore jeans and a black turtleneck with a Nike swoop on the throat. Unlike the rest of the guys on the team, who looked shaggy from their good-luck beards, Ty was still clean-shaven. His hair was wet, as if he’d just gotten out of the shower. She really hadn’t expected to see him. She’d been told the team was practicing, and she figured Ty would skip the meeting.

His electric-blue gaze met hers for several heartbeats before he moved to stand before the mock-ups. He folded his arms over his chest and stood with his feet a shoulders’ width apart. His shirt fit loosely about his wide back and was tucked into a pair of Levi’s so worn the back pockets softly cupped his muscular butt. He pointed to the photo with her foot between his thighs. “This looks like Mrs. Duffy has her stiletto on my nuts.”

Jules laughed and Faith bit her top lip to keep from laughing.

Bo pulled a rubber band from her stubby ponytail. “It tells a story.”

“Yeah,” Ty agreed. “The story of her foot crushing my nuts.”

Bo looked like she wanted to crush him with her clunky Doc Martens.

“Well, we certainly don’t want that to be the image we project,” Tim assured the Chinooks captain.

“Oh, I don’t know,” Faith said as Ty turned to face her. “I think there are probably more than a few women who’d like to see that image.” Her gaze landed on his flat stomach and the bulge behind the five buttons of his fly. She ran her gaze up the hard muscles of his chest, over the scar on his chin, to his blue eyes. She thought of last night’s game and his time in the sin bin. “More than a few men, too.”

“Yeah,” Jules jumped in, “but that isn’t the point of this campaign. It’s to create an image of conflict, but we don’t want it to look like Faith is busting the Saint’s balls.”

“Thank you, Jules.”

“You’re welcome, Saint.”

Faith ducked her head and hid her smile. Men were so weird about their balls.

“It’s too sensuous and playful to convey that,” Bo argued as she gathered up her short auburn hair and stuck it back in the ponytail. And while Bo and Jules argued about the photo and Ty’s balls, his gaze locked with hers. Fine lines creased the corners of his beautiful eyes and she thought he just might crack a full-blown smile.

Of course, he didn’t, but that didn’t keep something hot and sensuous from sliding down her spine and spreading across her skin. “I guess I don’t want to bust the Saint’s balls. At least not today,” she said. “I need him to win me the cup.”

First his sac and now his balls. He was really going to have to stop having these conversations with Faith. Especially with other people in the room. In some sort of sick, twisted way, it turned him on.

“I think we’ll go with this one first,” Tim said, pointing to the poster of Faith standing in front of Ty. “We’ll use the locker-room shot at another time. Or choose something else from that shoot,” he added, sounding suddenly exhausted as he headed for the door. “I need some Tylenol.”

“Tim, wait,” Bo called after him as she followed him out the door. “You didn’t hear my ideas for the captions.”

“I feel sorry for that guy,” Jules said as he stood.

“I like her.”

“She’s like an aggressive Chihuahua who thinks she’s a pit bull.”

“I think that’s what I like about her.” Faith stood and Ty lowered his gaze from her lips to the pink long-sleeved T-shirt with a heart and angel wings covering her breasts. Gone were her black pants or loose beige skirts. She wore a pair of jeans that hugged her waist and thighs, and had on a pair of furry Pocahontas boots. Without her loose, dark clothes, she looked younger. Softer and definitely less uptight.

“She’s bitchy.”

Faith grabbed a big leather purse with a gold chain strap. “She’s spunky. Kind of marches to her own beat.”

“Your mom marches to her own beat, but I don’t see you embracing her spunkiness.”

“My mother’s not spunky. She’s got problems.” Faith cast a glance at Ty before she headed toward the door. “The biggest being that she acts like she’s sixteen.”

“Mrs. Duffy,” Ty called out to her. “Can you stay a minute?” He needed to settle things between them.

