Now it was Ty’s turn to laugh as the ref dropped the puck. The two captains battled for it and the third frame started with a sprint to the Sharks goal.
Ty played a three-minute shift before he skated to the bench and grabbed his water bottle, and his gaze lifted to the owner boxes inside the HP Pavilion. Faith hadn’t traveled with them. Thank God.
He wiped off his face with a towel, then hung it around his neck. It had been four days since he’d kissed Faith and he couldn’t stop thinking about her. Couldn’t stop remembering every detail. He remembered the pressure of her soft lips and the taste of her in his mouth. She’d tasted good, like beer and hot passion and sweet sex. He’d pulled her body against his, pressed her breasts into his chest, and about lost his damn mind. She must have lost hers, too, because she hadn’t exactly protested. She’d kissed his neck and asked him to touch her all over, and God, he’d wanted to. Everything inside him had urged him to take that card key from her hand and push her inside her room. To shove her onto her bed and bury his face in her cleavage. “
I want to lick your tattoo,” she’d whispered, all hot and sexy, and damn if he hadn’t wanted to let her run her warm mouth across his skin.
She was beautiful and he’d wanted her. He was honest with himself enough to admit that he still wanted her, and walking away had been one of the toughest things he’d ever done.
A whistle blew and Ty turned his attention to the game and the icing call. He took his captaincy of the Chinooks seriously. The twenty-four guys on the team looked to him. He was an example and a leader, both on and off the ice, and he didn’t even want to think of the guys’ reaction if they ever found out that Faith had given him that sucker bite on his neck. He hadn’t even known it was there until Sam had pointed it out during practice Sunday morning. He’d made up some bullshit lie about hooking up with a waitress in San Jose, for the love of Christ. Not that that had never happened before, just not when he’d been captain and had just lectured the guys about hooking up.
Walker Brookes skated to the face-off circle in the Chinooks defensive zone and waited for the puck to drop.
The guys had harassed him about getting drunk and picking up a waitress, but they’d believed him. Of course they’d believed him. It never would have even occurred to any of them to suspect the owner of the team had put her hot mouth on his throat and left a mark. He was still having a hard time believing it himself.
Kissing the owner of the team could seriously impact his chances of winning the Stanley Cup, and he still couldn’t believe he’d been such a colossal dumb-ass over a woman. Especially over that woman. No matter how much he wanted to kiss her and touch her and let her kiss him.
The puck dropped and Walker fought it out until the puck shot behind him and into the waiting blade of the Sharks’ offense. San Jose moved the puck across ice, and Coach Nystrom signaled for Ty to change up on the fly. He stuck his rubber guard into his mouth and shoved his hands into his gloves.
Pavel Savage had been notorious for thinking with his dick and making mistakes. He’d ruined families and his chance to put his name on the cup.
Ty grabbed his stick and hopped over the boards. He kept his head up and skated to center ice as Walker took the bench. Ty was not his father. Kissing Mrs. Duffy had been a big fuckup, but a fuckup that would not happen again.
Nothing was going to come between him and his run at the cup. Not the other teams competing for the same prize. Not a defense that needed a little more size and speed, and especially not a former Playmate with big breasts and soft lips.
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 s
he 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.