Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Lily

I think you will give in first

Shane

????

Lily

When your heat comes, you will beg before I do

Shane’s breath stutters, face going hot, on the verge of slamming his phone down or maybe just dropping it before he remembers he’s alone. While it’s certainly not the most obscene text he’s ever been on the receiving end of from Ilya Rozanov, it’s the first time the alpha’s referenced the upcoming ten days they have planned as an obvious tease, intended to rile.

They’ve seen each other in person a grand total of once since dealing with Shane’s rejection sickness, a hasty post-game hotel hookup which had almost been more stressful than it was worth, on top of pressure to advance in the playoffs. Otherwise, they’ve kept in touch via texting - though with more frequency than they used to - as well as semi-regular weekly phone calls and even occasional video chats, when Ilya pesters him about needing a proper visual to jerk off to.

Shane had been annoyed by the introduction of that last one - albeit reluctantly turned on anyway - until he remembered that he and Ilya had somehow agreed to an exclusivity arrangement to placate Ilya’s alpha instinct. Which meant that Ilya was pestering him to jerk off in lieu of going out and finding a sexy, exciting stranger to bring back to his hotel room. And, well, when that occurred to Shane, he found himself a little more eager to comply, even though it was embarrassing, taking his clothes off and trying to hold his phone in front of his body so it looks appealing enough for Ilya to get off.

But all in all, Shane is mildly surprised it’s taken Ilya this long to bring up the topic as sexting fodder, though his type-A personality appreciates that they prioritized the planning and logistics before getting around to this part of it. The waiting game, a slow build of anticipation with each passing day as they drag themselves through their off-season obligations a hemisphere away from one another. Plane tickets purchased, suppressant dosage tapering schedules aligned, half-truths and fictions given to anyone else who might need to know the least bit about how they’re handling their cycles during the ten days they’ll have at Shane’s cottage.

Every day the eventuality grows just a little bit more real around the edges, now one month away. Now they’re letting themselves fantasize about it. He won’t tell Rozanov that it makes his belly flutter.

Shane

As if your rut won’t be making you just as desperate

Lily

Of course desperate for pretty omega hole to fuck

But first desperate to hear what you sound like begging in heat

Shane has to close his eyes for the next several seconds, remove Ilya’s text from his immediate vision so he can process the words without imploding from the sudden jolt of want.

…At least he’s already in bed for the night. Lying on his back, his legs unconsciously spreading a tad wider.

As he tries to collect himself enough to craft an appealing response, his phone vibrates a few more times in his hand. With a deep breath in, Shane peeks at his phone screen glowing in the dark.

Lily

Don’t worry, you will only have to beg for a little bit before I take care of you

Just so I can know how it sounds

After that I keep you full and satisfied

The tent growing in Shane’s sweatpants sure likes that idea. He’s not touching himself yet, not really, hand only skimming his own neck and the skin of his collarbone beneath his t-shirt - still half-feigning casually for an audience of no one like he doesn’t know exactly what he’s building up to, as long as Ilya keeps texting him. That said, Shane knows he needs to at least attempt his own contribution, too.

(And, God, it is so much easier for him to default to playing the stubborn brat in these exchanges rather than tying himself in anxious knots to try and achieve the sexting equivalent of baring his neck. Luckily, at least Rozanov doesn’t seem to mind.)

Shane

My knotting dildo will be there if you need backup

Lily

Finallyyyyyyyy the color, I will know the color

I won’t take bait about my stamina

Too long i think about you with this fucking dildo and i can’t picture it properly

I promise you won’t remember what dildo even looks like when i’m done with you (but finally i will lol)

Shane bites his lower lip, rucks his shirt up around his torso as his thumb hovers over the keyboard. He types out What else will you give me if I beg in all of its entirety, then hits the backspace key as quickly as he can before he can send the alpha what might risk being perceived as an oddly specific or leading sort of question.

Shane

Idk….my heats are pretty intense, might be a bit much for you to handle

It’s something about which he’s already cautioned Ilya, when they first began discussing the logistics of how this would all go. Most omegas don’t suppress their heats for an entire year, and so they’ll typically last two to five days, depending on an individual’s cycle. Shane’s heats, however, end up about a week long - drawn-out, miserable, painful, endless, nothing but his toy to ease the cramps and frustrated, lonely tears.

Ruts are slightly shorter, on the average, though Ilya saves his for once a year during the off-season like most other alphas in the league, similar to Shane’s heat. It makes their cycles rather complementary, based on what Shane has read online, in fact, assuming Ilya’s rut lasts for four or five days like it usually does. Something to do with alphas needing to protect the den and secure provisions for their vulnerable mate, with the purpose of rut being to sustain them through the most intense of said mate’s sexual needs. Weird, evolutionary nonsense that may or may not be half-bullshit to begin with, and certainly doesn’t apply to real life nowadays.

Shane has done a lot of research over the past few months, from both legitimate medical websites as well as the usual sorts of forums and subreddits, combing through other people’s experiences. After he’d been the one to suggest this whole thing to begin with, when he was too knot-dumb to resist the impulse, Shane considers it his responsibility to make sure they do it right, do it smart. And he obviously wants to be considerate of Ilya’s needs, too, as it’s not just Shane’s cycle, after all. The last thing Shane wants is to be a hassle, make Ilya regret not having spent his rut somewhere else with someone else, someone less of a burden, someone who is just plain more fun. Whatever kind of partner Ilya usually prefers to rut with.

Not that he’s gotten into that much detail about his insecurities with Ilya. But they exchanged general information about their cycles, and Shane warned Ilya then of the length and intensity of his heats, sans provocative innuendo. It was a phone call, so he wasn’t able to see Ilya’s reaction - not that he’d actually expected the alpha to balk - but he heard him let out a low, intrigued noise.

“Mmm, Hollander, maybe finally an omega who can keep up with me.”

“Fuck off - this isn’t like a brag. I’m just giving you a head’s up so we’re both on the same page -”

“Fuck off why? Is alpha now not allowed to be excited for seven days of fucking omega in heat, in rut? Instead I am supposed to shake and cry ‘oh no, my poor dick, it’s going to fall off from too much glorious fucking’?”

“Oh my god, that is not what I’m trying to say either, asshole.”

“Then let me be happy, yes? You act like prison guard and your heat is death by firing squad for me, instead of lots of good sex with world’s prettiest omega. Maybe bit of mess afterwards, maybe tired, but will be good, da? You keep talking like this, I will think maybe you do really plan to kill me in Canadian forest murder shack.”

Grateful Ilya couldn’t see how the world’s prettiest omega comment made him blush and resolutely ignoring the swoop in his belly, Shane laughed aloud despite himself. Then he sighed and set down the pen he’d been holding atop the calendar on his desk, flipped a few months ahead to July. “Da. Yeah. Sorry. Just nerves, I guess. Not your fault.” Then he added, almost petulantly, “I’m really not trying to talk you out of coming, promise.”

“Good, okay.” In the brief pause, Shane closed his eyes and imagined Ilya smiling into his phone just like he was. “And if my dick does fall off in the process, then you know I am happy to give noble sacrifice to very sexy cause.”

“...Damn it, Rozanov.” Shane had laughed again and was more relaxed in his chair as they continued discussing plans.

So…while they haven’t gotten that far into talking about it, Shane isn’t so obtuse that he doesn’t get that the challenge of his heat is part of the appeal of Ilya, and that doesn’t have to be a bad thing. It’s just one more biological compatibility on a preexisting laundry list, and this one a happenstance in large part just due to the cycles they both maintain for pro hockey. One more thing that works so well between their bodies - or might work, anyway, they won’t know for sure until it happens, after all.

Which Shane is suddenly looking forward to, lying in bed with one hand tucked in his waistband and the other clutching his phone in the dark, attempting to tease the very first alpha who’s ever going to have him in that way.

Shane

Idk….my heats are pretty intense, might be a bit much for you to handle

No shame for either of us if big bad rutting alpha needs help to satisfy me, right? ;)

Lily

Greedy

Eyes bigger than your stomach but for knot in your womb

“Holy fucking christ,” Shane mutters aloud, finally giving in to the temptation to slide his entire hand into his shorts and thumb the wet slit of his cock. The extent to which the word ‘womb’ turns him on, apparently, is a little alarming, but he’s choosing not to examine that any further - a minute quirk of Ilya’s use of English is hot, sue him.

