Rating:

Explicit

Archive Warning:

No Archive Warnings Apply

Category:

M/M

Fandom:

Heated Rivalry (TV)

Relationship:

Shane Hollander/Ilya Rozanov

Characters:

Shane Hollander, Ilya Rozanov

Additional Tags:

Crossdressing, Lingerie, Explicit Sexual Content, Angst, Panties, Anal Sex, Shane Hollander Walks Ilya Rozanov Like A Dog, Power Bottom Shane Hollander

Language:

English

Series:

Part 2 of Pretty Boy

Stats:

Published: 2025-12-22 Words: 5,305 Chapters: 1/1

Dolled Up

Summary

Dressing up for Ilya takes Shane about a mile out of his comfort zone. Good thing he’s not a chicken.

Notes

Please join me in my mission to get Shane in lingerie. With enough support, we can change the world.

Edited to add: The mission is a success. Here's some gorgeous art.

It’s a nightmare from the moment Shane pushes open the door to the lingerie shop.

First the bell above the door rings, with what is maybe the loudest chime any bell in the world has ever made. Then, in the din, not one but two smiling saleswomen pop out from behind shelves to approach him.

Shane has stared down the best goalies of the world in shootouts. He once dropped the gloves with a guy who had six inches and fifty pounds on him.

It’s much more difficult now, than it was in either of those situations, to force himself not to turn and run.

The first salesperson, a woman about Shane’s age with blonde hair and a toothy smile, has reached him. “Hi,” she chirps. “How can I help you?”

Shane swallows. He forces himself not to reach for the handle of the door behind him. “I’m picking up an online order for Jane,” he says.

“Oh, great. Let me check on that.” And she’s sliding away, winding through the displays toward the counter. The other saleswoman smiles at Shane and turns away to straighten a mannequin’s halter.

Shane is left alone amid racks of lacy nightshirts and strappy bustiers, of frilly bras and sheer slips. He knows what they are, because he’s been doing his research. He tucks his chin down, takes a deep breath, and follows the first woman to the counter.

The box is already wrapped. The woman has the price up on the card terminal; Shane shakes his head. “Can I pay in cash?”

“Oh, sure,” the woman says, popping open the cash register. “She’s going to love this, by the way. You have great taste.”

“Thanks,” says Shane. He’s just noticed he can see his face in the long mirror hanging above the registers. The salesperson must be good at her job; Shane would have never known, from her demeanor, how much he looks like he’s about to faint.

*

He is at the gym, the next day, when his phone buzzes with a text from Lily. Something I should know??? it reads, followed by a TMZ link.

Shane makes a face when he sees the domain. He slaps at the cool-down button on the treadmill, slows to a walk, wipes sweat off his brow as he picks up his phone and swipes open the link.

A low-quality photo of himself, standing with his hands in his pockets at the counter of the lingerie store, fills his screen.

Shane, still breathing hard, scowls. He thumbs back to the text thread.

I hate TMZ, he writes.

Says you have lucky mystery girl.

Shane pulls back up the article and skims through it. The phrase “lucky mystery girl” is, in fact, used twice.

By the time he returns to the text thread another message from Lily has popped up. Should I be jealous? it says.

Shane can feel his cheeks glowing red beneath the sweat growing cold on his face. Ilya must know why Shane was in that store. He must know how much Shane hated it.

He must be perfectly aware of how willing Shane is to humiliate himself for Ilya Rozanov.

Shane lets the sudden surge of resentment drive him to swipe back to TMZ, lead his fingers up to the search bar to type out Rozanov’s name.

He’d been ready to spend time digging around for something embarrassing. But the top result is from yesterday, and the link leads him to a photo of Ilya with his arm around a woman.

Shane hesitates. He hits the emergency stop on the treadmill. He slows to a stop as he looks down at the photo.

They’re on a sidewalk, on a city street. It’s nighttime. Ilya has one arm hooked around her neck, and it looks like he’s laughing. The girl’s shielding her face from the camera, and he’s helping her.

Their fingers are tangled, a little, above her grinning mouth.

TMZ doesn’t have much else to add, other than that the photo was taken outside a club in New York, and that a source close to Rozanov said they’d “never seen him so happy.”

Shane hesitates. Then he copies the link to the article, thumbs back to paste it into their text conversation. Should I? he writes, hits send.

