An almost imperceptible tension settled over the booth. “That’s true,” Pavel conceded. “Now there is no loyalty.”
The salad course arrived and Faith waited until fresh pepper was ground on everyone’s salad before she said, “Well, I know that everyone in the Chinooks organization is thrilled to have Ty. If that upsets our neighbors to the North…” She shrugged and tried to take her mind off the man sitting next to her. “They’ll get over it. I mean, they got over the defection of Jim Carrey.” She reached for her linen napkin on her lap. “Although Canada should probably give us a big, fat thanks for taking Jim off their hands. Did you see The Cable Guy?” She speared a bite of her roasted beet and butter lettuce. She looked across her shoulder at Ty, who was almost smiling. “What?”
“
Cable Guy?”
“It sucked.”
He shook his head. “No more than Me, Myself and Irene.”
“It might be a toss-up.”
“I like Jim Carrey,” her mother confessed. “He was on that In Living Color show with J.Lo.”
“I used to love The Rockford Files,” Pavel added.
“Oh,
The Rockford Files,” Valerie cooed. “I loved Jim Rockford’s Firebird. My third husband had a Firebird. Do you remember Merlyn, Faith?”
“He drove too fast.”
“You’ve been married three times?” Ty asked as he spread his napkin across the lap of his dark wool pants. The back of his hand brushed Faith’s hip and she would have scooted over if there’d been room.
Valerie paused with a bite of salad halfway to her lips. She looked at Faith and then at her boyfriend. “Five times, but only because I was young and vulnerable.”
It had been
seven times, but who was counting. Obviously, not Valerie. “Are you going to join us in the skybox tomorrow night for the game against Detroit?” Faith asked to change the subject.
“I would love to. Thank you, Faith.” Pavel ate a few bites and said, “The Chinooks are going in as underdogs, but sometimes that is the best position to be in. If our guys can get them to draw penalties, I think there’s a very good chance we’ll advance to the final round. Which I predict will be against Pittsburgh.”
“I don’t know, Dad.” Ty grabbed his fork and planted his free hand on the seat beside Faith’s thigh. “Pittsburgh’s playing without two of their power forwards.”
Father and son talked and argued about everything from power plays to penalty killers. Well into the main course, they talked about the best games ever played and Pavel’s glory days. Several times during their conversations, Ty’s hand accidentally brushed her hip. His touch spread fuzzy tingles to the back of her knee and tightened the hot, liquid knot in the pit of her stomach.
“Once I fired that puck into traffic, I lost sight of it,” Pavel said as he cut into his steak. “I didn’t know I’d scored until I heard it hit the back pipe.”
“I wish I could have seen you play. I bet you were something,” Valerie gushed and took a bite of chicken.
“My mom used to love to watch my dad play.” Ty raised his wine to his lips and his free hand slid to the top of Faith’s thigh. “She used to buy me a hot dog, and we’d sit in the middle row behind the goal because she thought those were the best seats. The old Montreal Forum had the best hot dogs.”
Faith’s eyes widened and she gasped at the heat of his palm spread across her lap. This time his touch was no accident. “I hate hot dogs,” she said.
He looked at her and his grasp tightened a bit. “How could you hate hot dogs? You’re American.”
“I ate too many of them growing up.”
“Faith was crazy for hot dogs back then.”
Faith’s breath caught in her chest and she couldn’t respond. She took a bite of salmon but had a hard time swallowing. Especially when his thumb brushed across her leg back and forth. She gave up trying to eat and reached for her wine.
“Is something wrong with your food?” he asked her.
“No.” She looked into his eyes, at the fiery blue lust and need staring back at her, and she wanted more. More of the hot flush and warmth pooling in her belly. She wanted to fall headfirst into more. Into him. She was a thirty-year-old woman who hadn’t felt the irresistible tangle of lust and need pulling her under in a very long time and she wanted to go. She wanted him to take her there, and she slipped her hand beneath the table. She ran her fingers down his forearm, over his rolled-up sleeve until her palm rested on the back of his hand. His grasp tightened, but instead of removing it, she licked her dry lips and slid his hand between her thighs.
“I think we should all go dancing after dinner,”