He’s struggling to both touch himself and think of something sexy enough to type back at the same time when another text comes in.

Lily

Are you touching yourself?

Shane throws an arm over his face as if that’ll stop Ilya from somehow seeing right through him, via text, a continent away. The phone vibrates right up against his ear.

Lily

Call? I have 5 minutes

Shane

Yeah

He answers the call halfway through its first ring.

“Greedy,” Ilya hisses before Shane even has a chance to say hello. He doesn’t need video chat to picture the smirk in the alpha’s voice. “You are in bed? Hand on your cock or your hole?”

“Yeah. My - ah - cock. What are you doing?” Shane’s face is hot. He gives himself a stroke and lets his hips buck up slightly into his grip.

“Listening to you, moy kotenok, all hot and bothered for me. Put me on speaker so you can play with your tits.”

“Oh fuck you.” Not that he hesitates to comply, setting his phone down next to his pillow on speaker, sinking a little deeper under the covers. With a slight uptick in pace, he keeps stroking his cock, using his free hand to grope his own chest. Palms drag against pebbled nipples as he squeezes his pecs, first one and then the other. It’s thoughtless habit to furtively stifle whatever sounds his own touch is capable of producing - but he can’t forget his audience. He closes his eyes and tries to imagine Ilya’s hands on him instead, making him moan loud enough for the other man to pick up through the phone. Through the self-conscious embarrassment and heavy breathing, he forces himself to ask: “Are you hard?”

“Da, yes, thinking about you spread out in heat, dripping and begging for my knot.”

“I mean I might not - ah - beg for it. But I do…I do want it. Want you.”

“Is your hole slick?”

“Nn, uh-uh.” Although he knows it’s true without having to check, he reaches lower to rub his fingertips around his dry rim, the sensation making him gasp. The vast majority of the time, his suppressants keep his body from self-lubricating, even when he’s doing something as objectively horny as masturbating. It would probably be easier to lie - they’re on the phone, after all, and someone less awkward than Shane would have something to say to maintain the fantasy. “Just - ah - give me a sec…”

“Mm, but you’d be slick already if I was there, yes? Perfect for me to fuck right into, one big thrust.”

“Yeah, yeah, I would.”

Then, biting his bottom lip hard enough to hurt, Shane finally gives in to the temptation tucked beneath his pillow, a dirty t-shirt - Ilya’s dirty t-shirt. White, basic, made from thin and soft cotton. Ilya had been wearing it just before the last time he and Shane fucked, after Shane had taken it off of Ilya and then taken it home with him, later. He’d taken a few other things, too, thanks to Ilya’s stubborn insistence, but this is the only one left to which any of the alpha’s scent still (barely) clings.

He drops the t-shirt right on his face and draws in a deep breath through his mouth and nose.

Mostly it smells like Shane’s soap, his sweat, but underlying his own subtle omega sweetness remain scant traces of Ilya’s smoky forest pine and alpha musk.

Enough to make his mouth water and the warm need low in his belly surge - Shane feels the beginnings of warm wetness in his insides a few moments before he can feel it on the outside, too, slick where his fingertips are just touching his entrance.

“Ilya,” he moans, not necessarily having intended to on purpose for Ilya’s benefit. The t-shirt still over his face should be thin enough not to muffle his voice enough to be noticed through the call, he has the fleeting thought, and leaves it there. Marginally more composed, he adds, “I’m…a little slick now, kinda.”

As the tip of his index finger nudges past his rim, he almost idly swipes a drool-wet tongue against the t-shirt, the cotton growing damp above his lips.

“Good boy,” Ilya purrs. “Is good, is okay, no matter what. We work you open, slutty hole, until you take it easy like you’re meant to, da?”

“Yeah, fuck. I’m close, I’m gonna be close, soon. Are you - ?”

“Can you come like that, just from your fingers and my voice?”

“I - mmhm, I think…”

On the rare occasions when he used to masturbate entirely on his own, watching porn or trying to let off steam, before this - whatever this is - with Rozanov became more and more frequent, he almost always just focused on his cock. Seemed easier, since he could hardly produce slick anyway, to ignore the pleasurable potential to this part of his body unless he was in heat and otherwise forced to. But the sound of Ilya’s voice deepened with desire makes Shane feel so fucking empty, like the only way his body will know true pleasure ever again is to be stretched open, filled up.

His heels dig into the mattress, knees raised under the sheet and back curving as he works a finger into himself, whimpering. Then he’s opening his jaw, sucking the shirt into his mouth and moaning freely just like that, saliva soaking into the fabric. The hand not awkwardly thrust between his legs won’t settle anywhere in particular, restless, tugging his hair, palming his chest, dragging blunt fingernails across his abs. An itch under his skin he’s desperate to scratch as the pressure builds in his lower belly.

“Go on, baby, just like that. Whatever feels good, okay? Just want to hear it when you come. How many fingers?”

“Two-ish,” Shane whines, starting on the second now. He pretends he can taste Rozanov on the shirt as his hips rock down against his hand. “I’m - I - “ He distantly manages to hope the alpha is as close to the edge as he is, just from listening to Shane get himself off in the dark -

“Shane,” Ilya growls.

Just then, Shane’s hand falls above his collarbone, thumb pressing in hard to one part of his neck - his cock spurts in his underwear, ass clenching down around the fingers he has shoved up there and writhing.

“Aghhhh, fuck, Ilya. Ilya. Ah, want - ah, ah -” He cuts himself from any further words by clamping the shirt between his teeth with a loud groan.

Ilya’s saying something, Shane thinks, but for at least a few seconds he can’t make out whatever it is over the noise coming out of him - Ilya’s fault, considering he’d essentially cranked Shane’s ‘volume knob’ all the way up to porn star levels.

“ - boy, good boy, such pretty sounds, just what I wanted. Shane, moy kotenok - “

His thumb is still digging into his own neck, Shane realizes, rubbing tiny and insistent circles almost hard enough to bruise - right on his fucking mating gland. Fucking - shit. He yanks his hand away like it’s on fire and flings the t-shirt - now with a damp drool spot in the middle - from his face.

“Ilya.” Shane clears his throat, wincing a little as he gingerly removes the fingers from his hole and wipes them on his messy underwear. He’ll need another shower before he can go to sleep, after this. “Are you - " Still panting. “Did you - “

Ilya grunts, and Shane is scarcely able to interpret it as being in the negative. “Bad timing, going to save it for later. But I promise you make my cock very hard. So hard it hurts a lot, and very difficult not to come in my pants like teenage boy, okay?”

“You - what?” Shane’s kneejerk response is annoyance. Surely he isn’t being ridiculous for assuming that phone sex should naturally be reciprocal, go both ways? “But you called me.”

“Da, and?”

“What do you mean bad timing?”

“Bad time for me to take dick out. Good time for you. You give me plenty of material for later though. Shane Hollander spank bank for when I close my eyes.”

Shane can’t help his irritated huff, bothered despite realizing he probably has no logical reason to be. But there’s an irrational embarrassment creeping beneath his skin, a sense troublesome to shake that he’s taking something without giving anything back and making a fool of himself somehow, like showing up empty-handed to a birthday party.

“Okay,” is all he says, stilted, suddenly unable to think of anything he can say to Ilya right now that he won’t feel very stupid about or later regret. Shane blames the orgasm. He picks up his phone, avoiding the brightness of his screen, and takes it off speaker. “I…am guessing we are past five minutes at this point, huh?”

He wishes he could feel as well as hear Ilya’s low chuckle, the warm breath of it in his ear. “A little bit, is no problem. ”

“It’s ass o’clock in the morning there, yeah?” As if by narrowly turning the statement of fact into a question, Shane can pretend the precise time difference isn’t etched into his brain. He’d assumed Ilya was at home in his Moscow apartment, maybe in bed, like him, but sleep-rumpled and procrastinating getting out of bed instead of putting off sleep. “No way you’re up this early to hit the gym.”