Lily takes so long to respond that Shane has headed over to the bench press just for something to do before he responds. The third time Shane grabs his phone between reps, he finally sees a new text.

It’s an emoji. The emoji is winking.

Shane gets abruptly up from the bench, heads over to the rack to grab some more plates. He’s suddenly in the mood to lift until he can’t feel his arms.

*

They don’t text again until two weeks later, three days before Boston is scheduled to cross the border for a Canadian road trip, when Shane’s phone buzzes beside his plate on the restaurant table with a text from Lily. Anything good to eat in Montreal?

“Sorry,” Shane tells his mom, reaching out and turning his phone over before sliding it off the table and into his pocket.

“It’s okay, honey,” his mom says, reaching over to refill his water glass. “It’s good to see you smile like that. You’ve looked so tired lately.”

*

The bra fits strangely well.

Shane had gotten out a tape measure— he’d had to break the plastic seal on the untouched tool box under his kitchen sink to get to it— and checked the span of his rib cage against the dimensions on the website before ordering, so maybe he shouldn’t be surprised the band is snug.

It’s more the way his pecs swell enough to fill out the soft scoops of the blue silk cups that has him shifting uncomfortably on the carpet as he studies himself in the floor-to-length mirror hooked over the door to his bedroom closet.

Shane finds himself strangely comforted that the matching panties look slightly more out of place. He needs to shave, probably; the dark hair between his thighs pokes incongruously through the delicate lace trim. Worse is his bulge, which even when he’s soft is an obscene strain against the thin triangle of fabric at the front.

Shane twists around, studies the way the lace stretches over the curve of his ass. He tries to imagine Rozanov seeing him, like this. Tries to remember the way Ilya’s face changes when he’s getting turned on, the way his nostrils flare and his eyes go hot.

He ends up thinking instead of the girl under Ilya’s arm, outside that club in New York, of the way the pale swell of her cleavage above her low-cut top had caught the camera flash.

Shane shakes his head at his reflection. No point dwelling on that, now, is there, he thinks. He goes to dig out his razor out from under the bathroom sink.

*

The Sunday matchup between Boston and Montreal is a day game. Ilya, who landed in Dorval early Saturday morning, comes over to Shane’s just after noon the day before.

Shane can tell something is wrong the moment Ilya walks past him into his house and, rather than staring at Shane’s face long enough that the intensity of his eye contact makes Shane start to sweat, starts peering around Shane’s living room instead. “You have new plants,” he says.

Shane blinks, shuts the front door behind Ilya. “Plants?” He follows Ilya’s gaze to the potted trees by the bay window behind the couch. “Oh, yeah. My mom keeps bringing those over. I don’t think she trusts my decorating skills."

Ilya is wandering toward the couch, away from Shane, like he’s utterly fascinated by the trees.

Shane studies the stiff line of Ilya’s shoulders through the back of his shirt. He slides his hands into the pockets of his sweats, feels the scratch of the lace through the thin fabric inside. “Do you want a drink?”

“Sure,” says Ilya, without looking back.

Shane hesitates for a moment before retreating across the hallway and into the sunlit kitchen, where he reaches into the fridge to dig out the Coke cans stashed at the back.

He turns around to find that Ilya has followed him, that he’s now standing on the other side of the kitchen island. He looks down at the soda in Shane’s hand. “You have anything stronger?” he asks.

“Stronger?” Shane looks over his shoulder toward the fridge. “I… think my dad might have left some beer here. Want me to check?”

“Is okay,” says Ilya, and holds out his hand for the soda.

It is strange, for things to be so awkward with Ilya. Things are awkward between Shane and most other people, but it’s been a while since other people has included Ilya. “Are you okay?” Shane asks.

Ilya stares at him. “Yes. Why?”

“I don’t know,” Shane admits. “You just seem…” He doesn’t know where to go with that, so he lets the sentence trail off instead.

“What,” says Ilya, setting the soda can down on the island. There is a challenging expression on his face. It’s the kind of look Shane’s used to seeing on broadcasts, directed toward Rozanov’s on-ice opponents, but not really in person. “Is not sexy enough for you?”

Shane blinks. “What?”

“I don’t pick you up, fuck you, second I walk in,” Ilya says. “That’s too boring, for you? Something has to be wrong?”

