The Long Game: A Gay Sports Romance (Game Changers Book 6)

“It’s fucking Christmas, Hollander,” Ilya groaned. “Eat a cookie.”

Shane bit back a whole speech about how even one cookie would fuck up all his hard work. He wasn’t on a weight loss diet, he was following a complicated nutritional regimen designed to enhance physical performance.

But Shane didn’t want to explain all of that again, so instead he rolled his eyes as hard as he could.

“I don’t want a cookie.” It was a lie. It was a fucking lie. He wanted a cookie so bad.

“Yuna,” Ilya called out. “Tell your son to eat a cookie.”

“Leave him alone,” Yuna called from…whatever room she was in at the moment. She moved around so much it was hard to keep track. “We love Shane even without carbs.”

Shane would really like it if everyone stopped talking about his diet. It shouldn’t be a big deal. He was a professional athlete who was treating his body as if he were a professional athlete. His nutritionist had worked with some of the top athletes in the world, and they all swore by him. Maybe Ilya was getting away with eating like a stoner teenage goat for now, but he’d be thirty soon, and that would change. Shane preferred to stop any physical deterioration before it started.

“You don’t even celebrate Christmas,” Shane said grumpily.

“I celebrate cookies,” Ilya said, then crammed an entire thumbprint cookie in his mouth.

“Gross.”

“It has jam!” Ilya said through a mouthful of cookie.

Ilya did love jam. Especially raspberry. He had a spot of it on his cheek that Shane decided not to tell him about.

“Here,” Yuna said as she emerged from the garage. She tossed something that Shane barely managed to catch. “I got you a treat.”

Shane frowned at the pomegranate in his hands. “Thanks.”

Ilya laughed. “Take a bite!”

“You don’t bite into a pomegranate, dumbass.”

“No? There isn’t important fiber and nutrients in the, um, shell?”

Shane huffed and took his pomegranate to the kitchen. The whole Christmas day so far had been weird, and sort of tense. They’d been sniping at each other since Shane had arrived at Ilya’s yesterday morning.

They’d woken up together after a somewhat competitive evening playing foosball on the new table Shane had bought as a Christmas gift for Ilya. It had been delivered earlier that day, and Ilya had been thrilled with it. So that had been okay.

Their heated foosball battle had turned into heated making out, and then sex, which had also been okay. Normal. Overall a decent Christmas Eve.

In the morning, Ilya had grouched about Shane not being fun to make breakfast for, and Shane had told him he didn’t ask Ilya to make breakfast for him. They’d argued back and forth while Shane made a smoothie and Ilya made himself scrambled eggs with toast and sausages. Then they’d glared at each other across the kitchen table while they ate.

Before they’d left for Shane’s parents’, Ilya had grumbled something about giving Shane his present later, and Shane didn’t know what that meant. Ilya hadn’t seemed excited about it, that was for sure.

There were things, Shane suspected, that Ilya wasn’t telling him, which made Shane anxious and a bit angry. Why would Ilya keep anything from Shane? He’d thought they were beyond that. If Shane didn’t know better, he’d think Ilya was cheating on him or something. Or that he wanted to break up.

But, Shane kept assuring himself, he did know better. Maybe Ilya’s mood was purely hockey-related. Shane would certainly be in a pissy mood if his team sucked as much as the Ottawa Centaurs.

Whatever it was, Shane was getting tired of it. If Ilya had a problem with Shane, or with anything, he should talk to Shane about it. Not dig into him about his diet or his friends or whatever else Ilya decided to make fun of him about.

Ilya entered the kitchen as Shane was irritably extracting seeds from the pomegranate. “Need help?” he asked.

Shane sighed, releasing some of the tension in his shoulders. Maybe he was being annoyed with Ilya for no reason. “I’m good.” He pinched a seed between his finger and thumb and held it out. “Want one?”

Ilya opened his mouth, and Shane slipped the seed inside. Ilya closed his lips around Shane’s fingers for a second, which made Shane smile. He really did love Ilya so much.

“Good,” Ilya said when he’d swallowed the seed. “Not as good as the cookies, but good.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

Ilya opened the fridge and pulled out a carton of eggnog. He glanced at Shane as he made his way to the cupboard where the glasses were, as if waiting for him to say something about the nutritional horrors of eggnog.

“What?” Shane asked testily.

“No lecture?”

Shane slammed the pomegranate half he was working with down on the cutting board. Juice flew everywhere. “Would you please fuck off? I don’t give a shit what you or anyone else eats, Ilya.”

Ilya snorted. “This is not true. You bitch at me all the time.”

“Because you always start it!”

