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.”
“Then the men in your life must have sucked.” He folded his arms across his chest.
That was true too.
“He’s gone, Faith.”
“I know.” She pulled her dress over her head and shoved her arms in the short sleeves.
“You don’t owe him anything.”
“That’s easy for you to say.” Her hands rose to the buttons on the front. “He left me enough money to take care of me for the rest of my life. He left me his hockey team, for God’s sake. And every time I’m with you, I feel like I’m betraying my husband.” Her fingers fumbled with the button. “I feel guilty as hell, but I feel the most guilty those times when I’m not feeling guilty at all.” She looked up at him. “Maybe Landon was right about me. I am a shameless gold digger. But I don’t even mind being called a gold digger. It’s the truth, but I thought I’d outgrown being shameless.”
“If you were shameless you wouldn’t be standing here freaking out.” He shook his head. “You’re thirty years old. You’re young and beautiful, and you’ve been living on a shelf. Jesus, you’ve been celibate for five years. You shouldn’t feel guilty about wanting to live again.”
“I
was living. It’s just not a life you approve of.” She looked into his still angry eyes. “Most of my life I’ve avoided feeling bad about the things I do. Most of my life I
was shameless. I always did whatever it took to survive, and most of the time, I didn’t feel bad. But being with you isn’t about survival. It’s about feeling good. It’s about risking my reputation, what little I have, and your career, and being so selfish I do it anyway.”