Rating:

Explicit

Archive Warning:

No Archive Warnings Apply

Category:

M/M

Fandom:

Heated Rivalry (TV)

Relationship:

Shane Hollander/Ilya Rozanov

Additional Tags:

Alternate Universe - Burlesque Club, Angst with a Happy Ending, Slow Burn, Eventual Smut, Mutual Pining, Forbidden Love, Trope Subversion, Healing from Trauma, canon-typical shitty parental figures, ilya rozanovology, basically a crazy horse paris au set in nyc, author got carried away with worldbuilding, yearning porn

Language:

English

Stats:

Published: 2026-02-27 Words: 40,966 Chapters: 1/1

House of Mirrors

Summary

When Janet had made Ilya manager, he’d been elated. A chance to make the change he knew was needed. He had done that, yes. But more responsibility hadn’t brought more control. In fact, it was the opposite. The harder he worked, the more he felt like the universe could take it away at any moment.

Someone else would have eased off. Ilya could only throw himself into it even more. And the whole time, he was looking over his shoulder, waiting for the hammer to fall, and all of it to disappear. Leaving him with nothing once again.

-

(The House of Mirrors: a legendary avant-guarde New York City burlesque club dedicated to celebrating the beauty of desire. It’s Ilya Rozanov’s entire life. And Shane Hollander’s latest investment.)

Notes

this fic was inspired by two things: watching a documentary about Crazy Horse Paris, and seeing a TikTok comment that said “heated rivalry isn’t an enemies to lovers story, it’s a star-crossed lovers story.” (also pictures of connor and his nipple rings.)

i’ve read the books and you’ll see a couple book side characters in here, but i didn’t tag the books as a fandom because before i read them i avoided all fics tagged with them for fear of spoilers. while writing i avoided all book spoilers and considered only the show as my basis for canon for that reason.

lastly, because i know these sorts of AUs can tend to have it—there is NO sexual assault or anything nonconconsensual in this.

oh and heads up there’s a tiny bit of pregnancy kink at the end if you’re not into that ok thanks hope you enjoy!!

The daffodils had bloomed. And here it was barely February. Ilya had been staring out the window blankly, thinking about anything except the expense report before him, for nearly ten minutes before he noticed them.

It was just the ones planted at the base of the old oak tree across the street, about ten that some city gardener had tossed in as an after thought. There were no others on this block, or if there had been, they’d be pulled up by shithead neighborhood kids years ago. As Ilya watched, some woman in a gray peacoat, staring down at her phone, let her dog pee on the flowers.

Ilya had to smile. Sometimes the universe’s chaos had a poetry to it.

There was a knock on his office door. It was Cherie. “Roz. Madelyn just got in.”

“I will talk to her in here.”

“She won’t come upstairs.”

She wanted a scene. That was like Madelyn. She loved an audience, on or off the stage.

Ilya followed Cherie down the tiny back spiral staircase, bending over to avoid hitting his head. Technically they weren’t allowed to use these stairs until they replaced the railing and repaired the crumbling steps, but that was about halfway down the second page of priorities. Guests never came back here, and if guests didn’t see it, it didn’t exist.

Madelyn was sitting at her bare station in the full dressing room, an island of stillness among the two dozen performers preparing for the evening’s show. Earlier today, the production manager Rickey had packed away all her things into a cardboard box, along with her last check. He was standing there beside her, trying to reason with her, but Madelyn was ignoring him, staring ahead with a look of pure fury on her face. She met Ilya’s eyes in the mirror when he came in. “You fucking cunt. All these years and you think you can let me go without so much as a word?”

Immediately, the room was silent. Ilya said calmly, “I wanted a word. Is why I asked for you to come upstairs.”

“You mean you sent your little bitch errand girl to fetch me. I’ve been here as long as you. I built this place. You want me gone so you can pretend it was you.”

Cadence, in the back corner, barely turned a laugh into a snort. She’d never been able to hide her reactions to anything. It made Madelyn even angrier. She turned to the room. “He’s lied to you! He makes up all these rules and tells you the only way is to follow them, but those of us who remember know that’s not true!”

Ilya looked away, bored. Really he was taking in the expressions of everyone assembled: he saw no agreement, no latent resentments. Just irritation at the interruption with some excited anticipation of a good public catfight.

He would give them one. Never let anyone think he didn’t care about his staff. “Are you done embarrassing yourself?” Ilya said.

“You don’t even know what happened!” Madelyn sputtered. “It’s all gossip and hearsay.”

“Gossip? What I saw with my own eyes?”

That threw Madelyn. “You? How?”

Ilya pulled out his phone. He played it for her—for the whole room. The video was very clear, despite the darkness in the theater. There was Madelyn Marin, one of the House of Mirrors longest-standing performers, in a box with Evan Masters at, of all things, Mamma Mia.

It was during Money, Money, Money, ironically enough. Evan squeezed her tit with a hand before bending in to kiss her. “Probably felt like squeezing a beach ball,” someone whispered.

Madelyn whipped around, looking for the culprit. “It’s fake! Which one of you jealous bitches made that?!”

“No one. I filmed it,” Ilya said. “Yes, I enjoy the music of ABBA.”

One of those sentences was a lie. For a month now, he’d had a feeling. Evan only came on nights Madelyn was working in the members’ lounge. He barely looked at the other girls anymore. (Though he still looked at the boys. Ilya wasn’t sure if he knew he was doing it.) Cherie knew a girl who was Nina Masters’ second personal assistant, and she got the intel that Evan had booked a box at the Winter Garden on Wednesday night.

Ilya had bought one of those obstructed view tickets from the box office three minutes before curtain, and slipped into the seat thirty seconds before lights went down. It only took him five to find Madelyn and Evan. She had bragged so much over the years about the patented color of red she used on her hair. It was like a beacon.

Now her cheeks were the same color. It didn’t look so nice on them. “I’m going to tell Janet what you’ve turned this place into. She won’t stand for it.”

Janet was in Tahiti with no cell service, likely on her third glass of sauvignon blanc of the morning. “What I have turned it into?” He let his voice rise. “You mean a real place of work and not a whorehouse? You have known the rules for years now. Or are you actually in love with him?”

Madelyn stared up at him. Furious tears were gathering in her eyes. “I’ll destroy you.”

Ilya rolled his eyes. At least she hadn’t pretended it was about love. “Get out.”

She went. Without her box of things, of course. Rickey grabbed the box and followed. Someone snickered, and a dozen different conversations broke out at once, everyone turning back to their stations. Within seconds, everything was back to normal.

Ilya went over Cadence. “Sorry for laughing,” she said to him. “I couldn’t hold it in.”

“Is fine. You are ready?”

Cadence nodded. She was settling the false diamond headpiece into her upswept braids—the headpiece that up until tonight had been Madelyn’s. “I’m nervous. But ready.”

That was all Ilya could ask. To the rest of the room, he called, “Break legs!”

“Not asses!” most all of them called back.

—-—

The main show was a good one tonight. Ilya hadn’t watched it in a while, but with Svetlana still in Asia and today’s tumult, he wanted to make sure all was well. Cadence was a more refined performer than Madelyn. Madelyn had relied heavily on pure sex appeal. That was what Janet preferred.

With Madelyn gone, Ilya was one of only a handful of people left that Janet herself had hired.

He and Madelyn hadn’t performed together on stage in a long time, but for a while that had been every night’s featured performance. They looked nothing alike, and yet Janet had always called them her “matched set.” In them, her vision was perfected.

Cherie found him after the show. “Zach Anderson is here, with a big group. They’re in the second private room.”

For the second time that night, Ilya followed Cherie towards trouble. Party boy reputation and friendship with Evan Masters aside, Zach Anderson hadn’t caused an issue at the House yet. But Ilya was anticipating it.

It needed careful handling. With Anderson were four or five other men, most of whom Ilya recognized as members. They’d all joined in the last four years since Anderson had and their fees had paid for the expansion of this very room. It had its own little stage and pole, in the middle of the blue velvet couches and chairs scattered about. “Gentlemen,” Ilya said.

“Roz!” Anderson lifted a finger in greeting. He already had a glass of whiskey in hand, lounging on one of the couches. Karina was making the rounds with everyone else’s drinks. “We brought you new blood.”

“I am guessing that means a literal bag of blood?”

Anderson laughed. “This is why I love you, man. You’re not afraid to give me shit. No. Say hi, Hollander.”

One of the men Ilya didn’t recognize lifted his head. He’d been staring down at his shoes. “Hello,” he said.

In one way, he was Masters and Anderson’s usual: a rich boy dressed in designer clothes bought for him by someone else, obvious in the way the outfit had no cohesion. In another way, he was the opposite. First, he wasn’t white; he was east Asian. From where specifically Ilya had no idea. But this Hollander had big eyes under straight black brows, and a dusting of freckles on his cheeks. Which were blushing.

“Nice to meet you,” Ilya said, letting each word roll off the tip of his tongue with a hint of suggestiveness. The blush deepened.

“Come on, Roz, go easy on the poor guy. He’s not used to you,” said another one of the men.

Ilya raised his hands. “I am easy. I am the easiest. Do we need anything in here?”

“Is Madelyn working tonight?”

“Ah, no. Madelyn is no longer with us.”

“Probably for the better. Couldn’t speak to her anymore without Masters staring daggers. Where is he, anyway?” None of his friends knew, and Ilya didn’t reply. “Got anyone else?”

Ilya glanced at Cherie, standing unobtrusively by the door next to John Paul, one of the security guys. She tapped the inside of her palm with a finger. “Paloma,” Ilya said to Anderson. “She is new. You will like her.”

“Send her in. And, Hollander, you need the tour! Roz, could you?”

“Of course.”

Hollander rose to his feet as if the last thing he wanted was the tour, but he went out the room after Ilya. Outside, Cherie was already speaking into her headset. Paloma would be in the room in seconds, and Ilya bet she would be dressed in Anderson’s favorite color.

“Anderson took you through the members’ entrance?” Ilya asked Hollander.

“Is that the sketchy door in the alleyway?”

“It is. We will go back out that way and start in the front.” Ilya held a hand out, gesturing for Hollander to walk ahead of him. “After you.”

It gave him a chance to observe. Hollander was taller than he’d looked slouched into himself on the couch, of height with Ilya. His haircut was conservative with blunt edges. The way his cashmere sweater lay across his shoulders suggested time spent in the gym.

Matty, the newish attendant at the members’ entrance, gave them a charming smile and a warm “Have a wonderful evening, gentlemen,” as he should. By contrast, the alley outside was chilly. It smelled bad, due to the 7-Eleven next door having their dumpsters nearby.

“Not exactly where you’d expect the entrance to a place like that to be,” Hollander said.

That was the point. Ilya said nothing, though, simply led Hollander around the corner to the street entrance. House of Mirrors. Established 1972. a simple bronze plaque said beside the old-fashioned metalwork doors. “Welcome,” Ilya said, and held one open. Hollander met his eyes briefly. Ilya had the fleeting impression of sharp intelligence and roiling uneasiness behind them, and then Hollander looked away to enter.

Only to stop after two steps. Ilya understood. “Our namesake,” he said. The large foyer was a mirrored box, the lights hung from the ceiling high overhead sending a rainbow scattering of light through it. It was like stepping inside a diamond at midnight. “Wow,” Hollander said softly, almost unconsciously, like he didn’t realize he’d spoke.

Ilya let him take it in, watching him in the mirrored wall ahead of them. Those sharp eyes were taking in everything—and then they met Ilya’s gaze in the mirror. Again, Hollander looked away quickly.

Ilya pulled back the velvet curtain across the entrance, moving them forward into the main atrium, decorated to look like a 19th century Parisian opera house, and began his spiel. “The House of Mirrors is one of the highly respected Houses of Desire, founded in Paris in 1953 by Arnold Devereux. With houses now in ten different countries, we remain the only non-European House.” He nodded to the security and ticket desk. The second main stage show of the evening was set to begin in about an hour so the bar to the left was already full, and the lounge before them on its way.

“This is the public-facing part of the House. Crystal’s,” he pointed to the bar, “the main stage, and the two galleries upstairs. For most people who enter our doors, is all they will ever know of us.”

“How often do you change the main stage show?” Hollander asked. He was looking around keenly. The sense of discomfort that had radiated off of him before was gone now.

“It will change this year. Our artistic director, Svetlana Vertrova, is currently in Asia researching her next creation.”

“And the galleries?”

“Every six months or so.”

“You have a curator for those as well?”

Ilya frowned. “Are you a journalist?”

It wouldn’t be the first time a journalist tried to trick their way in. Hollander, however, looked at Ilya in shock. “What? No. I’m—well, I guess I’m not exactly here of my own volition. Here.”

From his wallet, he offered Ilya a business card. It was printed on a creamy, heavyweight cardstock, much more elegantly designed than Ilya would have thought someone as milquetoast as Hollander would have. Hollander Financial Group, the top of the card read. Shane Hollander, Vice President of Investments and Acquisitions.

Ilya’s stomach dropped out. He stood there, staring at the card for far too long. “I see,” he said, even though he didn’t. After all these years, of course this would be how he found out Janet was selling the place out from under him. From all of them.

Hollander was oblivious. “Yes, I’m sure you’ve heard from your boss. She approached us. That’s why I’m here.”

“Of course,” Ilya said. He made sure his face was smooth, giving nothing away. “I didn’t expect you so soon.”

“It’s how we do business. Come in and take a look before everything can be cleaned up.” Now Ilya understood the scrutiny in Hollander’s gaze. He looked around too, seeing it through his eyes: the bar, redone three years ago. The chandelier the House’s designer found in an auction house in London.

And of course, everywhere, the beautiful men and women in the House’s mesh and satin. Up here in the front, the uniforms were far more conservative. It was the little details that gave them the House flair. Pants that hugged an ass a little too tightly. Four shirt buttons undone instead of two. Faintly blushing cheeks and bite-reddened lips. Diamonds (fake ones) on throats, ears, and wrists.

“Please continue,” Hollander said. “Just pretend I’m same as anyone else. I was supposed to be incognito, but I’m not very good at that.”

Ilya obliged, showing Hollander the main stage theater, filling up with tonight’s attendees, then leading them upstairs to the labyrinthine galleries. He didn’t want to think about this new information, anyway. He’d let himself believe Janet didn’t care about them. That she’d forgotten there was a New York location in the House portfolio.

Actually, if Ilya was really honest with himself, he thought her silence and intermittent presence, dwindling year over year, signified trust. It was her, after all, who not only hired him, but promoted him up the ranks. Dancer to featured performer to floor manager to membership director. She’d hired Svetlana as artistic director partly on his recommendation, too, shortly after that—and then she’d put the keys in their hands and walked away. No matter how much he’d told himself that having the keys didn’t mean they owned anything, he’d started to believe it did.

He was a fucking idiot.

He didn’t linger in the galleries; right now, they had an exhibition of Cadinot photography from the Devereux family collection. Even in the low light, Ilya could see Hollander was blushing at some of them as they wound through it. “This place is a little bit of a maze,” Hollander said.

“Yes. If you can’t find your way out…” Ilya pointed to where the ceiling met a back wall. The faint red light of a security camera was barely visible. “One of the staff will happily come to your rescue.”

“That’d be embarrassing,” Hollander laughed. “I’ll keep my wits about me. Oh!”

They’d rounded a corner and come upon a couple embracing in front of one of the photographs. They were only kissing, which was banal compared to stories Ilya had heard of the House’s earliest days decades back. The woman caught sight of them and, giggling, dragged her paramour away by the hand.

“That’s allowed?” Hollander said. He sounded deeply scandalized.

All the better. If he thought they were perverts, maybe his company would back out of the deal. “We will intervene if needed. But everyone who comes through our doors understands what they might see. And signs a release.”

“Ah. Got it. Knowing they’re being filmed probably makes people behave.”

Ilya almost laughed. He stopped himself just in time. He hadn’t heard words so innocent spoken in this building maybe ever. “The threat of being banned is a little more effective.”

Some of his amusement slipped through, because Hollander looked at him with a slight frown. “That’s it for the publicly accessible areas?”

“Yes. But if you are a member…”

At the back of the gallery’s last room was a hidden latch. It allowed Ilya to act like all he had to do was press on the wall to make a door appear. It swung open soundlessly. “Oh wow,” Hollander said with gratifying surprise.

The front of the building was Parisian opera house; the back was classic New York speakeasy. Ilya, like Janet, knew his clientele. Those with the money for only a night or two wanted to be transported. Those with the money for much more than that wanted to feel at home, surrounded by nostalgia for an era they revered.

And there they all were below them. No one came up on this balcony except to access the terrace, but it was the perfect place to make an impression on newcomers. The main area of the members’ lounge felt cozy when you were ensconced in one of the arm chairs or at a card table, with the dark blue velvet wall hangings and warm lighting. From above, you could see the scale. Tonight, a Monday, thirty or so members were scattered through the room. Servers roamed among them, pausing to chat and laugh. On the small stage, across from the bar, Stefan was preparing to do his silks routine.

“It’s crazy,” Hollander said in a quiet voice. He was studying the room with the same concentration as before. “You hear stories about places like this and think they must be fabrications. It’s 2026. How could it be real?”

“Money and imagination,” Ilya said. “Anything can be real with these two things.”

Hollander cracked a smile. It made him look much younger, almost boyish. “Well, not anything. But I guess a simulacra of anything, at least.”

Ilya had never heard that word before, but he wasn’t about to ask Hollander to define it. “This space is open from 5 p.m. to 2 a.m. daily, but the co-working areas on the sixth and seventh floors are open twenty-four seven. Coffee bar, gym, meeting rooms, everything you could need. Members can bring one guest per quarter, but during our yearly charity event, anyone who buys a table can enter the entire building.”

“How many members do you have?”

“That is confidential.”

“Of course. Your code of conduct probably is, too.”

“No. Everyone needs to know what they would be signing up for. Here.”

Cherie kept one of the tables up here stocked with the slim book of membership details. Hollander took it from him and leafed through. “And it really works? You don’t have trouble? Seems like a perfect storm for hostile workplace issues, harrassment—”

“The cameras you saw out there are here too. Someone is monitoring 24/7. And we have security in every room, even the private ones. Any improper behavior results in a lifetime ban, membership fees forfeit. Membership applicants are subject to background checks as well. And romantic, sexual, and financial relationships between members and staff outside of the House are strictly prohibited.”

Hollander nodded slowly. He was looking at the Staff section of the book. Ilya’s picture and bio stared up from the page. They had done new photos for all of them (except Janet) a few years ago. Ilya was wearing a mesh shirt under a suit jacket, light just catching the glint of his nipple rings. It was a good picture. Ilya was proud of it.

“You were a dancer,” Hollander said.

It wasn’t a question. “Yes?”

Hollander looked up at him. He was smiling again, pleased at whatever he’d realized. “I thought I recognized you.”

“You have been here before?” Ilya asked. Astonishing. He never would have expected.

“My friends dragged me to a show for my twenty-first birthday. Jesus, that was eight years ago.”

Eight years ago. Just months after Ilya had joined the House. At first, he’d been in a few numbers in the main stage show. Then once Madelyn had joined, Janet had bumped him to featured performer and come up with something new for them.

“So it took you eight years to come back,” Ilya said.

“They got me so drunk beforehand I barely remember it. But I knew you looked familiar.”

“The nipple rings reminded you?” Ilya said lightly. He had gotten them done shortly after coming to New York, in a fit of recklessness all too common for him back then.

Hollander reddened again. He did it so easily. “No. Your bio says you started as a dancer here.”

Obviously. In spite of himself, Ilya smiled. This feeling was unfamiliar. He understood their members, even liked some of them. But despite what he let them believe, he’d never been charmed by any of them. Until now.

He needed to get laid, bad. Even a strait-laced finance bro with pretty freckles was catching his eye. Ila looked away, leaning on the balcony banister. “Between us. You think this acquisition is likely to happen?”

“The deal is still taking shape,” Hollander said. “I doubt it would be an acquisition, though. Is that what you’re hearing?”

Ilya shrugged. “I am sure Janet is considering all options.”

“I’d be surprised. More capital is probably what she’s looking for. But I can’t say anything beyond that.”

It was enough. The weight eased. Ilya took a deep breath. “Well, if you need anything else.”

His turn to offer a business card. Black with silver type. Hollander took it without looking at it. “Thank you for the tour.”

He held out his hand. Ilya shook it. He couldn’t resist brushing his finger over Hollander’s pulse point. “My pleasure,” he said, low, purely to see that blush spread against Hollander’s cheeks one more time.

—-—

“Wait, I’m sorry,” Fabian yelled over the music. “That old bitch is selling the place?”

“No, no, she is not selling it!” Ilya yelled back. He and Fabian and Ryan were standing on the dance floor of Fabian’s favorite club, not dancing, which wasn’t making them popular. But Fabian hadn’t wanted to wait until later to get the update. “I think they are going to invest. Which would be great! The next time it rains the basement will flood.”

“How’s the place not been shut down yet?” Ryan yelled in Ilya’s ear. “Something like that is always happening.”

Ilya shrugged. Mostly they’d been lucky. “When are you coming back?” he said to Fabian.

“Two weeks. I have three more shows in the midwest and then the tour’s done.”

Ilya nodded. “Okay, you both have fun. I will be going to find my own fun now.”

“Never change!” Fabian called after him.

Ilya made the rounds on the edge of the dance floor, observing. He hadn’t been out dancing in ages, especially not out here in Williamsburg. The crowd was slightly older, around his own age, with much more style than the average Manhattan club. Not that Ilya had been to one of those recently.

It was odd, thinking back to those early years. Then, he would leave the House, go to a party and be there until dawn. Go home with someone. Once finished, make his way to Svetlana’s apartment in Morningside Heights, where he’d slept on the couch for the first six months he’d lived in New York. Nurse his hangover. Then do it all over again.

Without realizing it, he’d grown up.

“Looking for someone?”

Ilya turned. It was a tall, leggy woman with shiny black hair, nursing a drink as she leaned against the wall. Ilya told himself it was the way she smiled at him and not the freckles on her high cheekbones that made him say, “Yes. You.”

Back in those days, he had used to cry silently, covers pulled up over his head to hide it from Svetlana, fearful that his English would never be good enough to escape Brighton Beach serving jobs. Landing at the House had saved him; performing on the main stage had freed him. The body speaks what the mouth cannot, Janet had said to him many times.

That was how she got all of them under her spell. What others saw as crass, bawdy, tasteless, the House made into high art. Religion. A paean to sensuous empowerment. Ilya had believed in it like he’d never believed in anything. He still did, to be honest.

The woman’s name was Amber. She told him after they’d had sex in her apartment, a sixth floor walk-up, and were lying in bed sharing a cigarette that she’d rolled herself. “What do you do?” she asked him.

“I am in live performance,” Ilya said, as he always did.

“Oh, like Broadway? That’s cool. It’s nice to meet someone who’s actually doing it and doesn’t just want to be doing it.”

Usually, Ilya didn’t correct people. Who cared what a one-night stand thought he did? But for some reason, tonight, he said, “No. I work at the House of Mirrors.”

Amber went up on her elbow to look at him. “No shit. Wild. I’ve only been once, for my friend’s bachelorette like years ago. Is it true there’s a whole members only section where the girls serve naked?”

“Full nudity is not allowed. And partial nudity only in some performances.”

“But the members only thing is real?” Ilya nodded. It was public knowledge, if you were part of a certain public. “No shit,” Amber said again. She laid back down, fitting herself into the crook of his arm. Her hand stroked absently up and down his stomach.

They had sex again after finishing the cigarette, then Ilya went home. It was late, nearly 4 a.m., by the time he got through the door of his shoebox one bedroom in Chinatown. Going out had been the right call, though. He felt calm, and sated. It had become too easy to forget the needs of his own body.

He’d been asleep and dead to the world only a few hours when his phone rang. He went to silence it, then saw who it was. He sat up, willing himself into wakefulness, and answered. “My Ilya,” Janet said. “How are you?”

Every time, her warm tone made it seem like they were the only two people awake in the world. Unlike her deceased husband and father, Janet hadn’t been raised in France, but she’d adopted the ghost of a French accent through the years. “I am well. So is your House.”

“Oh, I know it is. You work so hard. I never worry. And Scott keeps me updated on his side of things.”

Scott Hunter was the head of finance for the House of Mirrors. He had a fancy office in Midtown and Ilya had seen him in person maybe twice in the eight years he’d worked at the House. Most of his and Ilya’s interactions consisted of email arguments about budgets. “Where are you? Somewhere warm I hope.”

“Tahiti, darling. It’s lovely. You should go yourself. What ever happened to those big plans of yours? You used to tell me you wanted to see every continent before you were thirty.”

I’m too busy running your House. “You are right. I should go.”

“You can use the family travel planner. Anyway, that’s not what I’m calling about. You know my father always wanted to expand in the States. Well, I’ve been talking to some people about how to make that happen. It’s still a long way off, but they may come sniffing around. Don’t be surprised, all right? Make us look good.”

She was—Ilya checked the time—about twelve hours too late. “Of course. We have a new main stage feature these days. Her name is Cadence. Incredible talent.”

“You have the eye, darling. I always told you. Call if you need me. Bisous.”

There was some comfort in hearing it from her own mouth, even if it was too late. And confirmation that selling wasn’t on the table. But Ilya felt even more exhausted as he lay back down in bed.

