Page 39 of Secret Husband
While I weighed this, our food arrived. I was on season’s rations, even in the summer, so I had chosen the sea bass. Lauren’s steak and mashed potatoes looked enviable.
“Another martini?”
“Two’s my limit, though …” She held her fork up to the server. “How’s the alley situation here?”
“The … alley situation?”
“Yeah, a lot of dumpsters? Sheltered from the street? Would a third martini help, do you think?”
The terrified server looked to me for guidance. Tonight, I would be tipping very well.
“Ignore her. She needs to eat.”
“Okay, sir. Let me know if you need anything else.” At which point he scurried off, likely praying to the customer service gods that we would never bother him again.
“I did not need to get you drunk to go down on you, Lauren.”
She blushed deeply. “Years after our alley adventure and that’s what you remember?”
“Your taste has stayed with me. I have never forgotten it.”
“This is highly inappropriate. I’m dating someone.”
Yet she had brought up the alley. Twice. “But you are married to me. I think that and our past connection gives me a little leeway.”
“Sure, tell me how I tasted, Ass-arov.”
Did she think I would not regale her with the details? This wife did not know her husband so well.
“Like peach nectar with a tang of?—”
She pointed the steak knife at me. “Just eat.”
“Instead of talking about eating your?—”
“Alexei!” She burst out laughing. “Still impossible.”
It was the first indication that she wasn’t as annoyed with me as she pretended.
“I will eat my boring sea bass while you taunt me with your steak and tell me all about your job.”
She sliced into the steak and added a little mashed potato topper, a fluffy cloud on her medallion of succulent beef.
“My job is amazing. After retiring from the game, I wondered if I’d ever feel that sense of accomplishment again. That sizzle when you’re this close to victory.”
“You enjoy it that much?”
“I do. Of course, it can be tricky. There’s a lot of competition for talent. Also, we’re talking about young clients with immature prefrontal cortexes, idiots who often make poor decisions off the ice and who need a lot of handholding. I’m mother hen, priest, fixer, best friend, and chief asshole.”
She had been a great leader of her team, both in college and the pros, a captain in all ways. This job was a good match for her strengths and personality.
“It was tough to leave hockey, yes?”
She blinked quickly, an acknowledgment of the pain. “It was. You think you’re invincible, that you can play through anything, but your body fails you in the end. Agenting isn’t the perfect substitute, but it’s close. I’m still in this world, even if it’s not how I imagined it. I thought I’d play forever.”
We all did. “Accepting that life must transition to the next phase is tough for us all, especially when we define ourselves by the game. It gives us so much, but it is a cruel mistress when we don’t meet its exacting standards.”
She shook her head. “Why do you make everything sound like a nineteenth century Russian novel?”