Shane’s eyes widen. “Whoa. No. That’s not what I meant at all. I just wanted to… see if you wanted to talk, I guess.”

Ilya drums his fingers against the side of the soda can. “About what, Hollander?”

Shane shakes his head. “Forget it.” He feels a little sick. Sometimes he hates when Ilya calls him that, when they’re alone. And if Ilya feels like Shane’s forcing him to be here, or something— “I’m just gonna… I’ll be right back,” Shane says, lamely, and goes to step around the island.

Ilya sighs. “Hey, no,” he says. “Wait.” He reaches out as Shane goes to slide past, gets a hand on Shane’s shoulder.

And then he freezes.

Shane stops moving, too. He looks over to see Ilya staring at his hand on Shane. “What?”

Ilya’s thumb strokes a slow path over the top of Shane’s shoulder blade. “What,” he says, enunciating carefully, “Are you wearing?”

Shane looks down at Ilya’s hand. “A t-shirt.”

Ilya’s thumb stops right over where the strap is pressing into Shane’s skin. “And under shirt?”

Shane slowly looks back up to meet Ilya’s eyes.

Ilya’s throat bobs as he swallows. “That photo.” And there’s the eye contact Shane’s been waiting for. “That was for you?”

Shane blinks away the head rush. His laugh comes out rawer than he’d intended it to. “Obviously.”

“I didn’t know,” Ilya breathes. Shane isn’t sure he’s ever seen this expression on Ilya’s face, before. He looks more confused than seductive. He sort of looks like someone’s just hit him on the back of the head. “I wasn’t… I thought maybe…” Ilya's other hand comes up, cups Shane’s chest through his shirt.

Ilya shudders. “Can I see,” he says, his voice hoarse.

Shane looks at the fingers grasping at the front of his shirt. He feels abruptly powerful. He finds he likes the feeling. “I thought you didn’t want to pick me up and fuck me the second you walked in,” he says.

Ilya’s looks almost like he’s in pain. His other hand slides down from Shane’s shoulder, folds over Shane’s opposite pec. “Shouldn’t have said,” he says. “Angry at other things, other people, not you. Was wrong. Can I see?”

Shane looks down at Ilya’s crumpled expression. “Go to my bedroom,” he tells Ilya.

Ilya hesitates. He pulls his hands away from Shane’s chest with visible reluctance.

He looks back at Shane, twice, on his way out of the kitchen.

Shane waits until Ilya’s out of sight to grip at the edge of the island and suck in a few steadying breaths. Then he grabs Ilya’s unopened Coke can, stows it back into the fridge, and tries his best to follow Ilya at a reasonable speed.

Ilya is already sitting at the foot of Shane’s bed, his feet flat on the floor. His eyes snap up to find Shane the moment Shane steps over the threshold.

Shane walks into the center of his room, stops there in front of the bed. He takes a deep breath. He reminds himself of how powerful he’d felt, just moments ago, standing in the kitchen with Ilya’s desperate hands on him.

He still can’t quite bring himself to look at Ilya as he strips off his shirt, then bends down to pull off his sweatpants.

Shane gains some time by turning to fold his clothes, stack them on a chair. But eventually there’s nothing left to do but straighten up and look at Ilya.

Ilya is leaning forward from the edge of the bed. His eyes are so bright he looks feverish. He mouths something that looks like, Wow.

Shane looks down his front. The panties look better, now that he’s shaved, although the bulge is still obscene, as is how well Shane fills out the top. “Do you like it?” he asks, aiming for sexy, landing somewhere closer to scared.

“Do I like it,” Ilya repeats. His hands flex against the duvet to either side of him. His cock is a visible line against the left thigh of his track pants. “You are beautiful.”

Shane isn’t sure how he has enough blood left over to be hard, with how forcefully he’s blushing. “Don’t call me that.”

“Is true,” Ilya says.

Shane doesn’t quite know how to handle the earnestness in Ilya’s words, the eagerness in Ilya’s gaze. Ilya is always present when they’re in bed together, but often when he’s speaking beforehand or after Shane can tell he’s not entirely there. He hadn’t been all the way there when he’d first entered the apartment. He hadn’t been totally there when he’d been frowning at Shane in the kitchen.