When he’d been promoted, he’d been elated. A chance to make the change he knew was needed. He had done that, yes. But more responsibility hadn’t brought more control. In fact, it was the opposite. The harder he worked, the more he felt like the universe could take it away at any moment.

Someone else would have eased off. Ilya could only throw himself into it even more. And the whole time, he was looking over his shoulder, waiting for the hammer to fall, and all of it to disappear. Leaving him with nothing once again.

—-—

Weeks passed. No hammer fell. Just when Ilya was relaxing, thinking the deal had fallen through, he looked up and Shane Hollander was sitting down at the bar in front of him.

“Hello,” Hollander said. He was dressed like he’d come from an office, in a well-fitted but boring suit.

“Shane Hollander,” Ilya said. “Either the deal went through, or you are not who I thought you were and you have become a member.”

Hollander laughed. “Both? Sort of. The deal went through. I won’t bore you with the details, but I’m now part of the newly created Devereux North America Holdings board of directors. I figured I should come by, start spending some time at the place.”

Ilya absorbed that. “Interesting. What does this board do other than overdress for the occasion?”

It had the intended effect; Hollander looked down at his suit and then around the room. “I came from work,” he said defensively.

“I can see. So that is all?”

“For now. There’s a lot to discuss.”

And Ilya wasn’t part of those discussions. But that was probably for the better. He didn’t want to spend the next five years in Los Angeles opening up a House of Beach Glass or something equally bullshit. If they left New York alone, it might work in his favor.

“Something to drink?” Ilya was filling in at the members’ bar, as he often did when a night got unexpectedly busy. It had the added benefit of face time with members, and proximity if something happened and he was needed.

“Um. Just whiskey.”

“Any particular kind?”

“Whatever you have.”

Ilya bit back a smile. This was really who would be helping to open more Houses across America? A rich boy who requested just whiskey as his drink? Ilya didn’t bother to ask if he wanted it neat.

He poured two fingers of Macallan 25 over an ice sphere and set it on the bar. Hollander didn’t quite hide his grimace when he sipped it. Then he said, “I’ve been reading about you.”

“Me?” Ilya said, surprised.

“Yes. I got ahold of your artistic director, Svetlana Vetrova. There’s plenty written about her. Record ticket sales once she took over, awards, so on. But she told me about how the two of you came to New York together from Russia.”

Svetlana wouldn’t have spoken about him unnecessarily, but still Ilya felt his shoulders pulling back, tensing. “Did she,” he said neutrally.

“She said it was really you who turned this place around.” Hollander sipped his drink and then coughed, as if he’d forgotten what it was.

Ilya couldn’t hold back. “I am just wondering. Why order it if you don’t like it?”

Hollander coughed again, covering embarrassment. “I’d feel lame ordering ginger ale in a place like this and I already look lame enough.”

His honesty was so disarming. Ilya had never seen anything like it. He could have lied, played it off. Why hand Ilya that information about his own insecurities? “Okay. You know what tastes great with whiskey? Ginger ale.”

Ilya took the glass of Macallan back; it was too pricey to waste. In moments, he replaced it with a highball, garnished with a twist of lemon. Hollander tasted it with trepidation that quickly faded. “Oh, yes, that’s much better. Thank you.”

“You are welcome.”

“You didn’t answer my question.”

Ilya leaned his elbows on the bar, putting him at Hollander’s eye level. “You didn’t ask one.”

A flash from those sharp eyes. “You know what I mean.”

Ilya did, but it was fun to toy with him. “When Janet made me director of membership, the House was in crisis, yes. There was potential here but it was not being allowed to flourish. All I did was step back and let it thrive.”

“There are some articles from back then. Saying this place was a glorified house of escorts.”

“Some men saw it as a place to find a certain kind of companion. That is true. There were rules, but anyone who did not feel like following them was not punished. It was one of the first things I changed. Unpopular, but it weeded out those who were here for the wrong reasons. Svetlana’s genius on the main stage saved us from going under.”

Now the public-facing elements of the business were barely more lucrative than the membership. Not that it made a difference to Svetlana. She loved to tease him about her being the real moneymaker. “What else did Svetlana say?” Ilya asked Hollander.

“We mostly talked about her approach, vision, that sort of thing. The company wanted to make sure she’d be sticking around. The contract’s airtight, but all the same.”

Another little jab by omission. Ilya’s contract was similar, but no one had made sure he was sticking around. He crouched down behind the bar and busied himself unloading clean glasses from the sterilizer, then loading dirty ones. Maybe Hollander would go away and leave him to work.

No. He was still sitting there, drinking his highball, when Ilya finished. He’d loosened his tie a little, and Ilya could see his throat bob as he swallowed. “I talked to Scott Hunter too,” Hollander said like there’d been no interruption in their conversation.

“What did he say?” Ilya asked, though he didn’t care in the least.

“That you run a tight ship. Take care of your people. And he told me about how, when you were replacing the chandelier in the front foyer, the designer suggested one that cost $50,000. You told him to jump out of the plane.”

Ilya was surprised that was the anecdote Hunter had chosen. There were hundreds of them arguing over payroll. “Well,” Ilya said. “That was a stupid price. He got me one for barely $5k in the end. And you saw it, looks beautiful.”

Hollander grinned at him. “I respect your priorities.”

“People don’t come here for $50,000 chandeliers. They come for a show you can’t get anywhere else this side of the Atlantic.”

“That’s exactly what I mean. But you don’t know how many other people pay the money for the chandelier.”

“Roz.” John Paul, one of the black-suited security guys, poked his head out of the little kitchen behind the bar. “There’s an issue.”

“Excuse me,” Ilya said to Hollander, and slipped into the kitchen. “What is the problem?”

“Masters just showed up. Tried to get in, then threw a fit when he was told his membership is canceled.”

“It is. So throw him out.”

“He’s making all sorts of threats. He wants to talk to you.”

Ilya shook his head. “He is no longer a member. There is nothing for us to speak about. Throw him out. If he shows up again, call the cops.” John Paul gave a short nod and left.

They always made threats. Men at that level of wealth and power, with their kind of lawyers, loved threats. Somehow the lawyers never thought they had a case, though. “Problem?” Hollander asked when Ilya reemerged.

“Nothing to worry about.”

“I wasn’t,” Hollander said. “Just curious.”

“Ah, so you are asking as—what was it? A member of the Devereux North America Holdings board.”

Hollander flushed. Ilya needed to start a bingo board to keep up with all his triggers. It could be a fun game. “No. Don’t tell me, then.” He drained the rest of his drink.

Wordlessly, Ilya made him another. Hollander didn’t see—he had turned to watch the performance beginning. Tonight, Paloma was doing a pole routine. She made it look effortless, which if you were in the know meant she was stronger than every single person watching.

Hollander looked away when she took her bra off. Ilya thought that was a little rude considering how nicely her diamond nipple broaches glinted in the low light. “Does your company hate you? Is that why they made you join the board?” Ilya asked him, speaking quietly so they didn’t distract from the show.

Hollander laughed humorlessly. “You’d think so. No. I pushed for the deal. So it became my problem.”

He couldn’t have said anything more shocking to Ilya. “You!? Why?”

Hollander glanced at Ilya and then down at his drink. Eventually, he said, “I said a lot of things about New York City history and the preservation of all kinds of art.”

It sounded like there was more. “But?”

“But… when it came down to it, I just thought it was the right call. Couldn’t tell you why exactly.”

If they’d known each other better, Ilya would have made a lewd joke. What man with money wouldn’t want to throw it at being surrounded by beauty? And no matter how much of a prude he might seem, Hollander was still a man.

And they catered to all tastes here. “If Paloma isn’t your style, Fabian is up next.”

Hollander followed Ilya’s gaze to Fabian, dressed in an all-lace bodysuit. Paloma finished to robust applause and Fabian took his place center stage, mic in hand.

“Oh,” Hollander said after the first verse. He was entranced, his glass at risk of spilling in his unconscious hand.

So that was Hollander’s type. Ilya smiled to himself and filed the information away, as he did every time. Later, he would tell Cherie and she would note it in the file she had without a doubt already created. Before long, they would have a full profile. Likes, dislikes, favorite drink, favorite color, birthday, all of it.

That was Ilya’s true talent. He had been a good performer. But stepping off the stage and into the background allowed him to observe, and then arrange every tiny detail so Hollander, like all of the others, would never notice this little world shaping itself perfectly around his desires without him ever having to ask for it.

—-—

As it turned out, Hollander had a talent of his own Ilya had never seen before. No matter where in the building Ilya was, Hollander managed to find him and ask him questions seemingly designed to aggravate. But the most amazing part was he had no clue.

Today, Ilya had brokered a disagreement between the two costuming houses responsible for maintaining the main stage show’s costumes. Normally, that type of thing fell to Svetlana but with her still in Asia, it was up to Ilya. Someone had forgotten to keep track of who was repairing what, and a score of studded garter belts had gone missing. Panic had ensued, and only when Ilya had stepped in and threatened the end of contracts had a real search to locate them been conducted.

They were found just in time for tonight’s show. Ilya had written a fair but stern email to Rickey, who hadn’t updated the inventory correctly. Then he’d gotten called down, again, to the private room where Zach Anderson and his cronies were hanging.

“It’s not a crisis yet,” Cherie said as they hurried through the back halls. “They just need a reminder.” That sort of instinct was why Ilya had picked Cherie as his floor manager upon promotion. Her ability to read the room was even better than Ilya’s.

And the room was on the precipice of disaster. Ilya felt it in the air the moment he entered. The atmosphere was slipping from boisterous to rowdy. Paloma was circulating with a tray of drinks. Angel, the security guy, was already moving to intercept the man reaching to grab her elbox. “You know better,” Angel said to him. “No touching.”

“Heard we’re breaking rules down here,” Ilya said, voice pitched to fill the space. Silence fell immediately. The man who’d almost touched Paloma looked down, shamefaced. Ilya’s gaze traveled across the rest of them—and then saw, in the back of the room, looking up from his phone, Shane Hollander. Unexpected.

“Sorry, Roz,” Anderson said, embarrassed. “I’ll keep ‘em in order.”

Ilya held out a hand and Paloma joined him, cozying under his outstretched arm. She tilted her hip so his palm fell possessively on it. The perfect picture. His staff knew how to play their parts as well as he did. “Don’t terrorize my girls, please,” Ilya said, pleasant tone barely masking venom.

“We’ll cool it down, won’t we?” A chorus of yeahs and sorry about thats in reply to Anderson. It was always nice how cowed everyone was after word of a membership cancellation got around.

“You are good?” Ilya asked Paloma once they were outside the room.

“Yes, Roz, don’t worry. Angel’s got my back.”

“That is a last resort. Someone else will serve them for a few months. Cherie?”

“Already on it.”

The door behind them opened. It was Hollander, exiting. “Sorry, I wasn’t paying attention. I should have told them to calm down,” he said to Paloma.

“Is not your job,” Ilya said. Hollander’s friendship with those men was the most incongruous thing about him. Maybe they were the friends from eight years ago he’d referenced.

“All the same. I apologize.”

“You’re very sweet,” Paloma said to him, “I’m completely fine.”

Crisis averted, Ilya went to do what he’d been yearning to do all night. He went up to the dark and empty terrace, lit a cigarette, and stared out at the city. The nicotine and ambient noise calmed him almost as effectively as sex.

“You smoke?”

Hollander had followed him. Ilya pushed down his annoyance at both the interruption and the distaste on Hollander’s face as Ilya took another drag. It didn’t stop him from joining Ilya at the ledge, though. “No,” Ilya said, purely to be difficult. “Need something?”

“That didn’t go how I expected.”

“They know the rules. And Masters getting the boot was a good reminder of what happens when you break them.”

“Right, I heard. You really mean the zero tolerance thing.”

Ilya didn’t reply. It seemed to be the only way to get Hollander to stop talking—give him nothing. They were silent together for a few moments. Somewhere on the street stories below them, there was the faint sound of an ambulance siren.

“Is the Hugh Hefner thing real?” Hollander asked. “Or—sorry, do you know who that is?”

Ilya snorted a laugh. “Yes.”

“So it is real?”

Ilya thought about playing it up, but there would be no benefit in the longterm. “No. An act. They are my staff. Nothing else.”

“Isn’t that a little weird?”

“Men who don’t respect women,” Ilya said, “will respect the possessions of another man.”

It was silent again. Ilya wondered if Hollander was shocked by the baldness of the statement. He didn’t want to look over to see his expression. But it was one of the most effective tools in Ilya’s arsenal. He let himself be viewed as one of them, and used that image to shield the House’s employees.

After a bit, Hollander said, “That makes sense.”

Ilya finished his cigarette. “Yes.”

“Can I ask you another question?”

“If I say no, will it stop you?”

Hollander exhaled, laughing quietly. “Fair enough.”

More quiet. This time Ilya found he didn’t care for it. He flicked his cigarette butt into the nearby ashtray. “Ask your question.”

“Do you miss performing?”

An ancient memory came to Ilya out of nowhere: Madelyn adjusting his satin shirt before they went onstage and whispering, Make them wild over the fact that they’ll never have you.

“No,” Ilya said. “I liked being good at it. And it can be very intoxicating. All those eyes on you. But I don’t miss it.”

“It looked like what you were meant to do, when I saw you.”

“That is part of the performance.”

Hollander dipped his head, acknowledging the point. “I suppose it is.”

“I must have been very good that night.” The thought brought with it the ghost of how such flattery felt back then. It had made Ilya believe in his own invincibility.

“You were.” Hollander’s eyes were fixed on Ilya when Ilya glanced over. Both his gaze and his tone were serious. “I had never seen anything like that before.”

Was I your gay awakening? Ilya stopped himself before he could say it. As fun as it was to tease Hollander, that would cross a line. And who knew what Hollander himself had come to terms with regarding his own sexuality. “Watch the main stage show again. We have amazing talent these days. Fabian has a lead role in it, now that he’s back.”

“He was incredible but I doubt he compares to you.”

“You have a bad memory. I can’t sing.”

“Okay, fine,” Hollander said wryly. “Don’t take the compliment.”

That hadn’t been the point. Ilya let it pass. “I don’t accept compliments just like I don’t smoke.”

“Right, so you love both and you lie about it.”

Hollander grinned while he said it. It was the closest he’d come thus far to teasing Ilya back. “You are seeing things. You need glasses,” Ilya said.

“I have glasses.”

“You are not wearing them. Proves my point. Now if you will excuse me,” Ilya wiped his hands on his slacks and headed towards the staircase, “one of us is actually working.” He made sure Hollander didn’t see him smiling as he left.

—-—

“Is there a reason the performers also serve?”

Every time he saw Ilya, Hollander had a new line of inquiry. Why a cohesive main stage show and not numbers that can be rotated? Do you have a membership cap? Why are there so many more male members than female members? As if Ilya wasn’t exhausted enough from his regular duties in addition to covering for Svetlana, he found himself articulating aspects of House tradition and his own approach he’d never put into words before. Story is one of humanity’s oldest pleasures. Maybe we’ll need one in the future, but not so far. Increasing female membership is Cherie’s focus.

“That is part of the draw,” Ilya said now. “People want to be close to talent. Is intoxicating.”

“I see. It’s part of the fantasy.”

“Exactly.” Slowly, Hollander was starting to understand. Ilya felt a spark of satisfaction. He was a little like a very eager student.

Perfectly positioned to pump Ilya for information and use it to open the new North American houses. The pride evaporated. Yes, Ilya didn’t want to be involved in that. But he wanted even less to be used for his skills with no recognition.

Ilya went back up to his office early in the evening, once the second bartender started her shift. Fabian was there, lying on the tiny couch crammed up against the wall. “You are sick?”

Fabian didn’t look up from his phone. “No. Needed a minute before the show.”

Ilya checked the time. It was thirty minutes to curtain. He said nothing, sat as his desk, and started up his least favorite task of reading his email. Fabian sang quietly to himself, which made it slightly more pleasant.

There was a noise in the corridor. Ilya looked up from his computer screen and met Hollander’s eyes. He was hesitating in the doorway. “Problem?” Ilya asked. There had to be, if Hollander had climbed up those back stairs.

Hollander shook his head. “Cherie said you were up here. Oh—hello.”

He had spotted Fabian on the couch, who had the decency to sit up. “Hi. I’m Fabian.”

“I know.” Hollander shook his outstretched hand. “Shane Hollander.”

“I know,” Fabian said, much more flirtatiously than Hollander had. He must have been becoming immune to them, because Hollander barely turned red. “You’re the one here to rescue us from insolvency.”

“Hey,” Ilya said, needled.

“Kidding, Roz.”

“I saw you perform the other night,” said Hollander. “You were amazing.”

“Aren’t I?” Fabian said with typical self-admiration. “I’m glad you agree.” Hollander looked like he was unsure how to respond to that, but Fabian was gathering up his stuff. “All right, I gotta go, or Rickey will raise hell. Bye!”

He left, and then it was just Ilya, at his desk, and Hollander, standing in the doorway. “We are not insolvent,” Ilya felt the need to say.

“I know you’re not. Hunter had to crack the books wide open for the deal.”

So Scott Hunter had a use after all. Ilya grunted in assent and went back to his email. Hollander remained standing there. “You walk up here for your health or something?” Ilya said after awhile.

“No. Ah…” Hollander shifted, hands awkward in his pockets. Ilya saw the nerves suddenly. It was written all over his face and posture. “I wanted to ask you something.”

Ilya shut his laptop. He had a feeling he would need to focus completely on whatever Hollander’s latest question was. “Okay,” he said.

“I haven’t eaten tonight. I’m sure you’re busy and all, but I figured I’d ask. Would you like to get dinner?”

It wasn’t what Ilya had been expecting. And then, as the question lingered in the air between them, he realized it was exactly what he’d been expecting but hadn’t wanted to see. He was out of practice. He used to be able to spot it a mile away. “That cannot happen.”

Confusion, and then understanding bloomed across Hollander’s face. His jaw set stubbornly; Ilya could see the muscle twitching. “I didn’t mean—”

“I know what you meant. And you know that cannot happen.”

“It’s dinner,” Hollander protested. “Surely we can have dinner without it breaking a rule.”

“And what comes after dinner? A drink, and then another drink, and another, and then someone’s place just happens to be around the corner.”

His crassness landed as he meant it to. Hollander’s eyes darkened with anger. “I think I have more self-control than that.”

Too honest. Ilya watched him realize. “It is a fantasy,” Ilya said quietly.

“Right, of course,” Hollander said, voice tight. “Forget I asked.”

He left without another word. Ilya held his breath until his descending footsteps faded. Then he exhaled and re-opened his computer. Unbidden, Madelyn’s words came to him again. Make them wild over the fact that they’ll never have you. There was a time when that had made him feel powerful. Now, alone in his office, the knowledge that he had done the right thing held no fulfillment. Just a vague sadness and exhaustion.

—-—

Two weeks later, he was still in bed after noon, watching the light spring drizzle fall outside his window, when the front door buzzer sounded. He untangled himself from his blankets to answer. “Yes?”

“You still in bed?” Despite patchily coming through the tinny speaker, hearing Svetlana’s voice speaking Russian was like a warm compress on a bruise—or a glass of expensive vodka. It depended on what he was craving. He didn’t bother replying, just buzzed her in.

“You look disgusting,” Svetlana said upon seeing him. By contrast, she looked perfect. Make-up fully done despite just stepping off a plane, hair hidden under a silk headscarf to protect from the rain. “I’m not talking to you until you shower.”

To fall into their oldest pattern was a relief. Svetlana made sense, and Ilya listened to her. She had brewed coffee by the time he was done, and they drank it together along with little cookies she had bought in Japan. “Cherie told me you’ve been MIA, working on the charity night.”

“Well, it’s in ten days.” It was his biggest undertaking every year since its inception four years ago. He had three auction prizes left to secure. Last year he’d managed a suite at the MLB playoffs, which had been hugely popular. Somehow he needed to top that this time around.

“Mm. She also told me you’re depressed.”

Of course Cherie had noticed. She missed nothing, including when it came to him. Ilya reached for anger and couldn’t find it. “I’m fine.”

Svetlana ignored the lie. “Are you still seeing that doctor?”

She meant the psychiatrist he’d started going to a few years ago. “No, I got too busy.”

She nodded. “Thank you for holding it down here. The new show will be the best yet.”

“I never doubted it.”

“But I’m back now. So you’ll call your doctor, and talk to her about whatever you don’t want to talk to me about.”

Ilya nodded. “I missed you,” he said softly.

“You too. Always. Wish you could have come. You’d love Thailand. Fucking insane, so beautiful.”

One day, people would stop telling him places he had to go, and he would actually go and see for himself. Like everything right now, it was hard to imagine.

They had an early dinner at the Szechuan place on Ilya’s block, then took an Uber uptown to the House. As expected, everyone was overjoyed to have Svetlana back. But they were also unexpectedly happy to see Ilya. Their little life updates came at him fast and furious once he entered the members’ bar. “Roz, where you been?” John Paul said. “We bought the place in Queens.”

He showed Ilya a picture on his phone of the apartment he and his girlfriend had bought. “Very ugly,” Ilya said, and John Paul laughed.

“The new member I emailed you about is here tonight,” Cherie told him. “See her over there?”

At a high table in the corner, an elegant mid-forties woman was talking with Stefan. According to the profile Cherie had sent, she was the heir to a Chinese conglomerate, though she’d been born in the States. “I will say hello.”

“No. She doesn’t like blonde men.” Cherie smiled at his affronted look. “Just wanted to point her out.”

“Oh, so you don’t need me,” he said to her.

“Never did,” Cherie said blithely and sailed off.

It was a joke, but it sat in the pit of Ilya’s stomach like a truth. The goal had always been to make them all impervious to the influence of just one person. Maybe he’d done it, in a way he hadn’t meant to.

“Roz!” That was Paloma, dropping off a tray of empty glasses. “Anderson apologized to me. Can you believe it?”

Ilya couldn’t, in fact. “He actually said the words?”

“Yep. ‘I’m sorry.’ Said he gave his buddy a big fucking smack up the head over it.”

Maybe Anderson wasn’t cut from the same cloth as Masters after all. “You haven’t been serving them, have you?”

“No, no. He came up to me after I performed in here last week. Angel was watching him the whole time to make sure he behaved. And I can take care of myself.”

“Well, is good he is not a total piece of shit.”

“I’m good to auction off a private performance, by the way. Cherie told me all the details. You gonna do it again yourself?”

Good. Ilya had proposed Paloma and Fabian, and Cherie had agreed. “Yes. Have to see if I can beat my record.”

“What’s it at?”

“$250,000.”

“Jesus Christ,” Paloma said. “You’re beautiful, Roz, but not sure you’re quarter of a million beautiful.”

Ilya raised an eyebrow at her. Four years ago, Ilya had put a private performance from himself on the list of auction prizes at his first charity evening as a proof of concept. There was nothing he’d ask them to do he wouldn’y do himself. Over time, it had turned into a bit of a joke with the membership running up the bid one after another, playing a game of chicken to see who dared to go higher. Ilya didn’t mind. Either way it went to a good cause. “Oh, you don’t think the Third Street Women’s Shelter deserves the money? Or the Boys and Girls Club of Harlem? Or—”

Paloma cut him off with a laugh. “Okay, you can fuck right off.”

The place was full that night. Ilya stepped in behind the bar to lend a hand, mixing martini after martini. He barely looked up until Paloma took the stage. Then he took the opportunity, when the lights were low, to scan the room.

Hollander was at a table to the left, tucked against the wall. He was with a woman Ilya didn’t know, pretty with red hair that looked much more natural than Madelyn’s. As Ilya watched, Hollander leaned over to whisper in her ear. She laughed and slapped him on the arm.

Ilya turned away. “Going to cut more limes,” he said to Darcy, the bartender, and went into the kitchen before they could point out there was plenty.

He kept himself busy back there the rest of the night, then he went up to his office. Svetlana found him up there later. “Everything to your liking?” he asked her in Russian, meaning the main stage show. Svetlana would have watched it tonight for the first time in nearly two months.

“Good enough. I can tell everyone is getting worn down. They need a break. And fresh material.” She dropped into the armchair in front of his desk. “I met Shane Hollander.”

“Oh?” Ilya said, not looking up from his computer.

“You didn’t mention he was gorgeous.”

Ilya had mentioned Hollander maybe twice in his conversations with Svetlana over the last few months, and only in reference to the deal. “Is he?”

“Ilyusha.” Svetlana was looking at him with knowing pity. After being apart for this long, Ilya had forgotten how easily she could read him. He needed to stop surrounding himself with perceptive women.

“Stop,” Ilya said, to head her off.

“Did you do anything?”

“What?! No! How could you ask me that?” Ilya actually felt injured by it. “I’m not twenty anymore. I don’t immediately rush into the worst decision possible just because it turns me on.”

“I know you’re not. I’m just making sure.” She leaned back in her chair. “But to be clear… he does turn you on?”

“Stop now,” Ilya ordered. He covered his face. He couldn’t think about this. He shut his laptop. “I’m going out. Want to come?”

Svetlana looked at him knowingly again but wisely said nothing. “Another time. Jet lag.” She didn’t say be careful. Ilya was eternally grateful for that.