“I’m at my father’s house.” Shane thinks he might hear Ilya sigh, or maybe blow out a stream of cigarette smoke. “He’s dead.”

“What? Ilya.” Shane’s cum is going to start going dry and gross in his underwear at any moment, and Ilya just told him his dad died. “Your dad - are you - “

“Yesterday, in the morning. I am…it is fine. He was sick. Long time coming.” A noise like a scoff. “And big asshole before he got sick, worse after. I have been busy, here, with the, um, arranging plans. Annoying family.”

“I’m so sorry.” The words feel less than useless in his mouth. Not being able to reach through the phone to wrap his arms around the alpha and rub their scent glands together is an almost tangible ache. “Ilya.” It’s all he has, name weighted with sympathy.

“You see why I call you now, yes? I need distraction. Pretty moaning in ears is best distraction.”

Still somewhat in disbelief, Shane shakes his head. “I’m here if you need to actually talk, too, y’know?”

Another pause, another long exhalation of air on the other end. “I know, Hollander.”

“...But I can help distract you, too. Since I get an orgasm out of it.” Look, Shane gets it - he isn’t entirely in denial about the fact that things between them have progressed a little beyond ‘just sex.’ But why make it even more complicated by talking too much about anything beyond what’s bringing their bodies together? “Whatever you need,” he adds, softer.

“I text you later this week. I will be busy, but…thinking of you. When I finally have chance to stroke my cock, later.”

Maybe it doesn’t amuse him as much as it should, but Shane forces himself to go along with Ilya’s banter anyway, mustering the shadow of a laugh. “Do they not have porn in Russia?”

“Not like Shane Hollander spank bank, unless you plan big career change.”

“Okay, fuck all the way off.”

“Yes, I should probably go,” Ilya says, resigned. Then, in a gentler tone: “You are good?”

Since Shane’s rejection sickness after Vegas, of course, Ilya never forgets to ask Shane how he’s feeling whenever they’re done talking or seeing one another. Right now, it makes Shane feel particularly absurd and coddled, considering he isn’t the one whose dad just fucking died. But he’s also genuinely okay - it was just a bit of phone sex, for fuck’s sake - and if the only thing he can do for Ilya to lighten his burden in this moment is reassure him of that fact, then Shane can do that.

“Yeah, I’m good.” For once it seems cruel to turn the question around on Ilya like he usually would, try to get him to confirm he’s good, too.

Miss you, Shane almost says, instead. I wish I was there. Then he’s biting his tongue and contorting the words into a more comfortable shape, however empty: “I’m here if you need anything else.” Whatever that’s worth - nothing, Shane thinks.

“Good night, moy kotenok.”

“Night.”

After that, Shane has to climb out of bed, tossing his underwear in the hamper and stumbling to the en-suite for a quick rinse in the shower. Under the hot spray of water between his shoulder blades, he closes his eyes and does his yoga breathing exercises, like he can release through each long, slow exhalation of breath another problem he can’t control or fix, washing it down the drain so he can actually get some sleep instead of worrying.

Once, using his hands to help sluice water through his hair, Shane lets them fall a few inches lower and pretends it isn’t entirely deliberate as he drags his knuckles over the mating gland in his neck. The sensation makes him shudder, though it doesn’t feel nearly as good as it had when he’d done it without realizing, part of what’d gotten him off so spectacularly while listening to Ilya’s voice.

Something else to worry about, he supposes, draw deep into his lungs and exhale out again, where it will still be waiting for him in the morning.

…..

Ilya’s done a decent job of lying to himself over the past month in Moscow, pretending like the thought of getting to see Shane Hollander’s freckles in the flesh again, and soon, isn’t what gets him through the worst of those days. The reality of which becomes much harder to deny once finally faced with the man himself, as Ilya slides into his passenger seat at the airport.

Shane doesn’t turn his head to look at him as he pulls out of the parking lot, and his expression is atypically inscrutable behind sunglasses - freckles still visible around the dark rims. He smells even better than Ilya remembers, honey floral musk escaping the scent blocking patches on the sides of his neck, a siren song for alpha senses, with just the hint of something sharper.

Ilya has to quell the urge to snap his teeth at the thought of any other alphas getting a whiff of Shane like this. His body isn’t begging to be fucked just yet, but the ripening of his scent is a sign that he will be, soon. If the omega went milling about in public, outside the confines of his car, the tinge of his oncoming heat would definitely attract leers and catcalls.

The stupid alpha jealousy in Ilya’s chest is smothered with stupid alpha smugness by reminding himself no one will be getting to smell Shane Hollander like this but him.

No one else ever has, probably, except when Shane was a teen and still had to deal with his heats under his parents’ roof. It’s a fact Ilya has long been well-aware of, that Shane has spent every one of his heats alone.

Until now. Asking Ilya to partner him - for whatever godfor-fucking-saken reason.

(It’s easier playing dumb, rather than thinking about all the reasons. For this. For them. A thought can’t hurt you if you don’t acknowledge its existence, goes the logic.)

The air-conditioner is on full blast, but traces of sweat glimmer on Shane’s forehead and in the hollow of his throat, the peek of chest where his top few buttons are undone. Ilya’s mouth waters with the knowledge that, soon enough, there will be nothing stopping him from chasing that sweat with his tongue.

“Smell like you’re looking for trouble, Hollander.” He takes a deliberately deep breath in through his nose for emphasis.

Shane’s cheeks redden all the way to the tips of his ears. “Fuck off,” he snorts. “What about you? Smells like trouble found me.”

“Hm, I am thinking of a phrase…I think it is called telling on yourself?” Ilya smirks and chuckles. “Rut comes fast, not like heat. This is my normal scent. Is your preheat making me smell extra yummy to you already, moy kotenok?”

Some of the awkward tension of the initial few minutes of their reunion dissipating, Ilya gives in to the temptation to finally exchange scents like he’s been dying to since opening the car door. Based on the unending irregular rhythm of Shane’s fingers tap-tap-tapping the steering wheel, Ilya figures it might help ease his nerves, too. Because Shane is driving, Ilya telegraphs his reach, only intending to rest his palm on the back of the omega’s neck for a few moments, maybe let his wrist brush the edge of the scent blocker -

Inches from Shane’s neck, practically out of nowhere, Shane swats Ilya’s hand away.

Ilya yelps - entirely due to outright surprise, rather than any actual force from the swat. Sure, he could’ve asked permission before reaching out, he supposes, bemused. But given everything else they’ve got going on at this point, it hadn’t occurred to him to question such a relatively minor intimacy.

Donning an overly-aggrieved scowl, Ilya clutches his hand to his chest and whines. “Shane.”

And, to Shane’s credit, his immediate grimace is apologetic. “Shit, sorry.” He reaches out, hesitating not once but twice before finally giving Ilya’s knee a single, tentative pat. The first time they’ve touched each other in months, fucking finally, the briefest flashes of Shane’s palm on the back of Ilya’s hand, his knee. Like touching a hot stove.

“I’m seriously sorry about, um, that,” Shane apologizes again, then launches into a ramble. “This. Obviously this is the first time I’ve got an alpha in my space when I’m…y’know - and I think I might really not like to be touched right now. At least during this part of my preheat. Which probably really sucks for you, and I’m not super thrilled about it either, honestly, but…” He pushes his hand through the sweat-dampened strands of hair falling across his forehead and sighs. “Sorry.”

Ilya shrugs, then puts his hands up and waves them. “No, no, no, is okay, Hollander. You say no touch, we don’t touch. I wait.” He slaps his own thigh to stop himself from automatically reaching for Shane again. “It’s just preheat. You will change your mind.”

“No shit.”

The initial onset of hormones at the start of their breeding cycle can make omegas sensitive. Some more than others. Some crave coddling during preheat, the soothing blanket of an alpha’s touch in the gradual build-up to a hormone-fueled fuckfest. Others get agitated and territorial, everything a little too much, with an alpha’s presence particularly grating against over-expanded senses before the haze of needing to get fucked finally settles in.

Figures Hollander would be the latter, more challenging type. Ilya grins. It might grate against his senses, for now, not being able to touch or scent Shane, but Ilya has a predator’s patience. He’s a wolf in the winter chill, waiting for the moment when he’ll get to warm himself with the hot blood of the prey he’s been tracking. Only unlike a wolf, Ilya has to wait for his prey to come to him. He can do that.