He’s here now, and he’s looking at Shane like he wishes he could swallow him whole.

“Come here,” Ilya says. He leans back on the bed, spreads his legs. He pats one hand against his upper thigh.

Shane swallows. It takes some concerted effort to remember how to put one foot in front of the other long enough to reach the bed. Then he clambers into Ilya’s lap, plants his knees to the mattress on either side of Ilya’s hips, gets his hands on Ilya’s shoulders to loom over him.

Ilya tips his head back to meet Shane’s gaze with an open-mouthed stare. He gets his hand on Shane’s stomach, slides it upward.

There’s that sense of power, again. Shane reaches down before the tips of Ilya’s fingers reach lace. He places an open palm over Ilya’s collarbone, pushes him backward.

Ilya goes willingly, sprawling back onto the duvet. He stares up at Shane kneeling over his thighs with his spreading grin revealing all his teeth. Shane always forgets how wide Ilya’s mouth is, until he smiles like that. “Shane Hollander,” he says. “You are in charge?”

Ilya can tease all he wants. It’s not enough to hide that breathless edge to his voice.  “Yes,” Shane tells him. “Hands above your head.”

Ilya, who had been reaching again for Shane’s pecs, shoots him a betrayed look. “Shane,” he says, a whine edging his tone.

“Hands,” says Shane. “Or I’ll get off.” And he shifts his weight, as if he’s really considering climbing out of Ilya’s lap.

Ilya flings his hands back so forcefully they bounce off the mattress above his head.

Shane relents, settles back onto Ilya’s thighs. He isn’t sure he’s ever felt this confident while also being this hard. Usually, getting turned on comes hand-in-hand with being at least faintly panicked.

It’s hard to feel anxious, now, with Ilya looking up at him like he’s waiting for Shane to tell him what to do next.

Shane leans forward. He plants his hand on the tent at the front of Ilya’s track pants. Then he rubs the heel of his palm slowly up from the base of Ilya’s cock.

Ilya bucks beneath Shane. His arms, still thrown above his head, twitch upward from the duvet.

Shane stills his hand. “Touch me and I’ll stop,” he says.

Ilya grunts, lets his hands thud back down to the mattress. “You will kill me,” he groans.

Shane lifts his hand away, leaves Ilya twisting untouched beneath him. God, Shane can see Ilya’s cock moving against the fabric of his pants.

Shane leans back on Ilya’s thighs, back toward Ilya’s knees, away from the twitching outline of Ilya’s cock. He slowly lifts his gaze up to meet Ilya’s.

It might be easier to hold eye contact in that moment than it ever has been in his life, as Shane lifts up his hand, splays his fingers. He places his hand on his own stomach. He drags it slowly upwards.

Ilya’s mouth is open. Shane can see spit gleaming wetly on his slack tongue.

Shane’s fingers reach the silky right cup of the bra. He slides them up, silk bunching beneath his touch, until he can feel the hard rise of his nipple beneath.

He stops, there. Traces a slow circle over the slick fabric.

Shane shivers a little at the sensation, but it’s nothing compared to the way Ilya twists beneath Shane, groaning, his hands lifting again from the mattress before he remembers and slams them back down again. He looks past turned on, now. He looks furious. “Shane,” he growls.

Shane’s lids are creeping lower. He peers out from underneath, studies Ilya’s scowl, continues the slow circle of his fingers over his own nipple. “Yes?”

“Let me,” Ilya says.

The tease is working a little better than Shane had intended. His own hips stutter forward; when he glances down, he sees his erection is making an obscene push out of the top of the straining triangle at the front of his panties. “Let you what?”

Ilya’s voice is so low it’s almost a rumble. “Let me touch.”

“I don’t know,” says Shane, sighing a little as he pinches himself through the silk. He reaches behind himself with his other hand, grips his fingers around Ilya’s knee so he can lean back further, away from Ilya’s contorted expression, his twitching cock. “You were rude, earlier.”

“Shane,” Ilya says. “Hollander.”

Shane smiles down at him. “Wanna be polite now?”

“You are joking.”

Shane doesn’t intend to gasp quite as loudly as he does when he tightens his grip on his own nipple.