He went to a bar in the Village not too far from his apartment. He made out with a girl in the back while a shitty band played for a while, but when she whispered, “Should we get out of here?” in his ear he felt too exhausted at the idea of having to get home after. And he didn’t want someone in his apartment right now.

So he went home alone, and slept alone, and woke up alone. He made coffee and stared out the window for a while. Then he called Dr. Morozova’s office and asked for her next available appointment.

It was three days from then, thankfully. Her cheerful little office in Midtown was just as he remembered it, down to the always-smiling receptionist. “Ilya, what a pleasure. I haven’t seen you in a while. What made you come in?” Dr. Morozova greeted him in Russian.

Dr. Morozova had the familiar bearing of any fifty-something Russian woman Ilya could have walked past on the street in Moscow, but she had studied things like somatic healing and family enmeshment which were not very Russian. “I think I’m depressed again,” Ilya said in Russian.

To hear the words come out of his own mouth, as always, felt like a deep weakness. His fingers found the gold crucifix on the chain around his neck. Dr. Morozova nodded. “What makes you say that?”

“I’m not interested in the things I usually am. I feel… empty.”

“I see. Did something happen to trigger this?”

Oddly, Ilya thought not of Hollander but of Janet on the phone that night. My Ilya. “I think I’ve been realizing how lonely I am.”

“Last we spoke, you felt like you were making good progress in that area. You’d found a good community at your work. Has that changed?”

If anything, it had only grown stronger. But, “No. I’m a manager, though, so there will always be some distance.”

“That can be true. You have no peers?”

“One. Svetlana.”

“Right, I remember her. She has been a good friend to you.”

“Yes, but lately I am thinking about… more.”

“From her?”

“No. In general.”

“Like what?”

Ilya paused. “I don’t know,” he said finally. “I don’t know.”

—-—

This was the frustrating thing about therapy. For every session Ilya felt like he came out of with a real breakthrough, he had two where he sat in silence and struggled to name any of the feelings rushing through him. They had spent an entire year of weekly appointments on his parents, from his childhood through to their respective deaths. It had been fucking hell, almost as bad as living through it.

And then it had gotten better. Slowly. He would have to believe the same thing could happen here, even if he didn’t have a clear problem to point to the way he had back then.

Thankfully work was so busy he had no time to dwell on it. He didn’t sleep for three days straight in the run up to the charity night, helping Svetlana put the finishing touches on the special show, rewriting program copy, and of course, rehearsing for his own private performance.

He hadn’t needed it the last few years; three years running, the winning bidder had been one of the younger male members who had no interest in making him perform. Instead, they’d sat around and drunk vodka and played cards. The first year, though, it had been one of the rare female members who’d won. She’d shown no reaction to his pole routine, freshly brought out of retirement, until she’d stopped him halfway through, given him a crisp hundred dollar bill, and told him he was very talented. He’d secretly used it to tip Darcy the next night.

But everything went beautifully. For one night only, they removed all the seats from the main stage orchestra level and filled it with tables. Svetlana had gone classic cabaret for the special show, with Fabian as the MC. It was equal parts funny, sexy, and elegant. Cadence debuted a new silks routine to an Edith Piaf song, which should have been incongruous but was breathtaking. Ilya could almost pretend he was watching it instead of the back of Shane Hollander’s head three tables ahead of him.

He’d bought a whole table. At $20,000 a plate, that was a cool $200,000. Ilya wondered how much of that was his money and how much was his family’s.

“Now, the moment you’ve all been waiting for,” Fabian announced. “The auction begins.”

The historical walking tour of Central Park with a Columbia professor went for a little over $5,000; the weekend in a lake cabin in the Adirondacks went for $25,000. Ilya’s proudest get was a private tour of the MOMA. That racked up nearly fifty grand, almost as much as Paloma got—by the newly inducted Chinese conglomerate heir. Fabian was similar, won by Ryan as always. Now there was someone putting his family fortune to good use.

Then it was Ilya’s turn. He joined Fabian on stage. Unlike the performers, he was in a tux, same as the other attendees. “Woo! Let’s go Roz!” someone cheered. Ilya winked.

“The most popular auction of the night. The legendary Ilya Rozanov, retired featured performer on this very stage. Your chance to see one of the classics. Roz, any hints at what you’ve prepared?”

Ilya pretended to think. He leaned into Fabian’s mic. “No hints,” he said, and grinned when the crowd groaned.

Oh, it was good to be back. For a few minutes as the bidding slowly started, Ilya let the feeling of standing in front of an audience flood through him. Whatever else had been hard about that time, being on stage had been easy. He hadn’t had to think. He was maybe tired of thinking.

“Do I see $75,000? From table 15, thank you. $80,000? Anyone for $80,000?”

Between them, Zach Anderson and his buddies ran the bidding over $150,000. A few of the old-timers jumped in now and then—Ilya knew their interest was purely nostalgic. “How about $200,000? I know you all aren’t tired yet!”

Someone new put up their number, but they were looking towards the back and the light was in Ilya’s eyes, so he couldn’t tell who it was until they turned around again. It was Shane Hollander, face set with anger. “We have $200,000! $210,000?”

Anderson raised his number. Hollander glared at him again and flashed his before Fabian had even finished calling for the next bid. Something was going on between the two of them that Ilya didn’t understand. Anderson seemed completely oblivious, laughing good-naturedly with his table. The redheaded woman, the one Ilya had seen with him the other night, leaned over and said something to Hollander.

“$275,000? Can I get $275,000?” Fabian called.

They’d beaten the record and Ilya hadn’t even realized it. The bid was Anderson’s; he pretended to think about it. The room cheered when he took it. “How high will they go? We love a face-off,” Fabian vamped. “Let’s see!”

$280,000. $285,000. It ping ponged back and forth between Anderson and Hollander, until it was with Hollander for $300,000. “Going… going… gone! To number 8 for a new record. Thank you so much, everyone, thank you! Here’s a reminder of just where all this money will be going…”

Ilya descended from the stage as the short video started playing and went back to his table, where he accepted hushed congratulations with as much grace as he could muster. He had to muster a lot, because after the show ended, it took twenty minutes of hopping from conversation to conversation until he finally reached the door and could escape.

He didn’t both telling Cherie where he was going. She would know, and after enough time had passed for him to change and seat himself on the couch furthest from the door in the second private room, she would send the correct person knocking.

Hollander had undone his bowtie, carrying his jacket over an arm. Angel was following him. “Thank you, Angel,” Ilya said. “We are okay here.” Angel bowed out, leaving Ilya alone with Hollander.

“Sorry,” Hollander burst out as soon as the door closed. “Anderson was doing it just to fuck with me, and I let him get to me. You don’t have to perform anything for me, obviously. I just couldn’t let him win.”

“Fuck with you how?” Ilya asked. Anderson had never won, but he’d been part of running up the bids in years previous. Maybe Hollander didn’t know that.

Hollander shook his head. He folded his jacket neatly over the back of the armchair near him. “It doesn’t matter.”

Ilya still wanted to know. “So you are saying you paid $300,000 to stick it to Anderson, and not because you wanted a chance to witness true art?”

Hollander scowled at him. And then his face went slack, falling into astonishment as he actually looked at Ilya. “You changed.”

Ilya stood. He walked slowly over towards Hollander who pressed back in the armchair as if afraid. Ilya stepped up on the edge of the room’s little stage, and leaned against the pole. Hollander’s eyes darted over him, taking in the black silk pants, the mesh long-sleeved shirt, and the gold nipple rings that could easily be seen through it.

It was a close match for the costume Hollander would have seen Ilya wear in that show all those years ago. A happy accident. It was the outfit Ilya had put on for this private performance all four years prior. He hadn’t anticipated this during the week’s solo rehearsals.

He never would have thought to anticipate the way Hollander’s gaze kept sliding from his face to his chest and back again. The way his white shirt made his blush even more pronounced. His throat was working; Ilya could hear him swallow, audibly.

“Okay, so I will not perform,” Ilya said. “What now?”

Being on the main stage earlier had done something to him. He felt possessed by his younger self’s bravado. His lungs were expansive, breaths deep with oncoming recklessness that he could sense but do nothing about. He didn’t associate the feeling with being at the House—he had been that smart back then, at least. Aware of how much he had to lose.

There was plenty to lose now, too. For some reason Ilya couldn’t think of what, though.

“Don’t do this,” Hollander said in a low voice. He was still pressed back in his chair, every muscle tensed in contrast to Ilya’s easy posture.

Ilya held his hands up. He hadn’t moved. “Do what? I am doing nothing.”

“Don’t make fun of me.” Hollander enunciated every word clearly. He looked angry again. “I’m sorry for making you uncomfortable. Okay? I really am, I wasn’t thinking. But I don’t deserve you throwing it in my face.”

That pulled Ilya up short. “You didn’t make me uncomfortable.” The thought hadn’t crossed his mind.

“Well, good. I’m glad,” Hollander said, slightly less angrily. “I’m sorry all the same. I genuinely did just mean dinner. As friends. But I see how it came off, and how it could look.”

“You were not the first, trust me,” Ilya said with a little amusement.

It made Hollander scowl again. “Is that supposed to make me feel better? Just another in a long line of fucking idiots who bought the fantasy. Jesus Christ. You all must think it’s hilarious. I can see it, you know, the way everyone laughs at me.”

Ilya couldn’t think of a single time he’d seen someone laugh at Hollander. “Do you mean the flirting? Is just how we talk here. No one is making fun of you.”

“You are.”

“I am not,” Ilya objected.

“When you flirt,” Hollander clarified. “You like how it flusters me.”

Well. Ilya couldn’t deny that part. “I am not making fun of you. Is fun to see you blush, yes. Makes you look very pretty.”

Hollander covered his face with his hands. “Stop!” he groaned. He took a deep breath. “Fuck, I can’t think with you in that outfit.”

Ilya took pity on him. “Hand me your jacket.”

Hollander obeyed. Ilya slipped it on, and sat on the edge of the stage. “Better?”

A long inhale. “Yes. Thank you.”

“I didn’t wear it for you. I always wear it for the private performance.”

“Oh.”

Ilya primly adjusted the sleeves of jacket. “Yes, not everything is about you.”

“I’m starting to gather that.”

The vibe had improved enough that Ilya felt he could circle the question he’d wanted to ask a few weeks back. “Seeing me in that show really affected you.”

“And those fuckers will never let me forget it.”

“Anderson and the others? So they are your friends from back then?”

“From middle school. Some of them from earlier than that. They know everything about me, which is a little annoying.”

"Everything?”

Shane met his eyes. “Yes. Everything. They can be idiots but they’re not that bad. Other than Masters.”

Ilya shrugged. “They are the reason you came to that show, all those years ago, so I have to be thankful to them for that.”

“I wish I remembered more of it.”

“You remember the important part,” said Ilya, meaning himself.

“That’s part of the problem,” Hollander said. “I only remember you. I don’t even remember your performance.”

Ilya was caught between feeling flattered and insulted. “Typical. The nipple rings and ass make the impression, not the art.”

Hollander started to shake his head, then stopped, sheepish. “Well, okay, yes, I remember the nipple rings. Sorry. But mostly I remember your face. Your expression, while dancing. I’d seen Broadway shows and stuff while growing up but the emotions never feel real. You know what I mean? But your emotion, it felt real. And the story of the show was really vague but I remember being like, holy shit, it doesn’t matter than I can’t explain it. I felt it.”

For all his talking, it was more words than Ilya had heard him say at a time. And for all his honesty, it was the truest thing Ilya had ever heard from him as well. Spoken from the heart, not the head. Hollander must have realized this because he fell silent abruptly, cleared his throat, and looked down at his hands in his lap.

Softly, almost to himself, Ilya said, “The body speaks what the mouth cannot.” Hollander looked up, eyebrows raised. At a normal volume, Ilya said, “And I had only been at the House for a few months when you saw me. I got better from there.”

“I can’t believe that,” Hollander said. “You would have had them crying in the aisles.”

Ilya stood. “There is an easy way to prove it. Unless you like your patchy memory that much.”

He removed Hollander’s coat and held it out to him. There was a moment when Ilya didn’t know which way the internal battle playing out on Hollander’s face would go. How far did his self-control extend?

Then Hollander slowly took the coat from him. Without speaking, Ilya went to the set the lights and start the music, and then took his place at the pole.

As the story went, the idea had come to Janet in a dream after seeing Faust at the Met. In her version, Ilya was the soul tempted into damnation by Madelyn’s beautiful and seductive devil. In the original show, the stage had three levels; Madelyn did her solo first on the lowest one, ending by taking a seat on her golden prop throne.

Then it was Ilya’s turn, on the highest. He started on his knees, facing away from the audience, with his back against the pole. From the first note of the song—a languorous cover of a Rihanna song that should never have worked but of course did—he was there again. You are at war with yourself. You don’t want to surrender, but in the end you always do.

He was used to disappearing into the performance, everything falling away until it was just him and his body. That more than anything else had been the best part of performing. But a minute in, after he’d shed his shirt, Ilya became aware of his audience of one.

Hollander’s gaze was like a physical weight, even before Ilya met it. The room was dark but Hollander’s eyes caught all the available light, huge in his face. At the sight of it, in a rush of adrenaline through his body, the recklessness flooded back through Ilya.

He faced away as he removed his pants, bending gracefully in half. The jock strap underneath was a simple black stitched with gold to match his jewelry. He had to do one more inverted spin in just that, before dismounting and descending to kneel at Madelyn’s feet.

There was no Madelyn tonight. Only Hollander. Ilya stepped off the stage and went to his knees in front of him on the thick carpet as the song ended.

The next one, an old French pop song, began directly after. At this point in the show, Madelyn would have pulled him up and in her lap with a single finger under his chin to begin the paired section. Hollander’s hands were gripping the arms of his chair tightly, so Ilya moved forward, turned, and perched on Hollander’s knees before flourishing an arm overhead in time to the music and leaning back.

His head landed on Hollander’s shoulder, so he heard his shocked inhale and, “Holy shit,” right in his ear.

Ilya grinned. “Don’t remember this part?”

He turned around and straddled Hollander, knees on either side of his, balancing just a little of his weight on Hollander’s thighs. Hollander stared up at him, enraptured. He looked like he was under a spell. There was sweat on his brow and he was breathing just as hard as Ilya, like he was the one who’d just been hanging upside down off a pole.

“I do,” Hollander said in a barely audible voice. “I remember all of it now.”

Ilya leaned forward. He wasn’t going to kiss him, as he would have kissed Madelyn at this point in the performance. No. He’d brush their noses together, draw another of those shocked inhalations from Hollander’s mouth.

He miscalculated. Or, that was what he’d tell himself, later.

Their lips touched. Barely. Hollander gasped, and the air rushing over Ilya’s mouth brought him back to the moment, back to what was happening. He pulled back, heart suddenly racing, but Hollander followed him, unconsciously chasing the touch—only to stop abruptly.

They were nose to nose, millimeters apart. Hollander’s dark eyes were flickering between Ilya’s eyes and his mouth. Ilya felt it the moment Hollander held his breath, the space between them falling still and silent. Do it, the young, reckless, powerful Ilya that still lived in Ilya’s blood whispered into that space. Surrender.

Slowly, so slowly, Ilya tilted his head, and let their lips brush again.

“Fuck,” Hollander whispered against his mouth, and kissed him.

And then they were kissing. Ilya found himself with his hands in Hollander’s hair, gripping tightly. Hollander made soft little noises of shocked pleasure as the kisses grew deeper and slicker, and more and more of Ilya’s weight settled in his lap. He didn’t touch Ilya anywhere else; when Ilya kissed down his throat, he saw Hollander was still clutching the chair’s arms.

Because he wasn’t supposed to touch. Fuck, he was too good. Ilya wanted to ruin him, take him apart until they both were sweat-drenched and satiated. He was fully seated on Hollander now, and could feel him growing hard.

“Oh, my god, fuck,” Hollander gritted out as soon as Ilya cupped him. He screwed his eyes shut tight and bit his bottom lip so hard it turned white.

“Look at me,” Ilya said, low. Immediately, Hollander’s eyes flew open. “Tell me.”

Hollander knew what he meant. “Yes,” he whispered, and then even more quietly, “Please.”

Please. Ilya kissed him, hard, and leaned their foreheads together as he palmed Hollander through his thin dress slacks, feeling the shape of him. He wanted to get his mouth on him—wanted Hollander’s mouth on him—but this was enough. Just the two of them, gasping into each other’s mouths, Hollander dressed in his expensive tux and Ilya in his gold-threaded jock strap.

He felt Hollander’s body tense up, orgasm imminent, and dared to undo the button and zipper on his pants. He got his fingers around Hollander’s damp, hot cock for less than five seconds before Hollander went, “Holy shit, holy shit,” and came all over his clothing and Ilya’s hand.

Silence, other than their breathing. Their foreheads were still pressed together. Slowly, Hollander moved to kiss Ilya gently on the cheek. “Do you want…?” he murmured.

Ilya’s own erection was obvious against Hollander’s hip. Hollander tipped his head back to meet Ilya’s eyes again. Something about the eye contact, and Hollander’s sweetly open, blissfully post-orgasm expression, sent panic racing over Ilya’s skin like an electric charge, and brought him crashing down to earth.

He pulled away, and stood. “No. Would be—no.” He laughed, trying to play it off as he found something to wipe his hand on, then snagged his discarded clothing from the floor to put it back on. What exactly had he just fucking done?

Reality was closing back in on Hollander too. He did up his fly, though the fabric around his crotch was visibly damp. His face had shut down, brows low and jaw set. “Was that—are you—”

“My fault,” Ilya said immediately. He wanted no misunderstanding there. “Got carried away. Apologies.”

Hollander opened, and then shut his mouth. He took a deep breath and simply nodded, accepting Ilya’s spoken words and unspoken meaning. This was a mistake. It never happened.

Ilya couldn’t look at Hollander shrinking in on himself in that chair any longer. He needed to be gone. “Sorry again,” Ilya said, and left the room.

The hallway was empty; the staircase was empty; his office was empty. Ilya sank onto the couch and buried his head in his hands. He’d made a lot of bad decisions through the years, many of them regarding sex. He’d never made one like this, so disastrous that it could destroy every single part of his life simultaneously.

He sat in his office, disassociating with panic, for an eternity before someone knocked on the half-open door. His heart leapt—half-terror, half-excitement—but it was Cherie.

Ilya could see on her face she knew. “Cherie,” he started, not knowing where the sentence was going.

“I deleted it,” she said. “The security camera footage. No one saw it but me.”

“Oh.” Ilya blew out a shaky breath. He hadn’t even arrived at worrying about that. As always, Cherie was several steps ahead of him. “Thank you.”

He couldn’t find more words. Any explanation would sound like an excuse. Though Cherie didn’t look angry. She was looking at him a little sadly, in fact.

“No one here would begrudge you one indiscretion,” she said quietly. “But if they found out you weren’t abiding by rules you’ll fire them for breaking…”

Ilya nodded wordlessly, not trusting his voice. “I know,” he said eventually.

There was nothing else to say. “I’m going to head home,” she said. “Are you good here?”

“Yes, thank you.” An obvious lie. Cherie let it pass, and left.

Ilya didn’t cry. Not in his office, and not when he finally left to go home, and not when he laid in his bed later. If the tears didn’t fall, then they—and everything else that night—wouldn’t be real.

—-—

Summer hit New York like a fist straight from the heavens, and it laid Ilya out flat. He woke up the next morning in a pool of his own sweat, his apartment turned into a sweltering fishbowl overnight. It was only after he’d gotten his window A/C out of the closet and installed that he realized he was shivering and sweating because he was running a fever.

Weeks like this reminded him that he was Russian down to the bone. He wasn’t meant to freeze damp washcloths for his forehead and lie in bed with two different fans pointed at him in order to sleep for barely a few hours. At least he was too sick to feel any emotions.

He got better just in time for his next appointment with Dr. Morozova. He was so numb from being sick, and the heat was weighing on him like an oppressive force, that he didn’t think about skipping it until he was in Dr. Morozova’s office and she was asking him, “How was your week?”

He thought about lying. Then he said, “I think I ruined my life.”

She listened to the story without speaking, simply nodding on occasion. She never took notes, which he liked. The less record of his self-destruction the better.

“That’s quite a lot to handle,” Dr. Morozova said when he finished. “How are you feeling?”

Ilya felt a flash of irritation. It didn’t matter how he felt. It mattered what he was going to do, how he was going to get out of this, and make sure everything didn’t crumble around him. “I feel nothing,” he said. It was true. “Is that bad?”

Dr. Morozova said, “Not bad. It’s a coping mechanism many people develop. They feel too much. So they shut it off.”

“Ah,” said Ilya.

He felt too much. He knew that. He had been told that by his father and his brother, and while his mother had loved his heart, her own had been too much for her. He mulled it over as he walked from Dr. Morozova’s office to the House. If he needed proof it was better to shut it off, he had plenty.

Svetlana was there in his office, waiting for him. She could see he wasn’t okay, but thankfully there was an easy explanation. “Ilyusha, you look terrible. Are you sure you’re better? Hunter said we can push this meeting to tomorrow if you want.”

Ilya hadn’t even checked his calendar. BUDGET PRIORITIES AND PLANNING was on there in an hour. It had to be serious if Hunter had come over to slum it with them in person. “I’m fine. What do we need to prep?”

Svetlana had done most of the work already. The meeting was up in one of the rooms in the member co-working space. Hunter and a couple of his people were in there already—as was Hollander.

He met Ilya’s eyes and immediately both of them looked away. Svetlana didn’t notice, too busy greeting everyone. Ilya loved how effortless her charm was. She sat next to Hollander, to draw him into a conversation, which meant Ilya could sit next to her and not have to look at Hollander.

“All right,” Hunter said, calling them to order. “This is just a preliminary meeting to draw up a list of priorities to take back to the new board for approval. They haven’t promised a dollar amount but—actually, Hollander, do you want to catch them up?”

“Sure,” Hollander said. He leaned forward in his chair to address Ilya and Svetlana. He was wearing glasses. Ilya had looked away so quickly he hadn’t noticed. They made him look much more serious, and also somehow less intimidating, like the glasses were shielding Ilya from the true weight of his gaze.

“There’s a willingness,” Hollander was saying, “to infuse some cash into this place, not just the new Houses, so I think if we can make a good case for what exactly that would go to, we can get a couple things through.”

“Excellent,” Svetlana said. “Ilya and I have made a list.”

They had agreed she needed the most for the new main stage show; she did a mini synopsis of her fresh concept for Hunter and Hollander then and there, putting her deck up on the projector. “The Japanese,” she began, “had a myth. There is a sun goddess who anoints their king. Without her blessing, the monarch was doomed to fail.”

Ilya pretended to watch her present, but really he was watching Hollander listen to the presentation. Hollander was fully focused on it, fingers steepled in front of his face. “This is just an overview,” Svetlana said after talking through the rough structure of the show and major stylistic choices. “What are your thoughts?”

Hollander blew out a breath. “I’ll be honest. We expected great things. This knocks those expectations out of the park.”

Svetlana smiled. “Glad to hear it. Ilya, your turn.”

Ilya’s part paled in comparison: a private room that needed to be redone, developing the terrace into a real space that could be used more frequently, a lower tier of membership only for the co-working space. Hollander listened to it all closely, though, and asked thoughtful questions that Ilya did a passable job of answering.

“Great. This is perfect,” Hunter said. “We’ll dig in and get back to you.”

And that was that. They all dispersed. Ilya didn’t have the chance to avoid Hollander’s gaze again because he disappeared immediately. Probably off to schmooze with Hunter, who was far more his rich boy type.

Back in his office, he threw himself into his desk chair. He didn’t think about the vodka in the bottom drawer.

Svetlana sat in the chair across from him. She studied him as he pretended to read his email. “I forgot to ask. How was the private performance for Hollander after the charity dinner?”

“Fine,” he said without looking up.

Svetlana clicked her tongue. “You’re such a bad liar.”

Ilya’s temper flared. “I’m a fucking phenomenal liar. I lie to you and to Shane Hollander and to Cherie and to the rest of the staff and to myself most of all. And everyone is nice enough to let me, except you.”

He regretted it immediately. Suddenly he was close to tears, like every emotion he hadn’t felt over the last week was hitting him at once. He got up from his chair and went to the little window so Svetlana couldn’t see. There was the oak tree across the street, limbs heavy with leaves, though the daffodils had long since died.

A touch on his shoulder. Svetlana was at his side. She leaned her head on his upper arm, and he leaned his on top, an apology. “Do you want to tell me?” she asked quietly.

“No,” Ilya said. He would lose it if he spoke about it this time. “Cherie deleted the footage. No one else knows.”

Svetlana could fill in the gaps. After a bit, she said, “I worry about how much you deny yourself.”

He hadn’t expected that. “Deny myself what? I can sleep with whoever I want outside of this place. It was one bad decision. Nothing more.”

She was silent. She didn’t need to say anything. Ilya knew what she was thinking. You are such a bad liar.

—-—

Despite everything, life went on. Ilya continued his pre-established pattern of avoiding Shane Hollander. When Hollander was at the members’ lounge, Ilya steered clear of his table and let Darcy serve him at the bar. The rare times they had to be in the same meeting, they were professional and cordial and said no more words to each other than was necessary.

Ilya’s guilt faded by the day. As Cherie said, no one would begrudge him one indiscretion. The further it was in the past, the more he could tell himself that was what it was.

