“Do you think she can get us invited to the Playboy Mansion?”
“See ya tomorrow,” Ty said through a laugh and moved toward the entry. He walked out the huge double doors of the brick mansion and the chilly breeze brushed his face. He paused to button his jacket and the sound of the Widow Duffy’s voice carried on the breeze.
“Of course I want to see you,” she said. “It’s just such a bad time.”
Ty glanced at her, standing a few feet away with her back to him. “You know I love you. I don’t want to argue.” She shook her head and her hair brushed the middle of her back. “Right now is impossible, but I’ll see you soon.”
She moved toward the side of the house and Ty continued down the steps. He wasn’t shocked that Mrs. Duffy had what sounded like a lover on the side. Of course she did. She’d been married to an old man. An old man who’d just given her his hockey team.
Ty didn’t like to think of all the ways that could screw up his chances at the cup, but of course it was always first and foremost in his mind. Virgil’s death could not have come at a worse time. Any sort of uncertainty could and would affect the players, and not knowing who was going to buy the team or what changes the new owner would implement, was a big question mark hanging over them like an axe. But worse than the uncertainty was the thought of being owned by a stripper turned playmate turned trophy wife. It was enough to make the bite at the back of his neck clamp down a little harder.
As he moved toward his black BMW, Ty pushed everything out of his brain but his latest obsession. He put Virgil’s widow, the impending buyout, and the upcoming game out of his mind. For a few hours, he wasn’t going to worry about the widow’s plans for the team or the game against the Canucks.
For most of his life, Ty had always tried to curb the wild Savage impulses that could get him in trouble, but he had one true weakness that he regularly indulged. Ty loved nice cars.
He slid inside the soft leather interior and fired up the M6. The low, throaty growl of the 5.0-liter V-10 engine hummed across his skin as he slid a pair of Ray-Ban aviators onto the bridge of his nose. The mirrored lenses shaded his eyes from the bright afternoon sun as he pulled out of the gated estate and headed toward Paulsbo. He opened up the 500 horses under the Beemer’s hood and took the long way home.
Faith Duffy closed her cell phone and looked out across the emerald expanse of lawn, carefully tended beds, and sputtering fountains. The very last thing she needed right now was a visit from her mother. Her own life was uncertain and scary, and Valerie Augustine was an emotional black hole.
Her gaze skimmed the busy waters of Elliott Bay, and she folded her arms across her chest and rounded her shoulders against the cool breeze blowing the hair about her face. Last night she’d dreamed she was working at Aphrodite again. Dreamed that her long blonde hair blew about her head as Motley Crue’s “Slice of Your Pie” pounded from the speakers above the main stage inside the strip club. In the dream, pink laser light slashed across her long legs and six-inch acrylic platforms as she slowly ran her hands down her flat stomach. Her palms slid over her crotch, covered in a tiny plaid skirt, and her fingers gripped the chair between her bare thighs.
Faith hated that dream. She hated the panic and the knot of fear the dream always left in her stomach. She hadn’t had that dream in years, but it was always the same. She always turned side ways on the chair, arched her back, and slowly lowered her head toward the stage as her hands unbuttoned her little white blouse. The pink light cut across her as she balanced on the seat of the chair and brought her legs up. She slid one foot down her calf as her big breasts spilled free of the blouse and threatened to fall out of her red sequined demi-bra. As always, men lined the edges of the stage, watching her with hot eyes and slack mouths.
“Layla.” They chanted her stage name while clinching money in their tight fists.
In the dream, an I-know-you-want-me smile curved her mouth as Vince Neil and the boys sang about a sweet smile and another slice of pie. Inside the gentlemen’s club, three blocks off the Las Vegas strip, Faith placed her hands on the floor by her head and executed a perfect walk over until she stood with her feet a shoulders’ width apart. She tossed her shirt to the side and rocked her hips as she bent forward at the waist. She slid the tiny plaid skirt down her thighs and legs, and she stepped out of the skirt wearing a red G-string that matched her bra. The heavy bass and drumbeat thumped the stage and the bottoms of her acrylic platforms as she became the object of male fantasy, manipulating them into digging deep into their wallets and handing over their cash.
