Chapter Text
On a random Wednesday, just after the season starts, Shane Hollander is traded to the Toronto Stars in exchange for four players.
There’s uproar in the hockey world and rumours flying left and right, but the truth is simple: he’s wanted to get out for a while. Poor management and bad trades have bled Montreal dry, turning it into something Shane barely recognizes. His mother had told him to jump off that ship before it sinks more times than he could count, and he’d finally taken her advice.
It had all been quite the commotion, Toronto having a historic rivalry with Montreal and being home to Shane’s rival, Ilya Rozanov, but Shane couldn’t be more sure that leaving Montreal was the right decision, no matter where he ended up.
Toronto fans had been buzzing with excitement, everyone thinking the same thing now that they had two superstars on the same team: this really could be their year.
࣪ ˖ 𖦹°⋆
The fans were right.
Since Shane’s trade, Toronto has jumped four spots in the rankings, making playoffs a real possibility. He knows hockey is a team sport, and he’s endlessly grateful to their strong defense and their brick wall of a goalie and their phenomenal coaches. But he isn’t going to lie and say that Toronto’s turnaround isn’t linked to his time on the ice.
Well…his and Ilya’s. The two of them are some of the best players the city has ever seen, no doubt.
He misses playing against Ilya, of course—there isn’t any feeling quite like playing against someone who can actually keep up—but being on the same team as him is just as good.
Ilya understands the kind of hockey that Shane has struggled to verbalize his entire life. They exist on another level, and they exist there alone; pushing each other to be better, to think faster, to play sharper.
It makes the sex that much better.
࣪ ˖ 𖦹°⋆
“God,” Shane moans, letting his head fall back. Ilya’s almost as good in bed as he is on the ice. Though Shane has to admit that thinking of Ilya’s stellar performance during last week’s game only gets him harder. Shane thinks about the game they have tonight and Ilya’s promise of a hat-trick, then he thinks about Ilya actually doing it. “God,” he groans again.
“No need to call me that,” Ilya teases, putting his mouth back to work after.
Shane tries to scoff, but it sounds embarrassingly like a moan the second he opens his mouth. “Shut the fuck up,” he says, breathless.
Ilya lifts his head, raising an eyebrow at Shane. “Not very nice.”
Moving to Toronto had been such a last-minute trade that Shane hadn’t even thought through what it meant for him and Ilya’s arrangement.
As it turns out, it meant nothing. Except that they didn’t need hotels anymore, not when they lived in the same city, and Ilya’s apartment was 15 minutes away. Frankly, everything in Toronto was 15 minutes away.
They met at Ilya’s, and only Ilya’s. And they fucked more than ever.
After practices, before practices. On their days off and after games. If Ilya was lucky and he managed to convince Shane like he did today, they fucked before games, too.
The consistency was everything, especially for Shane. He didn’t want to fuck just anyone; he didn’t want to be with new people every time. But with Ilya so close, Shane could have who he wanted, whenever he wanted. It really was the perfect setup.
“Rozanov…” Shane’s voice catches in his throat when Ilya presses a soft kiss to the inside of Shane’s thigh. Then another, a little closer to Shane’s dick, but not close enough for it to give him any kind of release. He moves closer, and closer, his lips feather light, hovering over Shane’s skin. “Stop teasing,” Shane groans.
Ilya’s lips quirk into a sly smile. “Say sorry.”
“What?” Shane asks, hoping his irritation is evident, even if it's under layers of his ridiculously horny, heavy breathing. “No.”
“Hollander,” Ilya warns, then wraps his mouth around Shane’s dick and pulls off immediately. Shane’s entire body shudders, and the heat pooling in his stomach only grows.
“Fine,” he says, rolling his eyes. He’s not sure what’s more annoying: Ilya’s teasing or how easily Shane gives into it. “Sorry. Can you suck my dick now?”
Ilya raises an eyebrow, dissatisfied.
Before he can complain, Shane sighs, reaching forward and pushing a hand through Rozanov’s curls, tugging the way he knows he likes. “I’m sorry,” he tries again, “can you suck my dick please?”
“Good boy,” Ilya says, smiling. It makes Shane impossibly harder, and he can hardly process that before Ilya is taking him into his mouth fully.