And then, one hot summer day, Janet Devereux returned to New York.

He was going through membership applications with Cherie in the members’ lounge pre-open, and she walked in wearing a white linen suit like she had never left. For a moment, with a hat covering her dark hair, Ilya thought she was his mother’s ghost. Then he realized. “Janet?”

She spread her arms wide. “It’s me, darling. Sorry I didn’t tell you, I thought it would be a nice surprise.”

He went to embrace her, let her kiss him on the cheek and hold him for a minute. She had worn the same perfume the entire time Ilya had known her, slightly masculine and woodsy. She was smiling widely when she pulled back. “It is a nice surprise,” Ilya said.

Janet laughed. “You don’t look very happy! You look like you’ve seen a ghost. And I got so much sun in Tahiti.”

Cherie had risen up to stand as well. “Janet, this is Cherie Simon. The floor manager.”

“Oh, Cherie?” Janet pronounced it with the proper French accent. “Vous êtes français?”

“Non, madame, québécois,” Cherie said in her full Montréal accent. Janet’s smile went a little pained hearing it.

“Well, enchantée regardless, dear. Ilya, I’m famished—come to lunch with me. Oh, I’m sure Cherie can handle all that, can’t you? Of course. Come now.”

She was the same as always. It had been two years since the last time he’d seen Janet, and then it had been for barely a few days. “How long are you here?” Ilya asked her on the walk to her favorite Italian restaurant a few blocks away.

“Oh, I’m not sure. I need to make sure this Hollander fellow isn’t destroying my family legacy. He seems quite smart but you never know with people like that, they could be scheming the whole time. Have you met him? Do tell, you are such a good judge of character.”

Ilya, unexpectedly, found himself defending Shane Hollander to Janet over lunch. “He did not know much about the Houses at the start, but he has become quite the student. He is at the members’ lounge multiple times a week.”

“Of course he is. He’s a man, isn’t he? Who’s his favorite?”

“Fabian,” Ilya said without thinking, then regretted it. Janet would extrapolate Hollander’s sexuality easily. That had never bothered Ilya with other members, but for some reason here it felt disloyal.

Janet raised an eyebrow. “Not what I expected, but I understand. Fabian is quite beguiling. Does Hollander appreciate the arts?”

“He thought Svetlana’s concept for the new show was genius.”

“About that. I was rather hurt she didn’t present it to me first. Of course I trust her vision, but seeing a deck from Scott Hunter is not how I want to be hearing about it.”

Ilya was sure it was in Janet’s email, buried between finance updates from her family’s foundation and a note from the U.S. ambassador to France. But he said, “We had the chance to ask for more budget on a few things, and we both felt it would be stronger if she pitched the concept. She would be very sad to hear you were hurt, I know that was not her intention.”

Janet flipped a hand dismissively. “Not her intention, never, but it’s still important to think of these things. I’ll speak with her. I’m sure we can set things straight.”

Svetlana had long since stopped caring about Janet’s opinion on anything beyond what she had to, but Ilya was curious. “What did you think?”

“Of the concept? Beautiful, of course. You both and Madelyn were always my best students. Speaking of which…”

She eyed him over the rim of her wine glass as if he was a naughty child she needed to scold. Ilya felt tension stiffening his shoulders immediately. “It’s very sad you felt the need to let her go,” Janet said.

“She broke the rules. You know how important those are to me.”

“I do, and I promised not to interfere! But darling, Madelyn? After everything, you couldn’t find it in your heart to forgive?”

“She was not sorry.” Ilya knew that for a fact. “She did not even offer up breaking things off with Masters.” If she had, maybe things would have gone another way. But Madelyn was too proud for that.

Janet sighed. “Oh, well, as I said, I won’t interfere. But it’s quite sad to see the family broken up like this.”

Ilya had never seen Madelyn as family, and she had never seen him as family. They’d been coworkers, and competitors on both the stage and for Janet’s attention. “It was sad,” Ilya agreed. “But Cadence, her replacement, is even better.”

“I’ll see for myself at the show tonight. But anyway,” Janet put her hand over his on the table. “Are you taking care of yourself? You look so worn down. Can’t you plan a vacation?”

Ilya thought of Cherie back in the lounge, waiting for his sign-off on member applications; the financial breakdown of the terrace refurb Hunter still needed; and the thousand other odds and ends only he could handle. “I should,” he said.

“You should! You work so hard.”

They chatted about nothing important for the rest of lunch. Ilya excused himself to the bathroom to text Svetlana the news of Janet’s return so she could prepare herself. The moment they returned to the House, Janet went looking for her.

Svetlana found him at the members’ bar that evening. “That mad old cow,” she spat in Russian. “She lives in her own world. I’m so glad what she says to me doesn’t bother me anymore or I would’ve throttled her. Imagine getting angry with me because she can’t read her own fucking emails! What am I supposed to do, fly to Tahiti and do an interpretive dance for her?”

Ilya poured her two fingers of vodka. Svetlana threw it back and motioned for another. “What bullshit did she say to you?” she asked.

“Nothing. She wanted to know about Hollander. I guess they haven’t met yet.”

He wasn’t there tonight. Ilya kept scanning the edges of the room to make sure he hadn’t missed him, but nothing. It was almost better when Hollander was there—at least it meant Ilya knew where he was. He could relax a little more, knowing he wasn’t going to suddenly appear.

“Have you two spoken?” Svetlana asked.

Ilya shook his head. “There’s nothing to speak about.”

“That wasn’t the case from what I heard. You two had a lot to speak about when he first started coming around.”

So people had noticed. Ilya had hoped not. “He was new. He needed to get up to speed.”

“Then you got him up to speed and left him high and dry.”

“Sveta,” Ilya said warningly.

“Sorry,” Svetlana huffed. “That bitch got me so worked up. I barely know what I’m saying. I’m going to go find a stagehand to yell at.”

Was that how Hollander felt? That Ilya had left him high and dry? It would be ironic, considering Hollander was the one who’d actually gotten off. Technically Ilya had been left high and dry.

The thought made Ilya laugh. That was good. If he could find the humor in it, maybe that meant they had enough distance from Ilya’s ill-advised decisions they could be friends again.

He decided to test the theory. Two nights later, Ilya was chatting with one of the old-timer members who’d been around since Janet’s early days, and caught sight of a familiar profile at the bar. He excused himself gracefully and, shielded by Darcy, slipped behind the bar at the other end.

Hollander was staring down at his phone in his hands. He was shockingly oblivious to his surroundings at times. Ilya was almost jealous. He’d had eyes in the back of his head since he could walk.

Ilya had to emphatically set the highball down in front of Hollander to get him to look up. Shock washed over Hollander’s face, but it was quickly tamped down. “Did Janet ambush you yet?” Ilya asked.

“Did—oh. Yes, she did. It wasn’t too bad. I had no idea she was coming. I would have set time with her for a proper introduction. Even Hunter didn’t know she was coming.”

“Even I did not know,” Ilya said.

Hollander frowned. “Really? I thought you were close.”

Ilya would never stop being amused at how simply Hollander saw the world sometimes. Closeness meant good communication to him, obviously. “She loves a surprise.”

“It caught me off guard, that’s for sure. Though… never mind.”

Hollander busied himself sipping his drink. “What?” Ilya said, intrigued.

“I shouldn’t. It was mean.”

Even better. “Now you have to tell me.”

Hollander eyed him, clearly looking for signs Ilya was making fun of him. Ilya tried to make his expression as sincere as possible. “It sort of felt like catching me off guard was the point. She wanted to throw me off. You know?”

Ilya did know. It was one of Janet’s specialties. “Yes. She thinks it makes people more honest, when they don’t have time to prepare.”

“It makes me look like a fucking idiot. I can’t quote financials from memory, so now we have to meet again anyway.”

Ilya was sure the financials themselves hadn’t been the point of any of Janet’s questions. She’d wanted to get a read on Hollander, and he hadn’t noticed. That would have annoyed Janet. She liked it when people played her mind games back at her.

“It felt like talking to my mom,” Hollander was saying, “if she never was straightforward about anything. Which is crazy. My mom is the most straightforward person in the world. You know what she said when I told her I thought we should invest in this place?”

This was going to be good. “What did your mother say, Hollander?”

“That if she hadn’t known me for twenty-nine years she’d thinking I was making a deal with my dick and not my brain, because why else would I want to invest in a glorified strip club.”

Ilya barked out a laugh. He covered his mouth to stifle it. He hadn’t expected Hollander to be so crude. It was a lovely surprise. “She did not.”

Hollander smiled, embarrassed by the story but enjoying Ilya’s reaction. “Yes, well, I made a convincing case that had nothing to do with my dick. And now we’re here.”

Another member sat further down the bar, and there was a pause in conversation while Ilya made him a drink. Hollander didn’t return to looking at his phone—when Ilya was done, Hollander looked at him expectantly, as if waiting for him to come back to talk more.

Just to see how long he’d be patient, Ilya went into the kitchen to grab a couple things. But he came out and Hollander was still waiting, a hopeful little smile on his face that he probably wasn’t even aware of.

Ilya decided to indulge him. “You think we will get the money?”

Hollander tilted his head from side to side. “Some of it, I think. The membership sub-tier is the easiest sell. You don’t need much capital to put that in place, and it’s a guaranteed moneymaker. Boards love stuff like that.”

Janet probably wouldn’t. Ilya had had the thought when putting together the proposal. She liked the exclusivity of the membership. “I’m pushing to get as much as possible,” Hollander went on.

Why? Ilya almost asked. “We won you over,” he said.

“That’s not inaccurate,” Hollander said. “You know I didn’t really get it at first. But the more time I spend here… Well, sex is an intrinsic part of life, isn’t it? Might as well celebrate it as something beautiful.”

Ilya rearranged the little glass bottles of bitters in front of him while he absorbed that. He felt almost… proud. “What?” Hollander said, nettled that Ilya wasn’t replying.

“What is the saying? The student has become the teacher. We can put that in the brochure.”

Hollander smiled, the big and genuine smile that made him look like a little boy and not a serious man. The way his eyes crinkled was actually adorable. They were nearly sparkling. Ilya couldn’t help it. He smiled back.

And then, as they looked at each other, Hollander’s expression slowly faded. It was the same way his face had fallen that night, as reality asserted itself. “Excuse me,” Hollander said, and without further explanation he picked up his drink and walked away.

Ilya stood there and watched him leave. Heat was rising under his skin—embarrassment, though no one had seen the implicit rejection that had just happened. Well, if he’d wondered if they could move beyond what had happened and be friends, Ilya had his answer. It was no.

—-—

Svetlana: Cadence wants to talk to you. She’s on the main stage.

Before opening, the front of the House was an odd place. At night, full of patrons and staff, it felt luscious and opulent. During the day, it retained its beauty but it was a faded, worn kind. Ilya had grown to love that more, akin to seeing a lover’s face free of make-up in the morning.

Today, a handyman perched on the top of a ladder and polished the foyer’s chandelier. Rickey, the production manager, was puttering around backstage with a stagehand, pointing out things that hadn’t been put away right. And Cadence, dressed in street clothes, sat on the lip of the stage, waiting for Ilya.

“Roz,” she said. Her braids were pulled up into a high ponytail, but they still fell almost to her waist. “Did Svetlana tell you?”

Ilya shook his head and sat in the front row, facing her. “Just that you wanted to talk. All is okay?”

“For me, yes. For you, not so much.”

Cadence was one of the performers who performed only on the main stage, not in the members’ lounge, but still, Ilya found he was bracing himself. Though if it was about him, Svetlana would have warned him. He was being paranoid. “Oh?”

“I’m pregnant.”

Cadence was beaming, clearly overjoyed about this news, so Ilya reacted accordingly. “Congratulations. That is wonderful.”

“It happened so fast—we were trying for only like a month and then it was like boom, pregnant.” Cadence laughed. “Sorry, total overshare, I know.”

It was very sweet and very like Cadence. “Not at all. This is where the bad news for us comes in?”

“Yes. I talked to Svetlana. I’ll taper off by the end of the month. I’m about to start showing.”

“Whatever you want. Svetlana would probably love to come up with something that centered around a pregnant performer, though.” It would be exactly the kind of challenge Svetlana enjoyed.

“She said the same thing. But no. Ken and I worked it out so I can take time off.”

“You would be welcome back any time.”

“Ilya? Are you in here?” It was Janet, sweeping down the aisle. “Ah, there you are. Svetlana said you were. Oh, and Cadence, wasn’t it?”

Cadence hopped down off the stage to greet Janet properly. “You’re very talented, my dear,” Janet told her. “Not that anyone can replace Madelyn, but you have your own charm.”

“Thank you,” Cadence said. “It’s been the experience of a lifetime being here, but, well, I just gave my notice.”

Ilya wished she hadn’t said that. It wasn’t information Janet needed, especially at this moment. Now Janet was looking between Cadence and him, perturbed. “But why? If it’s a question of money, dear—”

“It isn’t,” Ilya cut in. “Believe me, we would love her to stay but her mind is made up. Janet, shall we?”

He tried to take her arm and lead her back the way she came, but she ignored him. “Tell me, dear. Surely we can rectify this situation.”

Ilya watched, helplessly, as Cadence fell for Janet’s sympathetic tone and expression. “I’m pregnant. Almost three months.”

“Is that all? Even at three months, we can do something about it.”

Cadence frowned, confused. “I don’t want to do something about it.”

Janet’s smile faded. “Well, I’m not sure that’s the right decision. Pregnancy is very hard on the body. What will happen to your career? It’s best to think these things through before it’s too late. How about a cup of tea? There’s a lovely cafe around the corner.”

Now she was taking Cadence’s arm, but Cadence shook her off. “I’ve thought it through. With my husband. And I won’t be changing my mind.”

There were a thousand ways Ilya could intervene and head off the crash that was coming, but for some reason he couldn’t move. He was frozen and could only watch as Janet’s face slid into an ugly expression he’d seen a bare handful of times. “This is the problem with your generation,” Janet said in a nasty tone. “No sense of loyalty. No sense of gratitude. The American independence. It’s why any Houses in this country are doomed to fail.”

“Janet—” Ilya started, but Cadence spoke over him. Angry tears stood out in her eyes.

“Only a mean old bitch like you could say something like that. Everyone else can see that Roz and Svetlana build something real out of the carcass you left behind. What they all said is true, you’re really—”

Ilya moved just in time, even though his brain was so firmly convinced that this disaster couldn’t actually be playing out in front of him. Janet’s hand flashed up and out and the next thing Ilya knew, he was on his knees on the floor, his own hand clutching the right side of his face. The pain was so bad he couldn’t comprehend what exactly had just happened.

“Oh my god! Roz!” Cadence was shrieking. “What the fuck, you bitch, you’re fucking insane! Rickey! Rickey, are you back there?!”

Someone was leaning over Ilya. Janet’s voice, fluttering with distress. “Oh my dear, I’m so sorry! I got carried away. Here, let me see. Is it bad? Oh, I’m not myself when I’m upset.”

She pried his hand away from his face, but Ilya jerked out of her grasp. Without speaking, he got up and walked away, up the other aisle, out of the theater, away from Janet’s protestations and Cadence’s shouting and Rickey’s questions of what in the hell was going on. The foyer was empty, thankfully, but then he rounded a corner and almost collided with someone.

“Sorry, I—oh! Roz? Wait, hold on, are you hurt? What happened?”

It was Shane Hollander, because of course it was. Ilya’s heart was racing, throbbing along with the pain in his head—and eye. Fuck. How badly was he actually hurt? Hollander was looking at him with shocked concern. “Accident,” Ilya gritted out.

“Let me see.” Hollander’s fingers were much gentler than Janet’s had been. Slowly, Ilya lowered his hand.

It was covered in blood. He tried to open his right eye and immediately had to close it; the light was so bright it sent shards of agony through his skull. “Fuck. Okay,” Hollander said.

He looked like he was intentionally under-reacting so he didn’t freak Ilya out, which just made Ilya panic even more. “What? Is it bad?”

“There’s a lot of blood. I can’t tell other than that. Let’s get you to a hospital, now.”

Ilya’s panic was so deep now that he couldn’t move. Hollander took him by the elbow and towed him through the foyer and out to the street, where he hailed the first cab he saw. “The nearest hospital, please. As fast as you can.”

“He better not bleed on my seats,” the cabbie said, scrutinizing them in his rearview mirror.

Hollander made a disgusted noise, and pulled out his wallet. He brandished a wad of cash. “Fucking drive already, will you?”

The cabbie’s entire demeanor changed at the sight of the money. “Yes, sir!”

The car took off. Ilya shut his eyes, trying to wall out the pain. He couldn’t tell what was from the actual injury and what was extraneous, the result of the images in his mind flooding his body with paralyzing fear. Because behind his eyelids, playing on a loop, it wasn’t Janet’s hand flashing up he saw; it was his father’s. Be silent! A man does not cry at his mother’s funeral.

Ilya drew in a ragged breath. He couldn’t get enough air in his lungs. Was he having a stroke? Could you have one after being hit in the head? Janet for all her presence was a little old lady, surely she couldn’t muster the strength to concuss him with a backhand.

“Hey.” That was Hollander, watching him closely. He took Ilya’s free hand, on the seat between them. “It’s going to be okay. Don’t worry.”

It’s never going to be okay, Ilya almost said, but he just gripped Hollander’s hand tightly and focused on breathing for the rest of the drive.

The film of panic overlayed everything, making it seem distant and unreal: he stood there dumbly in the middle of the chaotic emergency room while Hollander argued with a nurse behind the counter. He stared at a kid with her arm in a sling, resting her head on her mom’s arm. Every so often, the mom would press her lips to her daughter’s forehead, comforting her.

“Sir? Sir, can you tell me what happened?” That was the nurse, speaking to Ilya.

“Got hit,” Ilya said. “She was wearing rings, I think one of them did something to my eye.”

“Someone hit you? Were you in a fight?”

“No. Was an accident,” Ilya said. Hollander was frowning at him, trying to piece things together, but Ilya ignored him.

He was put in a room. There was no chair so Hollander hovered awkwardly in the corner. Ilya had recovered enough of his wits by then to say, “You should go. I will be fine.”

Hollander looked at him like he was crazy. “I’m not leaving.”

Ilya shrugged. He still had his hand up over his right eye, though the pain had faded to a dull pulse. He felt better like that, the protection a security.

The doctor showed up shortly. “Okay, hear we got an eye injury? Let’s take a look.”

Ilya dropped his hand and let the doctor, a dark-skinned man not much older than Ilya, prod lightly along his cheekbone and ask him questions about where the pain was worse. Then he checked Ilya’s pupils with a little light, which made Ilya wince but was less painful than earlier. “Eye’s fine,” the doctor pronounced. “Might have a small corneal abrasion. We’ll take a look. Let me tape up this cut first, it’s not quite big enough for stitches.”

He gave Ilya a small mirror to see, and somehow that calmed Ilya more than the doctor’s diagnosis. With the blood mopped up, the cut was really more of a scratch, deeper near his hairline and tapering off just under his eyebrow but above his eye. His eye was bloodshot and teary, but looked fine otherwise. “Cuts like these on the face bleed a lot because there’s so many blood vessels. Can be pretty freaky, but it’s not so bad,” the doctor explained. “You might have a bit of a scar, though.”

“That is okay,” Ilya said. “Will look badass.”

Both the doctor and Hollander laughed, far more enthusiastically than the weak joke warranted. The doctor said, “That‘s the right attitude. Okay, let’s take a closer look at the eye and then get you out of here.”

In another room, a nurse checked his eye with one of those machines used for glasses prescriptions, declared his cornea completely fine other than a minor abrasion, and gave him a prescription for eyedrops and directions for changing the bandage on the cut. Hollander was back at the front desk, talking to the receptionist again when Ilya was done. He had his wallet out. “I have insurance,” Ilya said to him.

“They give you a discount if you pay out of pocket,” Hollander said.

That didn’t make any sense, but Ilya let it go. He was suddenly so exhausted, all he wanted to do was lie down and sleep for a week.

Hollander was watching him again. “Should I take you home?”

“No,” Ilya said. He couldn’t stand the idea of being alone in his apartment right now. Those memories that had felt so close on the drive over to the hospital would ambush him immediately.

“Well, I’m not taking you back to the House,” Hollander said. His eyes traveled over Ilya’s face, searching for something Ilya couldn’t read. That was unusual. Normally Hollander’s face was like an open book to him. “My place is around the corner.”

It wasn’t smart. Ilya didn’t care. “Yes. Okay,” he said.

—-—

Hollander’s apartment was on 76th at Lexington, and it wasn’t as bad as Ilya had been expecting. By New York City standards, it was the apartment of a wealthy person, but not unreasonably so. At least Hollander didn’t live in one of those ugly new glass skyscrapers on the park. It looked like it had been furnished by a middle-age woman obsessed with mid-century modern furniture, though, so Ilya assumed everything in it was the work of his mother or an interior designer.

Hollander guided him to a bedroom. Ilya wondered if it was a guest room or Hollander’s own room. “Here, lay down,” Hollander said. “I’ll get you some water. Want ice for your head?”

“Please, yes.” There was a floor length mirror in the corner. Ilya inspected the damage again in his reflection. He was going to have a nice bruise on his forehead in addition to everything else.

Something in his pocket was vibrating. Holy shit, his phone. He hadn’t thought to text anyone. He laid down on the giant, comfortable bed and scanned his messages. Cadence, Rickey, Svetlana, Cherie… Janet. He ignored all of them, even though he should reply to at least Cherie and Svetlana.

The ability to do what he was supposed to had abandoned him. He closed his eyes and let his mind drift. The apartment was dark and cool, even though it was stiflingly hot outside.

“Here.” Hollander was standing next to him, holding out a glass of water. “And I have these.” Two ibuprofen pills. Ilya took them and drained the glass, then took the ice wrapped in a dishcloth Hollander offered him. It felt blissful on his aching head.

He expected Hollander to leave the room again. Instead, he sat on the other side of the bed a respectful distance away. He didn’t say anything, and Ilya found himself deeply relieved to sit in silence but not be alone.

“I texted Svetlana and Cherie,” Hollander said after a while. “Told them you were okay but wouldn’t be back today.”

“Thank you.”

“Of course.” A pause, then, “It was Janet, wasn’t it.”

Phrased like a question and yet not one at all. ”It was an accident,” Ilya said.

The response was so ingrained in him, he didn’t understand Hollander’s disbelieving laugh at first. “How does a 120 pound old French lady clock a six foot tall man by accident? And hard enough to bruise the way you’re going to?”

“She is not French.” Somehow that was the only part of Hollander’s words Ilya could address. “Her family is French, but she was born in New York.”

“Who fucking cares? She could be from Mars, I don’t give a fuck. Why did she hit you?”

“It was an accident,” Ilya repeated, because by the barest definition of the word, it had been. “She did not mean to hit me.” She had meant to hit Cadence, but there was no point in telling Hollander that. Hollander was so angry it was radiating off him. Ilya was a little worried what he might do.

“I don’t believe you,” Hollander said.

“Then don’t,” said Ilya. He closed his eyes again. “You are making my head hurt.”

Hollander exhaled. “Sorry. You’re right. Want more water? How about something to eat?”

One of the pains running through Ilya’s body turned out to be hunger. “Yes. That would be nice.”

“I’m not a very good cook. I’ll order delivery. What do you want?”

Ilya wanted to not be asked another question for at least an hour. “Just pick something. I will eat it.”

Hollander ordered an entire pepperoni pizza, mozzarella sticks, baked ziti, and a huge salad. Even for two adult men, it was a bit overkill. Ilya didn’t tease him, though, especially when Hollander didn’t make them get up and eat at a table. He spread a towel over the middle of the bed and laid all the food out like they were two girls having a sleepover.

The ibuprofen had kicked in by then and Ilya felt almost normal. He was a little shaky from the comedown of the extreme panic, though the food was helping. A cigarette or a drink would help, too, but Hollander would definitely lecture him if he asked for those.

“Nice place,” Ilya said. “You own it?”

“The building.”

Ilya had to make sure he heard that right. “You own the whole building?”

Hollander had the grace to look sheepish. “Technically it was my grandfather’s. When he died last year, it became mine.”

“Wow. Wooooow,” Ilya said, drawing out the word. “So you are one of those New Yorkers.”

“On my dad’s side, yes. My mom’s family came from nothing. They emigrated from Japan in 1969, but she was born here. She started her own company straight out of college. Wouldn’t accept a dime from my dad to help.”

Ilya liked her already. “And which one are you like?”

“My dad works too, okay? But in personality I’m more like my mom, I guess. I started as an intern at the company and I made sure I was the best one ever, because otherwise half of them would say forever that I only got where I am because of my last name.”

“So being a vice president before thirty has nothing to do with being a Hollander,” Ilya said lightly.

Hollander scowled at him, but it wasn’t serious: there was a glimmer of playfulness in his eyes. “Maybe I’m good at what I do the way you are. Or are you the House’s membership director before thirty because of nepotism?”

It was a good point. Ilya wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of saying that, of course. But from Hollander’s growing smile, he knew what Ilya’s silence meant. “Some of them probably barely consider me a Hollander anyway,” he said.

“What do you mean?”

