Rating:

Mature

Archive Warning:

No Archive Warnings Apply

Category:

M/M

Fandoms:

Heated Rivalry (TV), Game Changers Series - Rachel Reid

Relationship:

Shane Hollander/Ilya Rozanov

Characters:

Ilya Rozanov, Shane Hollander, Cliff Marlow | Cliff Marleau, Ryan Carmichael

Additional Tags:

Canon Divergence, Episode: s01e02 Olympians (Heated Rivalry), 2014 MLH Awards in Las Vegas (Game Changers), Being Walked In On, ruined sex, Almost Being Outed, (but not), Semi-explicit sex, Protective Ilya Rozanov, they do kiss in this version because i thought they needed a treat for the trauma i put them through, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Use of first names, Pining, possibly even:, Yearning, POV Ilya Rozanov

Language:

English

Series:

Part 9 of hr canon divergence

Collections:

hollanov for the heart <3

Stats:

Published: 2026-04-16 Words: 2,430 Chapters: 1/1

it's just background noise, anyway

Summary

“Why was the fucking balcony door open?” 

“I had a cigarette,” Ilya admits in a guilty rush. “You don’t like the smoke. I was—trying to get it out before you came. And then you were here, and I—” 

And then Shane was here, and any hope of thinking about absolutely anything else had vanished into the chill of the night air. But he can’t say this, can’t say that the world narrows to a fine point when Hollander enters a room, that Ilya can finally fucking get in air when all he has to do is touch Shane like breathing and not carry Cups and build legacies and grin and bear it for cameras and share a last name and an ankle-weight of a country with his father. 

“Sorry,” Ilya tells him again, hating the way his voice trembles. 

Notes

i really don’t think we’re talking about the fact that the balcony door is open in the vegas hotel scene enough

There’s still ash on his tongue when he shoves his mouth against Hollander’s, lips sticky with expensive vodka that isn’t doing near enough to dull the sting of his want. 

Ilya had been hoping for a fight, maybe. That Hollander would shove at his shoulders, run his mouth, use his teeth. But the distance he’d put between them as a reminder of what they are, what this has to be, only seems to have softened Hollander’s edges. He’s too sweet like this, too desperate for it—letting Ilya push him around and press him into the bulge of his cock, into the mattress on his knees, letting Ilya take and take without demanding anything in return. 

Ilya wishes he would ask. 

“Crying already,” he purrs against Hollander’s ear while he fucks him toward the headboard, hand clamped on his shoulder to keep him from connecting with it. “You miss me that much, Hollander?” 

He licks a hot stripe up the side of his cheek to taste the salt with his tongue, then shoves it inside of Hollander’s open, eager mouth. 

“Fuck you,” Hollander gasps, but his brow is furrowed and his nose is scrunched, freckles dancing across his flushed skin, and Ilya feels insane with power. Like he shouldn’t have this much of it, probably. Hollander reaches back and slaps a hand against the side of Ilya’s thigh, digs his nails in and pulls. “There, Rozanov. Don’t fucking stop.” 

Nothing in this world could make me stop, Ilya thinks. 

“Yes? Right there?” he says, just to be a little bit mean. He likes this view, likes the wide spread of Hollander’s shoulders underneath him, the slick sticking to him in the dim light. 

He’d wanted to fuck on the sofa. More impersonal, maybe, but also more convenient. He’d been looking forward to watching the flicker of the fancy little fireplace on Hollander’s skin, watching his eyes glisten as Ilya fucked him to tears, the muscles rippling in his back when Ilya bent him over the end of it. But. It’s a lot of windows, Hollander said, so Ilya had moved them to the bed. He’s nothing if not a generous host. 

He would take this anywhere Hollander allowed. It would be foolish to pretend otherwise at this point. 

Ilya digs his fingers into the plush of Hollander’s hips, right where the skin folds and bulges, a nice handful for his palms. Hollander had said right there, don’t stop, but Ilya can—he can make it better, can get deeper, can be enough. He can. He knows this body better than his own. 

He bends low, wraps an arm around Hollander’s shoulders to pull him back flush against his chest, chases him down flat against the bed. Nudges one of his legs up a little to the side and grinds down and forward just the way he knows Hollander likes, the way that gets him making that noise that Ilya replays and replays on his lonely nights, the one he’d teased Hollander about making into his—into Jane’s—ringtone. 

You’d never hear it anyway, he’d told Ilya with that face that’s sort of annoyed and sort of something Ilya can’t define, we don’t call each other. 

But we would know, Ilya wagered, and then they’d fucked about it, and it was fine. 

Hollander makes the noise for him now, soft and sweet and just for Ilya, and Ilya slobbers wet kisses across the back of his neck and shoulders he’ll watch him scrub off later, desperate for marks he can’t leave. 

Sometimes, when he closes his eyes, he still sees Having a good time? in his head. The buoyant innocence of it. The simplicity of it. A fucking lifeboat. 