Ilya didn’t reply. Instead, he pulled a large glass from the cupboard and poured himself about a gallon of eggnog.

Shane’s pomegranate-stained fingers curled into fists. He was not going to say anything.

Ilya raised the glass in a toast, and took a long haul of eggnog, which was disgusting to watch. Shane stared him down anyway.

Ilya finished with a loud, obnoxious “Ahh,” then wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. Shane turned his back to him, grabbed a dishcloth, and began cleaning the spattered pomegranate juice from the counter.

“Your parents want to exchange presents now,” Ilya said.

“Okay.”

“Come to the living room when you are done, yes?”

“I know where we exchange presents on Christmas.” God, Shane knew he sounded like an absolute bitch, but he couldn’t help it.

He could hear Ilya leave the kitchen as Shane continued to aggressively wipe the counter.

The tension followed them home, neither man saying much to the other. Shortly after they got back, Ilya thrust a neatly wrapped present at Shane, then plopped himself grumpily on one end of the couch.

Shane sat on the opposite end, glanced at Ilya with a mixture of apprehension and apology, and carefully unwrapped the gift.

It was a framed photograph that he’d never seen before. He knew immediately when it was from, though. It was an outtake from their first ad campaign together, the one they’d shot in the dingy rink in Toronto the summer before their rookie seasons. The day when they would eventually hook up for the first time. Kiss for the first time.

In the photo they were nose-to-nose in full hockey gear, cropped close from the shoulders up, simulating a face-off. Unlike the intense, serious photo that ran in the campaign, however, in this one they were both laughing. Shane’s nose was scrunched up, and Ilya’s eyes were crinkled, but they still held each other’s gaze.

“How’d you get this?” Shane asked quietly.

“I found out the photographer’s name and his email. I asked if he still had those. He sent me some and that one was my favorite.”

Shane traced a finger over his own giddy face in the photo. At the time he’d felt embarrassed and unprofessional about not being able to keep a straight face. But now he felt a thrill shoot through him as he remembered all of the details of that day: the heat between them, the civil war that had raged inside Shane as he’d fought to ignore his attraction to Ilya. The cliff they’d been just about to jump off together.

“It never occurred to me that these existed,” Shane said now.

“I have always wondered.”

Shane pulled his gaze away from the photograph to look at the present-day version of Ilya. He looked effortlessly beautiful, as always, but also anxious, and a bit sad.

“Ilya,” Shane said. He set the photo carefully on the coffee table, then held his arms open for his boyfriend. Ilya came to him immediately.

“Thank you,” Shane said into Ilya’s hair.

“You are hard to buy for.”

“I know. I love this, though. I’ll bring it to the cottage.”

Ilya stiffened slightly in his arms. “The cottage. Yes,” he said quietly.

Shane felt like he needed to explain why it might be risky to display photos like this one in his Montreal home, which was ridiculous. Of course Ilya knew the reasons. So instead, he kissed him, and it escalated as it usually did. They went up to the bedroom and had sex, but Shane still felt like they’d become dry kindling, waiting for the spark that would destroy them. Like there was something important that wasn’t being said, and they were both waiting for the other person to say it, but neither of them knew what it was.

Ilya spent most of Boxing Day working up the nerve to ask Shane a single question. Finally, early in the afternoon, he broached the subject.

“Bood is having a party tonight.”

Ilya said it casually, as if there were no particular reason he was letting Shane know. As if his stomach wasn’t a mess as he anticipated Shane’s reaction.

“Zane Boodram? He’s having a party on Boxing Day?”

“Yes. Not a big party. It will be chill. Mostly just the team and partners. Bood has fun parties.”

“Oh.”

Ilya held his breath.

“Did you want to go or something?” Shane asked, clearly confused. “I could stay here, I guess. Or head back to—”

“I want you to go too,” Ilya said. “I want you to come with me to the party.”

Shane twisted around so they were facing each other on Ilya’s couch. “You want me to go to a party with your teammates? Why?”

So they can fucking meet my boyfriend, Ilya wanted to scream. But instead, he kept his tone light and said, “They are cool people. You might have fun.”

“But…wouldn’t it be weird, if we showed up together?”

Ilya shrugged easily, as if this was a normal thing for him to suggest. “They know you would be in Ottawa for Christmas. We are friends, so I invite you to a party. No big deal.”

Shane’s face scrunched up in confusion, then he shook his head. “Too weird. I don’t think so.”

The dismissal, though expected, irritated Ilya. No, irritated was too small a word—it infuriated him. For a moment, Ilya didn’t react. He stared at Shane, stony-faced, while anger scorched through him like lava. Then, before he said anything he may regret, he stood up and walked out of the living room.