Shane lets his head fall back again, eyes closed and practically whimpering as Ilya works his mouth around him. Ilya’s strong hands are gripping Shane’s thigh, reaching up Shane’s torso, pushing his legs apart; Shane is cumming in seconds, barely enough time to give Ilya a warning, but Ilya knows Shane well enough to know when to pull off. Shane coats his own torso in cum, too blissed out to care about how Ilya’s cum from when they’d fucked earlier is still on his chest.
Ilya kisses him softly, lying down next to him and pushing the hair out of Shane’s face. He kisses Shane’s jaw, then his shoulder, “Let me clean you up.”
“No,” Shane protests, turning his head to kiss him again, “stay. We’re going to have to shower soon, anyway. We have to leave for the game.”
“Shower?” Ilya asks, giving Shane a bored look. “Before a game?” He tucks his face back into Shane’s neck, pulling him closer ,and Shane closes his eyes briefly at the warmth of the contact.
Not much compares to getting fucked by Ilya, but the feeling of his bare skin against Shane’s own as they bask in the afterglow is a close second. Even then, it has to come to an end.
“Yes,” Shane argues back, “Unless you want to play the game covered in cum.”
“I’m not covered in cum,” Ilya says, putting both hands up in surrender.
Shane rolls his eyes, kissing Ilya softly and climbing on top of him to deepen the kiss, “Now you are,” he mumbles the words against Ilya’s lips, looking down at where their chests are now pressed together.
Ilya groans, but he’s smiling, wrapping his arms around Shane’s waist to hold him in place as he kisses his neck. “Five minutes,” Ilya says, mouth leaving hot kisses along Shane’s throat.
Dizzy from Ilya’s mouth but still aware that they have a fucking game soon, Shane glares at him, “One minute.”
࣪ ˖ 𖦹°⋆
The game starts well enough, with Shane scoring a goal in the first few minutes after a perfect assist from Hayden.
Toronto had acquired Hayden at the beginning of the season, just before they got Shane, because Hayden had been smart enough to save himself any more of Montreal’s torture. It was stellar to get to keep playing with him, especially when they worked so well together.
Shane scores again minutes later. When he’s swapped off, Ilya scores once.
Once he’s back on the ice, giving a passing smile to Ilya as they trade spots, Shane realises he has 2 goals, and Ilya only has 1. They’d made a bet earlier about who would reach 3 goals first, and now, Shane is determined. The winner gets to make the other do whatever they want—kind of a loose prize because they’re more than willing to please each other regularly, but they’re both so competitive that Shane is sure the added layer of winning will add something to it.
He snags the puck easily from the other team, whizzing around every player in his way. He’s just about to take his shot and score again, he can see the clear path to the net, and he catches Ilya’s grin from the bench in his peripheral vision, just as he skates forward, his vision goes black.
It takes Shane a moment to open his eyes, wincing at the faint ringing sound that he hopes isn’t coming from his ear, but it probably is. He blinks, then blinks again. Getting checked is always strange, the way you can go from zipping across the ice to being on the floor out of nowhere, but Shane has never been checked like this. He’s never been completely laid out. He can barely fucking move his legs to get him back upright.
“Shane?” He hears someone’s voice, he can hardly make it out through all the fucking ringing and the commotion and the fighting and the sharp pain crawling up his torso.
He tries getting up, to no avail, lying motionless and out of breath, praying to god his season isn’t over.
“Shane?” This voice he knows. This voice he’d know anywhere.
“Ilya,” he reaches out, or at least attempts to, his arms moving barely an inch. He wonders what Ilya is even doing on the ice; he’d been on the bench just seconds ago.
He hears Ilya’s concerned voice as the medics lift him up and wishes everyone would stop asking him questions so he could clearly hear what Ilya was saying, so he could reassure him that he’s fine.
Shane spends the next 20 minutes telling everyone that he’s fine. His coaches, the medics, their manager. Everyone except who he wants to be with right now.
Pulling his jersey and pads off had been agony; raising his arms even slightly resulted in a stabbing pain, much less pulling his jersey all the way over his head. But he didn’t want anyone to take him to the hospital or even consider him unable to play, so he bit down hard on his tongue and let himself be inspected.
There was a bruise forming alongside his hip, a deep, ugly red taking up the entirety of his right hip. Once they’d ruled out the hospital entirely, Shane sat down, his legs almost shaking under the pain in his torso. Realistically, he knows he can’t play today, but he doesn’t want to be out for any more than that.