The inevitability crackles like static in the air.

“Ugh, this is so fucking weird,” Shane says, face scrunching in that half-embarrassed, half-annoyed way he does so often that Ilya can’t help but find adorable. He rolls the car windows halfway down without adjusting the air-conditioner from high, and then Ilya just has to laugh.

But he feels a little guilty, too, sitting there playing passenger princess when Shane is clearly uncomfortable. “I offered to rent a car and drive myself,” he reminds Shane. He knows better than to offer to take over driving now, and tiptoes with his English around saying anything to make Shane bristle. “You could be nesting.” Could is the right word to use there, he knows, not should.

“Not worth trying to come up with a story for my parents if they saw a strange car out front. They’ll give me all the privacy I want, as long as I let them know I’m alive once or twice a day, but they live too close to probably not drive by at some point.”

Ilya grunts in acknowledgment - not that he didn’t know this already, anyway. They’d talked about it over the phone, along with just about everything else, planning out the mutual sharing of Shane’s heat, his rut. Shane asked a few questions about Ilya’s past experiences, too, about being in rut with omegas, the heats he’d partnered omegas through.

Ilya could tell when Shane was speaking with his guard up, on the phone, each word a carefully placed brick in a wall to defend himself from Ilya’s bullying. After every few bricks, Ilya could decide what to do with them - kick them down, knock them off balance, do nothing but let Shane build his silly wall a couple bricks higher, so that when Ilya did decide to kick it down, it would feel all the more like victory.

This was one of those times, Shane doing his wall-building. His questions were curious but deliberately neutral and non-intrusive. Boring. As Ilya responded, honest but without going into any specifics, he imagined Shane reading them from a written-out list, and it bothered Ilya as he realized he didn’t know what Shane’s handwriting looked like.

In this context, boring questions were fine with Ilya. He didn’t want Shane to have any thoughts in his head about Ilya with other people. Who knew what trouble those kinds of thoughts could cause up there, in that anxious brain of his? He’d make unkind and ridiculous comparisons to himself, twist Ilya’s words into inventing a standard that Shane would fail to live up to in his mind alone.

So Ilya kept his answers simple. He’d helped Svetlana through several heats, and she’d helped him through a few ruts, and they’d never synced up because it was less convenient that way, when both partners were out of their minds, and also because so much of their friendship was built on grounding one another that it just felt wrong to cross that particular line together. Not that Ilya explained that last part to Shane. The other omegas he’d been with, either during their heats or his ruts, Ilya had mostly been with to make sure the sex part was as fun as possible - because most people didn’t choose to spend their cycles lonely and miserable - with little to none of the before and after parts. Casual one-offs of mutual pleasure and convenience.

He’d used the words fun and casual and convenient in there for sure, when explaining all of this to Shane.

“So sort of like what we’re doing, only since it’s the off-season, it’s more convenient for us to cycle at the same time,” Shane commented.

Ilya chuckled, husky and teasing. “Mm, you are opposite of convenient, Hollander, for me.”

Sue him - He’d been flirting! But after a few seconds of silence on the other end, Shane sputtered, then launched into a hasty apology which Ilya had to hurriedly interrupt so he could explain he wasn’t trying to complain about the inconvenience of coming to Canada for ten days.

“...But wouldn’t Svetlana or someone else in Moscow be more convenient?”

Convinced he could hear Shane’s puppy dog eyes through the phone, Ilya silently cursed himself. What was he supposed to say to that? Fuck convenience, your heat is mine even if you lived in Antarctica and I had to walk all the way there to have you.

“Fun we will have together will be more than worth it for me,” Ilya said aloud. “You know this. Sex-wise, we are very compatible.”

Compatible. It’s become one of Ilya’s favorite English words, from the first time he looked it up and mouthed it silently, the shape of the consonants on his lips.

He could’ve said more, at the time, talk all about just how compatible they were and the fun they’d have, in explicit detail, employing all the filthy thoughts in his head. But he’d behaved himself without devolving into phone sex so they could continue to talk productively. At least that’d been the last time Shane had asked if Ilya was sure that all of this was worth the trouble, that he was worth it - which pleased Ilya, since he hoped it meant Shane was questioning his own value a little less.

The fresh air from the open car windows offers marginal relief from the distraction of Shane’s alluring scent. Ilya looks out his window and pretends he’d rather be looking at trees than at Shane - it’s easier not to accidentally reach out and touch him, that way.

“Do you want to see my test results?” Ilya asks. Something else they’d discussed over the phone some months ago. “I brought the paper.”

Condom usage. Or rather, the lack thereof. Shane’s idea, to Ilya’s shock, citing ‘the internet’ as a source on why it would be more practical to go without, as long as they were both disease-free and contraception was otherwise handled (no issues there, I would not have suggested this otherwise, trust me, Shane told him).

Shane shakes his head and shrugs. “You sent me a picture already. I don’t really need more proof than that. Why, you want to see my paper results?”

“Is cute you think you needed test done too.” Ilya cocks his head to watch Shane’s face redden out of the corner of his eye.

“It was only responsible and fair for us both to get tested,” Shane grumbles. “And it’s not like I’ve been with absolutely no one else other than you, so.”

Sure, whatever betas he’d dry humped before Ilya showed him what he was missing out on. And Mexico alpha.

But even the most indirect reminder of Shane’s Mexico alpha experience has Ilya barely managing to quash a growl and resist the urge to lean over the console and rub his scent possessively all over the omega.

Rolling the window on his side the rest of the way down, Ilya briefly debates the wisdom of sticking his whole head out of it like a dog, beast that he is, only deciding against it to avoid being demanded to explain his ridiculous behavior.

…..

Although Shane is still very much trying not to crawl out of his skin, both from preheat on its own and the impact of Ilya’s presence, there’s an unexpected relief in taking the alpha over the cottage’s threshold, a sort of unclenching of a fist in his chest Shane never noticed until suddenly it was gone.

Unfortunately it’s not enough to fix the rest of what’s wrong with him, the itching in his blood, flustered and over-warm. His extremities are tingling worse and worse by the hour, like he’s taken too much preworkout but the only cardio that work the feeling off is fucking - but the thought of anyone touching him now gets his jaw clenching and muscles tense. Even the thought of touching himself has zero appeal, despite how odd and itchy and empty he feels.

He doesn’t know how Ilya can smell so fucking good to his senses - pine and snow and a blanket of familiar alpha want which Shane’s been missing - while his body is simultaneously telling him to stay the hell away. The itchy, unpleasant tingling just worsens with proximity, a nonsensical alarm in his nervous system. More stupid omega bullshit, Shane supposes. Something his hormones are doing, while his body readies itself for the days ahead of it, keeping him untouched and unfucked until he’s ripest for breeding.

At least Rozanov isn’t giving him shit for it, a mercy Shane didn’t expect - at the very least, he’d been braced to deal with more whining.

It’s dark out, by the time they arrive. Shane flicks a switch connected to soft lamplight and offers Ilya a quick tour. Living room with television and game console. His home gym. In the kitchen, Shane pulls open the refrigerator door, grabs a can of Coke for Ilya and a ginger ale for himself. He also shows Ilya the rest of groceries he bought - mostly fruits and veggies in the fridge, for him, and bags of pizza bagels and chicken nuggets and other junk Shane’s never tried locating in the freezer aisle until now, all stuff from Ilya’s supply list. The pantry is similarly stocked: granola, instant oatmeal, two loaves of bread that are more seeds and nuts than flour, alongside an assortment of sugary cereals with mascots on the colorful boxes and three boxes of Pop-Tarts.

“There’s a mini fridge and protein shakes and a lot of snacks downstairs, too. Jerky and stuff like that,” Shane explains. “We shouldn’t need to come up here very much. Either way we definitely won’t starve.” He ignores how hot his face is from acknowledging aloud the necessary preparation for the days ahead of them, when they’ll need to take occasional breaks from fucking for the sustenance to resume.

