“We just need to keep playing hockey the way we like to play it. We had thirty-two shots on goal last Saturday night, compared to the Sharks’ seventeen.”
The two of them left the office and headed down to the arena, where the team was practicing. “Everyone thinks we should be afraid of Detroit,” Faith said, and the closer they moved to the tunnel, the more the air thickened with testosterone. “They’ve got some great talent, but so do we. I think it will come down to…” she thought of Ty and smiled “…what’s in a player’s gut.”
“Hey, Mrs. Duffy,” the “Sniper,” Frankie Kawczynski, called out as Faith and Jane approached. He stood in the tunnel in front of a blowtorch heating the curve of his stick.
“Hello, Mr. Kawczynski,” she said, her heels sinking into the thick mats. Frankie was in his late twenties and built like a tank. At the moment, he stood in a pair of sweatpants, low around his hips, and a pair of flip-flops. He had a pit bull tattoo on his bare back. Her attention was drawn to the play of muscles as he heated his stick. “How are you?”
“Great.” His dark beard had gone full Mountain Man, and he flashed a brash, cocky smile. Faith was suddenly very aware that she was surrounded by men. Big, tough men who towered over her and Jane. Some of them were half naked. “Are you going to practice with us this morning?” Frankie asked.
Walker Brookes walked from the locker room and grabbed his skates off the sharpening rack. She fought the urge to whip her head around for a better look. “I forgot my gear.” Within her soul, Layla fought to get out. She kicked and screamed for just one little peek. Just one, but Mrs. Duffy did not stare at men’s asses. At least not when a reporter was around. “Perhaps some other time.” And she kept her gaze glued to Frankie’s face.
Vlad Fetisov walked out of the locker room with his helmet in one hand and stick in the other. A wide smile curved his mouth as he moved toward them on his skates.
“Hi, little Sharky,” the Russian greeted Jane.
“Hi, Vlad,” Jane said. “How’s it going?”
“Life iz good. How iz Lucky?” he asked, referring to Jane’s husband.
“He’s good.”
As soon as Vlad moved onto the ice Faith asked, “Why did he call you ‘Sharky’?”
“That’s the name the guys gave me because I beat them all at darts. They’re very competitive at everything they do.”
They stopped at the end of the tunnel and Faith looked out across the rink. The men on the ice were divided into two groups. Offense practiced at one end; defense drilled at the other. They appeared even more scruffy and unkempt, but they skated with well-timed precision and skill, weaving in and out and passing the puck. There were about fifteen men on the ice, all dressed in dark blue practice sweats and white helmets, but as if pulled by an invisible force, her gaze landed on a pair of broad shoulders and dark hair curling up from beneath the white helmet of the man standing with his back to her at center ice. She didn’t need to see his face to know it was Ty. Something warm in the pit of her stomach recognized him.
“Vlad is a little warped,” Jane said, thankfully pulling Faith’s attention from center ice.
Faith had never gotten a creepy vibe from the Russian. Still she asked, “Is he a perv?”
“No. He’s just never been shy about dropping his towel in front of women. He used to like to shock me, I think. They all liked to shock me.” Jane shook her head and adjusted the strap of her briefcase. “They didn’t want me traveling with the team. A woman on the jet is considered bad luck.”
Perhaps that’s why they’d been so quiet when she’d traveled with them. “That’s stupid and sexist.”
“Exactly.” Jane laughed. “They’re hockey players.” The two of them watched the assistant coach lay a series of pucks on the red line and Jane said, “Tell me about Ty Savage.”
She thought about the morning she’d stood in the conference room pulling up her shirt. Of his hot blue eyes and the day she’d lost her mind and let Layla out for the second time. The day she’d pulled up her shirt like a stripper, slow and deliberate just to prove him wrong. The day she’d slid her hand across her belly toward the button of her jeans, just to see the heat in his eyes burn a little hotter. “What would you like to know?”
“Do you think he has what it takes to lead this team to the final round?”
“Well, I think the numbers he puts up speak for him.” She watched Ty take off from one end of the ice, skating like he was on fire. Wind flattened the Chinooks logo on his sweatshirt against his chest as he raced toward the red line. With the blade of his stick on the ice, he turned at the center line and one-timed the row of pucks at the goalie. The goalie twisted and contorted to stop each shot. He caught one puck while the others hit his pads with loud thwaps. One of the pucks got through and hit the inside of the net. “He’s a very intense, serious guy.” Except when he was trying to use reverse psychology to get her to give him a lap dance. “Very disciplined and in control. I wonder what he would be like if he ever let go.” What she hadn’t anticipated that day in the conference room, while he’d sat there acting like he was bored, was the way his hot, steamy gaze on her body had turned her all hot and steamy inside.
With the wind still flattening his sweatshirt, he shoved his stick beneath one arm and looked at the laces on his glove. “Really let go,” she added, thinking of him walking away from her at the Marriott. “Maybe he wouldn’t be so rude and surly.”
“He makes rude and surly look good,” Jane said.
That was an understatement.
“He’s a very good-looking man.”
Faith smiled. “I hadn’t noticed.”
As if he’d heard them, Ty looked up as he came to a hockey stop near the goal. From half the length of the rink, she felt his gaze as cool as the ice on which he stood. It froze her in place even as it heated her up inside.
“A lot has been made out of the fact that you have a contentious relationship with your captain. Is that true?”
As his eyes stared into hers, he grabbed a water bottle from the top of the net and lifted it to his mouth. The water shot between his lips and then stopped. He swallowed then rubbed one big gloved hand across his mouth. For the past month her life had been a whirlwind of activity and change. Sometimes she couldn’t recall what she’d done from day to day, but she remembered every hot detail of Ty’s mouth on hers. “I wouldn’t call it contentious.”
“What would you call it?”
What did you call a hot, overwhelming attraction to the one guy on the planet for whom it was completely inappropriate to lust after? “Complicated.” Impossible. A disaster waiting to happen.
“There you are,” Jules said as he moved through the tunnel toward Faith. A man with red hair and a mustache walked beside him.
“We need to get a photograph of Faith with the team,” Jane said.
“Now?” She looked at the shorter woman.
“Yeah.”
“We have a whole PR campaign with Ty, so why don’t we shoot with some of the other players?” Jules suggested.
“Faith, this is Brad Marsh.” Jane introduced the stranger. “Staff photographer for the Post Intelligencer. Brad, this is Faith Duffy.”
“Pleased to meet you, Faith.” He took her hand in his. “I’m a huge Chinooks fan.”
“I’m thrilled to meet you. Especially since you love my team.”
Jules stepped out onto the ice and pointed to the defenders. “I need some of you guys to volunteer to take a photograph with Mrs. Duffy for the Post Intelligencer.”