“Well, my mom isn’t exactly the kind of person someone like my dad was supposed to marry. But she won the family over. Out of sheer stubbornness, I think.”

The story made Ilya look at Hollander with new eyes. To Ilya, money was money. He’d always thought that if you had it, nothing else mattered. “And they are okay with it now?”

Hollander grinned, proud. “My dad threatened to walk away if they didn’t. So anyone who isn’t keeps their mouth shut.”

Ilya laid back down after eating, while Hollander cleaned up and came in and out bringing him a change of clothes, towels, and other odds and ends. “Here’s a toothbrush. There’s shampoo and stuff in the bathroom if you want to shower. Oh, but you probably can’t wash your hair because of your face—let me make sure there’s a washcloth.”

Ilya liked that Hollander hadn’t even asked him if he was staying the night. He had assumed, and was arranging everything accordingly. What a relief to have to make no decisions.

The sun had barely set outside, but after showering, Ilya got in bed and slipped into sleep quickly. He woke to a pitch dark room, disoriented, then realized someone had woken him. “Hm? Wha’ is it?”

“You were shouting,” Hollander said. He turned on the bedside lamp. He was in sleep clothes himself, but wearing his glasses. “Is it your head? Are you okay?”

Ilya sat up and touched his forehead gingerly. It hurt, but not enough to wake him. He made a quick inventory of his body. “No, I… I think I had a nightmare.”

It was coming back in wisps, just impressions and snatches of emotion. His father, his mother, and Ilya standing between them. He found he was shivering, chilly despite being swathed in blankets.

“Hey. Hey, it’s okay.” Hollander put a hand on his shoulder. The touch, as it had been in the cab, was infinitely grounding. “You’re okay.”

Hearing those words when his guard was down, after a day of physical pain and emotional turmoil, was affecting Ilya intensely. The fact that it was Shane Hollander he was hearing them from, too… Ilya bit back a sob.

The tears hit in earnest as Hollander sat on the bed beside him and pulled him into a hug. He said nothing, just let Ilya cry, patting his back a little awkwardly, the way you would a child’s. But that was what Ilya felt like: a very small child crying after an immensely overwhelming day.

He would have expected Hollander to withdraw the moment Ilya calmed down. He didn’t. He stayed there, letting Ilya rest his head on his shoulder and breathe, until Ilya was the one to pull away.

He didn’t want to. He wanted to fall asleep being held, as he hadn’t since his mother died. But there was no way Ilya could ask for that.

He laid down. Hollander sat there, looking down at him. There was a huge wet patch on his t-shirt where Ilya had cried all over it. “Think you can sleep?” Hollander asked him.

The answer was no, but Ilya nodded. He found Hollander’s hand in the blankets and took it. He scraped together all his bravery to say honestly, in a low voice, “If you stay.”

Hollander’s glasses were reflecting the light, so Ilya couldn’t read his expression as he considered. Then he took them off, folded them, and put them on the bedside table. “Okay. Move over.”

Ilya ruthlessly squashed the leap of joy his heart did inside his chest, and scooted over. He thought Hollander might sit beside him, or lie on top of the covers, but he got under the blankets next to Ilya, in the hollow where Ilya had just been lying. Again, he left a respectable distance between them, and went back to patting Ilya’s shoulder the way he had been. It lulled Ilya back to sleep in no time.

—-—

He woke disoriented, again. This time it was morning. Sunlight was scattering through the wooden blinds that hung over the floor to ceiling windows. Shane Hollander was still in bed with him. While sleeping, they had both moved around so now Hollander’s back was pressed to Ilya’s chest, with Ilya’s arm slung around his waist. And Ilya, as he was most mornings, was hard.

From the depth of his breathing, Hollander hadn’t woken yet. Ilya was torn between pretending to be asleep and enjoying what closeness he could, and putting some distance in between them. The last thing he wanted was Hollander being jump-scared by nonconsensual morning wood.

He tried to split the difference, and move just his hips back. Little by little, to jiggle the mattress as minimally as possible. He’d about done it when Hollander woke up.

Ilya could tell only because he’d been so focused on Hollander’s breathing, which caught, went shallower. The sound of Hollander swallowing. Then, unbelievably, Hollander shifted infinitesimally back towards Ilya—until his ass pressed right up against Ilya’s erection, and he froze.

Ilya lay there, every nerve ending alight. Was Hollander pretending to be asleep again? No, there was some rustling. His hand was moving in front of him. Was he touching himself?

The thought was incendiary. Ilya couldn’t handle it anymore. He yawned, pretended to wake up, and laughed low in his throat. “Good morning,” he said.

If Hollander was going to move away, it would happen now. He didn’t. He stretched, arching back against Ilya like a cat, either completely oblivious to how it made his ass rub against Ilya’s dick, or deeply aware. “Good morning,” Hollander said, voice fuzzy with sleep.

He rolled over to face Ilya. There was a crease on his cheek from the pillow, and he squinted in the morning light. “Feel okay?” Hollander asked him. “How’s your head?”

He was so cute. Ilya felt a big, stupid grin splitting his face. He couldn’t resist. He leaned forward across the few inches that separated them and kissed Hollander on the lips.

A light kiss, a reasonable good morning or thank you for everything yesterday kiss. He didn’t even stick his tongue in Hollander’s mouth. It wasn’t about that. There was so much affection welling up in his chest, it had nowhere else to go.

Hollander was smiling at him when he pulled back, and moved towards Ilya to kiss him in return. His kiss was chaste, too, but then he kissed Ilya again, a little less chastely, and then Ilya took his face in his hands and kissed him for real, deeply, because why had he ever thought he could do anything else?

They couldn’t be friends, and they couldn’t platonically share a bed, and they couldn’t kiss and not have it lead elsewhere, because Ilya wanted Shane Hollander so badly. Ilya could think of nothing else as Hollander went up on an elbow to kiss him back just as deeply. He had a cautious hand on Ilya’s cheek, careful of his injury. “Is this okay?” Hollander said against his lips.

In response, Ilya rolled them over so he was on top of Hollander, bodies pressed together. If Hollander hadn’t noticed his hard dick earlier, it was obvious now—and it flared through his body like gasoline to fire to feel Hollander’s arousal against his. “Is this okay?” Ilya asked.

Hollander nodded. His mouth dropped open a little when Ilya rolled their hips together. “Holy shit,” he breathed. His hands went down to grab Ilya’s ass, spreading his legs to let Ilya settle firmly between them, and moved his body up against Ilya’s to meet the motion.

Ilya had to kiss him again. He was dangerously close to coming already, and splitting his focus helped hold it off. Hollander spread his legs even further, bending his knees, and for a moment the image of fucking him painted itself in perfect detail in Ilya’s mind. How good it would be, how right it would feel, with Hollander under him panting into his mouth like he was doing right now.

“Oh, god,” Hollander moaned, as if he was imagining the same thing. Then he stiffened, and turned his face to the side, brow furrowed. Ilya thought he’d come—but then Hollander was pushing Ilya off, scrambling away.

Ilya let him go immediately, moving back. His blood, heightened from the arousal, suddenly went cold. “Sorry—did I hurt you?”

Hollander was sitting on the edge of the bed, facing away. His head was bowed and his shoulders rose and fell as he breathed heavily. Panic was mounting inside Ilya. Had he done something to him he didn’t want? “Hollander,” he said, and then when there was no reaction, “Shane.”

He didn’t know what made him say it. Maybe a realization that after everything that had happened in the last 24 hours, it was absurd to keep calling him by his last name. The distance he’d pretended it had given him was immaterial now.

And it had the intended effect; Shane’s head popped up and he looked over his shoulder at Ilya with huge, wretched eyes. “The fuck are we doing?” he said in a broken voice.

The question was almost as bad as if Ilya had physically hurt him. “You don’t want to? Is okay if you don’t, I’m—”

“Of course I fucking want to. I think that’s pretty obvious. I want you so bad it’s making me insane, but you somehow keep forgetting what you told me, which is that we can’t. And it could have pretty disastrous repercussions if we do.”

Ilya sat up, cross-legged. He shouldn’t be lying down for this conversation. “No one has to know,” Ilya said. It wasn’t an explanation, but he didn’t have one. Just the desire that was too overwhelming to ignore anymore. It scared him more than a little. He’d never felt like this before, especially with someone he hadn’t actually had sex with.

Shane shook his head in astounded anguish. “So we’re going to sneak around and lie to Svetlana and Cherie and everyone else? I know them barely at all compared to you and even I know someone would notice. Maybe you’re good at pretending, but I’m not.”

“Okay, fine,” Ilya said with a casualness he didn’t feel. “So we don’t. We will just be friends.”

It was the most bold-faced lie he’d ever told. He didn’t believe it himself even the tiniest bit. They couldn’t be friends. Shane gave him an exasperated look. “We are not going to be friends,” he said flatly.

“Not with an attitude like that,” Ilya muttered. He looked away. He couldn’t tell what Shane wanted to hear from him. A declaration of love? A denial of Shane’s practicality? Did he just want Ilya to kiss him again and shut them both up?

Shane stood up and faced Ilya fully, arms crossing over his chest. “Why are you being like this?”

“Like what?”

“Acting like an asshole. Like you have no idea what I’m talking about. I guess that’s one way to solve this problem, if you make me hate you, we won’t have to—” Shane cut himself off. He looked almost as angry as he’d been last night when talking about Janet.

“I don’t want you to hate me,” Ilya said quietly. The thought was horrible. Possibly the worst outcome he could think of.

“Then talk to me! Do you understand what I’m saying?”

Ilya’s temper blazed to match Shane’s. “What do you want me to say? We can’t, we shouldn’t, but we aren’t going to be friends. And so? You want me to quit my job so we can, what, ride off into the sunset together?”

Shane’s jaw dropped in shock. “I would never ask you to do that.”

“Then what? What do you want?”

Shane took a deep breath. He pressed the heels of his palms into his eyes, then dropped them and looked Ilya full in the face. Slowly, he said, “Maybe I want us both to acknowledge that what we’re feeling is real. Or are you gonna tell me that it’s all a fantasy, and I’m imagining it?”

If Ilya was a stronger person, he would have lied. It would’ve been best for both of them in the long run. But for all his practice at deceiving both himself and others, he couldn’t do it. Not with Shane Hollander looking at him like that, face half-agony, half-hope. Not with how Ilya had to physically hold himself back from going over there to take him in his arms.

“You aren’t imagining it,” Ilya said in a low voice.

The words seemed to hit Shane hard. He nodded, then jerked his head back and stared at the ceiling. He was trying not to cry, Ilya realized.

There was no way Ilya wasn’t going to go to him. He gave Shane plenty of time to avoid his touch, but the moment Ilya embraced him Shane fell into him. It was his turn to hold Shane as he cried, though his tears weren’t as bone-deep as Ilya’s had been. In fact, when they pulled apart, he was smiling.

“Don’t tell me. You figured out how to fix it,” Ilya said.

Shane laughed wetly and wiped his face on his t-shirt sleeve. “No. I just needed to hear you say that. Fuck. I feel like I can breathe.”

Both of them were talked out. They ate cold pizza for breakfast on Shane’s couch in an exhausted but comfortable silence. It was still early, barely 8 o’clock. Shane made them cappuccinos with his fancy espresso machine, which he could do well even if he couldn’t cook, and they sat on his shady bedroom balcony to drink them.

It was in fact Shane’s bedroom he’d put Ilya in. “You should have given me the guest room,” Ilya said when he found out.

“It doesn’t have an en suite,” Shane said.

“I am not an invalid,” Ilya said, amused. “I can walk down the hall to the bathroom.”

“Sorry! I’ll put you in the guest room next time, Jesus,” Shane grumbled.

Shane had been right. There was a lightness to their banter now. Ilya looked up at the sunlight playing through the leaves of the honeylocust tree that engulfed the balcony and felt almost happy. He found he was holding his mother’s crucifix between his fingers, rubbing over it with his thumb. Nothing had been resolved. But he would take the moment of peace where he could.

Shane broke it, because he was who he was. “What are we going to do?” he said to Ilya.

If Shane didn’t know, Ilya sure as fuck didn’t. “I don’t know,” Ilya sighed. He wasn’t going to quit his job. He was sure Shane wouldn’t either. If he left the board, there was no guarantee he’d be replaced by someone friendly to the House. And the rules were not going to change. Even if Ilya somehow convinced himself this qualified as an exception, he would never be able to convince everyone else.

Shane had to be running through all the same things in his head. “Maybe now that we’re on the same page, it won’t be so hard,” he theorized.

Ilya looked at Shane, with his nerdy glasses and beautiful freckles and soft little smile that grew while he watched Ilya look at him. Ilya wanted to kiss him just as badly as he had earlier. “Maybe,” Ilya said.

“I really like you so much,” Shane said softly.

They had basically said it earlier, so Ilya could tell himself it wasn’t the confession it was when he said, “I like you, too, so much,” in the same soft voice. Because he did. The desire, burning through him, was more than physical. Far more.

For now, that knowledge would have to be enough.

—-—

The House was in a state of uproar when Ilya arrived later that afternoon. Cadence had apparently told everyone what had happened, and Svetlana and Janet had had a screaming fight in the middle of the dressing room in front of the whole main stage cast. Then Janet had left, but not before threatening to fire every single last one of them. Cherie had confirmed with her assistant that she’d flown out of JFK last night, heading back to Europe.

“Well,” Ilya said, resigned, when Cherie and Svetlana gave him the download in his office. He had the private, disloyal thought that if it all came crumbling down, at least there was now a small silver lining.

“She doesn’t have the power to fire anyone,” Shane said. They’d come separately, Ilya having gone home to change first, and Shane had joined them halfway through the recap. “The board can vote on replacing personnel, but no one person can fire a member of the staff unless they’ve done something illegal or broken the conduct guidelines.”

Suddenly none of them wanted to look at each other. The situation was a little hilarious, Ilya had to admit. They all knew something about what had happened, but none of them wanted to talk about it. At least Janet knew nothing. Se hadn’t been at the House long enough to even see Ilya and Shane interact.

“Cadence said she’d sue for wrongful termination if Janet tried to pull anything,” Svetlana said.

“That’s probably not going to work if she was going to leave anyway,” Cherie said pragmatically.

“No one will be suing,” Shane said reassuringly. “I’ll call a meeting of the board tomorrow and make them aware of the situation to get ahead of things. Including Janet, there’s seven people. Only two would be in her pocket no questions asked. The rest will see reason.”

“Thank you, Hollander,” Ilya said. “Please keep us updated.”

Shane recognized it as a dismissal—he nodded and left. “You don’t have to be so cold towards him, Ilyusha. He rushed you to the hospital, didn’t he?” Svetlana said in Russian once Shane was gone. She switched to English for Cherie’s sake to continue. “How do you feel, is it bad?”

Ilya had changed the bandage at home. His eye was almost back to normal, just a little irritated and sensitive. “Looks worse than it is. She didn’t mean to hit me.”

“Oh, I know,” Svetlana said venomously. “She meant to hit the lady she’d just found out was pregnant. Jesus Christ, she’s ten times more evil than I thought. I almost bashed her head in but Cherie held me back.”

“I didn’t feel like you going to jail would help the situation,” Cherie said. “For the record, I wanted to do the same.”

“Did she say anything to you?” Svetlana asked him. “It would be just like her to ghost and not apologize.”

There were still unread messages in his phone from her, and likely some missed calls. “I have not checked.”

“Good. Leave her on read. I’d say sue her for assault, but I know you won’t.”

He wouldn’t, anymore than he would have sued his father. “How is Cadence?”

“She’s fine. I told her she didn’t need to do her wind-down weeks if she didn’t want to, but now that Janet’s gone she wants to stick to the plan.”

“Good. I will talk with her when she arrives, to make sure.”

“You’re her savior,” Cherie told him. “I think her husband is going to buy you flowers.”

The thought was extremely embarrassing. “It never should have gotten to that point. I should have stepped in earlier.”

He’d thought about it his whole subway ride uptown. Why had he been so frozen, unable to intervene? For once, he was looking forward to an appointment with Dr. Morozova. He had some new things to unpack.

“That bitch makes all of us crazy in specific ways,” Svetlana said. “It’s her fault for being evil.”

That didn’t keep Ilya from feeling guilty. He tried to apologize to Cadence later and say as much, but she wouldn’t hear it. “Roz. Are you serious? You can’t take responsibility for her actions.”

“Did she say anything else to you after I left? Sorry I ran out of there.”

She looked at him like he was insane. “You were fucking bleeding because she basically punched you in the face. No, she tried to apologize but I screamed at her and left. She tried to find me in here later but Svetlana was there and cursed her out. It was very satisfying. Are you good? Cherie said Hollander took you to the hospital.”

“I am fine. Looks worse than it is.”

Cadence scrutinized him. “Looks pretty bad, Roz. But I guess Hollander wouldn’t have let you leave the hospital if it was serious. Would probably be some sort of liability.”

Ilya wanted the subject off Shane. “You are sure you want to perform? You should be resting, yes?”

“I’m not gonna let her get to me like that,” Cadence said decisively.

Her courage was inspiring. Ilya gave her a hug and went up to the terrace. He needed a cigarette more than he ever had in his life. He’d gotten halfway through it when the door behind him opened.

It was Shane. Ilya leaned against the brick ledge and watched him approach without trying to hide it. God, he really was gorgeous. Ilya could admit it to himself now.

“Let me see if I have this straight,” Shane said. “Not only was it not an accident. But you took a hit meant for your pregnant employee.”

Ilya turned away, embarrassed. “It was not like that.”

“Are you a superhero or something?” Shane came to stand beside him. “That’s how they’re all talking about you downstairs. Is there a Russian Spider-Man?”

“I am hearing I should milk the bandage as long as I can,” Ilya said.

“And the scar,” Shane said. “Make sure it scars.” In a more serious voice, he added, “You’d have grounds for a restraining order, if you wanted one.”

Ilya couldn’t talk about that now, especially not with Shane. He took a drag from his cigarette. “I want to know something. Will the new American Houses ever happen?”

Shane considered. “It’s tough to say. Honestly, it depends on how things shake out with Janet. The Devereux name doesn’t mean that much, but without her it might get dicey.”

“Right. Like she even has had anything to do with the House of Mirrors in years,” Ilya grumbled.

“I know. I actually think it would be good to get the rest of them down here for some face time with you and Svetlana. You’re both very charming in your own right, and they’d see that other than the name, Janet doesn’t bring much to the table.”

There was a lot to unpack in that statement. “So you think I am charming.”

“In your own right,” Shane clarified.

“Whatever that means.” Ilya finished his cigarette and thought about lighting a second one. It was torture to stand next to Shane, with everything they’d said to each other between them, and not be able to touch him. Is this how things were going to feel from now on? He tapped another one out, ignoring Shane’s disapproving look. “And Janet was going to be the creative mind behind the new Houses?”

“No, there’d be a new team for each. Using what we know is successful in previous ones.”

“So that is why you were pumping me for so much information when you first came,” Ilya said. He kept his tone light, because he wanted Shane to answer honestly, not out of defensiveness.

Shane’s forehead creased as he thought. “Pumping you? What do you mean?”

“You asked me like ten thousand questions every day.”

“Oh.” Shane shook his head. “No. I mean, yes, your knowledge basis will be invaluable in the next phase, however you wanted to be involved. But that was just…”

“Just what?” Ilya prompted when he trailed off.

“I just wanted to hear what you thought,” Shane confessed. “This was such a new world and the way you talked about it… I’d never heard anyone speak like that before.”

Ilya had to light the new cigarette and smoke it for a few moments before he could say anything to that. “Now you are used to us. The shine will wear off.”

Shane didn’t take the bait. Or, he took the bait Ilya hadn’t realized he was offering. “No. I think you’re one of the smartest people I’ve ever met.”

Ilya closed his eyes and willed himself to breathe. And keep his hands to himself. “Don’t say things like that to me,” he said in a low voice, “when I am not allowed to kiss you.”

“Oh,” Shane said again in a small voice. He was red when Ilya opened his eyes. “Sorry. That wasn’t my intent.”

Somehow that just made it worse. They stood there in silence while Ilya finished his cigarette, went back inside, and didn’t speak the rest of the night. But every time Ilya looked up from making a drink at the bar, Shane’s eyes were there to meet his, like a game only the two of them knew they were playing.

—-—

The game was fun for a few weeks. Then it wasn’t.

Nearly every day, Ilya saw Shane. He spoke to Shane. But he could not touch Shane. There were only so many times he could be half-hard the entire night from the tension, thick between them, and then go home alone and jerk off in solitude. Slowly, he was going insane.

Theoretically, he could speak to Shane about sleeping with other people. But whatever this thing blossoming between them was, a tricky conversation like that would kill it immediately. And to sleep around without the conversation would kill it even more certainly. If he’d wanted to end things with Shane, permanently and decisively, it would be a good way to do it, actually. But somehow, that being the objectively wise option—end things, now—didn’t feel like the healthy, non self-destructive choice.

Who was he becoming? Giving up life’s buffet of sexual partners for a secret quasi-relationship that couldn’t be consummated? Because that was what this was becoming, Ilya realized. He was beset by doubts every moment they were apart, only for all of them to evaporate as soon as he saw Shane’s face.

Oddly enough, it probably would have been the best possible time for him to reveal to everyone that he was sort-of definitely breaking their number one rule. Protecting Cadence had made the staff love him even more, in a way that was sweet but also deeply awkward. Ilya could only receive so many tearful words of gratitude for defending one of them from his one-time mentor, to his own physical detriment, before he started feeling like a fraud.

The truth was he hadn’t been thinking about Cadence when he stepped between her and Janet. He’d been thinking about Janet, and how much trouble she’d be in if she’d hit Cadence. Cadence, who had no loyalty to her and would have taken out a restraining order, a lawsuit, everything she possibly could. And then Cadence likely would have been crushed under the weight of the Devereux family fortune and lawyers who could twist every true statement back around in a lie.

“That makes me sick, right?” Ilya asked Dr. Morozova at his next session. He’d skipped over the Shane stuff, focusing on everything Janet-related. They only had so much time every appointment. “I’m thinking of protecting the wrong person. I’m just as bad as her.”

“That isn’t true. That’s the power of these figures in our lives. We become so attuned to their feelings and ways of thinking, we mistake it for our own. Does it remind you of your relationship with anyone else?”

He’d known that question was coming. “Yes. My father.”

Dr. Morozova nodded, like she’d known that answer was coming. “I see some similarities as well.”

They spent some time drawing parallels, until Ilya felt ill with how obvious it was. He’d fled his father’s house in Moscow, only to end up in Janet’s House in New York. “Am I doomed?” he asked.

“Of course not. On every repeat of the pattern, you become a little more aware.”

“But there will be a next one?” Ilya was overwhelmed with anxiety at the thought.

“Maybe not. But try to be understanding of yourself if there is. Build your tools in the meantime. Trust yourself.”

How could he trust himself when he was the same self who’d gotten in this situation in the first place? But that wasn’t fair. He’d learned that in the beginning with Dr. Morozova. At every turn, he had made the best decision he could with the tools he had at the time.

It was one of those sessions that left him completely drained and barely able to string two sentences together. Thankfully it was a slower night, so he wasn’t needed down in the lounge. He pretended to work in his office when really he was zoning out, staring at his email.

A knock on the door. “Yes?”

It was Shane. Ilya was so happy to see him but also he was the last person he wanted to see. He didn’t think he could keep it together in front of him. So quickly, Ilya was getting used to dropping his guard. It was dangerous.

“I don’t know if I can talk right now,” Ilya said.

“Oh. Of course. Everything okay?”

Everything’s fine. Ilya almost said it. He took a deep breath. “No,” he said instead.

“Okay.” Shane was doing a good job of hiding his anxiety, but Ilya could still see it. “Want to talk about it?”

“No,” Ilya said again. He let his gaze run over Shane from head to toe and back up again so his meaning was clear.

Shane came inside his office, shut the door, and threw the lock. “Come here.”

Ilya went slowly, a little nervous but also desperate for anything Shane would give him. “We’re just going to hug,” Shane told him sternly. “And only because you look like you need it.”

Ilya did. He thought he wouldn’t be able to stop himself from escalating things, but so much of the tension drained from his body the moment Shane’s arms were around him. He laid his head against Shane’s shoulder and just breathed. Shane breathed with him, rubbing his back.

No physical touch other than sex had ever relaxed him like this before. He pulled back after a few minutes. Shane smiled at him and kissed him on the cheek. “Better?”

Ilya nodded. “How did you do that? You are magic.”

Pleased, Shane let him go. “Do you want to be alone?”

“No,” Ilya said. He didn’t feel so on edge anymore, like one glance from Shane would break him open.

“Okay. I’ll sit over here for a bit?”

Shane opened the door wide, a reminder to both of them to behave. Ilya worked at his desk and Shane from his phone on the couch in a comfortable silence. After a while, Ilya found he did want to talk. “I see a psychiatrist,” he said in an offhand tone.

Shane put his phone down. “Like for therapy?”

“Yes. Once a week. Some sessions are harder than others.”

“And you had one today,” Shane confirmed. Ilya dipped his head. “It was hard?” Ilya dipped his head again. “What did you talk about?”

Ilya pondered an answer. “Janet. And my father.”

