The Long Game (Game Changers #6)(117)

The Ottawa arena was packed for game six. It had been sold out for most of the past three months, but that night Ilya thought the noise rivaled the crowd back in Montreal. The Centaurs charged out onto the ice to an earsplitting roar from their hometown fans.

“Does the noise scare you?” Shane asked as they got ready for the puck drop. “I know you’re not used to it.”

Ilya snorted. “This is nothing. Wait until I score.”

“Oh yeah? When’s that happening?”

Ilya bent over the circle. “Right now.”

He won the face-off, knocking the puck back to Dykstra and immediately getting himself in formation with Troy and Bood like they’d practiced. He watched as Troy dodged Hayden and took the pass from Dykstra. Ilya made sure he was exactly where he needed to be when Troy sent the puck over to him, and as soon as it hit his blade, Ilya took off.

J.J. was in front of him, which was definitely a challenge, but Ilya was ready for him. He passed the puck back to Bood, moved quickly to the side of the net, and waited for Bood’s shot. Ilya was there for the deflection, and directed the puck over Drapeau’s outstretched pad, making it 1–0 Ottawa less than thirty seconds into the game.

Troy slammed into Ilya against the glass, his mouth stretched in a wide smile. “Let’s fucking go! Hell yes.”

Ilya hugged him as Bood pressed up against both of them. “Now this is fucking fun,” Bood yelled.

Ilya grinned at the crowd, a sea of red Centaurs jerseys. “Let’s keep going.”

Montreal didn’t make it easy for them, but Ottawa ended up winning the game 4–3, and Ottawa, in their first playoffs appearance in over a decade, had taken the series all the way to game seven. Against the number one team in the league and the defending Stanley Cup champions.

“Eat shit, everyone!” Bood yelled in the locker room after the game. “Easy sweep for Montreal my ass. We just fucked up everybody’s playoff pools.”

Everyone in the room was in a great mood, Ilya included, but playing a game seven against his boyfriend was going to be intense, to say the least.

Game fucking seven.

Shane usually lived for this, but tonight he was a mess as he waited in the locker room for the game to start. Coach was barking at them, and Shane was barely listening. He was deep in his own head, trying to settle his nerves.

I wonder how Ilya is feeling.

He quickly shoved that thought away. It wasn’t useful right now.

One of them was about to win, and the other was about to lose. Shane knew their relationship would withstand it; they’d been rivals their entire careers, there was no reason to start being petty now. But even so, this series felt bigger than anything they had faced each other in previously.

The Montreal crowd went wild, as always, as their team entered the arena. The starting lineups were announced, and Shane took his place on the blue line for the anthem. He focused on the three most recent Stanley Cup banners hanging from the rafters, and not on Ilya’s number 81 jersey across from him.

“We got this, baby,” J.J. said as they waited for the anthem to start.

Shane steeled his expression, nodded, and said, “Let’s get it.”

The game was a battle, and then it went to fucking overtime. Because of course it did. Everyone on both teams was exhausted, but desperate to win. And now there was less than five minutes left of the first overtime period and Shane was dreading a second one. He bent to take the face-off against Ilya in the Ottawa zone.

“This is fun,” Ilya said conversationally. “I forgot how it feels, to have such high stakes.”

“It will be less fun when I score in a few seconds.”

Ilya smiled around his mouth guard, then won the face-off.

Shane didn’t let Ottawa keep the puck for long. He stole it from Zane Boodram, then glanced around quickly for someone to give it to before he got rocked by Troy Barrett. He spotted J.J. and sent the puck back to him to give Montreal some breathing space.

Shane managed to dodge Troy’s hit at the same moment he watched Ilya intercept his pass to J.J.

Fuck!

Ilya took off, and Shane darted after him. Within seconds they were over the center line, completely alone, and Shane was in a good position to cleanly poke the puck away from him. He was just about to do that, when instead he stumbled forward and went crashing to the ice in a frustrated heap.

He was helpless to do anything but watch Ilya carry the puck to the net, and bury it between Drapeau’s pads.

Fuck, fuck, fuck!

Shane couldn’t believe it. Montreal’s hopes for a repeat Stanley Cup win—their hopes for eliminating fucking Ottawa—had just been crushed. Because Shane had tripped.

He’d be lucky if he wasn’t tarred and feathered right here in the arena.

He watched miserably, on one knee, as the Ottawa bench spilled onto the ice and piled on top of Ilya in celebration. Eventually he felt a hand on his shoulder, and he knew without looking that it was Hayden.

“It’s over, buddy,” Hayden said. “Come line up for the handshakes.”

Shane forced himself to his feet, and skated over to where his teammates had gathered in a devastated cluster, waiting for Ottawa to stop celebrating. It could be a long wait.

“Good game,” Shane said to Drapeau, who looked stunned behind his mask. “It wasn’t your fault.”

Drapeau fixed his intense goalie eyes on Shane’s face and said, coldly, “I know.”