Naturally, Ilya, eyes alight with amusement as he cracks open the soda, picks up on his plight. “Good omega, keeping me fed so I keep you fucked, hm? So I don’t run out of energy to satisfy you.” On the opposite side of the kitchen island from Shane, Ilya leans forward, elbows on the marble and wearing a smirk which shows his teeth.

And Shane knows it’s not smart to turn his back to a predator, but he does it anyway. It’s easier not to look at him when all Shane wants to do is chase that obnoxious fucking smirk away with a kiss but his stupid body won’t allow it.

“Whatever. Fuck off,” he mutters, busying himself with grabbing a frozen pizza and turning the oven on. Neither of them have had dinner yet and for once Shane is too consumed by everything else happening to his insides to worry overmuch about some excess sodium and empty carbs.

As he turns back around, Shane presses the unopened can of ginger ale to his neck, letting out a pleased little hum of relief at the feel of the ice cold metal against his over-warm skin.

”Shit.” The can almost slips out of Shane’s hand as his pupils dilate and knees shake.

All thanks to the sudden spike of alpha in the air, a burst of smoke and spice.

On the other side of the kitchen island, Ilya has gone utterly still, gaze fixed on the soda can now gathering condensation on Shane’s throat.

For a few moments, staring at Ilya and breathing the scent of him in, Shane nearly panics, thinking he might be tipping over into heat early, or maybe Ilya’s rut is on more of a hair-trigger than either of them realized. But - fuck, that annoying buzz under Shane’s skin hasn’t gone anywhere. Meanwhile, Ilya doesn’t lunge or growl, just blinks, slowly, as if centering himself without the benefit of a deep lungful of air.

“Rein your shit in, Rozanov!” Shane yanks the collar of his shirt up over his mouth and nose as he stomps past Ilya while keeping as much distance between them as possible.

“I can’t help it!” Back to crinkling in amusement, the corners of Ilya’s eyes bely his whiny tone. “Is not my fault you are so sexy.”

Shane flops onto the farthest end of the sectional with a frustrated groan and scrubs his hands over his eyes. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I’m actually looking forward for my heat to start, because it will definitely be an improvement on how I feel right now.” And here he’d originally been hoping that an alpha’s presence would alleviate his preheat symptoms instead of making them worse.

“Impossible not to look forward to spending heat with alpha as virile as me.”

“You know, I hate that that’s in your vocabulary.” Regardless of whether or not Shane feels himself smiling.

“Is there anything I can do to help, Hollander? For real, totally not sex-related. It’s one of the reasons why there is no real pre-rut, for alpha to care for omega during miserable preheat.”

Is that why he has to let himself be cared for? As dictated by biology? Shane wrinkles his nose but chooses another point to question aloud. “This miserable, with other omegas?”

Ilya shrugs. “Other omegas don’t like touch sometimes, probably, I don’t know. I’m sure you are not that special. Svetlana likes backrubs and reality TV with the rich ladies who yell at each other, and sometimes she puts on a rom-com instead that makes her cry. You’re not that bad, I don’t think. It’s hard not to touch you, but I can be patient now and make up for it later. But anyway.” He stretches his arms up over his head, and Shane has to avert his gaze from the strip of chiseled abs and trail of hair temporarily on display. “Can I help with anything?”

“Um, can you get me a plate of some of the chopped-up fruits and vegetables in the fridge, I guess? I meant to grab some before sitting down to snack on while we wait for the pizza to be done.”

Ilya practically bounces to comply as Shane looks on, half in disbelief. He stews on another idea, working up the courage to suggest it when Ilya returns with a plate, looking ridiculously pleased with himself as he stretches his arm out to hand it to Shane from a distance.

It’s…an array of fruits and veggies, all right, arranged in the vague outline of a cock and balls. Like what a twelve-year-old boy would attempt carving on his school desk, spread out on the plate in fruit form.

Ilya is waiting for a reaction, clearly, either for Shane to laugh or maybe to scold him - knowing Ilya, he’d prefer the latter - which makes Shane reflexively determined not to react and give him the satisfaction. But then, looking at Ilya, the unguarded, boyish glee all over his face over something so fucking stupid - Shane finds himself grinning back at the other man, chest shaking with laughter.

“You’re - “ Adorable. “An idiot.”

“Anything else? How about I kick your ass at video game from safe distance?” Ilya pats the opposite end of the soda.

“Yeah, good idea. But before you sit down, do you want to…would it help if you wore something with my scent already on it?”

Ilya’s eyebrows lift a fraction. Then he nods.

Shane’s burning up enough that he wouldn’t mind unbuttoning his current shirt, honestly, and tossing it at Ilya’s chest. However, he knows better than to do anything to intentionally provoke Ilya’s instinct any further, right now, and he’s self-aware enough to realize that probably includes revealing more skin.

“Down the hall, my bedroom door is open. There’s a laundry hamper right there.” He knows his face is once more turning red, thinks it would just be easier for everyone if it stayed this shade permanently. “Grab a shirt or something. Just - don’t be a weirdo about it.”

“Weirdo how? I’m going to be inside your asshole for the next week, and you’re worried about me sniffing your underwear? You think I will snoop? Who wants to snoop through things of world’s most boring man? It’s not time to sleep yet.”

He easily locates Shane’s room, doesn’t bother to flick the light on as he evidently takes whatever is right there on top, or maybe finds what he’s looking for through scent alone.

When Ilya comes back to the living room, he’s wearing the faded blue Voyageurs’ t-shirt Shane woke up in this morning. It’s all but molded to Ilya’s torso thanks to their size difference, and he has his nose buried in the shoulder and armpit as he sits down on the opposite end of the sofa with the slightest rumble of a purr.

“Gross,” Shane comments, fond, something warm and possessive and new fluttering in his chest. Reluctantly, he permits himself to enjoy the feeling, along with a bit of self-congratulations for having thought of something that so evidently pleased the alpha.

Ilya tosses Shane one of the video game controllers, picks up the other, and uses it to boot up the console. They end up playing last year’s league-licensed hockey game, the one with Rozanov’s face on the cover. After Ilya baits Shane into an argument before they’ve even made it past the start screen, they play intently, chirping like they’re against each other on the ice. So they can both graze before dinner, Shane puts the plate in the middle of the coffee table. As they play and snack and bicker, Shane becomes conscious at some point that Ilya is careful never to reach for something at the same time as Shane, respecting his need for space.

For a while - after the oven timer goes off, too, and Ilya fetches them both some pizza - they just get to hang out. The video game gives Shane something to focus on outside of his body and how damn weird he feels, helps him unwind a little as he laughs and volleys insults with Ilya just a few feet away. He hadn’t given too much thought to what these stretches of time where and he and Ilya wouldn’t be having marathon sex would be like, but it’s…nice. Not only nice, it’s fun, loads more fun than Shane ever has by himself in the single-digit number of hours he spends playing video games during his typical solo staycations. He supposes it’s not all that different from real hockey - Shane always has more fun on the ice, too, when Rozanov is there to push himself against.

Eventually, they call it a night, and Ilya gets to doing the dishes before Shane can even think about doing them himself, so he ends up lingering awkwardly, watching from the other side of the kitchen. All of Ilya’s upper body muscles bulge ridiculously in Shane’s shirt, and it occurs to Shane that he’s less than a day or so away from having all that coiled-up strength unleashed on him.

Ilya shoots Shane a glare over his shoulder, nostrils flaring. “Now who is the one who needs to rein their shit in, Hollander? Unless that is the smell of your heat starting?”

“Well, it’s not, so fuck off. I did think there was a chance I might, y’know, start early, with you here.” Shane shrugs. “But I haven’t, so probably tomorrow.”

“You are going to show me where heat room is, yes?”

Ugh. Yes. Shane had intended to show him the windowless bedroom in the basement where he always nested and spent the duration of his heat. A completely private place built and furnished expressly for that purpose and nothing else, for Shane to hide away in all the comfort he could muster as he was reduced to his basest self. His mother’s idea, another way for Shane to treat himself when they had the cottage built.

“I was going to,” Shane says. “It’s in the basement, down the stairs over there.” He points at a door. “Where the bed with the nest is gonna be and everything else, and where we’ll…yeah. But.” Cringing again at his own flummoxing behavior, he hesitates, biting his lower lip and ducking his head bashfully. “I - my omega - doesn’t really want to right now, I don’t think.”