He hasn’t deleted it yet. Doesn’t think he can. 

Ilya threads their fingers together roughly, slides them up underneath the pillow by Hollander’s head. Bites his ear lobe as he rocks into him. “You close?” 

“Don’t stop,” he begs again, so Ilya doesn’t. 

His own heartbeat pounds in his ears, determination seething beneath the surface. His control is paper thin, vast and wide from the front, no more than a whisper from a different angle. He wears his feelings too close to his chest where Hollander’s involved, isn’t sure how to stop. He thinks about the photos from earlier this evening sitting in his phone right now in a private folder. Thinks about how no one knows, can ever know, will ever know. He fucks Hollander harder, but Hollander always likes it a little like that. Hadn’t signed up for a version of Ilya that isn’t rough all around the edges. 

Underneath the pillow and out of sight, Hollander’s fingers tremble in Ilya’s grip, clinging tight. His mouth drops open again, spit soaking into Ilya’s pillowcase. He’s practically vibrating with it and Ilya can feel it, how close he is, that he’s going to come just like this the way he does when Ilya fucks him nice and deep for long enough. 

He pushes in, presses harder, desperate for the pride that comes with it. Ilya had fooled everyone enough to win himself a trophy today but this, right here is what really makes him a winner. Makes him want to prove himself until he can’t anymore. 

His lips slide against the sweat on Hollander’s temple, his cheek. Ilya opens his mouth to give it to him, because Hollander likes to be given permission even if he says he doesn’t, but the rumble of close voices—too close—makes him stutter to an immediate stop. 

Hollander whimpers. Instinctively, Ilya shoves a hand over his mouth. 

He pushes up on his free arm, tries to reel in his breathing over the ringing in his ears. Hollander might be lost in his head where Ilya put him, but Ilya has never been able to let go so easily. He’d listened for footsteps for eighteen years of his life. Sometimes, he still does. 

Ilya’s blood freezes over at the sound of the balcony door swinging open, the blinds rattling against the wall. Hollander’s heard it now too, his entire body going rigid and eerily still on the bed. 

His heart hammers, mind lapping through his options here. There’s loud shushing and the scuff of shoes on the shiny tile, two people, Ilya thinks. Slurred whispers—drunks, maybe? Easier to fight that way, especially when all he’s got here is his fists. 

“Shit,” comes a hiss from the other side of the partition, the clink of something ceramic wobbling. “Fucking—careful. Shit’s expensive, bro. Roz’s gonna be so mad if he’s gotta pay for that.” 

Ilya freezes again. 

“...Marly?” 

There’s a guilty pause. 

“Uh. Hey,” Marly calls out through the suite. Then, as if he can’t hold it in, “Carmy’s here too.” 

“Hey, Roz,” Carmichael adds with a hiccup. 

Ilya keeps his hand over Hollander’s face but shifts it up, more to cover his features than just his mouth. Hollander is breathing shallow and too fast beneath him. Ilya swallows and drops his weight onto him, covering as much of him as he can. 

“What the fuck are you doing here?” he calls back. 

“We came to surprise you on your big night, man!” Marly’s voice echoes. Something else knocks into a wall, the clinking of drinks from the bar cart. “Your little speech with Hollander was cute, by the way. Did you actually get his number? We could invi—” 

“Get out,” Ilya says. 

Marly chuckles. His voice comes closer. “Woah, take it easy, Roz. You’re the one who left the balcony door open! Figured you were one step ahead of us already.” 

Ilya tenses. “Marly—” 

“Aw, c’mon, man. You love a surprise party!” 

Something that sounds like an elbow rattles the wall in front of the headboard, and Hollander curls in on himself beneath him, face hidden in Ilya’s palm. 

“Do not fucking come around this corner,” Ilya barks, spreading himself as much as he can over Hollander. “I swear to God, Marly. I will make sure you never see ice again.” 

The pause is longer this time. Distantly, Carmichael stops helping himself to Ilya’s vodka. 

“Oh, shit. You got a girl in here, man?” Marly whispers loudly. Drunkenly, he tacks on, “Is it… is it Jane?” 

“Get the fuck out. Both of you. Now.” 

Two pairs of sneakers scuff the floor again, and Ilya thinks okay, yes, finally, they’re leaving, but then—

“Hey, is that—whose tux is this?” Carmichael mutters. 

Hollander chokes beneath him. Ilya grits his teeth. 

“Carmichael. If you want to play hockey again you keep your mouth shut and get the fuck out of my suite. Understand?” 

He can hear whispered cursing as Marly shoves him in the shoulder. “Shit, dude. We’re sorry, we didn’t think—” 

“No, you didn’t,” Ilya snaps. “Be sorry somewhere fucking else. Go.” 

Finally, the door handle clicks, automated lock beeping. Two pairs of footsteps stumble out into the hallway and the door slams shut again behind them, the sound ricocheting through Hollander, then through Ilya, rattling around the sudden, sharp silence of the room. 