He saw Shane make the connection. But Shane said nothing, just kept waiting, leaving space for Ilya to continue talking if he wanted to. In that moment, Ilya felt such a rush of affection for him he couldn’t have spoken if he wanted to. This one conversation held more meaning than a thousand hook-ups. What a miracle they were even here, having it.

“I want to tell you about them someday,” Ilya said after a bit. “My father and my mother.”

“I want to hear,” said Shane. “Whenever you want to tell me.”

It didn’t happen for some time. They had so many other things to talk about, and that was all they could really do: talk. Ilya had had a few relationships of varying lengths, but none of them had been exclusive or serious and not a single one had consisted of so much fucking talking.

It was like extensive foreplay with no payoff. Ilya was developing the self-denial skills of a monk. This must have been how the great forbidden courtships in history had felt, conducted in public under constant scrutiny, through meaningful glances and letters that crossed oceans. The comparison made him feel a little less alone in their deeply weird and fucked up circumstances. Catherine the Great could probably relate.

“Where would you go, if you could go anywhere?” Shane asked him one night.

They were seated together at a table in the members’ lounge, across from each other so they looked like the two business associates they were, just catching up. Every so often a member that knew both of them would stop by to chat. It was second nature for Ilya to drop in and out of his persona, but at first the discomfort rolled off Shane in waves and he barely said anything to the intermittent visitors. No one other Ilya seemed to notice, though, and Shane relaxed more and more, like he was proving to himself he could do it. He managed to speak to Fabian for five whole minutes.

“Columbus, Ohio,” Ilya said in response to Shane’s question, and Shane laughed and rolled his eyes. “No, really. I do not think it is a real place.”

“It is,” Shane said. “It’s not that bad, actually.”

“Wow, not that bad. That is great.” Shane hid another laugh behind his hand. Ilya thought about a serious answer. “Buenos Aires.”

“Really? Why?”

Ilya shrugged. When he was young and in school, he sometimes would look at the map on the classroom wall and find the furthest point from Moscow on it, and spend the rest of the day fantasizing about being there. He couldn’t say all that, though. “There are many places I want to go. I have money saved, to travel, but is never the right time.”

“You should. Svetlana took time off to travel, didn’t she?”

“For work. She was researching, visiting different theaters and shows and so on.”

“And she didn’t do anything fun for herself while out there?”

She certainly had. It was very annoying when Shane insisted on making sense. “Not now,” Ilya said. “In the future, maybe.”

“Roz! Hey, I’ve been wanting to talk to you.” It was Zach Anderson, sitting down with them. “Hollander, you probably should hear about this, too. Look, I saw Evan Masters a few days ago. I thought he’d have calmed down by now but he was talking a little crazy. Said he’d been digging and that you wouldn’t like what he’d found. Shit like that.”

Shane’s eyes flicked towards Ilya and then away. “What did he find?” Shane asked.

“He wouldn’t tell me. Just kept repeating he was going to bring everything down.”

“Everything,” Ilya repeated, and Anderson nodded. That signified a general threat, not one towards Ilya specifically. How Masters even would have found out about him and Shane, he had no idea, but it was reassuring. “He is still with Madelyn?”

“No, but knowing her she’s pretty pissed off old lady Devereux didn’t intervene to get her her job back. She probably doesn’t even remember who Madelyn is.”

“Should we try to talk with them?” Svetlana said later when Ilya told her in his office. “What dirt could there be?”

“I don’t know,” Ilya said too quickly.

Svetlana narrowed her eyes at him. “You said Cherie deleted the footage.”

“She did. There’s nothing else.” What could Masters even have? They’d never touched each other in a remotely public place other than the night of charity dinner. The most they could be accused of was being friends.

“You don’t sound sure.”

“I don’t know what Masters is capable of,” Ilya said a little testily. “Is he having us followed? Did he install spycams around the member areas before he was kicked out? I’m not in his mind, I don’t know what he knows.”

Svetlana regarded him for a moment. “If he had,” she said, “what could there be?”

Ilya was fucked. There was no way out of this now without lying through his teeth to Svetlana. “Nothing’s happened. A few conversations that could sound a little… incriminating.”

“Incriminating how?” Svetlana asked.

Don’t say things like that to me when I am not allowed to kiss you. “It’s not a big deal,” Ilya said, as much for his own benefit as Svetlana’s.

“If you got fired by the board for breaking the rules, it would be an extremely big deal,” Svetlana snapped. “Hollander may have managed the Janet debacle with them, but he’d be implicated. There’d be no saving things.”

“You’d be fine without me,” Ilya said reasonably.

She threw her hands up. “I can’t talk to you when you’re like this. Everyone would be fucking devastated, myself included. You know this.”

He’d actually never thought about it. In his imaginings, he’d only pictured how angry people would be, and how readily they’d discard him the way he’d discarded Madelyn and the rule breakers before her. “We’ll have someone do a sweep and make sure,” Ilya said. “Let’s not panic until we have as much information as possible.”

It was a crazy situation if he was speaking more practically than Svetlana. He went down to the terrace to smoke and figure out who to call. Unfortunately, this was the kind of thing Scott Hunter would know how to handle.

It was 9 p.m., but Hunter picked up on the first ring. “Must be bad if you’re calling me, Roz.”

They didn’t exactly dislike each other; it was more that Hunter was the kind of bottom line-obsessed suit Ilya hated, and Ilya was the kind of unserious rake Hunter disdained. But beneath that, Ilya grudgingly acknowledged Hunter was good at what he did. He probably felt the same about Ilya. “We have a bit of a situation.”

He explained the Masters problem as succinctly as he could, without implying anything about himself or Shane. “Masters, Masters…” Hunter muttered. A keyboard clacked as he typed. “Oh, right, his mom’s Nina Masters. So that’s not good. Before she retired she was one of those fixers. Great at finding bodies and better at burying them. Hopefully he doesn’t have his mom’s abilities. Or help.”

“What bodies are you hiding for us, Hunter?” Ilya asked.

Hunter laughed. “Not a thing. My books are clean. You’re welcome. And you and Svetlana run a tight ship down there, unless there’s something you want to tell me?”

“Not a thing,” said Ilya.

“Then we’re good. I have a guy, I’ll send him over tomorrow and he’ll make sure Masters didn’t hide or install anything. Could he have a person on the inside? That would be a much simpler explanation.”

Ilya thought about it. Most of the staff other than Madelyn had hated Masters. Even his former friend group didn’t like him anymore. “I doubt it.”

“Great. Nothing to worry about. If he pulls anything, we’ll sue his ass.”

The thought cheered Ilya. “That would be fun.”

“We have different definitions of fun. Call me with anything else.” He hung up without saying goodbye.

Ilya finished his cigarette and lit another. The breeze was a little chilly. God, Ilya couldn’t wait for winter. The familiarity of its misery was a comfort he could use right now.

He wasn’t surprised when Shane appeared. “Not now,” Ilya said before he could speak. He felt a sense of paranoia that wouldn’t be put to rest until he was sure they weren’t being spied on.

“Okay,” said Shane. He didn’t try to argue. “Later?”

Ilya nodded. “Yes. I will call you.”

He did, much later, after he’d left the House and gone home. Shane picked up immediately anyway, like he’d been waiting. “Hey.”

“Hey,” Ilya said. “Svetlana and I talked. Hunter is sending someone over to the House tomorrow to make sure Masters did not install any bugs or things.”

“Oh.” Shane was quiet on the other end for a moment. Ilya put him on speaker in his bedroom while he changed out of his work clothes and into a pair of boxers to sleep in. “I didn’t think about that.”

“Why would you? It would be insane. I doubt he did. But still.”

“Yes. It’ll be good to check.”

Usually when Ilya got home from work he would make something to eat, but tonight he didn’t feel like it. He lay in bed, phone on the pillow next to his head. He closed his eyes and imagined it was Shane beside him.

It was too painful an image to hold for long. Instead, it just made him realize that, the way things were now, ahead there was only a lonely fall leading into a lonely winter leading into a lonely every season after that, with them piecing together these little moments of restrained intimacy, until someone found out or one of them couldn’t take it any longer.

“Are you still there?” Shane asked.

“Yes,” Ilya said. He swallowed, and took a deep breath.

“Are you okay?” Shane’s voice was quiet. Ilya pictured him in his bed, in his apartment four miles to the north. The call connecting them felt tenuous over the distance. Fragile, and easy to break at any moment.

“I don’t know,” Ilya said honestly. “Are you?”

Shane didn’t answer. Ilya could hear him breathing, though. “I was thinking about options,” he said eventually.

“Tell me.”

“I could quit the board.”

“No,” Ilya said immediately. “What happens then? Janet replaces you with one of her people and she fires everyone?”

“It would be someone from my company. She doesn’t know any of them.”

“Would they care about the House like you?”

“Maybe,” Shane said, which meant no. “But you survived with indifferent leadership for years. Thrived, even”

It still felt like choosing himself over everyone else. Ilya couldn’t. “Would you want that? Stepping down?”

Another silence. “I would do it,” Shane said.

“But you don’t want to.”

“Maybe I want this more.”

Ilya closed his eyes again. His heart was beating hard in his chest. He pressed a hand over it, trying to calm it. “Shane. Don’t.”

“It’s true. You want me to lie?” Shane said stubbornly. “It’s not like it would be some act of martyrdom. I’d still have a job and all. I just wouldn’t be involved in anything to do with the House.”

“I am not worth it.”

“Ilya,” said Shane. He sounded astonished. “You are, to me.”

How could he just say things like that? Easily, like it wasn’t the bravest act of vulnerability Ilya had ever witnessed. And he was saying them to Ilya. Ilya couldn’t find words in English to reply. Instead, in Russian, he whispered, “As long as you want me, I’m yours.”

“What?” Shane said. “Did you break up or was that Russian?”

In English, Ilya said, “I wish you were here.”

“It’s probably good I’m not,” Shane said, and laughed unsteadily. “I don’t think I could hold back.”

“Me either,” Ilya said.

“When have you?” Shane joked.

Only every time they saw each other in person. “We should sleep.”

“Mm.”

Neither of them hung up. Ilya rolled onto his side facing the phone, pulled a sheet up over himself. “Good night, Shane,” he said.

“Good night, Ilya.”

Ilya kept his eyes on his phone, waiting for Shane to end the call and for the screen to blank out. He fell asleep before it did. In the morning, when he checked his phone, the call length was five hours. He had a text from Shane. Phone died in the night. Have a good day. I’ll see you later.

Ilya didn’t reply. But on the subway to the House later, he found himself opening his texts and staring at the message again and again. It was nothing, so simple, especially compared to the things Shane had said to him on the phone. But even the tiniest amount of proof that this was real felt monumental.

—-—

Hunter’s guy found nothing. He checked the members’ lounge, every private room, and the terrace; he did some sort of sweep on their surveillance system for malware that came up blank, and then he came up to Ilya’s office to do the same. “Usually the guys I’m doing this for, they’re making like the next water-powered car or some shit,” the guy said in a thick Brooklyn accent. “Terrified someone’s gonna steal their bajillion dollar idea. But you guys are just some titty bar. You can see those on the internet for free any time. Dunno why someone would go through the trouble.”

Ilya’s computer was fine, too. All clear, he texted Hunter, Svetlana and Shane separately. He got a thumbs up from Hunter, a thank Christ from Svetlana, and nothing from Shane. He was probably still working.

Tonight was Cadence’s last performance. They had a cake for her down in the dressing room, and a card they’d all signed. She was starting to show just a little, but you could only tell from the side. “Thank you for everything, Roz,” she said when they hugged. “I owe you so much.”

“Don’t forget us,” Ilya said.

“Never. Ken keeps threatening to name the baby after you. A little half-Filipino half-Black baby named after a Russian dude.”

“Please don’t. They will have no friends when they grow up,” said Ilya, and Cadence laughed.

Shane found him as he was about to go up to his office with a piece of cake. “What’s that from?”

“Cadence’s farewell. Want some? There is plenty.”

“Oh, of course. Cherie told me to sign her card, though I doubt Cadence even knows who I am. And no, I don’t really eat sweets.” But Shane was eyeing Ilya’s slice enough that Ilya grabbed an extra fork.

Shane led the way up the staircase. “Hunter’s guy checked everywhere?” he asked.

“Anywhere that matters. Is not like him to have that kind of foresight, so I am not surprised.”

“I was thinking over every conversation we’ve ever had,” Shane said quietly. “Wouldn’t have been good.”

No… but in some ways, the repeated false alarms were fraying Ilya’s nerves more than if it just happened. That lonely road ahead was the sole alternative. He didn’t know which was worse.

Shane looked over his shoulder. “By the way, I wanted to ask—”

It happened so fast. Shane placed his foot wrong on one of the crumbling steps, and before Ilya could react, he fell against the rickety railing—which screeched and tore away, taking Shane with it.

Or it would have, if Ilya hadn’t dropped the cake and yanked him away from the edge, arms around Shane’s chest. They both hit the opposite wall and stayed there, pressed up against it, staring at the new three-foot gap in the railing that was the perfect size to fall through and then down three stories.

“Holy shit,” Shane panted. They were both breathing hard, suddenly. “I thought that railing looked in bad shape, I didn’t know it was that bad. Are you okay?”

He turned to face Ilya. Ilya felt like his heart was outside his body, pulsing with a terror so large it was going to choke him. He couldn’t speak.

“Are you hurt?” Shane was checking him with worried hands.

Ilya shook his head. “Are you?” he choked out.

“I’m fine. Jesus Christ, you’re really trying to earn that Russian Spider-Man title, aren’t you? Hey, it’s okay. Come on, let’s go up before the whole thing comes down around us.”

Miraculously, Ilya’s slice of cake had landed face up. Not that he cared about eating it now. When they reached his office, he threw it on his desk and pulled Shane into his arms. “It’s okay, we’re both fine,” Shane said.

Ilya held him anyway. He’d seen Shane falling so clearly, as if it had actually been real. The way his body splayed out in his mind was too similar to another image, one he couldn’t let resurface. “Those fucking stairs are getting fixed tomorrow,” he said. He had to fight to keep his voice steady.

“I would have been fine. Probably just broken my leg and gotten a concussion,” Shane said dryly. Then, when Ilya didn’t laugh, “Hey. You okay?”

He pulled back to look at Ilya, who kissed him. He didn’t care that he shouldn’t—that they were standing in the open doorway and Cherie or Svetlana or someone else could come in at any time. He needed it too badly.

Shane made a surprised sound against his mouth. But he kissed Ilya back, fingers light on his face. Ilya meant for it to stay soft, just reassurance that Shane was real, and here. But of course, before long, it devolved. Soon he had Shane pressed up against the door frame, kissing along his jaw. “Fuck,” Shane groaned. “We can’t.”

Ilya ignored him. Shane wasn’t pushing him away—in fact, his hands were straying downwards, rucking up Ilya’s shirt to touch underneath. In response, Ilya cupped his ass through his jeans. The horrible images his brain had conjured were gone, replaced by those all too intoxicating thoughts of fucking Shane. God, how he wanted to.

Shane moaned, and then caught himself. “Ilya, fuck, stop, stop.” He actually put his hands on Ilya’s biceps and made him step back this time. For a minute they just looked at each other. Shane had to be seeing the same thing Ilya was: Shane’s kiss-reddened lips and messed-up hair and rumpled shirt.

How was Ilya supposed to resist that? “Sorry,” he said, not sorry at all.

Shane smiled and shook his head, bemused. He took a deep breath and Ilya followed suit. After a little of that, Shane asked, “Can you behave?”

Ilya wasn’t sure, to be honest, but he said, “If I have to.”

“Sadly, you do,” Shane said. They sat across from each other at Ilya’s desk. Ilya picked up a fork and stabbed it into the cake, like it was the reason they needed to behave. He shoved a chunk in his mouth. “Here,” he said, offering the extra fork to Shane.

Shane took it. “It’s chocolate?”

“Yes. Try it.”

Ilya had no appetite for food. He had a couple more bites; Shane ate the rest. “So you don’t eat sweets?” Ilya said.

“I’ll regret it when I break out tomorrow,” Shane groused. He licked the icing off the fork.

“What were you going to ask me?” It came back to Ilya, Shane’s words just before disaster struck.

“Oh, right. Do you want to get dinner with my parents?”

There was no studied casualness to the question, which surprised Ilya. The idea seemed immediately fraught to him. Shane looked up when he didn’t answer. “You don’t have to,” Shane said, defenses rising.

“No. Is not that. Do your parents know anything?”

“Just that you’re the director of membership here, and about the great work you and Svetlana have done. I haven’t told them about… you know. I haven’t told anyone.”

“So it would be a business dinner?” Ilya said.

Shane thought about it. “I guess, yeah. They’d like to hear about the House from you.”

“And we will act like we are just colleagues?” Ilya said. With every point of clarity, Shane was deflating in front of him. “I just want to think this through.”

“No, you’re right,” Shane said. He took a deep breath, shoulders rising and falling. “This is really fucking complicated, isn’t it?”

Ilya nodded. “Tired of it yet?”

Shane frowned at him. “No,” he said obstinately. “Are you?”

It would have been better to turn it towards banter. But now that the twin adrenaline rushes of the staircase disaster and the truncated make-out had passed, all Ilya felt was weary. He could have taken it in stride if there was an end point in sight. There wasn’t. Only Shane before him, always just out of reach.

“So you’re tired of it,” Shane said. His tone was brittle, posture tensing. Bracing for a fight.

“I didn’t say that,” Ilya said. “It is a lot.”

“Okay. What would make it better? Do you want to sleep with other people?”

It was so shocking to hear that suggestion come out of Shane’s mouth. He pressed his lips together as he waited for Ilya’s reply, and when none was forthcoming, Shane said, haltingly, “Or… are you already—”

“No,” Ilya said immediately. “There has been no one. And I don’t want to.”

Considering it sickened him. Ilya knew without a doubt, now, that if he slept with anyone else, he would only be thinking of Shane. “Fuck,” Ilya said, and covered his face with his hands. He tried to remember how to breathe.

“Do you want to end things?” Shane asked in a low voice. “It’s okay. You can tell me.”

“No,” Ilya said again, even more emphatically. He dropped his hands. Tears were standing out in Shane’s eyes, ready to fall. “I just… I wish…”

I wish things were different. But they both did. It didn’t bear stating. “I want…” Ilya gathered his words. “One night.”

Shane stared at him, uncomprehending. Then understanding dawned, quickly followed by trepidation. “That’s not a good idea.”

“I don’t care,” Ilya said. “Unless it isn’t what you want.”

“That’s not the problem,” Shane said immediately. “It’s too big a risk, though.”

“Shane. Is all a risk. How about we take a risk that reminds us what is important?”

Even as Ilya spoke, he fully expected Shane to shoot it down. But he meant every word. Right now, whatever there was between them was dominated by tension and longing. They needed just the tiniest amount of joy, of pleasure, of enjoying each other if there was any chance they were going to make it.

Shane’s hand was on the desk right by his. Ilya moved his fingers over just enough to overlap his. Shane looked down at them. Then slowly, he turned his hand over and interlaced their fingers.

“Okay.” Shane spoke slowly, every word deliberate. “When you’re done here for the night, come over to mine.”

Ilya’s heart jumped in his chest. “Really?”

Shane looked at him. The heat in his eyes ran through Ilya’s body. “Yes,” Shane said. It was a promise. “Now I have to leave or I won’t be able to wait.”

Ilya understood. He was about three seconds from lunging over the desk and kissing Shane. “Okay. Be careful on the stairs!”

“I will. See you later.”

It took an eternity after Shane had gone for Ilya to calm down. He forced himself to look up repairmen for the stairs to call tomorrow, and send out a note to all staff to avoid using them. Thankfully barely anyone did.

Those simple tasks took nearly thirty minutes. Ilya kept zoning out, mind wandering forward a few hours. They had never been together with no holding back. Would Shane kiss differently? Would he get on his knees? Would he want Ilya to be slow and tender, or hard and urgent?

What did Ilya even need to get done? What was he doing here? He should have left with Shane. He should go now. He was wasting precious moments on things he could do tomorrow, the day after, never.

He was gathering his things to leave when Cherie appeared in his office doorway. She was breathing hard, like she’d just run up the stairs. “What’s wrong?” Ilya asked sharply.

“Your computer,” Cherie gasped. “The news. Search Houses of Desire.”

With dread flooding through him, Ilya obeyed. He opened his computer and typed it into Google, and then stood there, frozen, while he read headline after headline.

The group of historic avant-guarde burlesque cabaret Houses of Desire rocked by embezzling scandal… Millions of dollars in membership fees unaccounted for across Europe… Founding Devereux family, who maintain majority control of the European institutions, claim no knowledge of where the money has gone… According to internal documents leaked by a whistleblower…

“Hunter said we were clean,” Ilya said. It was the only thought he could conjure. If Hunter fucking lied to him…

“We are. The story just broke, but so far it’s only the ones in Europe. Nothing that mentions us yet.”

The next article Ilya clicked into said so in the last paragraph: New York-based House of Mirrors is so far untouched by the scandal, though recent investors Hollander Financial Group will certainly be scrutinizing things much more closely.

“There is this, though.” Cherie held out her phone. It was a Twitter post, screengrabs. It was a list of the House of Mirrors members.

“Fuck,” Ilya said. That wasn’t good. Membership was confidential. No one would be happy, and they’d probably lose some people over it. The post had several hundred likes already. “It is accurate? Can we get this taken down?”

“A year or so out of date. I’m already on it, but it’s being reposted. It’s a moving target.”

“Stay on it.” Ilya sat back down at his desk. “I need to send an email out.”

He drafted something vague but apologetic, promising the House would get to the bottom of this very serious breach in privacy. We value your trust more than anything, and we are dedicated to earning it. “Can you read this over?”

He handed his computer to Cherie, who sat in the chair across from him to edit it. For the first time since she entered his office, Ilya checked his phone.

A text from Shane. I saw the news. I have to go into the office. Emergency board meeting.

We are clean. I fucking promise. Hunter told me, Ilya texted back.

I know, Shane replied immediately. I just spoke to him. Janet forgetting about New York for so long may have saved us.

He didn’t seem to know about the membership list leak. Ilya sent him the link. FYI. Cherie and I are dealing with it.

Shane didn’t reply for a while. When he did, it was a phone number. Hunter says call this guy.

Ilya rang it without question. “Hello?” said a thick Brooklyn accent.

“Hello. Is the titty bar. I need something online taken down.”

“All righty, what was leaked? Sex tape? Nudes?”

“A list of names.”

The guy laughed. “Easy peasy. Text me the link.”

Ilya hung up and did that. Cherie handed him the laptop back. “It’s ready to send.”

Ilya read over the email one more time and then sent it. Minutes later, his phone rang. It was Zach Anderson. “Fucking Masters. I fucking know it. That motherfucker. I’m gonna kick his ass. And this shit about the European Houses embezzling, that has Nina Masters written all over it. Probably pissed him off that you guys were clean.”

“How would he get the membership list? He doesn’t know everyone from memory, especially after this long. He had not even met half of them.”

“Would Madelyn?”

The moment he said it, Ilya knew. It would be exactly like Madelyn to steal the membership list long before leaving, as insurance. Should she need it. It was what Janet’s student would have done.

Footsteps again—Svetlana. “What,” she heaved, out of breath, “in the actual fuck is going on?”

—-—

The three of them stayed in Ilya’s office fielding emails, phone calls, and texts until the sun was rising. By that time, most of the membership had contacted him or Cherie in one form or another. The vast majority were pissed, but not with him, which was surprising. Only a couple wanted to cancel their membership.

They stopped when Cherie fell asleep on the couch and dropped her phone on her face. They carefully went down the stairs together and out into the morning chill.

Ilya waited until both Svetlana and Cherie had gotten in their Ubers. Then he pulled out his phone. I’m back at mine, Shane had texted him a couple hours ago. Completely understand if you just want to go home and crash when you’re done, but you’re still welcome to come over. No pressure/expectations.

He’d sent his address and door code to his fancy entry keypad. Ilya called himself an Uber, and put the address in as the destination.

He was never up this early. It was a different city outside the car window—lots of kids on their way to school and adults on their way to work. He imagined it for a moment: being a normal person who went to work in the morning and then home to their family at night.

Shane’s keypad beeped quietly after he keyed in the code, but inside the apartment was silent and dark. Shane was in bed in his bedroom, fast asleep. It had been a long night for him, too. Ilya stripped down to his boxers, got into bed beside him, and fell asleep in moments.

He woke a few hours later, only because the bedroom was so sunny. The bed was empty beside him, and Shane had pulled up the shades. Clothes and towels for him were laid out on the chair by the window.

Ilya wanted to shower, but he wanted to see Shane more. He went to the living room and found him sitting on the couch in work clothes, drinking a cup of coffee and looking at his laptop. “Sorry,” Shane said when he saw him. “I wanted to let you sleep but the board called another meeting later today. You and Svetlana are supposed to be there.”

“Is okay,” Ilya said. He sat next to Shane, and leaned his head on his shoulder.

Shane put his coffee and laptop aside immediately so he could wrap his arm around Ilya. “Not the night either of us wanted, huh?”

Ilya laughed. “The opposite.”

Shane kissed his forehead and then Ilya’s lips. They kissed for a little bit, just simple closeness without it skyrocketing immediately. Both of them being so tired helped. Ilya stopped them when he felt his body stirring, but he stayed close, nestled under Shane’s arm.