“Sure,” she said over her shoulder as she stopped just inside the door. “I’ll be right with you.” As she spoke to her assistant, Ty’s gaze lowered from her blonde hair and back to the metal buttons closing the back pockets of her jeans. Kissing her had been a massive screwup. He could pretend it hadn’t happen, but Ty liked to confront potential situations before they became real big problems.

Faith turned and left the door slightly open. “Is this about the other night?” she asked as she moved toward him.

“Yes.”

“Good. Then you know about it.”

Of course he knew about it. He’d been there while she’d sucked on his neck.

“I’ve been so disturbed by it all week,” Faith continued.

Ty rested his behind on the edge of the table and folded his arms over his chest. He didn’t like the sound of that.

“At first I was horrified.” She shook her head and her hair fell from behind one ear. “I was just so…so grossed out.” She crossed her arms beneath her breasts. “All I could do was just stand there.”

Grossed out? She hadn’t acted grossed out as she’d kissed him like it was her job and she was working on a big, fat bonus. Irritation pulled at his brows. “You did more than just stand there.”

“I might have said something. I don’t know; I was in shock.” She looked down at the toes of her boots and her hair fell over her cheeks and hid her face. “It’s forever etched in my brain.”

His too. That was the problem.

“God, I just want to take an ice pick and dig it out.”

His irritation turned to anger and settled in his belly right next to the aching part of him that liked the way her butt looked in those jeans. “Maybe you should have thought about that before you gave me a sucker bite and begged me to touch you all over.”

“What?” She looked up. “What are you talking about?”

He pulled one side of his turtleneck down and exposed the little purple mark she’d left on his neck. “This.” His hands fell to his sides and gripped the table. “I didn’t even notice it until the next morning when Sam pointed it out at light practice.”

She plopped her purse down on a nearby chair and stepped forward. The cool tips of her fingers brushed his neck as she pulled the side of his turtleneck back down. The cool touch spread heat down his chest and straight to his groin. “That’s hardly noticeable.”

“It’s faded since Sunday.” He looked up into her face and his gaze lowered to her mouth just inches from his. “I had to make up a story about a waitress.”

Her eyes looked into his. “Did they believe you?”

The last time she’d been this close, her mouth had been on his neck and she’d bitten his earlobe. “Touch me,” she’d whispered, and God, he’d wanted to touch her and more. “Yeah. They did.”

“Sorry.” She frowned and stepped back. Her cheeks turned pink and she shrugged. “I guess I was caught up in the moment and got carried away.”

“Even though you were disgusted, horrified, and grossed out?”

“What? Oh. I wasn’t talking about that.” She gestured to his neck. “I was talking about walking into my apartment and finding your father on top of my mother. Naked. Having sex.” She pointed to the ground. “On the floor in front of the fire.”

Now it was his turn to ask, “What?”

“Your father and my mother…and I walked in on them.”

“Wait.” He held up one hand. “My father knows your mother?”

“Obviously.”

He thought of the woman he’d met the night of the photo shoot. She hadn’t been bad looking, just overblown and a bit tacky. Exactly his father’s type. “And you walked in on them having sex?”

“Yes, and it was disgusting. They were…” She lifted her palm as if she could stop the painful memory. “Doggy. I think.”

“You’re kidding?”

“I wish!”

Even though his father dating her mother could only end in complete disaster, Faith looked so distressed, he had to laugh.

“Oh.” She pointed at him. Her short nails were painted a light pink. “You think that’s funny? The man who never laughs?”

“I laugh.”

She turned her slim finger toward her chest. “At me!”

“Well, you’re so freaked out, it’s funny.” She also looked a little indignant and cute and sexy, standing there in her pink shirt and boots.

“If you’d seen what I saw, you’d be freaked too.”

“Believe me. I have seen it.” Pavel had never purposely flaunted his sexual exploits, but he’d never been all that discreet. “The first time was when I was about seven.” He’d walked into the living room and seen his father having sex on his mother’s antique credenza. His mother hadn’t been home at the time.

Her pink lips parted and she gasped. “I was five! And she’s sneaking him in at night and he leaves before I get up in the morning. He’s like a ghost. If they weren’t so loud, I wouldn’t know he was there.”