Ilya’s brow furrows for a moment in confusion, but he’s back to grinning once the meaning clicks - at least thus sparing Shane the necessity of further explanation. “Aww, your omega is very shy, hm? Is okay, is cute. You’re like bunny who knows better than to bring bear back to den.”

“And here I thought I was a kitten.”

“Da. I said like bunny, for sake of comparison only. Bunny has den in woods. Kitten is kept.”

The words don’t seem to be loaded with any particular weight, not that Shane can hear, anyway. But he still has to bite his tongue to stop himself from asking: Is that what you’re doing, keeping me? A stupid retort to a metaphor spun out of nonsense to tease him.

Instead, Shane waves at the dishwasher. “Thanks for doing that, by the way.” He swallows, hands at his sides, fingers curling and uncurling. “And for being here. Thank you for being here.”

The amusement in Ilya’s gaze softens. “Shane.” He steps back to lean against the counter. “It’s nothing. If only I could kiss you to show you happy I am, really, that you’re letting me be here. Would you believe it then?”

“I believe it now. Still just…I’m allowed to say thanks, alright?”

“Polite Canadian boy.” Braced on the edge of the counter behind him, Ilya’s knuckles are white, the rest of his body swaying ever so slightly toward Shane. “So Mister Architect, does your fancy place have extra bedroom for me to sleep in tonight?”

Shane sighs, partially in relief that Ilya has spared him having to be the one to bring it up. “Yeah. Also not what I originally planned on, by the way, but you know…” He gestures exasperatedly at himself. “Sorry. I’m aware this is the lamest thing ever.”

“It’s no surprise. You are very lame, Hollander.”

Ilya winks, and Shane rolls his eyes, smiling begrudgingly.

…..

Before Shane can get them, Ilya snatches up his bags and takes them to the guest room pointed out to him. Following separate showers and an awkward wave good night from across the hall, they both try in earnest to get some sleep, knowing they’ll need to be well-rested for the days ahead.

It’s easier said than done, at least for Ilya, surrounded by the omega’s scent and tormented by both the closeness and the distance between them.

While Shane was showering, Ilya thieved from the hamper the pale blue button-down Shane had been wearing all day. When Ilya closes his eyes and presses his face into the wrinkled linen, still slightly damp with Shane’s sweet and salty sweat, he imagines he’s able to hear the omega’s heartbeat from more than a room away.

What Ilya really wants to do is jerk off.

He thinks about clamping Shane’s shirt between his teeth, fisting the fabric around his cock and stroking until it’s soaked with his cum, a poor and temporary substitute for the real thing. Just enough to take the edge off, for now, help him work off some of his pent-up desire so he can fall asleep more easily. The only reason he resists is his presumption that Shane, with his preheat-heightened hypersensitivity to alpha pheromones, will know immediately. Probably be pissed off by it, too, whether he wants to be or not, and then be embarrassed and more pissed off at himself than Ilya.

Usually, pissing Hollander off is more of a reason to do something. But for as restless and horny as Ilya feels, he knows the omega has it worse than he does, and now is not the time for Ilya to go out of his way to further agitate him.

Some of the tension has leeched out of Ilya’s chest since he doesn’t have to look at Shane anymore, be in the same room as him and smell him not smelling like Ilya. The urge to scent-mark him with a deliberate brushing of pulse points, to make Shane smell the tiniest bit like his, felt as necessary and impossible as the gratification of any touch at all.

He’d noticed it earlier, a subtler sharpness faintly underlying the rest of the delectable preheat scent that had slapped Ilya in the face. Like a honey-drenched garden menaced by a swarm of bees you don’t notice until you’ve already stepped too far into their flowers. In this case, the bees are whatever the hell Shane’s hormones are doing.

But Ilya’s used to sleeping in strange rooms, under more stressful circumstances, so he falls asleep eventually. And he must find something soothing in Shane’s scent and not only riling, because Ilya sleeps deeper than he has in as long as he can remember. He wakes up feeling surprisingly refreshed just after the sun has gone up, drooling on the stolen shirt beneath his head.

He runs his hands through his curls for a few minutes trying to neaten them before poking his head into the hall. Shane’s bedroom door is still closed and he doesn’t seem to have gone anywhere - Ilya doesn’t want to risk interrupting if he’s still asleep. But the restless energy from last night thrums with renewed intensity under Ilya’s skin. He needs to work at least a little of it out, find space for the patience he promised.

He types out a text to Shane but deletes it before sending, in case the other man’s phone isn’t on silent, writes a quick note to push beneath his bedroom door instead.

Going out for jog. Be back in 1 hour or less. Call/text if you need me sooner, I will come running xoxoxo

To be cheeky, he signs it Lily, draws a heart for the dot in the i.

Then Ilya goes for a jog. The cool morning air hits oddly like a cigarette, outside of the muted haze of pheromones beginning to permeate the cottage, a pleasant jolt to his system he enjoys in deep, luxurious inhales. Ilya considers himself a city boy - it’s nice that nature is out there, for other people, but it’s never had much appeal for him. But as he runs among the trees and along the lake, imagining he can hear the beat of shorter, faster strides alongside his, sometimes ahead of him and sometimes behind - Ilya can’t help but think maybe this could have some appeal, after all.

Blood pumping, his legs find their rhythm. He feels more alert, a tad twitchier than usual, not that there’s anything out here to be twitchy about, considering Ilya doesn’t even spy so much as a squirrel.

But there’s something primal and very stupid in Ilya’s instinct which exalts at pretending he’s doing some nonsensical alpha bullshit like scouting the perimeter or surveying his potential mate’s territory to ensure their safety for the days ahead.

…Maybe he can empathize, if only a little bit, with how flustered Shane gets over his own frustratingly illogical instincts. At least Ilya gets to keep this piece of nonsensical alpha bullshit his own private embarrassment.

It’s not just due to Shane’s proximity, but part of the earliest signs of Ilya’s oncoming rut. If he were on the ice right now, he’d be even more of a monster than usual, senses heightened, a touch faster and stronger. And that’s without factoring in any additional aggression toward other alphas. No one’s allowed to play in rut, of course, but that doesn’t stop some guys in the league from trying to get themselves into a pre-rut state before a critical game, for example. The benefits are tangible, as are the liabilities. Ilya’s never bothered with it himself, however - he’ll leave that sort of thing to players who, unlike him, aren’t just damn good enough on their own.

Ilya’s pulse beats faster and louder in his ears against the sound of his shoes on the dirt path. Something about it makes him think about fucking - probably because everything makes Ilya think about fucking, right now. He thinks about his heart pounding in time with rhythmic thrusts between sweat-drenched bodies. The slap of flesh instead of rubber soles.

He licks his teeth, panting.

Ilya is used to maintaining some thread of lucidity, during rut, particularly when it comes to keeping his strength controlled. The conventional knowledge goes that alphas aren’t reduced to such mindless beasts in rut as to unknowingly risk doing harm to a partner. Heat, however, tends to be different, in terms of how it affects omegas. The most basic biological explanation is that, since omegas are supposed to be smaller and weaker, they aren’t at risk of genuinely hurting their partner - regardless of whether or not that’s true in reality. An alpha in rut, meanwhile, simply has more instinctual imperative to ensure they keep an omega thoroughly fucked without damaging them.

Omegas in heat are uniquely vulnerable. Even the worst sort of knothead alphas, for the most part, are above using rut as an excuse to neglect their responsibility to care for and protect an omega in heat - on top of the whole breeding aspect, of course.

Ilya won’t risk taking any longer than he’d promised Shane in his note by wandering too far, so after about half an hour, he turns around and jogs back to the cottage approximately the same way he came. He’s gotten what he needed, fresh air and the chance to soothe the beast in his chest by stretching his legs.

Shane hasn’t called or texted him in the meantime. Maybe Ilya’s a little disappointed he didn’t have an excuse to come sprinting back and bursting heroically through the front door, but he’ll continue to be patient. He takes one last big deep breath in to regather his self-restraint before entering -

Where the scent of an omega teetering on the precipice of heat hits Ilya like a rib-shattering slam into the boards, except the boards are also on fire. Ilya feels on fire, all of sudden, surrounded by the thick scent of sweet honey-vanilla and ginger spice.