Shane caught up with him in the kitchen. “You can go,” he said. “It’s fine.”

“Great,” Ilya snapped.

“What’s wrong?” Shane sounded so genuinely clueless about why Ilya might want him to meet his friends that it only angered Ilya further.

“What isn’t wrong?”

“What does that mean?”

Ilya spun around to face him. “It means I have a boyfriend who doesn’t want anyone to know I am his boyfriend.”

Shane’s eyes widened in surprise. “Uh, sorry. Did I miss something? I thought we were on the same page about this.”

“We are not on the same anything.”

“I don’t fucking understand you.”

“Sorry,” Ilya said sardonically. “My English, you know.”

“That’s not what I—” Shane threw his hands up. “Could you please explain what the fuck is happening? Because last I checked we didn’t go to each other’s team parties. Or tell anyone about our relationship.”

“No. I don’t tell anyone about our relationship. You tell Hayden, and Jackie, and Rose, and your parents, and who the fuck knows who else.”

“That’s literally everyone! You know that.”

“It is five more people than I have told,” Ilya said, omitting his therapist, because that was a whole other conversation.

“What about…” Shane waved a hand around as he searched for a name. “Ryan Price?”

“Oh yes. My best friend Ryan Price. I have not talked to him since the last camp.”

“Well—” Shane didn’t seem to have anything to add to that.

“I have no one,” Ilya said. “No one I can talk to about us.”

“That’s not true. My parents love you.”

Ilya threw his head back and walked to the living room. Shane followed immediately.

“It’s not easy for me either, you know,” Shane said, clearly angry now. “We’re both hiding, and we’ve both made sacrifices that—”

Ilya spun around. “What sacrifices, Shane? What have you given up?”

“Seriously? If we get outed, our fucking careers might be over! Everything I care about—” Shane snapped his fingers “—gone.”

“Everything,” Ilya said flatly.

Shane rolled his eyes. “Not everything. But hockey is pretty fucking important to me.”

“No shit.”

“Oh, fuck you. Sorry I still want to win cups instead of smoking weed with my teammates between losses.”

The words hit Ilya like a crosscheck to the teeth. Shane truly didn’t understand anything. Not what Ilya had given up for him, certainly. Ilya could be in Boston right now, leading one of the top teams in the league to more Stanley Cups. He could be breaking more records, and winning more awards. Instead he’d chosen to come to Ottawa, when he could have gone to almost any team in the league. He’d chosen a team that hadn’t made the playoffs in over a decade. He’d chosen it because it was Shane’s hometown, and close to where Shane lived. He’d chosen it so he could build a life in Canada with the man he loved.

And Shane thought he had, what? Come to Ottawa so he wouldn’t have to work so hard? Ilya wanted to punch a wall.

“You wouldn’t even choose me, would you?” Ilya said. “If it is between me and hockey.”

“Of course I would,” Shane said, though not as confidently as Ilya would have liked.

Ilya studied his face, and saw Shane flinch. “Would you?”

Shane tilted his chin up defiantly. “Would you choose me?”

Ilya let the question hang in the air, his whole body trembling with rage. He couldn’t believe Shane would even ask that, after everything.

Finally, quietly, Ilya said, “You should go.”

“What? No way. Fuck that. Answer the question.”

“No,” Ilya said firmly. “Go home, Shane. We can talk…later.”

Shane’s brow furrowed, and he seemed unsure about whether Ilya was serious, so Ilya made it clearer. “I don’t want to look at you right now. I don’t want to talk to you. Go home.”

Because Shane couldn’t leave anything alone, he asked again, “Would you choose me?”

Suddenly, Ilya had Shane backed against a wall. Ilya hadn’t realized he’d moved until he was looming over Shane, one hand planted firmly on his chest. Ilya pulled his hand away quickly and moved it to the wall. He would never hurt Shane, he was sure of that, but his own fury was scaring him at the moment. He’d never been this close to flying apart.

If Shane was scared at all, his face didn’t show it. He kept his sharp black eyes fixed on Ilya’s, refusing to back down from this fight.

Ilya didn’t want to fight. He was exhausted, and miserable, and his boyfriend was breaking his fucking heart.

Quietly, in a voice that couldn’t disguise his pain, he said, “I already chose you, Hollander.”

He stepped back, and watched Shane’s eyes widen. After a moment, Shane’s lips parted as if he had something to say, but Ilya didn’t want to hear it.

“Go home,” Ilya said. “Please.” Then he turned and walked quickly upstairs.