Ah. That explained his father’s sudden disappearances and sudden reappearances. Ty hadn’t seen much of the old man, and figured it had to have something to do with a woman.

“And they kick Pebbles out and make her sleep with me.”

“Pebbles?”

“My mother’s dog.” She pushed her hair behind her ears and dropped her arms to her sides. “Pebbles hates me and the feeling is mutual. She snaps and snarls at me all the time. Except when she needs something. Like a place to sleep.”

He tilted his head to one side and looked at her. “Why don’t you kick her out?”

“I tried,” she said through a sigh. “But she looks at me with those beady little eyes and I just can’t be that mean. Now every time Pebbles jumps in bed with me, I know that Pavel’s in the other room getting naked with my mom.” She made a face and shook her head. “I probably wouldn’t be so disturbed if it wasn’t my mother moaning and carrying on like someone is killing her.”

It wasn’t the sort of reaction he’d expect out of a former stripper and Playmate. Especially an unrepentant stripper and Playmate. He didn’t really know what he’d expected. Maybe someone who thought sex was no big deal, no matter who was having it. At least, that had been the attitude of the strippers he’d known. “Huh.”

“Huh what?”

“For someone who used to get naked for a living, you seem all uptight about sex.”

“That was a job.” She shook her head as she looked into his eyes. “Stripping was never about sex.”

Which made no sense at all. A woman getting naked was always about sex. “Neither was Playboy,” she added.

She should tell that to all the guys who looked at her photos, because it sure as hell looked a lot like sex. At least it had to him. It had felt like it too. He thought of her wearing those pearls and felt his sac get tight. “Bullshit. You sold sex.”

She shrugged. “That was acting.”

He didn’t believe her, but all this talk about sex had him thinking of sliding his hands up the back of her jeans and cupping her smooth, bare behind as she put her hot moist mouth against his throat again. He needed to get out away from her, but he didn’t want to stand up just yet. His jeans were loose, but not that loose. “Again, I apologize for kissing you the other night.” He looked at his Rolex as if he had somewhere else to go. “I’d had a few too many beers. That’s not an excuse, and I’m sorry.”

She took the hint-thank the Lord-and reached for her purse on the nearby chair. “It was inappropriate on both our parts,” she said.

“Let’s just chalk it up to alcohol and forget it happened.”

“I can do that.” She hung the gold chain strap over one shoulder. “Can you?”

He was going to try like hell. “Absolutely. You have my word that it won’t happen again.” She stood before him like a sexual buffet that he wanted to dive into headfirst. “You could run around naked in front of me and I wouldn’t do a thing.”

She raised one skeptical brow. “Really?”

“Yep.” He lowered his gaze down the full curves beneath her shirt then back up again. “You could go ahead and whip that top off and I’d just sit here kind of bored.”

“You wouldn’t move a muscle?”

He shrugged one shoulder. “I’d probably yawn.”

She dropped her purse to the floor, crossed her arms over her chest, and grasped the bottom of her shirt. “You sure you won’t feel anything?”

Holy shit. “Yeah.”

Her fingers gathered the edge, pulling it up until a strip of smooth white skin showed just above her jeans resting on her hips. “Still not feeling anything?”

Ty had been playing in the NHL for more than fifteen years now. He knew a thing or two about putting on his game face. “Not a thing.” To prove his point, he yawned. Which was difficult considering he had a hard time breathing.

She laughed, a soft seductive little chuckle as she pulled the shirt up past her little belly button, pierced with a pink jewel. “Nothing?”

The blood rushed from his head to his crotch and he fought the urge to fall to his knees and press his open mouth against her smooth belly. “Sorry, Mrs. Duffy.” Then he told the biggest whopper of the day. “You’re just not that attractive.”

She raised the bottom of the T-shirt further up her slim ribs. “You don’t think so?”

“No.”

“A lot of men have told me I’m beautiful.”

