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The GPS announced the exit for Ottawa and Shane Hollander's grip tightened on the steering wheel, knuckles pale against the dark leather. Three weeks. Twenty-one days since he'd last been in the same room as Ilya Rozanov, and every single one of those days had felt like dragging himself across asphalt. The road hummed beneath his tires, the same two-hour route he'd memorized down to the potholes, and his brain was already somewhere ahead of him, somewhere with blue eyes and a jaw that could cut glass.
His phone buzzed in the cupholder. He glanced at it. Group chat. Hayden. Something about a bar.
He ignored it.
Tuesday nights like this were sacred. Game on Monday, recovery Tuesday, and when the schedule aligned, the drive to Ottawa became the only thing that mattered. His teammates assumed he was visiting family or doing some quiet solo thing, which was rich coming from guys who spent their off-days golfing or destroying their livers. Shane didn't care what they assumed. He cared about the townhouse on Ottawa and the Russian menace waiting inside it.
He pulled up at 8:47 PM. The porch light was on. Ilya's Mercedes sat in the driveway, freshly washed, because Ilya was the kind of person who washed his car before picking someone up from the airport, even when no one was flying anywhere.
Shane didn't ring the bell. He had a code.
The door beeped once, then clicked open, and the smell hit him first, some expensive candle Ilya would never admit to buying, cedar and something darker underneath. The hallway was warm, dim in that deliberate way Ilya arranged lighting when he wanted Shane to know what kind of night this was going to be.
"Shanya."
The nickname came from the kitchen doorway. Ilya stood there in grey sweats and nothing else, blonde hair still damp from a shower, chest bare and ridiculous in the way that only professional athletes' bodies could be. He was leaning against the frame with his arms crossed, and those blue eyes caught the low light and held it like they owned it.
"Your hair's wet," Shane said, dropping his bag by the door.
"You drove two hours and that's what you say to me?"
Shane closed the distance. Three steps. Ilya didn't move, didn't uncross his arms, just watched him with that look, the one that made Shane's stomach do something complicated and physics-defying. When Shane was close enough to feel the warmth coming off his skin, Ilya finally reached out, one hand catching the back of Shane's neck and pulling him in.
The kiss was slow at first. Deliberate. Ilya's lips tasted like the mint tea he always drank before bed, and his fingers threaded up into Shane's black hair, gripping just enough to tilt his head. Shane melted into it, his hands finding Ilya's bare waist, palms flat against the ridged muscle there. Three weeks of FaceTime and texting and voice notes that got progressively filthier, and now he was here, and the reality of Ilya's body was overwhelming in the best way.
"Missed you," Shane breathed against his mouth.
"Show me."
Shane pulled back just enough to look at him. Ilya's eyes were half-lidded, that lazy confidence he wore like armor. The freckles across Shane's nose stood out darker when he flushed, and he was flushing now.
"Kitchen?" Shane asked.
"Bedroom. I made the bed."
"You made the bed."
"Don't make it weird."
Shane laughed, and Ilya kissed him again, harder this time, walking him backward through the hallway with the kind of spatial awareness that came from years of reading a rink. They bumped into the wall once, the doorframe twice, and by the time they reached the bedroom, Shane's shirt was already gone and Ilya's sweats were riding dangerously low on his hips.
The bedroom was exactly how Shane expected, neat, the bed actually made with hospital corners that Ilya had definitely googled, curtains drawn. Ilya pushed him onto the mattress and Shane went down easy, bouncing once, looking up at the man standing over him.
Ilya pulled the sweats down. Nothing underneath.
"You planned this," Shane said, his voice slightly strangled.
"I always plan things." Ilya climbed over him, one knee on either side of Shane's hips, and leaned down to mouth along his jaw. "You're the one who shows up unannounced."
"I told you I was coming."
"You said 'probably.' That is not the same thing."
Shane would have argued, but Ilya's teeth found the spot below his ear, the one that turned his brain to static, and the conversation was over. Ilya worked his way down, neck, collarbone, the plane of Shane's chest, each kiss pressed with intention, each scrape of teeth deliberate. Shane's hands roamed the broad expanse of Ilya's back, feeling the muscle shift and flex as he moved.
"Three weeks," Shane said, and it came out almost accusatory.
"I know." Ilya looked up at him from where he was trailing his tongue along Shane's sternum. "I counted."
"Did you?"
"Every day. You think you're the only one who..."
He stopped himself. Ilya didn't do vulnerable often, but Shane could hear it lurking at the edges, the same need he felt mirrored back at him.
"Yeah," Shane said softly. "I know."
Ilya kissed him again, and this time it was different, deeper, rougher, the kind of kiss that was a promise of what was coming. Shane arched up into him, their bodies aligning, and the sound he made when their hips pressed together was embarrassing and perfect.