The dream always ended the same. Her stash of money always evaporated like a mirage, and she always woke gasping. Anxiety beating her chest and stealing her breath. And as always, she felt like a helpless little girl again. Alone and terrified.
Women who claimed they’d rather starve than strip had probably never had to make that choice. They’d probably never had to eat hot dogs five days in a row because they were cheap. They’d probably never fantasized about tables of Big Macs and fries and ramekins filled with creme brulee.
Faith turned her face toward the breeze and took a deep breath. She should go back inside. It was rude to neglect Virgil’s friends at his wake, but most of them had never really liked her anyway. As for his family—well, they could all go to hell. Every last one of them. Not even on this day, of all days, had they put aside their bitterness.
Virgil was gone. She still couldn’t believe it. Just a week ago he’d been telling her stories about all the amazing things he’d done in his long life, and now…
Now he was gone and she felt horribly alone. She was raw and drained from burying her husband and the best friend she’d ever known. She knew that some people hadn’t liked Virgil. In his eighty-one years, he’d made a lot of enemies. But he’d been good to her, especially at a time when she hadn’t always been good to herself.
Even after his death, he was still being good to her. Virgil had endowed his various charities, and the bulk of his billion-dollar estate had gone to his only child, Landon, and Landon’s three children and eight grandchildren. But he’d left Faith the penthouse in Seattle, fifty million dollars in the bank, and his hockey team. A smile lifted her lips as she thought about how much that had pissed off his family. She was sure they all thought she’d schemed and connived to get her hands on all that money. That she’d traded twisted sexual favors for the hockey team, but the truth was that Virgil had known she hadn’t cared about the team. She wasn’t into sports and had been as shocked as everyone else that Virgil had left the Chinooks to her. She suspected Virgil had done it because Landon had never made any secret of the fact that he expected to inherit the team. Once he owned the Chinooks, Faith knew she’d be banned from the skybox. Which, really, would have been no hardship for her. She had no interest in hockey. Sure, she’d gone to some of the games with her husband, but she hadn’t really paid much attention to the action down on the ice. She’d spent her time up there tuning out the contentious Duffys and looking through binoculars for hideous outfits and idiot drunks in the seats below. On a good night at the Key Arena, she might spot an idiot drunk
Unlike Faith, Landon had more interest in the games and had been counting down the days until he could get his hands on the team. Owning a professional sports team was a sign of extreme wealth. A membership in an exclusive club that Landon had wanted badly. A membership his father had now denied him.
Landon might have been Virgil’s only son, but they’d despised each other. Landon had never attempted to conceal his disapproval of Virgil’s life or his hatred for Virgil’s fifth wife, Faith.
She moved down the long carpeting in the upstairs hall and into the bedroom suite she’d shared with Virgil. Several men from a moving company were packing her clothes into boxes while one of Landon’s lawyers hovered in the background, making sure Faith didn’t take anything that they didn’t feel belonged to her. She ignored the movers and brushed her hand across the back of Virgil’s worn leather chair. The seat was indented from years of use and Virgil’s reading glasses sat on the table on top of the book he’d been reading the night he’d died. Dickens, because Virgil had an affinity to David Copperfield.
That night, five days ago, she’d been lounging in the chair next to her husband and watching a rerun of
“I’m not feeling well.” He’d set his glasses and book aside and raised a hand to his sternum. “I think I’ll go to bed.”
Faith put down the remote, but before she could rise to help him, he slumped forward and gasped, his age- spotted hand falling to his lap.
The rest of the night was a blur. She remembered yelling his name and cradling his head in her lap while she talked to the 911 operator. She couldn’t recall how he came to lie on the floor, only looking down into his face as his soul slipped from his body. She remembered crying and telling him not to die. She’d pleaded with him to hang on,