“A lot of men lie to get women naked.” The shirt rose a few stingy inches.

“Even women they’re not attracted to?”

His gaze took in her smooth belly as she pulled the shirt up just past the pink satin cupping the bottoms of her breasts. “Depends.”

“On?”

“If it’s after midnight and the bar’s about to close.” He held his breath, waiting for more. “A lot of people get more attractive at closing time. But I’ve never been the kind of guy to go ugly just to get laid. You could probably come over here and give me a lap dance right now and I’d just go ahead and fall asleep.”

Her little chuckle became deeper as if she could read his mind and knew he was lying. “I haven’t given a lap dance since I quit Aphrodite years ago, but I imagine it’s like riding a bike.” She gathered the shirt in one hand and slid a slow, deliberate palm across her bare belly. “I guarantee that you wouldn’t fall asleep.” There was something sinful and hot about a woman touching herself. “Within seconds you’d be whimpering like a baby and begging for mercy.”

“That’s a bold statement, Mrs. Duffy.”

“Just stating a fact, Mr. Savage.” Her little finger skimmed the top of her waistband and dipped below the top button. “You feelin’ sleepy yet?”

“Keep going. I’ll let you know.”

The tip of her ring finger followed her pinky beneath her waistband. “Bored?”

“Gettin’ there.”

“Wait.” Her hand stopped along with his heart. “Wouldn’t a lap dance be considered inappropriate behavior?”

Hell no!

She laughed and dropped her shirt. “And just after we said it wouldn’t happen anymore.”

His hands grasped the edge of the table to keep from reaching for her. From grabbing the waistband of her jeans and pulling her to him until she stood between his thighs, close enough to touch. He wanted to tell her she could behave inappropriately all she wanted. Anywhere. His bed came to mind, but the look in her clear, almost calculating eyes stopped him. While she’d just turned him inside out and upside down, she felt nothing.

She reached for her purse. “Are we going to be able to forget this happened, too?”

“Not a problem.” With his dick throbbing against his inner thigh, he said, “I’ve already forgotten.”

She moved toward the door but turned and looked at him over her shoulder. “Me too. You’re not the only one who was bored.” The door swung open before she reached it and her assistant stepped inside. “What’s up, Jules?” she asked.

Jules looked from her to Ty. “I just came to let you know that I set up a meeting next week with the director of the Chinooks Foundation.”

“Sounds good.” She adjusted the purse on her shoulder and looked at Ty one last time. “See you around, Mr. Savage.”

Jules watched her leave, then asked, “Is there something going on between you and Faith?”

“No,” he answered truthfully. There was nothing and there could never be anything either.

“It looked like something.”

“I’m the captain of her hockey team.” He raised his hands and rubbed his face. What the hell had just happened? “That’s it.”

“I hope that’s true. She’s my boss and I don’t allow myself to think of her like that,” Jules said.

He dropped his hands. “Like what?”

“Like the way you were looking at her. Like she was standing naked in front of you.”

It was so close to the truth, Ty stared at the bastard. “Even if that’s true, why is it your business-eh?”

“Because her husband just died and she’s lonely. I’d hate to see her get hurt.”

Ty folded his arms across his chest. “You seem overly concerned with her feelings.”

“I’m concerned about her, yes, but she’s a survivor. I’m more concerned about the Chinooks.” Now it was Jules’s turn to fold his arms across his chest. “What do you think the other guys will say about you making it with the owner of the team?”

“You seem to know. So, why don’t you tell me?”

Jules shook his head and stared him in the eyes. And as much as Ty wanted to punch him in the head, he had always admired a guy who didn’t back down when he was right. And as much as Ty hated to admit it, Jules was right. “I don’t think I have to list how many ways that would be profoundly stupid. There is no reason why we can’t knock out the Sharks in the next game and advance to the third round. Then we’re only two teams from winning the cup. I don’t think I need to tell you what a distraction that would be for you and everyone else.”