Ilya reached for the nightstand. The lube was already there, because Ilya planned things, and Shane watched him with his lower lip caught between his teeth as Ilya slicked his fingers with practiced efficiency.
"Turn over," Ilya said, and his voice had dropped into that register that made Shane's whole body listen.
Shane turned. Pressed his chest to the mattress, face turned to one side, breathing in the scent of Ilya's pillows, detergent and something that was just him. The first touch of Ilya's fingers made him flinch, not from pain but from anticipation, from three weeks of nothing and then suddenly too much sensation.
"Relax," Ilya murmured, one hand resting warm on the small of Shane's back.
"I am relaxed."
"You are shaking."
"That's different."
Ilya laughed quietly, and Shane felt the vibration of it through the hand on his back. The first finger slid in slowly, and Shane exhaled long and controlled, his eyes closing. Ilya knew his body better than Shane did sometimes, knew exactly how to work him open, when to add another finger, when to curl just right to make Shane's hips jerk involuntarily against the mattress.
"Ilya!"
"I know."
He always knew. That was the thing about Ilya Rozanov. On the ice he was a nightmare, all speed and aggression and that terrifying competitive edge. Here, in this bed, he was something else entirely, patient, attentive, reading Shane's body like a playbook he'd memorized cover to cover.
By the time Ilya withdrew his fingers and Shane heard the crinkle of a condom wrapper, he was wrung out and desperate, his fingers twisted in the sheets, his forehead damp with sweat.
"Ready?" Ilya asked, lining himself up.
"I've been ready since the highway exit."
Ilya pushed in, and they both went still. The stretch was significant, three weeks was three weeks, and Shane breathed through it, the initial ache fading into something deeper, something that made his toes curl against the sheets. Ilya's hands gripped his hips, steadying him, steadying them both, and when he was fully seated, he leaned down and pressed his forehead to the space between Shane's shoulder blades.
"Fuck," Ilya whispered. "Shane."
"I know. Move. Please."
Ilya moved. The first thrust was slow, controlled, and Shane felt every inch of it. The second was harder, and the third found the angle that made Shane's vision blur. Ilya set a rhythm that built gradually, each thrust deliberate, each pull back almost torturous in its slowness before snapping forward again.
The room filled with sound, the creak of the bed, the slick rhythm of their bodies, Shane's breath hitching every time Ilya hit deep. Ilya's hand slid up Shane's spine, pressing him flatter against the mattress, changing the angle, and Shane made a noise that he'd be embarrassed about later if he had the capacity for embarrassment right now.
"More," Shane managed. "Harder. You won't break me."
Ilya's pace shifted. The next thrust was punishing, and Shane cried out, his back arching. Ilya did it again, and again, and then his hand came down, open-palmed and sharp, against Shane's ass.
The sting bloomed hot and immediate, and Shane jolted, a broken moan tearing out of him. Ilya smoothed his hand over the spot immediately, gentle after the impact, and then did it again on the other side.
"Ilya!"
"You like that."
It wasn't a question. Shane's body was answering for him, pushing back into every thrust, chasing the sting and the fullness and the overwhelming rightness of being here after twenty-one days of absence. Ilya spanked him again, harder this time, and Shane's arms gave out, his chest hitting the mattress fully, and the new angle made him see white.
"Fuck, fuck, fuck!"
"Shane." Ilya's voice was ragged now, the control fraying at the edges. His hips snapped faster, the rhythm turning erratic, and his hands gripped Shane's hips hard enough to bruise. "I'm close."
"Don't stop. Don't you dare stop."
Ilya didn't. He drove in deep, and his hand came down twice more in quick succession, sharp, stinging, perfect, and Shane reached beneath himself, wrapping his hand around his own cock, stroking fast and desperate. It took maybe four strokes before his orgasm hit him like a freight train, his whole body locking up, a sound coming out of him that was barely human. He came across Ilya's sheets, his muscles clenching rhythmically, and behind him Ilya swore in Russian and followed him over the edge, hips pressed flush, trembling.
They collapsed together. Ilya's weight on Shane's back was heavy and grounding, and neither of them moved for a long moment, just breathing, hearts hammering against each other through sweat-slicked skin.
Eventually, Ilya pressed a kiss to Shane's shoulder blade and pulled out carefully, rolling to the side. Shane stayed face-down, his ass throbbing with the aftermath of Ilya's enthusiasm, and when he finally shifted, he winced.
"Advil," he mumbled into the pillow.
"Bathroom cabinet."
Shane dragged himself up, legs unsteady, and padded naked to the bathroom. He didn't bother with the light, he knew Ilya's bathroom by now, could navigate it blind. He found the bottle, dry-swallowed two pills, and caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror. His hair was destroyed. His freckles stood out stark against flushed skin. And when he turned slightly, he could see the handprints, red and vivid across both cheeks, the outline of Ilya's fingers unmistakable.
