by Nan Comargue
Lila grimaced, remembering some of the speculative articles she’d read about her marriage. “Whenever possible, yes.”
Leaning a broad hand against the counter top, Chris remarked, “That’s hard to do living in a fish bowl. This city is the unofficial hockey capital of the world.”
“I know,” she sighed, tucking a wayward strand of black hair behind her ear. “This was exactly what I wanted to avoid.”
He gave her an odd look. “I heard you were back with Cahal.”
The terms of the contract strangled any possibility of an explanation.
“Yes.” She couldn’t resist adding, “For now.”
“Even Jarrett would have been better,” Chris remarked, shoving his hands into the pockets of his leather jacket.
She stared at him. “Why?”
“For selfish reasons. Then I would still be able to see you.” His hand reached for her face before he checked the movement in mid-air. “You’ve always been decent to me, even when I was just Cahal’s younger cousin, wearing his cast-off equipment and living in his shadow.”
It was surprising to hear this interpretation of the family dynamic. With both players forecasted for future superstardom by the time they entered the professionals, Cahal had reached this level first but Chris’ outgoing personality and somewhat wild reputation assured him sponsorship deals and greater financial success. Cahal was still the star but Chris was more often the face on cereal boxes and commercials.
Yet, because Cahal had achieved success first, even turning around to hook Chris up with his first agent, Chris never stopped resenting his cousin. In hockey, youth was everything and Chris’ grudge went a long way back to when Cahal was scouted as a very young child, leaving Chris to develop a talent that didn’t shine until he had reached his early teens.
“If you were ever in his shadow, you’ve escaped it by now.” Glancing around the library, she was conscious of the interested stares they were getting from her colleagues. “Chris, I have work to do right now.”
“I’m in town for two days,” he told her. “I have a guest spot on the Prime Time Sports show. How about dinner tonight? My hotel has a great restaurant attached to it.”
“Your hotel?” The question slipped out, causing his expression to subtly alter.
“I can control myself,” he assured her. “Put that night down to too much alcohol and too many painful revelations.”
Though his voice was cool, his blue-blue eyes assessed her face. Lila flushed, remembering nothing of the night but with the pictures he’d taken on his phone vivid in her mind. Her nude body, laid out on the wide bed like a sacrificial offering, and Chris’ hand hovering above it.
Why had he taken the pictures? She’d asked herself that a thousand times. But maybe men like Chris always took pictures. That was his trophy.
“Your hotel is fine,” Lila said. “You can pick me up after work. I finish at five-thirty.”
She didn’t want him coming to Cahal’s apartment, knowing that her husband wouldn’t appreciate his cousin visiting in his absence.
“It’s a date,” Chris confirmed before striding out of the building, leaving before Lila could change her mind about the assignation.
Already she was regretting her recklessness.
• • •
Chris’ truck might have cost the earth but it was still a pick-up, modest in looks and manufactured domestically. The utilitarian design was as deceptive as the man behind the wheel, the lack of ornamentation concealing powerful and undeniable ability.
“I saw you in a magazine last week. I think it was an ad for jeans.”
Her companion cocked an eyebrow. “You think?”
The eyebrow made her unaccountably flustered.
“It was hard to tell.” He was nearly naked in the ad, a pair of battered jeans being the only thing he wore. “You know how advertisements are these days.”
He shrugged. “I guess I should. I’m in enough of them.”
“Why?”
“Why am I in so many ads?”
Lila nodded.
He thought. “I suppose it’s how my agent measures success. Any hockey player can sign a contract worth a million dollars a year. How many make more on their endorsements than they do playing the game? How many become household names? The more I earn, the more my agent earns and the more famous I become, the more famous he becomes. It’s not the way Billy Avery thinks but it’s the way sports is heading.”
A half-forgotten fact resurfaced. “Billy Avery used to be your agent, too.”
His look was cool. “When I just started in the league, yes.” The chiseled jaw that had graced a series of razor ads years ago hardened. “He only agreed to represent me because my cousin talked him around. He didn’t think I was going to be big enough to bother with but he didn’t want to risk offending the great Cahal Wallace.”
Lila thought it was kind of nice of Cahal to convince his much-admired sports agent to represent his younger cousin yet she recognized the grievance behind the statement. Loyalty to Cahal had caused his own parents to push him away and even though his presence was an uncomfortable reminder of her mistakes, Lila felt a duty to stand by him. She had committed the same mistake and she hadn’t been ostracized.
Chris surrendered his keys to the waiting valet but she didn’t fool herself that that was all he had to say on the subject of his cousin.
He bided his time, waiting until the end of the meal to mention her husband again.
“So how long is this reconciliation going to last?”
Hiding her distaste, Lila replied neutrally. “That’s a rather cavalier attitude to someone else’s future happiness.”
Her companion dropped his bantering tone. “You’re never going to be happy with him.”
“You mean once a cheater, always a cheater? Remember that I’m one, too.”
For an instant, Chris looked confused before a knowing smile spread across his lips. “That was one time,” he stated. “Your husband’s adultery spans the last decade.”