Shane gave him the rest of his coffee instead of getting up to make more. It was still warm. “How did it go last night?” Ilya asked him.

“Oh, fine. It helped that we were thorough before the deal. There’s just only so many places you can hide money like that. And the House of Mirrors budget is tiny compared to some of those European Houses.”

“They will ask us questions?”

“I don’t know. It might… it might be a little tense. I don’t know what to expect.”

There was something Shane wasn’t saying. “Are they thinking of pulling out?”

Shane didn’t reply right away. “I don’t know,” he said again. “It could happen.”

Ilya heaved a sigh. “One way or another, it will be over.”

Shane wrapped his arm more securely around Ilya’s shoulders. “Yes. And I’ll be there. Hunter’s on our side, too.”

Ilya had a sudden realization. “Janet?”

Shane shook his head. “She might call in. But this is nothing compared to what she’s dealing with in Europe.”

A small mercy. Shane called him an Uber home, and after a shower, Ilya ironed his nicest shirt and donned his most conservative blazer, and took the train right back up to Midtown to the Hollander Financial offices.

Svetlana met him out front so they could go in as a united front. She looked like the female C.E.O of a tech start-up in her black pantsuit and designer heels. They didn’t speak through getting their i.d.s checked at the building’s security desk, but on the long elevator ride up to the 19th floor, Svetlana linked her arm with his. “Together, no matter what happens. Right?” she said in Russian.

“No matter what,” Ilya replied.

The Hollander Financial office was all done in shades of grey. It had a soothing effect that reminded Ilya vaguely of a hospital, with too-bright fluorescent lighting and everyone speaking in hushed voices. They sat on a gray couch by the gray front desk while the gray-suited receptionist called someone to tell them they were there.

The someone she called was Shane. He had a little entourage following him, people in suits tapping furiously on phones or holding notebooks like they might need to take notes at any time. “Roz. Svetlana,” Shane said, and shook their hands. “Things have shifted a bit. The meeting’s closed-door now, but we might pull you in at the end. You can wait in here for now. Want anything? Coffee?”

Shane Hollander said the name plate on the wall by the door. Shane’s office. Surprisingly, it was about the same size as Ilya’s, though his furniture was much nicer and all matched. Someone brought them coffee in fancy glass tumblers that had no handle, and then shut the door behind them.

Ilya understood why Shane had placed them in his office. The meeting was taking place in the room directly across, beyond the field of cubicles in the center. Ilya stood, as if he was too restless to sit down, and pretended to look at the art on Shane’s office wall. “Can you see?” Svetlana said in quiet Russian.

“Barely. Hunter, Hollander, a few other people I don’t know. They’re all listening. I think to someone on the phone.” Both Hunter and Shane were frowning. Hunter had his arms crossed over his chest like he was dissatisfied with what the unseen speaker was saying. “Now Hollander is speaking.”

Shane looked like he was trying to form a consensus, gesturing in a way that made him look very confident and competent. It was odd seeing him in this setting. He fit in. His haircut didn’t even look stupid. Ilya had the realization that he must look like an escaped circus performer in this office the way Shane had looked like an accountant who’d gotten off the wrong subway stop at the House.

A gray-haired man with his back to Ilya was responding to Shane, and Shane was listening intently, nodding. Then he shook his head and said something emphatically that Hunter agreed with. “What’s happening?” Svetlana hissed.

“They’re just talking,” Ilya said, “I don’t know. I can’t read lips!”

Svetlana made a sound of frustration. “This is fucking torture. We came all this way to watch from the outside while they decide our fate. Fucking rich people. I swear to god, if they close us down and we have to find new jobs, I’ll be starting my own company. I’m not reporting to someone else ever again.”

The discussion dragged on. Trying to interpret its contents only by the few faces he could see started to make Ilya feel like he had in his early days in New York, when English had been like an alien language that he would never comprehend. But he couldn’t look away. He had the horrible feeling that if he did, it would solidify the worst possible outcome.

Finally, after nearly an hour, something was decided. Everyone stood and started shaking hands. Shane looked up and caught Ilya’s eye through the glass, and motioned for him and Svetlana to join. “Sveta, come on.”

The two of them hovered outside the glass meeting room door awkwardly for a few moments, then one of the underlings who’d been taking notes in a corner opened it for them. They stood aside to let a few people out, one of whom—a middle-aged woman—extended a hand. “Ilya Rozanov and Svetlana Vetrova? Wonderful to finally meet you. A shame it’s under circumstances like these. You both have done such great work.”

Circumstances like these? Ilya needed to know what had gone down, now. The room could not empty itself quickly enough, but all these suits apparently needed to stand around and exchange pleasantries. The gray-haired man was leaning over the table, talking to someone on the conference speaker in the center. “Oh, well, Gerald,” a familiar voice was saying through it, “when all this blows over, come out to place in Tahiti. It’s lovely. Bring the family.”

“Sounds great, Janet,” Gerald said. He glanced up and saw Ilya and Svetlana. “I gotta meet your protégés! I’ll let you go.”

“Bisous, darling.” A click, and the line went dead.

It was the closest to her Ilya had been since that day. And she hadn’t even acknowledged them. Ilya expected this to crush him. But, as Gerald greeted them and Ilya said niceties he didn’t hear, he realized he felt… nothing. It was like her hold over him had never existed.

Eventually, everyone was gone except Ilya, Svetlana, Shane, and Hunter, who closed the door. “What happened?” Ilya asked.

Shane and Hunter exchanged looks. Without preamble, Hunter said, “They’re putting the House of Mirrors up for sale.”

Svetlana swore in Russian. “All of it?” Ilya asked.

“Everything but the name. Though that’s close to worthless now.”

Ilya tried to process this. “What happens to us? Everyone else?”

“That depends on the new owners,” said Hunter. “I’m sorry, guys. We tried.”

Shane was watching Ilya from the other side of the room. “I’m sorry,” he said, and Ilya knew he meant it in the same way as Hunter did, but also far more deeply.

“I am sure you did your best,” Ilya said mechanically. The numbness he’d felt hearing Janet’s voice seemed to be lasting. He couldn’t really muster any strong feelings.

Hunter sighed. “Let’s get the fuck out of this place. I always feel like I’m in a hospital here. No offense, Hollander.”

“None taken,” Shane said.

“You guys hungry?” Hunter directed this at Svetlana and Ilya.

Svetlana answered for them both. “Starved. Let’s go.”

Ilya would have expected Hunter to take them to some bougie steakhouse full of men on two-hour lunch breaks, but he took them to a dive bar. They sat in a booth and ordered from sticky plastic-covered menus, and then Ilya realized as he looked around—it wasn’t just a dive bar. It was a gay bar.

“This is your kind of scene?” Ilya asked Hunter.

“Yep. My husband and I had our wedding reception here,” Hunter said.

If he’d said he could breathe underwater, Ilya would have been less surprised. He could only sputter, “Your… husband?!”

Svetlana jabbed him with her elbow. “You sound like a homophobe,” she chided in Russian. In English, she said to Hunter, “That’s great. How long have you been together?”

Hunter had been with his husband for ten years, married for five. At Svetlana’s insistence, as they all ate their meals of cheap beer and mediocre bar food, he told them the horrifyingly sweet story of how they met. Kip had been working in a smoothie shop by Hunter’s office. Hunter had gone in and bought a smoothie from him three times a week for four weeks before he asked him on a date. “After which he basically moved in and we’ve been together ever since.’

“I didn’t know that about the four weeks thing,” Shane said. “I would’ve thought you’d ask him out on the first day.”

“Oh, I was pretty stupid back then,” Hunter said, smiling.

“That is a very lovely story. Very romantic,” said Ilya, to make sure his lack of homophobia was clear. If only Hunter knew.

Hunter looked at him skeptically, like he thought Ilya might be making fun of him. Ilya just smiled. “Well, thanks, Roz. Anyway. Any other questions we can answer for you guys?”

The good mood vanished immediately. Ilya didn’t feel numb anymore. A deep well of sadness was opening up inside of him. He thought of the staff and what was going to happen to them. “We have no way of knowing who is going to buy the place?”

Shane shook his head. “And unfortunately, I don’t know that they’ll be too discerning. They’ll probably look to get the initial investment back and that’s all.”

“Which was?”

“30 million.”

Ilya looked down at his empty beer glass. “Ah.” Inside his mind, a vague fantasy had formed and then been killed in the space of three seconds.

Hunter mistook his reaction. “I know, it’s barely anything. They structured it to put more money in over time, but now of course that won’t happen…”

He droned on as Ilya spiraled deeper into his misery. Of course the contents of his savings account would never have been enough to buy the House, no matter how much its reputation had been affected. He didn’t even want the reputation, or the name, or the money that would never materialize. He just wanted what they had built.

“What is it?” Shane said, interrupting Hunter. He was looking at Ilya. “What are you thinking?”

“Nothing. Is stupid,” Ilya said. All three of them were looking at him now. “No, really, it’s nothing.”

“No bad ideas,” Hunter said. “Spill it.”

“I don’t have 30 million,” Ilya said. “So it doesn’t matter.”

“Would be crazy if you did, Roz,” Hunter said. “Hollander might not even have that much lying around.”

“I don’t,” Shane said. The tone of his voice made Ilya look up. Shane was smiling. “But I know a few people who do.”

The table was quiet. “Of course,” Hunter said. “Honestly, I’m embarrassed I didn’t think of it. What do you think, five? Split investment—”

Shane finished his sentence. “—in a historic New York institution, supporting the arts—”

“—convert it to a non-profit model?”

“No, that cuts down on who’d be interested, limits what you can do. I think—”

Svetlana spoke up. “So, we trade one set of rich assholes for another? You’ll land us right back where we started.”

“No,” Shane said decisively. “I’ll go in. Hunter, what about you?”

“You know what, hell yeah.”

“And,” Shane said, looking at Ilya again, face glowing with excitement, “we make both of you part owners. Voting power. Same as everyone else.”

Silence. Ilya felt like he was floating. Any moment now he was going to wake up alone in his apartment in Chinatown and find he was dreaming. “You can do that?” he said quietly.

“The House is nothing without you both,” Shane said. “Especially when it’s not the House anymore.”

“He’s right,” Hunter said. “Honestly strengthens the draw of the investment.”

“I’m fucking in,” Svetlana said. She held out her hand. “If this turns out to be a joke, I’ll kill you both.”

Hunter shook her hand, and then Shane did, both smiling. “I’d expect nothing less,” said Shane. “Ilya?”

He offered his hand to Ilya. Slowly, Ilya took it. Shane’s palm was warm, the handshake firm. Real. “If it’s a joke,” Ilya said, “I will bring you back to life after Svetlana kills you and kill you again.” Shane laughed. He squeezed Ilya’s hand before letting go.

They talked rough details the rest of the meal. Already Hunter and Shane were throwing out names of people they knew who would be a good fit. After, standing on the curb while they all got cabs, Hunter told them to hold their mornings the rest of the week for meetings. “Let’s pull together an offer ASAP before another can come through. I want both of you there,” to Ilya and Svetlana. “Svetlana, spruce up the deck with your new show. It’ll kill.”

Hunter departed, then Svetlana, who gave Ilya a knowing look and said, “I’ll make your excuses at the House, shall I?” in Russian before leaving. Finally, it was just Ilya and Shane.

Ilya turned to face him. “What if the board doesn’t accept the deal?”

“They will,” Shane said, certain. His confidence was so reassuring. And there was nothing false about it: it wasn’t a performance for Ilya’s sake. “It might actually assuage a few guilty consciences.”

“Maybe I will believe it after I sleep.” The exhaustion was hitting, now that the rush had crested. It was buzzing under his skin. Or was that something else?

“That makes sense. You want to go home and crash? You got even less sleep than I did. We’ll see each other tomorrow.”

Shane rubbed his hand up and down Ilya’s arm. Ilya caught it, and held it in both of his. “No,” he said.

“No what?” Shane asked, confused.

“No, I don’t want to sleep,” Ilya said. He looked at Shane’s mouth, and then back up to his eyes.

Shane understood. A little faintly, he said, “Right. Okay.” He swallowed. “Okay. Yes. I will get us a cab.”

—-—

They didn’t touch in the cab other than their hands, linked on the seat between them as they had been on that ride to the hospital all that time ago. Shane’s palm was sweating now, and Ilya’s probably was too. But neither of them wanted to let go. Ilya was never going to let go, ever.

He had Shane pressed up against his door before it had even closed. Shane was just as eager. His mouth was hot and insistent, his hands digging into Ilya’s hair. Ilya held his face and kissed him over and over and over again.

He realized Shane was trying to take their clothes off without breaking the kiss. “Patience, patience, we have time,” Ilya laughed.

“No,” Shane panted. “I need you in me now. Waited long enough.”

How could Ilya argue with that? He let Shane push his blazer off his shoulders and unbutton his shirt, and then drag him by the hand down the hallway to his bedroom and push him to sit on the bed. Ilya sat there and watched as Shane undressed himself at the speed of light. “What are you doing? Take off your pants!” Shane demanded.

“I am admiring the view,” Ilya said. He had never gotten to see Shane fully naked, and it was a little overwhelming. He had more freckles on his broad shoulders and muscled back, and his nipples were brown, which for some reason made Ilya feel sick with affection. He was so, so beautiful.

“You’re staring,” Shane said. He came forward to put his hands on Ilya’s shoulders. Ilya rested his on Shane’s hips. He couldn’t say anything. Instead, he kissed Shane again until he was melting into Ilya’s arms and his fully hard dick was pressed against Ilya’s stomach.

“Take your clothes off,” Shane whispered.

Ilya obeyed. Shane stripped all the decorative pillows and blankets off the bed and threw them on the chair in the meantime, leaving only the fitted sheet. “What did they do to deserve that?” Ilya wanted to know.

“They were going to be in the way,” Shane said practically. He fished an unopened bottle of lube and a string of condoms out of the bedside table drawer. “Bought these at Duane Reade—fuck, was that only yesterday?”

Not even twenty-four hours ago, they had been in crisis mode, making their plan to break the rules once and for all. Technically they still were, but Ilya felt no guilt. Everything had changed. The universe had remade itself into something Ilya never even had known to imagine—but Shane had.

He kicked his last sock off and got on the bed, over Shane with a knee on either side of his hips. “Shane,” he said, kissing his face, and then his mouth, throat, neck, collarbones and back up again, “Shane, Shane, Shane, Shane.”

Shane’s hands were in his hair again. “Ilya,” he breathed into Ilya’s mouth. “Can you please fuck me?”

Ilya fumbled for the lube, trying to take off the plastic shrink wrap. It took several attempts. All of a sudden the blood in his body had left his brain, rushing down to his dick.

Finally he had it. He pushed Shane’s knees up, dipping his head to lay wet, open-mouthed kisses to the warm skin of his inner thighs and hip bones on either side of his dick. “Oh, god,” Shane groaned when Ilya licked over his hole, “oh, fuck, fuck.”

Ilya pulled away to coat his fingers in lube, and then came back with his mouth and one finger, pressing in slowly. Shane was tight but clearly trying to relax, breathing deeply in between his exclamations. “Okay?” Ilya looked up to ask, just to be sure.

“Yes,” Shane gasped. Ilya added another finger and got to work. “Fuck, that’s good enough. Come on, please.”

Ilya laughed. “Maybe you didn’t get a good look. You are not ready.”

“I did,” Shane argued. “I can take it. Come on, I can’t wait any more.”

Ilya was obsessed with this side of Shane—bossy, impatient, and a little slutty. Fingers still inside him, he moved up the bed to kiss him again. Shane kissed him back perfunctorily. “If you make me come before you’re inside me, I’m gonna be so fucking pissed,” he grumbled.

“I won’t hurt you,” Ilya said, though he was rapidly losing any ability to deny Shane what he wanted.

“You won’t, it’ll feel so good,” Shane said in a low voice, his breath fanning hot over Ilya’s mouth. He was moving his hips now, fucking himself on Ilya’s fingers. “Fuck me, Ilya, please, please, please, please—”

The begging had the intended effect. Any bits of control Ilya had been holding on to disappeared. He whipped his fingers out, frantically wiping them on the sheet; Shane shoved an unwrapped condom into his hand: Ilya put it on, lined himself up, and pushed in.

Slowly—it was so tight, but Shane moaned, “Yes, fuck.” He was working with Ilya, pushing down little by little, actively trying to relax further. Ilya’s forehead was drenched with sweat from holding back by the time he was fully seated inside him.

“Oh my god,” he said, and his voice sounded like someone else’s, ragged and desperate.

“Feels so good,” Shane said breathlessly. “I’m okay, you can move.”

Ilya gripped Shane’s hips firmly in his hands and rolled his own hips experimentally, keeping his thrusts shallow. Shane’s head dropped back on the pillow. “Okay?” Ilya asked him. Shane only made a wordless sound of assent.

He kept his head tipped back as Ilya kept moving. Ilya couldn’t see his face, which suddenly had his heart clenching in his chest. “Shane. Shane, hey.” He went forward again, holding himself over Shane, and cupped his cheek with a hand. “Look at me.”

Shane blinked his eyes open. He was flushed all over his face down his chest. “What? I’m okay, it’s okay,” he half-slurred.

“I want to see you,” Ilya said. “Stay with me.”

Shane nodded. He wound his arms around Ilya’s neck. His eyes started to drift shut again on Ilya’s next thrust, but he forced them open. Ilya could see the pleasure washing over him in distinct waves every time he moved: Shane’s eyes unfocused, rolling back in his head, and then he came back to himself and tried to focus in on Ilya again.

He was trying so hard to do what Ilya asked. Ilya kissed his mouth and each cheek as he fucked him, unable to hold back his fondness. “Good?”

Shane nodded. “Gonna come,” he whispered.

Ilya watched it hit. Shane’s mouth dropped open, brow furrowing, and then he arched up against Ilya and clenched around him, crying out through the shockwaves of orgasm. He kept his eyes on Ilya the whole time.

Ilya was so intent on not missing a single moment of it that his own orgasm took him by surprise. He came in the condom inside of Shane, gasping as his hips jerked, their gazes locked together.

“Holy shit,” Shane panted. He kissed the side of Ilya’s face. “You okay?”

“Yes,” Ilya grunted. He let his weight fall partly onto the bed and partly onto Shane, still inside of him. His face landed in the hollow of Shane’s throat. Shane stroked over his hair and down the back of his neck, both of them getting their breath back. The exhaustion was hitting again. Ilya needed to get them up and in the shower before they fell asleep.

He failed. He woke up some time later, still on top of Shane, still inside of him. Shane was snoring in his ear. Shane’s cum had dried between them, on their stomachs. With immense effort, Ilya pushed himself up. He carefully moved Shane’s thigh so he could ease himself out.

It woke Shane. “Wha—oh. Fuck. We fell asleep like that?” Ilya nodded. “That’s new. Ugh, I’m so gross.”

They showered together. Shane’s bathroom was small, not conducive to any misbehavior. Not that Ilya wanted to. It was enough to be so near Shane, to see the water bead over his skin and catch in his eyelashes. They washed each other’s hair, taking turns.

Shane remade the bed after. “See, they weren’t in the way and now they’re still clean,” he said, proud of himself.

Ilya had the feeling they wouldn’t stay that way. The sun was setting outside the window. They were both starving, so they ate leftover Chinese takeout from Shane’s fridge, standing in the kitchen in their underwear. Neither of them wanted to dress and sit on the couch and eat properly.

Back in Shane’s bedroom, Shane turned on the bedside lamp and then went to brush his teeth. Ilya laid down and waited for him. He was so happy he felt physically changed, like maybe when he went to the House tomorrow no one would recognize him. He hadn’t known it was possible to feel this way.

“You okay?” Shane asked him. He joined Ilya in bed, lying next to him shoulder to shoulder. Ilya tipped his head to the side to touch their heads together, too.

“More than okay,” Ilya said. “Earlier, the chance of being an owner of the House, or whatever it will be called now… I never thought that could happen. I still can’t believe it’s real.”

“It will be,” Shane said. “I promise. I won’t do it unless you and Svetlana are part of it.”

Ilya couldn’t say anything else. He kissed Shane’s shoulder, the closest part of him to Ilya’s lips. Shane turned on his side to kiss him. Before long, they had their arms around each other, legs tangling, mouths urgent. The underwear they’d put on was already an impediment.

“Wait,” Shane said. “I want to do something.” He moved down the bed, pushing Ilya onto his back, until he could dip his head and lick over one of Ilya’s nipple rings. Ilya sucked in a breath. “Does that feel good?” Shane murmured.

“Yes,” Ilya said. “How long have you been thinking about that?”

Shane sucked on it gently, then moved over to the other one. Ilya groaned deep in his throat. The little sparks it sent through him were electric. “Since I saw you perform,” Shane said against his skin.

“The night of the charity dinner?”

“No,” Shane said. “Before that.”

It took Ilya a second to understand. “Since you saw me perform eight years ago you have been thinking about my nipple rings?”

“Well,” Shane said. He pushed up to sit on his knees. “That makes it sound like I’ve been thinking about it constantly for eight years. I thought about it after I saw you perform, felt bad about it, and didn’t really think about it until we met again.”

“And you didn’t feel bad about it then.”

“Oh, no, I still felt bad. I felt bad about a lot of things.”

They had never spoken about this. “Tell me.”

Shane looked at him, brows pinching. “It’s embarrassing.”

“What, that you were obsessed with me since you were 21?” Ilya said, grinning. “Is adorable. The only thing that would be more adorable would be if you convinced your family’s company to invest in my place of work so you had an excuse to be close to me. Oh, wait.”

“Fuck off,” Shane said, but he was smiling. “Everything I said was true, for the record. But yes, maybe that was part of it. I didn’t admit it to myself until the charity dinner.”

Ilya thought of that night, the way Shane had looked at him like he was spellbound, and how he hadn’t touched Ilya except to kiss him. “Come here,” he said, and Shane went to him so they could kiss.

“I thought about some other things,” Shane said, low.

“Show me,” said Ilya.

Shane moved back down the bed, pausing only to strip Ilya’s boxers off. Then he settled on his stomach between Ilya’s thighs. He started slowly, licking over the head of Ilya’s dick and down the length of it. His motions were precise, but his mouth was hot and wet and he left trails of saliva on Ilya’s skin.

“So good,” Ilya groaned. He couldn’t look away. “Fuck, you are beautiful like this.” Shane glanced up at him, pleased at the praise, and then went back to his task.

He really was good at it, which Ilya should have anticipated. He blew Ilya with his customary focus, and every time something he did elicited a moan or word of encouragement from Ilya, he did it again, like he was building an arsenal of ways to make Ilya feel good.

In very little time, Ilya was on the verge of coming. “Shane,” he warned, “Shane, I’m close.” Shane just shut his eyes and bobbed his head down, and Ilya came down his throat, Shane’s name on his lips.

Shane sat up, breathing hard, and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “Now we’re even.”

Ilya’s post-orgasm brain couldn’t make sense of that. “Even? How even?”

Shane poured himself a glass of water from the carafe on the bedside table, and then got back in bed. “You got me off that night but you didn’t let me get you off. Now we’re even.”

“I didn’t know that bothered you,” Ilya said honestly. “I got scared at what I had done.”

“I know that now,” Shane said. “But for a while I felt like… I don’t know. That I’d taken advantage of you.”

That shocked a laugh out of Ilya. “You? Taken advantage of me? I kissed you!”

Shane frowned. “That’s not true, I kissed you!”

“Okay. We can say it was mutual,” Ilya said with great amusement. “Are you going to keep an orgasm fairness score moving forward?”

Shane nodded. “Until there’s too many to keep track of.”

Ilya pulled him in close. “Then we had better get started.”

He fully intended to have sex again or at least get Shane off, but the reality was both of them were still exhausted. This time, at least, they drifted off mid-make-out with no cum drying on or inside anyone’s body. When Ilya woke next, the bedside lamp was still on, though it was full night outside, and Shane was spooned up against his chest, holding one of Ilya’s hands in his as he slept.

For a moment he just lay there, appreciating the closeness. Then he remembered: there was no reason to hold back anymore. He pulled Shane in closer, kissing the back of his neck and whatever parts of his face he could reach. Shane woke quickly, heavy breathing turning to moans. “Oh, fuck, Ilya.”

They were both hard already. Ilya was still naked, and Shane kicked his boxers off. He tried to hand the lube and a condom to Ilya. “No,” Ilya said. He pushed the covers down and sat up.

Shane looked at him, eyes bleary with both sleep and confusion. His hair was sticking up all over the place. “No?”

“I am not rushing this time,” Ilya said. He pushed Shane’s knees up as he had before, and lay properly on his stomach between them.

“Oh,” Shane gasped when Ilya licked slowly over his already-sensitive hole. He moved his hands to hold his knees up, so Ilya could use his to spread Shane wider and focus on rimming him with intention.

It made Shane so loud. Not that he’d been quiet before, but he wasn’t even forming words, just his voice rising and falling in pleasure. His dick, lying on his stomach above Ilya’s face, was glistening with pre-cum.

Ilya’s jaw was starting to cramp, so he found the lube and switched to fingers for a break. “Fucking hell,” Shane gritted out at the first one.

Ilya stopped. “It hurts?”