The door to the basement is open, though Ilya forces himself to bypass it initially, suspecting that he won’t be coming up from those stairs for quite a long time once he follows them downward. Shane’s bedroom door is open, too, room empty and bed unmade, reeking of arousal which Ilya doesn’t pause to bask in.

When he does pause, just inside the door to the guest room, his brow furrows at the sight of the large suitcase he brought lying open, the majority of his things strewn about in a mess around it. It takes him less than a second to realize what precisely is missing and why.

Ilya just can’t help the ridiculous grin that splits his face after that.

In his suitcase, there was a bag specifically packed with some of his softest sweats and shirts that hadn’t been washed after he wore them each once to sleep in - what he’d hoped Shane would find decadent fodder for his heat nest.

…He just hadn’t expected the omega to literally go into Ilya’s suitcase and find the clothes himself. Later, he’ll have to try to remember to feign some outrage about it, see if he can get Shane flushed and stammering in self-defense.

After the world’s shortest shower, he approaches the threshold to the basement stairs. The moment he crosses it might be the first time Ilya admits in a silent flicker of acknowledgement that he’s been lying to himself about expecting to still be the same person, once this is all over.

Just like he’s been lying to himself about not being changed by every kiss, every fuck, every goddamn glance, since the first time Ilya laid eyes on those gorgeous, stupid freckles.

Pretending like this, in particular, won’t change him in some fundamental, irrevocable way he might come to regret, if it ruins him for good.

He takes the stairs two at a time on the way down.

…..

Shane needs to make sure the nest is perfect. He’s never been quite so consumed by it before. His heat nests have never been built for anything but his own comfort, in the past. Even the nest in Ilya’s bed when he was sick was made primarily with himself in mind, since he’d been too wrung out to worry overmuch about the alpha’s preferences.

Now, however, especially with the bounty of perfect nesting materials drenched in Ilya’s pheromones at his disposal, Shane is torn between two urges. The first is to hurry, get the nest done before Ilya gets back - like that’ll somehow get him fucked faster, and he’s been wet ever since he woke himself up moaning loudly in his sleep, dreaming about -

No, no, the nest. Shane needs to focus on ensuring the nest is perfect - he can worry about the rest when Ilya gets back.

That’s the other urge, the one winning out, though every move he makes is frantic - to fuss.

He has a dresserful of his usual things to choose from - soft blankets and some of his own old clothes, stashed away here just for his heats, as well as nearly a dozen pillows in all kinds of shapes, colors, and textures. They were a ridiculous online retail therapy purchase he’d made when he was feeling especially sorry for himself during preheat two years ago, and now he’s suddenly embarrassed that Rozanov will be seeing them.

But he still includes them as he pieces the nest together, settling each item with care, tucking corners of blankets under the oversized mattress, weaving Ilya’s scent carefully throughout his own clean things. It’s difficult for Shane not to second-guess every decision he makes, wondering if he ought to move a pair of sweatpants somewhere else or fold a blanket differently, thinking he can make the nest more appealing somehow through infinite tweaks.

And that’s what it comes down to, what Shane is consumed by - not just wanting, but needing Ilya to find his stupid nest appealing.

This was a thing Shane had encountered In more than a few of the dozens of the heat-themed porn videos he skimmed through for research purposes. Near the beginning, the omega performer acted either all sexy and aroused or wide-eyed and sweet as they asked for the alpha’s opinion on their nest. He’d assumed it was a weird alpha fetish thing, not something omegas actually felt compelled to do in real life.

Fuck.

He’s aware that his heart is beating a little faster than usual, and the pumping of his jugular to keep up is a tangible drumbeat against his throat. While he’s felt uncomfortably warm for days, the slow simmering of his blood has felt cranked up to a boil since this morning. Oddly, however, he’s all of sudden barely breaking a sweat. Despite feeling like a sweaty and disgusting mess as he tossed and turned, struggling to get to sleep last night, right now Shane is only damp between his legs - just starting to soak through his boxer briefs, too, the only thing he’s still wearing.

Ilya’s voice comes from beyond the door to the stairway.

“Hollander! Shane? I am here! I am coming down the stairs now, okay? I am allowed? If I am not, tell me and I will stop, okay?”

For several seconds, Shane loses the capacity for rational thought as the sound and the scent of Ilya in the flesh hit him like an aphrodisiac. He feels himself grow more slick as his lower belly and hole both clench with raw need as he listens to bounding footsteps, and then a knock at the door.

Shane sits on the edge of the bed and tries to do his yoga breathing as his underwear grow steadily more wet. The haze of need which will reduce him his basest instinct hasn’t set in yet, which means he’s still capable of rational thought and the anxiety accompanying it.

Another knock. “Shane? Are you okay?”

Finally realizing he has to respond, Shane clears his throat nervously. “Uh - yeah! C-come in.”

As he opens one of the drawers beside the nest, he notices and tries to ignore how his hands are shaking as he grabs what he’s looking for, relieved he isn’t too far gone to have forgotten about it.

With one more deep breath to compose himself, Shane rises to his feet to meet Ilya in the middle of the room - in large part due to his eagerness for the other man’s touch, Shane resists the temptation to hide in the nest, instead.

Ilya greets him with pupils blown and nostrils flaring. “Shane.” He leaves his mouth open around the name as if to keep tasting the air around them. After a few steps into the room, he pauses, hesitating. He’s wearing gym shorts and nothing else, not even underwear, judging by the half-hard bulge Shane can see. The ends of his curls are wet; condensation glistens on sculpted shoulders and bulging pecs, his familiar necklace in its place between them. An expanse of bare skin stretched over powerful muscles, all Shane’s to finally fucking get to enjoy.

“Ilya,” Shane breathes, drawn to him like a moth to flame. He all but flings himself upon the alpha with no thought other than needing to get all that bare skin against his. As their chests collide, Ilya doesn’t stagger or flinch - just catches Shane around the waist to keep him there, bodies pressed together.

Ilya’s already purring, Shane realizes. Inaudible, but he feels the indistinct rumble in Ilya’s chest as Shane insistently exchanges their scents, rubbing the sides of their necks together. He himself, meanwhile - and only just now noticing - is humming happily in the back of his throat.

“And here I was going to behave, ask if I am yet allowed to touch you.” Ilya reaches between them to capture Shane’s chin between thumb and forefinger, looking intently into his eyes for a half-dozen heartbeats or so. Then his lips are on Shane’s, a warm press of mouths turned wet as Ilya slides his tongue between Shane’s teeth.

“It was so fucking annoying, not being able to,” Shane grumbles into Ilya’s mouth, breaking the kiss so he can nuzzle Ilya’s pulse instead. “Not wanting this is stupid as hell.” As he rubs the underside of his jaw into Ilya’s shoulder, he feels the alpha’s low chuckle vibrate through to the base of his own spine, making him squirm.

“For once we agree on something, Hollander. You are very stupid and annoying.”

The tenderness with which Ilya pets the soft insides of Shane’s forearms gives him goosebumps. The urge to bare his neck is almost overwhelming - and it reminds him.

“Though, um, there is this…I probably should’ve said sooner, but - “

“Mmm, what’s in your hand, sweetheart?” Ilya asks, distracted. He has already laced one set of their hands together and is encouragingly unfurling Shane’s other hand.

When he sees what’s in it, he freezes, and the hand holding Shane’s goes somewhat loose.

“It’s a heat collar,” Shane forces himself to say. Too nervous to look Ilya in the face, he stares down at the thick strip of black leather he’s holding, what he’d been so concerned about remembering while he’s still lucid enough to care. “To make sure you can’t…yeah.”

It’s too hard to speak the rest aloud. The collar is far from delicate - it’s sturdy, solid, and has a series of pea-sized buckles hanging from small straps at each end, intentionally annoying and finicky and difficult for fingers of any size, though particularly larger ones, to deal with. For someone in the throes of heat or rut, undoing the collar would be nearly impossible once it was in place.

That is, quite obviously, the point. A physical barrier which can only be removed by someone right enough in the head not to do or ask for something colossally, irrevocably stupid.

