Heated Rivalry (Game Changers #2)(26)

With Rozanov safely out of the room, Shane grinned stupidly at the ceiling. He was maybe happier than he should be that his most successful sexual experience to date was with Ilya Rozanov.

The smile faded as he wondered how in hell he was ever going to experience this again. Because he couldn’t keep letting Rozanov fuck him. Obviously. And he wasn’t sure how to safely find other men to do it.

“Hit the showers, Hollander,” Rozanov said as he left the bathroom. “I will get dressed and leave.”

“Oh,” Shane said. Of course he was going to leave. What the fuck had Shane been expecting? He stood up. “Yeah. Okay. Well...”

Rozanov put one hand on Shane’s shoulder in a fairly condescending way. His lips were twitched up in an irritating little smile. “Was fun,” he said.

“Yeah, um. Thanks, I guess.”

Rozanov nodded, then turned to pick up his scattered clothing. Shane went to the bathroom, closing the door behind him.

When Shane left the bathroom, freshly showered and wearing a towel, Rozanov was gone. There was no trace of the man, other than the messed up bedsheets. Shane grimaced at them, then pulled off the top sheet and dropped it on the floor. He imagined that hotel maids probably dealt with worse shit than this all the time.

He’d leave a big tip.

He dropped the damp towel beside the soiled bedding and got himself dressed. He wasn’t going to spend the night here. He made sure he had removed everything he had brought into the room, then dropped a fifty-dollar bill on the dresser for the maid and left to go back to his apartment. Alone.



Chapter Eight


June 2011—Las Vegas

It couldn’t have been a closer race.

It was the night of the NHL Awards in Las Vegas, and all anyone had been talking about leading into it was who would win the Rookie of the Year award. Both Shane Hollander and Ilya Rozanov had scored over fifty goals. In fact, they had each scored exactly sixty-seven goals. Both men had helped their teams reach the playoffs for the first time in years, though both had been eliminated in the first round. The two men had been the most talked-about players in the league all season, sparking fierce debate among fans and the press about which of them was the better player.

Shane knew that it was impossible to definitively answer that question, but being named Rookie of the Year would certainly feel good.

Rozanov brought something out in him. Shane wasn’t the type of guy who needed to be the best player on the team—he just always was. And maybe that was it. Maybe Shane had been a little bit bored before Ilya Rozanov came along.

Rozanov was a lot of things, but he wasn’t boring. He frustrated Shane on the ice, and flustered him off the ice. Shane wanted to crosscheck him in the mouth, and then kiss it better. He wanted to forget about him, and he wanted to play every game against him. He wanted...

He wanted to win this fucking Rookie of the Year award.

He wanted to rub it in Rozanov’s face.

He wanted to rub himself on Rozanov’s face.

The Canadian rock band on stage finally finished their song and a B-list celebrity walked out on stage, holding an envelope.

This was it.

Shane’s mother put her hand on his arm. She was as nervous as he was. Maybe more.

Shane gave her a weak smile, and waited.

The reception afterward was as raucous as anyone would expect a Vegas hotel banquet hall packed with professional hockey players to be. Most of the guys were pretty drunk, but Shane couldn’t have gotten drunk even if he had been legally old enough to order a drink in Nevada because he was faced with an unending parade of people slapping him on the back and congratulating him. Some even tousled his hair.

The only person Shane hadn’t seen that night was Ilya Rozanov.

Secretly, Shane had been searching for him all night. Half the times he’d been talking to someone, he’d been looking over their shoulder. He never caught even a glimpse of golden-brown curls, which should have been easy to spot, given Rozanov’s height.

He wondered if Rozanov had just gone back to his room.

The thought made Shane angry. What a fucking baby. If Rozanov had won, Shane would be here, in this room, ready to congratulate him. If Rozanov wanted to spend his first NHL Awards sulking in his hotel room, that wasn’t Shane’s problem.

Or maybe he just wanted to stealthily get drunk in his hotel room, and then come to the party. Rozanov wasn’t old enough to order a drink here either.

“You seen Roz anywhere?” someone asked him suddenly.

Shane flinched. He felt like his mind had been read.

“No!” he said, way too quickly. And with more blushing than was necessary. He took a breath. “Why would I know where Rozanov is?”

The guy—a forward for Toronto—shrugged. “Thought you guys might be at the kiddie table together or something.”

“No,” Shane said. “I haven’t seen him. At all.”

“Okay, well. Congratulations, kid.” He squeezed Shane’s shoulder and walked past him.

It was hot in the room. Too many people. Quite a few of the guys had removed their jackets and ties. It was getting harder to tolerate the atmosphere of the place without the help of alcohol.

Shane scanned the room for his parents. He spotted his father slumped in a chair, drinking what Shane was sure was a Sprite. Shane’s mother seemed to be talking a star goaltender’s ear off.