Ilya says nothing for a long moment. He swallows down the knot in his throat, shuts his eyes and takes a breath. He carefully lifts his hand off of Hollander’s face and flinches at the sound wrenched from his chest that follows. 

“Hollander,” he says. He hovers, still inside of him but unsure of if he’s allowed to touch anywhere else, desperate to know everything is okay. “Hollander. Shane.” 

“Fuck,” Shane chokes eventually. 

Ilya collapses on top of him, mouth pressed to the skin between his shoulder blades. “I know. It’s okay. They did not see.” 

“My tux, Ilya, they—” he whimpers, shoving his face into the pillow caught between his fists. 

“They are drunk and stupid and they will not remember in the morning.” 

“But what if—?” he asks. 

“Then I will make sure it is handled.” 

It comes out too strong, maybe. Too certain. Too obvious that he would punish his own team before he would ever think to place any blame on Hollander. Shane. Shane. 

And—he’d said Ilya. 

“Fuck,” Shane spits out again, shaky. “That was too fucking close.” 

Yes. He winces. 

“I am sorry.” 

“Why was the fucking balcony door open?” 

“I had a cigarette,” Ilya admits in a guilty rush. “You don’t like the smoke. I was—trying to get it out before you came. And then you were here, and I—” 

And then Shane was here, and any hope of thinking about absolutely anything else had vanished into the chill of the night air. But he can’t say this, can’t say that the world narrows to a fine point when Hollander enters a room, that Ilya can finally fucking get in air when all he has to do is touch Shane like breathing and not carry Cups and build legacies and grin and bear it for cameras and share a last name and an ankle-weight of a country with his father. 

“Sorry,” Ilya tells him again, hating the way his voice trembles. 

He’s never scared during. It’s always after. 

“Rozanov?” Shane asks, pushing up a little on his elbows. Ilya presses a little on his shoulder so he won’t turn around and see his face, which is as much an admission as anything. His voice softens. “Hey, Ilya, it’s fine. It’s—like you said, right? They didn’t see us. We’re good. We’re fine.” 

Through gravel, Ilya manages, “Yes. Fine.” 

Pulses sinking and sweat uncomfortably cool, Ilya’s gone almost completely soft when he shifts his weight. Shane reaches back, touches his fingertips gently to where he’d dug his nails in earlier. 

“We should—get cleaned up. Make sure everything’s shut now.” 

He nods even though Shane can’t see it, extra careful as he pulls out and disposes of the condom. He tugs on his boxers from earlier to walk through the suite, pulling the balcony door soundly closed and locking it tight, double checking the main door to the room and flipping the deadbolt, pulling the curtains shut on the windows. He feels unsteady on his feet. 

In the ensuite, he hears Shane start the shower. Ilya idles beside the bed with a blank stare. It’s always a toss up if Shane wants company or not. Usually not, if it’s afterward. Like he can’t properly get clean if Ilya’s still there. Or something. 

“Ilya,” he says from the doorway. Ilya’s head snaps up. “You—are you coming?” 

I shouldn’t, Ilya thinks, but his feet are already answering for him, moving toward the bathroom. Toward heat and Shane and somewhere with a lock on the door and a curtain to hide behind. He thinks of the photo of them on stage again and something in him aches. 

He tells Shane I’m sorry again when the spray of the water over them is just loud enough to almost drown it out. Shane puts a hand on the back of his neck and pulls Ilya’s head to his shoulder and says it’s okay, it’s fine, we’re okay while soap circles the drain at their feet. 

They share a towel. Shane wears a shirt from Ilya’s suitcase instead of the tux. He shuffles on his socked feet by the sink, chews at his lip. 

“Maybe—maybe I should stay,” he offers. “Just for a little while. We don’t know if they’re still out somewhere in the hotel, or—” 

“Yes. I think so.” 

Shane sucks in a breath, exhales slow as he nods. Relief, maybe, is the other thing that Ilya couldn’t put a name to before. 

He hadn’t planned on Shane staying, so he hadn’t ordered a change of linens ahead of time, and there’s only towels in the closet. So Shane grabs two of the clean pillows and Ilya yanks the duvet from the top of the mattress and they settle into the sofa instead, right in the big, roomy corner of it that Ilya had thought about fucking him in earlier. 

He can see almost the entire suite from here and when Shane’s head meets his lap, blanket tucked around his shoulders, the fireplace flickers just the way he’d wanted it to. They’re quiet for a while as the adrenaline fades and gives way to exhaustion, Shane’s lashes eventually fluttering against his cheeks as his eyes close. Ilya sifts his fingers through damp hair and feels slightly calmer, watching it. 

“Just for a little bit,” Shane murmurs as he falls into sleep, and Ilya hums a lazy assent. 

It doesn’t much matter how long a little bit is. He’ll be here regardless. As long as he’s allowed.