To make sure you can’t give me a mating bite.

Some aspect of Ilya’s scent which was building to a blazing bonfire instead begins to char.

“I…” Ilya trails off and takes a breath. Forces a hollow laugh. “Hollander, if you are so worried that I could - that I would ever - we talked about this, da? No bond bite, we agree.” His tone is stony.

And…fuck. Shane knew he was going to fuck this up, that there was no graceful way for him to introduce his intention to wear a heat collar that would be accepted with any degree of nonchalance. He knows collars worn by omegas expressly to keep an alpha from bonding them aren’t widely used nowadays outside of risky situations like heat sex with strangers.

Biting an omega in heat against their will, scarring their scent gland with a mate bond without their enthusiastic consent, is a taboo which only the worst kinds of alphas violate. Even rut isn’t considered an excuse, though some alphas may opt to wear a muzzle, if it’s something they’re that worried about - Shane’s research indicated this was rare, but somewhat common than heat collars. But, considering this was his issue, not Ilya’s, Shane would genuinely rather die than ever ask such a thing of the alpha.

A collar seemed like the easiest solution to his worries; he’d known the hardest part would be actually telling Ilya that, which is why Shane had kept putting it off. Of course, waiting until the very last moment to spring it on Ilya was just Shane fucking it up beyond the bare minimum. Maybe it would’ve been easier, if he’d been able to put the collar on himself when he was struggling to do so twenty minutes ago. But his hands were too sweaty for the clasps and staring at them for more than two minutes made his vision blur. That hadn’t been a problem when he tried it on a week ago, after it arrived at his door in discreet packaging, though it had taken several painstaking minutes of squinting at the collar in the mirror as he fastened them.

Now the collar’s weight is lead-heavy in Shane’s hand. He still hasn’t looked at Ilya, doesn’t know if his gaze upon it is part of what’s giving the collar its new weight.

“Ilya.” Shane swallows and squeezes the alpha’s hand. “This isn’t…it’s not that I don’t trust you, but - “

“Is okay. Is your choice, I know. I should not…” Ilya lets out a frustrated exhale through his nose, grappling with the English.

His hand is only still in Shane’s because Shane is hanging onto it. That’s what Shane is staring at, their joined hands. He feels small - not the kind of small he’s come to enjoy feeling, sometimes, in Ilya’s arms. Pathetic small. Coward small. When he at long last forces himself to look up at Ilya, the alpha’s expression is guarded and jaw tense as he stares down into Shane’s face. Meeting his gaze makes the backs of Shane’s eyes burn, and he has to avert them to stop himself from crying.

“I know you wouldn’t,” Shane says. “Of course you wouldn’t. But we’ll both be so out of it, and - and I’m just really worried about what could happen if - “

“Stop explaining. Is no problem. Better safe than sorry, yes? Would have brought muzzle if I knew.”

“Shut up.” Taking a step back, Shane drops Ilya’s hand and puts his forearm over his face. He can’t - it’s so fucking hard to say what he knows he has to, the truth, so that Ilya stops wondering about what it is he must have done for Shane not to trust him with such an essential, vulnerable thing, despite being the one to ask him to share his heat. It’s the last thing in the world Shane wants to admit to, but more than anything else he is compelled to repair the hard-won trust between them.

“I might…beg for it,” he musters through gritted teeth, unable to hazard even a glance at Ilya as he waits in for the other man’s uncertain reply.

“Yes, of course, is heat. And I have promised, is nothing to be - “

“Not that. I mean, also that, I am sure I will be begging for all of it, in the general sense, very soon but…” He sighs and runs a hand through his hair, where sweat is just starting to bead around his hairline, the nape of his neck. From his other hand, the collar dangles limply. “The biting. I…I’m afraid that - when I can’t control myself - I’ll beg you to bond-bite me.”

In the lingering silence, Shane can’t avoid looking at him anymore - at Ilya’s expression, uncharacteristically strained.

Brow furrowed, the alpha huffs and curses in a spit of Russian. “I am…confused. By English. You are afraid of - wanting bite? That’s…”

Shane is on the verge of whining, and he can feel his hamstrings starting to quake. He misses the warmth of Ilya’s skin against his to a visceral degree. And he knows what he’s saying sounds like nonsense without any further explanation. But honesty comes a little easier every second his oncoming heat loosens his tongue, flush rising in his cheeks. He licks his lips and stares at the wall behind Ilya’s head, pitiful in tearing the words out of himself.

“I can’t stop thinking about it when I touch myself and pretend it’s you. I - fuck, Ilya - even when I try not to, I’ve been having dreams about it.” Shane blinks back the tears prickling behind his eyes. “And it definitely means I’m gonna want you to do it to me while I’m in heat, I’m not going to be able to help it. And I know you won’t want to, you’d never do it on purpose, but you’ll be in rut, and - and if I’m begging for it, then…it’s too much, it’s too big of a risk.”

They both know what would happen to Shane if he’s ever given a mating bite by an alpha, on accident or otherwise. First and foremost, he’d be outed as omega. Not only would the mark itself be a giveaway to anyone who saw it, but the way his scent would change to scream claimed would be impossible to hide completely. Bite scars could be surgically removed, but dissipating a mate bond took many months of pharmaceutical intervention.

The topic was not one which ought to require significant pre-negotiation. They weren’t doing this to mate, so they wouldn’t. Their bodies would be too preoccupied trying to breed to be too concerned about doing anything else, so all Ilya really had to do was keep in the back of his mind that he could sink his teeth into any part of Shane except one. That Ilya wouldn’t bite Shane’s mating gland was simply a given.

Or it should’ve been. If not for Shane’s recent fixation.

“I should’ve said something sooner,” he says, wiping his eyes with the back of a hand and wrapping his arms around himself. “Maybe called the whole thing off. I feel like such a fucking freak. I don’t even need to be in heat for the thought of your teeth in my neck to drive me so fucking crazy, and -”

Ilya cuts him off in fervent-sounding Russian, looking wild-eyed as he reaches out for Shane. Then he cuts himself off. “Can I touch you, please?” His voice nearly cracks around the question, accent thicker than usual.

Shane manages a tiny nod, and in less than an instant he’s back in Ilya’s arms, going just a little boneless against the breadth of the alpha’s chest. He tucks his head into the crook of Ilya’s neck, cheeks wet and wishing it wasn’t too late to hide them.

He feels a nose and mouth against the top of his head, hears Ilya murmuring in more Russian. The acrid tinge of smothered smoke has faded from the alpha’s scent.

Then Ilya’s head dips to bestow a kiss upon Shane’s mating gland, the tenderest brush of lips.

Shane’s breath hitches. His cock, which had gone half-soft, perks up again, and he feels his hole gush with slick. He shudders, leans a little further into Ilya’s body, letting his head fall back halfway.

At some point he realizes he can hear himself whimpering.

Then Ilya kisses his forehead. As he moves on for a kiss to Shane’s mouth, he places his hand on the back of Shane’s neck, squeezes so gently that the shift in pressure is almost imperceptible. Holding him just like that, Ilya tips their foreheads together, and Shane knows without being told that the alpha wants eye contact.

Slowly, Shane drags his gaze up from the crucifix on Ilya’s chest, vision blurring as he forces himself to meet Ilya’s eyes an inch away. Fingers comb through his hair. Ilya picks up his wrist, presses a kiss to its inside, and carefully removes the collar from Shane’s grasp.

The collar. Shane had already briefly forgotten.

“If this is what you really think you need, then…thank you for telling me, moy lyubimyy. Never want you to be afraid to lose hockey because of me.”

“Because of me.” Shane isn’t so far gone that he won’t insist on that being the truth of it.

For a moment Ilya looks like he might argue, but he takes a deep breath in as he tests the leather’s softness against the palm of his hand. “You need my help putting it on, da?”

Help me keep us both safe from how fiercely I want to keep you, be claimed by you, Shane thinks. Though all he says is: “Please.”

Ilya kisses Shane’s mating gland one last time, lingering a little longer to draw out how it makes Shane moan and tremble against him. Then he drapes the collar around Shane’s neck, and Shane tells himself it feels like safety.

“Anything, for you.”