“I wish someone had told me about it sometime during the past decade.”
His look was searching. “I told you, didn’t I?”
“After I cried on your shoulder. You felt sorry for me.”
“I still do if you’re back with my cousin.”
She couldn’t argue with him. Only a fool stayed with an adulterer.
“Can we talk about something else?”
“All right.” He smiled and switched topics only by the slightest degree. “Why’d you break up with Jarrett?”
Lila sighed. “Don’t tell me. You hate him too.”
Blonde brows lowered over smoke-blue eyes. “Who else hates him? Oh, your erstwhile spouse. He was always possessive, wasn’t he? It’s the hallmark of the compulsive cheater.”
“Hey,” she protested. “Put like that, you make Cahal sound sick, not just … bad.”
She wasn’t quite convinced that he was bad; his cheating was likely a result of loneliness. As tough as it was for her to sit at home and wait for him, it was no doubt just as hard to be away from home for days or weeks at a time.
“He could be both,” Chris insisted, warming to his topic. “The guys on my team who take advantage of puck bunnies — sorry, female fans — are pretty messed up themselves. Looking at some of those women, the young ones with poor self-esteem trying to please, it’s almost criminal to think of using them for sex. The young players do it because they get their heads turned, it’s their first taste of stardom, but once they start down that road it’s difficult to stop.”
Puck bunnies was the derogatory name hockey players called the groupies of their sport, young women who waited at every city for visiting teams or who stalked members of the home team on their own turf, just for the chance of offering their company for a night. A kind of feminine bedpost notching for the enlightened times, hockey wives shuddered at the mention of these women, knowing that some players did keep company with them. Indeed, some of these
women in time became girlfriends and wives.
“You’re a veteran member of the team, why don’t you stop them?”
Her companion lifted his hands. “Hey, I’m not the coach or a captain. It’s none of my business what the youngsters want to do. I stay out of the team politics.”
With an attitude like that, it was no wonder he wasn’t a captain or alternate captain even after nearly a decade on his team. Although goaltenders couldn’t wear the captain’s “C,” Cahal was widely hailed as a league leader and mentor to younger players. He wouldn’t throw up his hands and claim to be staying out of the ‘politics’.
Lila smiled. “Just like you stay away from the puck bunnies?”
“I do,” he replied. “Who knows what kind of diseases those women are crawling with?”
Her smile faded. “I got tested,” she said, “like you suggested. The results were all negative.”
“You’re lucky.”
“So are you,” she pointed out, frowning. “Unless we used protection.”
“We did. Why, do you remember?”
Her frown deepened as she shook her head. “I told you I was too out of it. I’ve never had a head for champagne.”
Chris’ voice dropped, becoming intimate. “I wish I’d known that before we went to bed together. I feel like I took advantage of you. Is that why you refused to have anything to do with me afterwards? You know, I’m different from my cousin. I would never hurt you the way Cahal did.”
“You say that now,” she said. “Given the chance, he would have said the same words a few years ago. Only time tells us those sorts of things.”
“Hasn’t time told you what sort of man I am?”
“I thought time told me what sort of man my husband was,” Lila countered. Remembering Jack’s fury, she added, “Maybe I’m a poor judge of character.”
Chris let go of her hands. “Since you’re back with my cousin, I won’t argue that conclusion. So where is Cousin Cahal tonight? At practice? I’m surprised he let you out of your cage.”
“Cahal’s out of town. I thought you knew.”
“I didn’t but I should have guessed. Of course he would never allow you to have dinner with me after what happened between us last year.”
“It’s not a question of allowing me,” Lila told him. “I’m not a prisoner and he’s not a jail guard.”
The smirk on his face said the opposite. “So when do you get to see your husband? At birthdays and on holidays? Probably not even then. He spends his holidays sucking up to the media and performing charity work, right? He doesn’t even bother to earn some extra money.”
“Like you?” Lila said and regretted it. Chris did his share of charity work in Los Angeles, where the management expected every player to serve the community as well as the bottom line.
When she first began volunteering for the Wives, it was with a view of sharing some of Cahal’s obligations. Even if she was just sitting at his side during a charity-sponsored party, it was still one extra evening she had him with her. After a year or so, the volunteer work became a reward in itself, bringing her closer to the other hockey families and providing a challenging distraction from the lonely days and nights without Cahal.
She ran a restless hand through her hair, putting it into disarray, and stared at him from between the tousled strands.
“Why are we talking about this?”
“This is your life, Lila. This is your future.”
No, she wanted to contradict him, this was not her life or her future. This was a charade and she was irritated that he thought so little of her that he believed she would go back to the soul-destroying relationship he had first warned her about.
“My life, my future,” she emphasized.
“So ‘back off, Chris’?”
“You said it, not me.”
They grinned at each other over their empty coffee cups. After Chris signaled the hovering waiter and paid the bill, he drove her back to the apartment.
“When can I see you again?”
Avoiding his eyes, Lila unclasped her seatbelt. “I thought you were busy with the taping of your show.”