He stared at his reflection for a moment, something between embarrassment and satisfaction curling in his chest.
"You're admiring yourself," Ilya called from the bedroom.
"I'm assessing damage."
"Is it bad?"
"It's artistic."
Ilya's laugh followed him back to bed, where Shane crawled in beside him, curling against his side. Ilya's arm came around him automatically, pulling him close, and for a while they just lay there in the quiet, relearning the geography of each other.
Shane's phone was somewhere in his bag by the front door. Ilya's was on the nightstand, face-down, ignored. The world outside this townhouse didn't exist, and that was exactly how Shane wanted it.
It was Ilya who reached for his phone first, sometime around midnight, mostly to set an alarm. When the screen lit up, the notification count made him blink.
"What the hell," he said quietly.
Shane, half-dozing against his chest, opened one eye. "What?"
Ilya's thumb scrolled. His expression shifted from confusion to something sharper. "There's a video."
"What video?"
"Hayden. On a bar. Instagram live." Ilya's jaw tightened. "Someone recorded it."
Shane sat up, suddenly very awake, very aware of his nakedness and the handprints still burning on his skin. "What did he say?"
Ilya handed him the phone. The video was everywhere, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, every hockey account with a pulse. The quality was terrible, filmed off a screen by someone who clearly wasn't sober, but the audio was damning enough.
Hayden's face filled the frame, flushed and loose with drink, and his voice came through with crystalline clarity: "I can't believe he prefers to drive two hours to get bent over by that asshole."
Someone off-camera, Comeau, Shane realized with a sick lurch, chimed in: "One thing's him telling us he's a fag. Entirely different thing he's being dicked down by Rozanov."
Then Hayden again, grinning like he'd just scored a power play goal: "The thing is, Boston Lily, he told me he was a virgin until the night of their CCM photo shoot."
Laughter. Cruel, careless, echoing across the water.
Drapeau's voice cut through: "So what, he just saw a Russian Menace and opened his legs wide open? Bullshit."
And Hayden, because Hayden could never leave anything alone: "For real, if I knew I had a chance, of course I would have bent him over at the first chance."
More laughter. The video ended.
Shane stared at the screen. His face in the video's aftermath, his real face, not the pixelated one, was completely blank, the kind of stillness that Ilya recognized as the calm before either shutdown or explosion.
"Shane."
"He said..." Shane's voice was flat. "He told them I was a virgin."
"Yes, you were."
"And that he would have..." He couldn't finish the sentence.
Ilya took the phone back, set it face-down on the nightstand, and pulled Shane against him. For a moment, Shane resisted, his body rigid, but then something cracked and he pressed his face into Ilya's chest and breathed.
The notifications kept coming. Every sports outlet had picked it up. The headline variations were creative in the worst way: "Rookie Scandal: Secret Relationship Revealed by Teammate's Drunken Rant." "Hayden's Heartbreak: Teammate Chose Rival Over Him." "NHL's First Open Secret: Shane Hollander and Ilya Rozanov."
Someone had dug up the CCM photo shoot. Someone else had found old clips of Shane and Ilya's on-ice rivalry, reframed now with entirely different context. A sports psychologist on Twitter was doing a thread about toxic locker room culture. A pride account was calling Shane brave. A trash account was calling him worse.
"They're saying Hayden's heartbroken," Shane said, his voice muffled against Ilya's skin.
"Hayden's not heartbroken. Hayden's an idiot who can't hold his liquor."
"He told them personal things. Things I told him in confidence."
"I know."
"I trusted him."
Ilya's hand moved through Shane's hair, slow and steady.
"I'm going to break his jaw next time we play."
"That won't help."
"It will help me."
Shane laughed despite everything: a wet, exhausted sound. He pulled back enough to look at Ilya, whose blue eyes were doing that thing where they went from soft to murderous in the space of a blink.
"My ass is covered in handprints," Shane said. "And my phone is blowing up. And tomorrow my GM is going to call me."
"Probably tonight, if I know your GM."
"This is a nightmare."
"This is a Tuesday." Ilya kissed his forehead. "You drove two hours for this Tuesday."
Shane looked at him, at those stupid blue eyes, that stupid perfect jaw, the stupid way he'd made hospital corners on a bed they were about to destroy again. Three weeks of missing him, and now the whole world knew why, and somewhere in there was something that felt less like catastrophe and more like relief.
"I'd do it again," Shane said.
"Drive two hours?"
"Get bent over by that asshole."
Ilya's laugh was startled and bright, and he pulled Shane down against him, and for a while the phones kept buzzing and the world kept spinning and neither of them gave a single fuck.