“Shane,” his coach says, “you took a bad fall, just—”
“Look,” Shane stands up, walking around him, arms stretched out, “I feel absolutely fine.”
“You think I don’t see you wincing, Hollander?”
“I’m fine,” Shane repeats.
Coach rubs his forehead with a sigh, “Fine, but you’re out for the game. And you’re resting on this bench in this fucking locker room until third period is over.”
“But—”
“You can watch the game from here, on the TV,” Coach says, pointing to the corner of the room where a large screen displays a stream of the game, “Now sit down.”
Shane does as he’s told, not wanting to get benched, and graciously accepts the painkillers he’s given by his assistant coach. He lies back down, trying hard not to wince, even as a sharp pain shoots up his hip, because everyone is still looking at him.
As the locker room filters out, he closes his eyes, squeezing them shut tightly and gripping the edge of the bench to try and stifle the pain. When he looks at the screen, he sees that the score is now 3-2.
“Toronto is having a difficult time finding their footing after seeing star player Shane Hollander get wheeled out by medics,” one of the reporters says, “Ilya Rozanov looks to be taking it especially hard, missing yet another seemingly clear shot on goal.”
࣪ ˖ 𖦹°⋆
By the end of the second period, they’re losing 4-3
Everyone filters into the locker room, most of them making a beeline toward where Shane is seated.
“Jesus Christ,” Hayden says as soon as he sees Shane's torso. There are deep creases in his brow, and he’s at Shane’s side immediately.
During the break between first and second period, Shane had still been with the medics, so this was the first time anyone on the team had seen him since he was lying flat and unresponsive on the ice.
The bruise, which only seems to be growing and turning a purple-ish tone, probably makes him look worse than he feels. Though he does feel pretty shit.
“I’m fine,” Shane insists, but he lets Hayden inspect the area and get a good look to make sure nothing else is hurt.
“It was a bad hit, Shane,” Hayden says, worriedly. He looks up to where Ilya is quietly observing them, leaning against the lockers with his eyes fixed intently on Shane. “Ilya, doesn’t it look bad?”
“Is not bullet wound,” Ilya says flatly, “he will be back on ice within week.”
“Okay, guys,” Coach calls from the door, “Unless one of you can magically heal him by crowding around the bed, grab your water and come sit outside for debrief.”
Everyone starts to filter out, except Ilya. He walks toward Shane slowly as the door shuts.
“They’re meeting outside,” Shane says, breath hitching slightly as Ilya squats down in front of him.
“Yes,” Ilya replies coolly, "good observation.”
“Ilya—”
“Does it hurt?” He asks softly, fingers grazing lightly over the skin that’s starting to bruise.
Shane takes a deep breath at the contact, goosebumps rising on his skin. Even after Ilya takes his hand away, Shane can feel the ghost of his touch. “I’m fine,” he stutters out.
“Idiot,” Ilya says, but Shane can’t find a trace of malice in his tone. Instead, weirdly, Ilya’s voice is laced with concern, strained and worried just like the look in his eyes. “Your skin is purple.”
Ilya presses a soft kiss to his thumb, then brushes it along Shane’s hip.
Shane feels everything come to a stop. He knows it’s not possible, but his hip barely hurts, not under Ilya’s touch. Not when all of Ilya’s attention is focused on him, just how Shane likes it. His beautiful, concerned eyes and soft, caring hands, all working to make sure Shane is okay.
“Just a bruise,” Shane replies. He catches Ilya’s hand in his own. He brings it to his mouth, pressing a soft kiss to his fingers, then one to his thumb where Ilya had kissed before.
“Shane—”
“I’m fine,” Shane cuts him off. He tilts Ilya's face up, forcing his eyes away from Shane’s hip and to his face instead. “And I’m going to win.”
“What?”
“Three goals,” Shane says, “I have two, and you only have one. I’m closer to three.”
Ilya clicks his tongue and shakes his head, “It wasn’t closest to three, it was three.” He’s smiling now that he’s sure Shane is fine, fine enough to argue at least.
“Two is closer to three, therefore closer to winning, therefore the winner,” Shane counters. He’s hoping Ilya will take the bait and start playing to win again. One injury can’t throw off their entire game like this.
“Ilya,” someone calls from outside, “you in there?”
“Give me one minute,” Ilya calls back. He stands up, then grins down at Shane, leaning so his lips are next to Shane’s ear. “You’re on, Hollander. Hope you’re ready to be my prize.”