Chris’ hands remained on the steering wheel. “This time, yeah. But I can always make a special trip.”
Feeling his glance, she continued to stare out of the windshield. “I don’t see the point.”
“No?” For a moment, his voice held a husky undertone that reminded her of her husband. “We would be dynamite together.”
Inwardly debating whether to end the conversation through an expedient exit, Lila wanted to remain to make her point. Like it or not, Cahal and Chris were family and they would have to work out their differences sooner or later. After she was physically gone, she didn’t want her memory to stand in the way.
She turned her head just enough to meet his gaze. “Unfortunately, we know how we are together. One of us simply doesn’t remember.”
Though his blue eyes slid away from hers, his tone was jaunty. “All the more reason for us to try again.”
Irritation hardened her clear features. “Chris, let me get this straight for the first and last time. That night was a mistake. I was wrong to lean on you and I was wrong to think I could get back at Cahal by acting the way he had acted. Sleeping with you didn’t make me feel strong or glad; it made me feel weak and mean.” Taking a hitching breath, she ground her meaning home. “If I had one wish, it would be to take that night back.”
Hurt mingled with shock. “You can’t mean that.”
“I can and I do. I lowered myself to Cahal’s level. I compromised my integrity and yours.”
A big hand lifted off of the steering wheel, coming to cover hers as they lay in her lap.
“How can I compromise my integrity by sleeping with the woman I love?”
The suspicion that had been crouching in the back of her thoughts since that night with Cahal, waiting for a chance to spring, leaped into sudden action.
“Love?” She repeated the word, tasting it and finding it alien and distasteful in this context.
His fingers tensed over hers; his expression was far from his usual control. “I shouldn’t have said that.”
She’d never seen him look so unguarded — not even on that night a year ago. “Do you mean it?”
Again his eyes skittered away. “Look, can we forget it?”
“Chris … ”
He lifted his hand and raised his head to show her a familiar face, good-humored and self-mocking.
“Leave it, okay, Lila?”
Her hand fumbled with the door, the cold air touching her face like a welcomed caress. “Okay. I’ll see you.”
He smiled as she stepped out of the truck. “You can bet on it.”
Chapter Eight
Lila didn’t mention his cousin’s visit to her husband yet she found herself trying to make up for the omission in a dozen little ways. She went to team practices, chatting with the other wives and admiring their children. Taking on a greater role in the charity gala gave her excuses to be away from the house when Cahal was home.
She posed for several hundred photographs with Cahal, all set against the background of their condo, decorated for the holiday season. A few of the photographs would accompany the team’s holiday publicity packages and one of them would be used for the upcoming calendar: the perfect hockey family celebrating the happiest season of the year. Perhaps next year, one of the photographer’s assistants hinted, there would be a little Wallace to complete the picture.
Although she spent most of her time away from work watching her husband play or pose, she managed to avoid any conversation more intimate than a coordination of their respective schedules.
When the phone calls began, Cahal was on the road so she put the matter in the hands of the security staff he had hired. As long as they were going to follow her every day to work and back and even to the grocery store, she might as well utilize their services. Her husband made it clear that they wouldn’t be dismissed and experience
showed her that they couldn’t be avoided though she was surprised at her bodyguards’ discretion. Despite her fears, no one told Cahal about Chris.
Chris had called a few times in the week since his visit but Lila was always conveniently unavailable.
Lila’s cell phone went off in her purse and she dug it out only to grimace at the tiny display.
“Another unknown caller?”
Nodding, she surrendered the phone to the man in the back seat of the SUV. To her astonishment, he flipped open the cell phone and held it to his ear.
“Who is this?”
Lila could hear no response to the harsh question.
The bodyguard’s voice dropped lower. “Listen, lady, this is a dangerous game you’re playing. If you know what’s good for you, you’ll end it right here before it turns out bad for everyone concerned. Especially you.”
Again there seemed to be no response but the man snapped the phone shut with a satisfied expression.
Lila swiveled as far as her seat belt would allow. “Do you think it was her?”
“Has to be,” the man replied. “But she didn’t hang on long enough for a trace.”
“You’re monitoring my phone calls?”
It was the driver who answered. “Yes, ma’am. Those were your husband’s orders.”
Lila crossed her arms over the front of her coat. “I’m still not convinced it’s Victoria.”
“You don’t have to be convinced,” the man told her. “Your husband is convinced enough for both of you.”
• • •
“Hey, baby.”
“Hi.” Lila allowed the kiss her husband pressed against her closed mouth but she made no move to return it.
He swept his eyes over her shuttered face. “What’s the matter?”
Conscious of the constant traffic of his teammates around them, Lila said, “Nothing.”
“Tell me.”
She shrugged. “Your security guys can fill you in.”
Taking her by the shoulders, he drew her into a quiet corner. “Did you receive another phone call?”
Lila nodded, the concern in his voice making her emotional.
He drew her close and the strong comfort of his body eased some of her tension. “I’m so sorry, darling. Instead of sending her a message, our reconciliation seems to have caused Victoria to switch her tactics.”