“No, no, agh, just so sensitive. Holy shit.” Shane writhed on the bed as Ilya fingered him slowly and thoroughly. It was incredible to watch him like this, the length of his body laid out for Ilya to see. He’d long since let go of his legs so he could grab at the sheets. His abs clenched every time Ilya pet over his prostate.

“Oh my god,” Shane snapped after the third time Ilya did it, “are you gonna fuck me or not?”

“Maybe I want to see you come like this,” Ilya said. He bent down to lick up the length of Shane’s cock.

Shane made a sound like a sob. His thighs were trembling on either side of Ilya’s head. “No, please, want you to fuck me.”

It was no use pretending to have self-control. Ilya was lucky Shane had never begged him for anything before tonight—he was scared to think what he might have thrown away for him. Possibly everything.

Shane’s body, slick and open, welcomed him with almost no resistance. Shane sighed, face falling into an expression of bliss. He looked down at Ilya. “Come up here?”

Ilya did, and they kissed for a little bit, slow and deep. They stayed close, foreheads pressed together, as Ilya started moving and Shane wrapped his legs around his waist, urging him on.

“I never thought it could feel this good,” Shane whispered, so quiet that Ilya could barely hear it over the sound of their bodies meeting, “holy shit, Ilya.”

Ilya groaned. He’d never had trouble lasting before but Shane’s words made him insane. “What have you done to me?” he said in Russian, and kissed Shane to stop him from saying anything that would make Ilya come on the spot.

He managed to hold off long enough that Shane came first, untouched again, though Ilya was close behind. He couldn’t stop kissing Shane through the comedown. Finally, Shane made them get up to clean. “We’re not falling asleep like that again.”

“What, you don’t want to fall asleep with me still inside you?” Ilya said jokingly, but the furtive look Shane shot him had Ilya saying, delighted, “You liked that?!”

“I didn’t, it was gross,” Shane said, glaring as he dampened washcloths for them in the sink. He threw one at Ilya’s head.

Ilya intercepted it, grinning. “I think you are a bigger freak than me.” Shane rolled his eyes like he was too mature to engage with Ilya’s nonsense. That was fine. Ilya had his measure now, and he wasn’t going to forget.

He knew it was the endorphins, but Ilya could have spent the rest of his life like this: alternating between sex with Shane and sleeping beside him, with interludes only to clean themselves up and eat. The outside world might as well not have existed for all he cared. Ilya’s world now consisted of the constellation of freckles on Shane’s left shoulder, his small sigh of contentment when Ilya kissed them, and Shane’s fingers playing with the chain around Ilya’s neck as they lay in bed again.

“Can I ask you something?” Shane said.

“Anything.”

“Had you talked to Janet since that day?”

Ilya closed his eyes. He didn’t want to think about that now. Quickly, Shane said, “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have brought it up. Pretend I didn’t say anything.”

“Is okay.” Ilya probably needed to talk about it, if he was honestly with himself. “No. I deleted her texts without reading them and never called her back. I heard her voice on the phone, earlier, and she knew I was there. But she said nothing to me.”

Shane shook his head in disbelief. “The way she was talking on the call before you came in, it was like the two of you had never had a falling out. I don’t get it.”

“What did she say?” Ilya asked, though he was afraid he wouldn’t want to hear the answer.

“That losing the name would devastate not only the House but you and Svetlana. That you were Devereuxs yourselves in all but name. But then when it came down to a vote, she voted to sell. Makes no sense.”

Ilya let all of that sink in. “Nothing she did ever made sense,” he said after a bit, “and I think I am tired of trying to understand her.”

“You don’t need to any longer, if you don’t want to,” said Shane.

Maybe it could be that simple. Soon enough, she would be just a part of his past. “My father was like that, too,” Ilya said quietly.

“Mm. You said. Do you still talk to him?”

“No. He is dead.”

Shane’s fingers, which had still been playing with Ilya’s necklace, stopped moving. “Oh. I didn’t know.”

“I never told you. How could you know?”

“I’m sorry,” Shane said. “Even if you didn’t get along with him, that’s still hard. What about your mother?”

For a moment, Ilya saw her face, the way he liked to remember it: eyes crinkling in a smile, laughing at her own joke, tossing her blonde curls that were just like Ilya’s. She had been so alive, it still seemed impossible she no longer was. “She is dead, too. But she wasn’t like my father. She was… like sunshine.”

Beside him, Shane swallowed. His eyes were wet when Ilya looked at him. “Fuck, I’m sorry,” Shane said, scrubbing at them. “I had no idea. Oh my god.”

“It was a long time ago,” Ilya said. One day, he would tell Shane the whole story. Not now. He didn’t want that memory tainting this night. He knew his mother wouldn’t have wanted that either.

But there were things he needed to say to Shane, if they were going to do this for real. “I started seeing the psychiatrist after my father died three years ago. It was a bad time, but also I started to maybe realize that a lot of times before that had been bad. And I had not wanted to see it.”

Shane nodded, absorbing that. “It helps?”

“A lot,” Ilya said. “It took a while, and sometimes it is still bad. But yes. It helps.”

“I’m glad. You can…” Shane paused like he was choosing his words. “You can tell me anything. Even if I can’t help, I can listen. You won’t scare me.”

Another thing Ilya never could have imagined hearing. “Thank you.”

They lay there, Shane’s head on Ilya’s shoulder. After a little pause, Shane said quietly, “I didn’t know your mother, but I know you. You’re like sunshine, too.”

Shane saying that, as his fingers gently rested on the crucifix that had been Ilya’s mother’s, was too much to bear. And he had no idea. Ilya pressed his lips together to hold back the tears. “Oh, Shane,” he whispered. The English words he wanted to say couldn’t be spoken, so he said in Russian, “I think you may be the love of my life.”

Shane blessedly did not ask him what he’d said; he just kissed Ilya, and then held him until he stopped crying and they fell asleep, entwined.

—-—

Three weeks later, they called a meeting for all the staff in the members’ lounge before opening. The mood, which had been tense through the recent tumult, lightened noticeably as everyone greeted each other and caught up while they waited. Ilya waited to the side, pretending to chat with Fabian but really looking at all of them.

Svetlana touched his shoulder. “Shall we?”

“Yes, let’s.”

They stepped up on the little stage and waited for quiet to fall. “Thank you all for gathering,” Svetlana said. “We know it’s been a difficult few weeks, and we appreciate your patience while we work behind the scenes to figure out next steps.” Somehow she managed to make the words sound genuine and not like meaningless jargon. “But that’s not why we’re here.”

Tension rippled through the staff. Near the bar, Ilya saw Angel shake his head and lean over to Darcy to whisper in their ear. “Is good news,” Ilya said, and complete silence feel. Now they had everyone’s real attention. “A deal has been finalized to transfer ownership and operation of the House. As of this morning, seven people are the new owners. Several you know.” Two of them were in the back of the room, standing a little aside from everyone, and Ilya gestured towards them. “Shane Hollander. Scott Hunter. Myself. And Svetlana.”

Blank looks of shock. “Wait, are you serious?” Rickey said after a moment.

“No, it’s a joke,” someone next to him said.

“Roz, for real?” Cherie, right up front, asked. She too was completely stunned. For once, Ilya felt proud she hadn’t been three steps ahead of him.

“Is not a joke,” Ilya told them. “Is real. We will be changing our name, because that was not part of the deal.” His voice was getting louder. Not for dramatic effect—purely because he couldn’t hold in his exhilaration any longer. “But who fucking cares about a name? We have what we built together, and more importantly, we all have each other!”

“This place is fucking ours!” Svetlana yelled, and that broke the disbelief; everyone cheered, screamed, applauded, and started talking all at the same time.

There were more details they’d planned to share, but it would have to wait. Someone broke out bottles of Dom Perignon from behind the bar before Darcy could stop them, and they were being passed around with no glasses. More than one person kissed Ilya on the cheek and congratulated him. “Fuck the Devereuxs!” Fabian shouted in his ear, which made Ilya laugh even though it fucking hurt.

Ilya celebrated with everyone, soaking in the moment, but after a while he escaped to the terrace for a cigarette. The end of his days as a smoker were approaching, so he needed to enjoy it while he could.

He got three lungfuls of nicotine. And then the door opened.

“Great speech.”

Ilya didn’t turn around. As always, Shane came to stand next to him. Side by side, they looked out at the city. “Thank you. I worked very hard on it,” Ilya said.

“Everyone seemed so happy. They kept coming up to me to say thank you. I didn’t know that many of them knew who I was.”

“You are only here almost every day.”

“Yeah, well, I didn’t think I was that memorable.” Ilya looked at him, eyebrows raised. Shane laughed. “To them!”

“No. They know you. Some of them might even like you as a person, but you will have to guess who.”

“I think I know at least one.”

He was smiling, the soft and private smile that Ilya couldn’t get enough of. Ilya dropped his cigarette in the ashtray, took Shane by the hips, and kissed his smiling mouth. After a bit, when they parted, Shane said, low, “Yeah. Maybe one.”

Ilya kissed him one more time before letting him go and returning to his cigarette. “By the way, I thought you were quitting,” Shane said.

Ilya was amazed it had taken him this long to bring it up. “Quitting. Not quitted.”

“That’s not a word.”

“Oh, you had trouble understanding me?”

Shane just grinned. Ilya finished the cigarette in peace and didn’t light another one. “What do you think everyone’s reactions will be?” Shane said after a bit.

They’d decided that, once the dust settled over the ownership change announcement, they would behave as if they’d quietly started dating in the interim. Ilya was ready to receive some ribbing and possible side-eyeing of the timeline, but Svetlana was adamant that no one would actually have a problem with it—especially in this new post-Janet world, where Shane and Ilya were equal co-owners.

“I think most everyone will be happy for us,” Ilya said to Shane now.

“Think anyone will be upset?”

You could probably shoot someone in front of them and they’d still love you, Svetlana had told Ilya. Ilya thought everyone likely felt similarly about Shane, but in case, “If anyone is mean to you, tell me and I will kill them.”

Shane laughed, even though Ilya was completely serious. “They might hate me, for taking you off the market,” said Shane.

Ilya snorted. “No. They will love you for reforming me.” When he thought in concrete terms of everyone and his friendships with all of them, he knew more than a few people would tell him they were glad he’d found someone and a couple would probably cry tears of happiness for him.

“Is that what I did?” Shane said, grinning. “I thought that was all an act.”

“My reputation is very carefully crafted,” said Ilya. Shane laughed again.

After another pause, Ilya said, “I spoke with Svetlana. She wants to set Monday as the start of my leave.”

To his credit, Shane sounded only happy when he said, “That’s great. I’m glad. You should go now, and then when you’re back we can all dig in and figure out what the next few years will look like at the House. What did Cherie say?”

“Nothing yet. Wanted to make today’s announcement before telling her. I am sure it will be fine.” In fact, Cherie would probably react like Svetlana, and be thrilled he was acting on something he’d talked about for literal years. Svetlana had insisted on him going as soon as possible once he’d told her he wanted to finally do it. And if both she and Shane thought so, it was probably the way to go.

Shane was quiet. Ilya could feel him thinking. But he just said, “It’s going to be amazing. I’m so excited for you.”

Come with me. It had been on the tip of Ilya’s tongue for the last three weeks, since Shane had suggested he think seriously about going once the deal went through. Ilya had brushed it off, but Shane was relentless once focused. He’d drawn Ilya’s fantasies and half-thought through plans out of him one by one, night after night.

And every night, Ilya had waited for him to offer to come along. Yes, before Shane, Ilya had always pictured going on this adventure solo—making it up as he went along without considering anyone else. But that had been when the trip was meant to be an escape. He didn’t want to escape anymore.

Yet he couldn’t seem to verbalize that to Shane, and Shane was either too thoughtful or too unaware to offer. “I can’t really believe it’s happening,” he said to Shane now.

“You will when you look out the window on the plane and see the Andes. Send me all the pictures.”

“I will,” Ilya said. Come with me. The words were right there.

Oblivious beside him, Shane was talking. “I’m sure you’ll be too busy having a good time. But, if you get lonely…”

His tone was too casual. Suddenly Ilya was listening very hard. “Yes, if,” he said to prompt Shane to go on.

“Big if. I know,” Shane said. “You wanna do your own thing, and you should. But yeah. I’ve been thinking of taking some vacation myself. Got too much PTO saved up. Nothing crazy, somewhere with a beach. Hiking. If it lines up with you timing-wise, we could meet up.”

“We could,” Ilya said. He turned his head to the side to smile so Shane couldn’t see it. “That could be nice.”

“If it works out,” Shane said.

“Oh yes,” Ilya said. “Only if it works out.”

—-—

TWO MONTHS LATER

—-—

It turned out Ilya only hated the heat when he wasn’t on vacation. They’d been in Mexico City for three days before he realized it was hotter than most summer days in New York. But here he only needed to wear linen shirts and wake up at noon and eat freshly made corn tortillas and kiss his boyfriend.

“You’re going to make us late,” Shane breathed against his mouth. He’d booked them a day trip to Teotihuacan, and after dinner last night he’d read the Wikipedia page out loud to Ilya, until Ilya had stopped being subtle in his attempts to distract him and picked him up and thrown him on their Airbnb’s bed.

Only in the last few hours of their economy flight from JFK to Buenos Aires had it occurred to Ilya that his and Shane’s travel styles might not mesh. Maybe he was suddenly about to be confronted with how bougie Shane’s taste was, how he wouldn’t want to rough it or be spontaneous. But if anything, Shane was more excited than Ilya to go off the beaten path. And once Ilya had made it clear they’d be splitting every purchase and hostel and meal 50/50, Shane had stopped trying to secretly pay for everything.

They had budgeted to spend the last week in Mexico City, in a nice Airbnb in one of the cool neighborhoods. It was ending up a nice transition back to real life: sleeping in a comfortable bed, wearing clothes that weren’t only for hiking, going out to dinner together. It also meant they could be as loud as they wanted while having sex.

Ilya had intended to behave this morning, but it was impossible to wake up next to Shane and not touch him. Not that Shane ever seemed to mind—unless they had somewhere to be. “Fuck, don’t,” Shane groaned when Ilya started to stroke him through his boxers. “We have to go!”

Ilya relented. As much as he made fun of Shane, the tours and things he was always booking were usually fun. Educational. Shane loved learning. Ilya knew this now. As one of the things Shane loved learning about, Ilya considered himself a major benefactor of this personality trait.

They went to Teotihuacan. Ilya took about a thousand pictures of the pyramids and sent them to Svetlana. The day was overcast, muggy, but that made everything look nicer. When it was cloudy, Shane’s skin seemed to glow in any photos Ilya took of him, like the sun was inside of him.

“That’s crazy,” Shane said when Ilya told him this. “I was just thinking the same thing.” He showed Ilya a picture he’d just taken: Ilya from the side, looking up at some ruins. His hair was standing out around his head like a halo because of the humidity, golden.

Back at the Airbnb, Ilya showered first. He didn’t get dressed after. He stretched out on the bed and waited. “Tired?” Shane asked him, emerging from the bathroom in a towel.

“No,” Ilya said, and Shane came to straddle him, leaning down to thread his fingers in Ilya’s damp hair and kiss him.

If Ilya had an educational obsession, it was this. It should have been mortifying to travel across a continent and see multiple ancient wonders and still think that the line of Shane’s throat as he tipped his head back when Ilya entered him was the most stunning sight of all. But anyone could see pyramids. Only Ilya got to see this.

By this point, they’d had every kind of sex. The heated kind, after a senseless argument they forgot about by morning. The silly kind, where they couldn’t stop laughing into each other’s mouths. The needy kind, when one of them was craving reassurance. Ilya liked all of them, but he might have liked this kind the most: the slow, tender, romantic sex, that he knew there was another name for, that he had been thinking about for weeks and maybe months now, but that he hadn’t yet been able to say out loud—in English.

“You are so beautiful, my love,” he murmured in Russian against Shane’s jaw. Shane shivered and looked at him with dark eyes, which he did sometimes when Ilya spoke Russian to him in bed. Maybe it was the thrill of not knowing what Ilya was saying.

“Ilya,” Shane murmured back, “more, come on,” but Ilya wasn’t ready for that. He kept rolling his hips slow and deep despite Shane’s attempts to urge him faster, and pressed wet kisses to his collarbone.

Shane knew the game, though. “I was thinking,” he said, low, “about something.”

“What?” Ilya said, knowing the answer was likely going to make his brain short circuit.

Shane put a hand under Ilya’s chin to lift his face, to look him in the eye when he said, “When we get back to New York, let’s go get tested. Then you can fuck me raw.”

There was an evil little glimmer in his eyes, and he was smiling, self-satisfied. Ilya took a deep breath. “Turn over,” he said, and Shane positively grinned, secure in the knowledge he was getting what he wanted.

He got on his hands and knees. Ilya kept breathing deeply as he pushed back in, trying not to lose his composure. It wasn’t like he didn’t want to fuck Shane’s brains out. But he had a bigger picture in mind.

He leaned down, blanketing Shane’s body with his own. He gave him a couple short, hard thrusts, and Shane gasped, “Yes, oh my god.”

“My dick is not enough for you?” Ilya growled in his ear. “You need my cum now, too?”

“Fuck, no, that’s not what it’s about,” Shane said. He was pushing back on Ilya, trying to fuck himself, but he couldn’t from this angle.

“I think it is,” Ilya said. He started up a good rhythm and immediately Shane relaxed, dropping his head down. Ilya let him have it for a few minutes, then slowed again.

“Ugh, goddamnit, come on,” Shane cried out, fisting his hands in the sheets.

“I want to hear you say it,” said Ilya. His mouth was right by Shane’s ear. “You want me to fill you up. Claim you. Make you mine.”

He punctuated each one with a thrust. Shane couldn’t hold himself up any longer; he went down to his elbows, which just made his ass push back even more, forcing Ilya deeper. “No, no,” he was saying, “that’s—”

He stopped, breath heaving, body shuddering. “That’s what?” Ilya said. He reached around and got a hand on Shane’s dick, starting to jerk him slowly in time to his thrusts.

“—gross, nasty, I don’t know, fuck, fuck—”

Ilya laughed softly. He knew he had won. “But you like that, don’t you? I know you do, sweetheart. You like it when I make a mess of you.”

Shane let out an anguished sound. “God, yes, only you, Ilya, oh my god, I want it, please, please—”

Ilya gave him what he wanted, which was, as always, what Ilya wanted in the end. Shane came, convulsing and nearly sobbing. Ilya’s own orgasm seemed endless, stars and galaxies dancing behind his eyes.

They collapsed onto the bed together. It took an age and a half for Ilya to regain enough self-command to gently pull out. Shane lifted his head off the pillow when he did. “You okay?” Ilya asked him.

“Holy shit. I think I met god,” Shane said hoarsely, completely serious. Ilya cracked up, and Shane smiled.

Ilya had to change the sheets before they could crash. Neither of them wanted to be apart, so they got back in immediately after, with Shane cuddled up under Ilya’s arm, his face tucked against Ilya’s chest, next to his necklace.

“I can’t believe it,” Shane said after a while. “I’m actually looking forward to going home.”

“Me too,” Ilya said. “I didn’t think I would be.”

He missed Svetlana, and Cherie, and everyone else at the House—though it would no longer be called that about a month after they got back, which was when the grace period for the name change ended. Svetlana and Hunter and the other co-owners had narrowed it down to a shortlist, and that would be their first task upon returning.

“Was the trip everything you’d imagined it would be?” Shane said. “You’d been wanting to do it for so long.”

“No,” Ilya said. “I don’t think I ever could have imagined this.”

It wasn’t just the trip. It was being free of Janet. Having control of the House. And more than anything, Shane, in his arms. Shane must have felt it, because he turned his face up to kiss Ilya’s cheek.

In return, Ilya kissed his cheek, each eye, his nose. He pressed their foreheads together and whispered, in Russian, “Love of my life, you are a miracle.”

Shane’s face was glowing when they separated. He was grinning and his eyes were sparkling, like they did before he said something that exploded Ilya’s mind. “Be right back,” he said, and got up to go to the bathroom.

Ilya lay there, enjoying the afterglow of the evening, Then, suddenly, something clicked into place. He sat up. “Wait a moment. Shane?”

Shane came out of the bathroom. “You need something?” he said, except he didn’t say it in English. He said it in Russian, just like he’d said be right back in Russian a second ago.

Ilya’s brain was going a million miles an hour, trying to make sense of this discovery. “How long?” he said finally, in Russian, to test the theory.

“I started teaching myself the day after our first time together,” Shane said in Russian. He sat next to Ilya in bed, leaning against the headboard. He looked deeply satisfied with himself.

His accent was mediocre, but he spoke with astonishing confidence. “And already you are fluent?” Ilya asked. It had been barely three months. Ilya had lived in New York for a year before he’d felt like he could claim fluency.

“Of course not,” said Shane. He switched back to English. “But I know enough.”

“Enough for what,” said Ilya, though he knew the answer.

Shane moved closer, pressing their foreheads together like Ilya had done earlier. “Enough to know what you’re saying to me in bed,” he said quietly. “I love you, too.”

It went through Ilya like a thunderbolt from the heavens. All the times he’d said it to Shane in Russian, calling him my love and love of my life… and Shane had known. Suddenly Ilya felt like a coward, hiding behind his mother tongue to say what he hadn’t had the courage to articulate to the face of the man he loved. A man who had studied that mother tongue for Ilya.

“Shane,” Ilya said, overcome. He swallowed back tears. “Oh god, I love you.”

Shane cupped his face and kissed him. He was crying too, which made their kissing damp, but neither of them cared. “I’m sorry I couldn’t say it,” Ilya said.

“Please, no, don’t apologize,” Shane said. He wiped Ilya’s tears away and then his own. “I was going to tell you that I was learning Russian, but the first time I understood what you said… I don’t know, I didn’t want you to stop. It feels different in Russian.”

He was right, it did. “I love you,” Ilya said in Russian, so that Shane could hear it in all the ways he deserved to.

Shane’s eyes lit up. “Yes. Say it again.”

He put his fingers on Ilya’s jaw as he did, as if he could absorb the pronunciation through them. “Ya lyublyu tebya,” Shane repeated.

His accent was awful. “Perfect,” Ilya said in English.

Shane laughed. “No, it isn’t. But you can teach me now.”

“How have you even been learning? How have I not seen it?”

“I study for like two hours every morning before you wake up.”

Except most mornings he was in bed with Ilya when Ilya woke up. “You get up, study, then get back in bed?”

“No, I just put my headphones in and study while you’re dead to the world. You are so not a morning person. You really didn’t notice? I wasn’t trying that hard to hide it.”

“No,” said Ilya, though now that he was thinking about it, there were a couple times he’d woken up to Shane looking at something on his phone, headphones in. But all Ilya really cared about in the morning was touching Shane as quickly as possible. “What else are you hiding?”

“Nothing, I promise,” Shane said, smiling.

“I don’t believe you,” said Ilya. “You have at least three more freaky kinks you haven’t told me about yet.”

He said it purely to make Shane laugh again, and he did. “You tell me. Sometimes I feel like you know about those before I do. They only come out when I’m on the brink of coming.”

It was because that was the only time Shane’s magnificent but overactive brain truly let go. Ilya loved seeing it happen. “Mmm. I will get them all out of you eventually.”

He kissed Shane, slow and tender. Shane kissed him back, but pulled away after a moment. ”I’m worried the next one’s going to be weird, though.”

“Oh, I hope so,” said Ilya. Nothing would delight him more. “Tentacles, maybe. Or should we stay on the cum thing? Want me to try to get you pregnant?”

“It doesn’t work like that,” Shane said in his know-it-all voice, which Ilya knew meant he’d struck a nerve. Shane groaned when he saw Ilya’s smug expression. “Fuck, why is hearing you say it so hot?”

“It would be my honor to put a baby in you,” Ilya said solemnly. Shane rolled his eyes but then they kissed again, much more heated this time. Ilya had thought they were both spent for the night: maybe not.

“Really didn’t see being an unmarried mother in my future,” Shane said breathlessly between kisses. “Lack of imagination on my part, clearly. Not sure how to feel about it.”

God, Ilya was so in love with this man. “Okay, so we get married, problem solved.”

He’d gotten too used to speaking from the heart without thinking around Shane. He didn’t even register what he’d said until Shane pulled back. His eyes were huge with shock. “Do you—are you—”

“No,” Ilya said, and then quickly when Shane’s expression started to fall, “wait, listen to me. No, because when I ask, it will be with a very nice ring, and classical music will be playing, and you will have brushed your hair so it does not look stupid—”

Shane laughed, like Ilya intended. “Fuck you, your hair looks stupid.”

“Yes,” Ilya said very seriously, “that is what I am saying, our hair looks stupid and I have no ring, so I am not asking. But don’t you ever, for a second, doubt that I will be. As long as you want me, I am yours.”

He had meant those words then, and he meant them now. Shane’s eyes were shining. “I’m yours,” Shane said, “and you’re mine. Forever.”

“Forever,” Ilya repeated, testing the word out. He pretended to think. “I am not sure. Might not be long enough.”

“Okay,” said Shane, amused, “how long were you thinking, then?”

“This life and every single one after should cut it.”

This time, Shane didn’t laugh. He took Ilya’s face in his hands. He was gazing at Ilya with so much love. It seemed impossible. And yet, it was real. “Deal,” Shane said, and kissed Ilya to seal it.