“That’s right. You don’t.” Ty stood. “That’s why we were talking about my father dating her mother.” Which was true. In between him looking at her like she was naked. “I like you, Jules. If I didn’t like you, I’d just tell you to stay the hell out of my business.” He moved toward the door and stopped to look down into the other man’s face. “So, I’m going to be straight with you. Every man on the team has seen those pictures in Playboy. There’s no point in even denying that. Hell, you’ve seen them, and Mrs. Duffy doesn’t seem at all worried about it. But there’s a world of difference between thinking about her in those pictures and taking it a step further. Let me assure you that nothing is going to get in my way of making it all the way to the finals.

“Not winning the cup has been a monkey on my back for fifteen years. I’ve been one overtime shot away from having my name engraved on the cup, and the last thing I’m going to do is fuck that up.” He gave Jules one last hard look and walked from the room.

He’d parked his BMW in the lower level of the parking garage, and on his way home, he thought about what he needed to do in tomorrow night’s game. They needed to shut down San Jose’s defense, clinch the second round, and move on to the third. He thought about Faith and Jules. And he thought about his dad and Faith’s mother. Of all the women in Seattle, why did the old man have to screw around with her? Ty didn’t get it. It was like Pavel was the Pied Piper of penis and women followed him anywhere.

He drove across the floating bridge of Lake Washington to Mercer Island. He parked the BMW in between his Bugatti Veyron and his father’s Cadillac.

“Jesus, Dad,” Ty said as he walked into the kitchen and tossed his keys on the deep brown granite countertop. “You didn’t tell me that Faith Duffy walked in on you having sex with her mother.”

Pavel shrugged as he turned from the refrigerator and shut the door. “She was supposed to be in California.” He popped the top on a can of Molson and shrugged as if that said it all. “But she got sick and came home early.”

Ty doubted she’d been sick and suspected her sudden departure from San Jose had more to do with that kiss in the hall than bad fish or the flu bug. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“You are judgmental.” Pavel raised the can to his lips and took a drink.

“No. You didn’t tell me because you knew I wouldn’t like it.” He sighed and shook his head. “Seattle is a big city, Dad. Couldn’t you find another woman besides Faith Duffy’s mother to bang?”

Slowly Pavel lowered his beer. “Don’t talk disrespectful, Tyson.”

That was the weird paradox about Pavel. You could treat women like shit, and that was okay. But you couldn’t talk disrespectfully. “What’s going to happen when you break up with her?” There wasn’t a doubt in Ty’s mind that he would, too. “I don’t want to have to deal with a hysterical woman showing up here.” Like when women always discovered that Pavel was married, or wasn’t going to marry them, or he had dumped them for someone else.

“Val isn’t the type to get too attached. She’s only in town for a short time to help her daughter through a difficult time. She’s a devoted mother.”

Which brought up a subject Ty had been meaning to talk about. He couldn’t come right out and ask the old man when he was going back to his house. “What are your plans?” he asked instead as he moved toward the refrigerator and opened the stainless-steel door.

Pavel shrugged and raised his can. “Just having a beer. Later Valerie invited me over for dinner. I’m sure the two ladies wouldn’t mind if you joined us.”

After his latest conversation with Faith and the enormous wood she’d given him, that wasn’t going to happen. “I’m meeting some of the guys at Conte’s for poker and Cubans.” He was definitely in the mood to kick some ass on the poker table.

“You spend too much time in the company of men and it makes you bad-tempered.”

“I’m not bad-tempered! Jesus, I wish people would lay off about that.”

Pavel shook his head. “You’ve always been so sensitive. Like your mother.”

His father was talking out of his ass again. Sensitive? Like his mother? Ty was nothing like his mother. His mother had spent her life loving the wrong man. Ty had never been in love at all.

“You need to find a woman,” Pavel suggested. “A woman to take care of you.”

That just proved how well the old man knew him. The last thing Ty needed was a woman in his life. A down-and-dirty hookup was a different matter, but even that was too big a distraction. And right now, he couldn’t even afford a quick, wham-bam distraction.