Ilya’s eyes rise to Shane’s mouth, drop down to Shane’s hand, flicker back again. His twitching fingers close into fists on the mattress above his head. His throat moves visibly as he swallows. “Please,” he says, his voice hoarse. “Please, Shane.”

Shane smiles down at him. “See,” he says. “That’s nice.” And he leans forward, carefully stretches out the waistband of Ilya’s sweats, rolls them carefully down over Ilya’s straining dick. He knows without asking there’s a condom in Ilya’s pocket, so he digs it out, rips it open, gently smooths it down over Ilya’s hot skin.

Then he reaches behind himself and tugs his panties to the side.

Ilya says, “Oh, my god.”

Shane shuffles forward. He splays his thighs wider, gets his knees on the bed to either side of Ilya’s hips. And then he reaches behind himself for Ilya’s dick.

Ilya’s panting is audible, now. “You already,” he says, and can’t seem to find enough air to finish the sentence.

Shane is aware his grin is probably slightly too smug. Maybe he deserves this, in the end, for how silly he’d started to feel, there in the kitchen with Ilya frowning at him and lube growing sticky between his cheeks.

And then he stops being able to hold on to his grin, because he’s sitting back, and Ilya is inside him.

Ilya twists against the bed, grabs fistfuls of comforter, tosses his head to the side. “Shane,” he grits out.

Shane gasps for air. He’s always taken aback by how hot Ilya feels inside of him. He’s always surprised by how much he likes it.

He leans down, plants one hand on Ilya’s sweaty chest. Slowly starts to move his hips.

Ilya makes a sound like a wounded animal. His fingers are going white with how forcefully they’re twisting into the comforter above his head. “Please,” he grits out. “Please let me touch you.”

Shane looks down at himself, at the gleam of his sweat through the lace, at his cock shoving its way out of his twisted panties to tap at his undulating stomach. He’s starting to lose track of what his goal had been, here. It’s always difficult to think when Ilya’s inside of him. “Yeah,” he says. “Touch me. Fuck me.”

Ilya’s hands come down, grab Shane’s hips, pull him off Ilya’s cock, flip him. Shane goes thudding down on his back on the mattress, so forcefully the breath is knocked from his lungs. And then Ilya is shouldering his way beneath Shane’s legs, he’s shoving down his own sweatpants with one hand, tearing Shane’s panties all the way off and flinging them aside with the other. Even as he’s hiking Shane’s thighs up and pushing himself back inside, Ilya is reaching for Shane’s chest. He’s grabbing handfuls of silk and skin. He’s rubbing rough thumbs over Shane’s aching nipples.

His thrusts are clumsy, artless, desperate.

Shane grabs at the sides of Ilya’s snarling face. God, he can barely hold on, it feels like Ilya is going to put him through the mattress, he doesn’t know if Ilya has ever fucked him quite like this. Shane grips at the back of Ilya’s hair, arches up into the rough grip on his chest, and makes a sound at a pitch he hadn’t known he could reach as his untouched cock spits come against his stomach.

Ilya leans down, gets his open mouth against Shane’s. He presses himself so close it’s like he’s trying to crawl entirely inside Shane. His hips jerk, hunch inward. His hands spasm over Shane’s chest as he grunts into Shane’s mouth.

It takes Ilya a long time to stop twitching against Shane, even longer to pull out. Even then, he doesn’t pull his weight off from where Shane’s thighs are still folded in toward his belly, doesn’t remove his hands from Shane’s chest. He just looks down at Shane with a solemn expression for a moment before leaning in for a kiss.

It’s a peck, a warm touch of lips, at first. Then Ilya leans away. He dips in again, licks gently inside.

Shane’s feet, still hiked in the air over Ilya’s shoulders, curl inwards a little.

The kiss lasts forever and it doesn’t last long enough. Then Ilya is pulling back, releasing Shane’s chest with a lingering drag of his fingers down the silk. He untangles Shane’s legs from around his shoulders, leans back and helps Shane stretch them out.

Even once Shane’s legs are extended, Ilya still keeps his hands wrapped around Shane’s right calf. He leans down, crouches at the foot of the bed so he can press his mouth to the side of Shane’s knee.

Shane watches. He wishes he could be brave enough to ask Ilya to come up here and kiss him some more, but he’s lost that golden feeling of power, now that he no longer has Ilya whining and desperate to come. 

Ilya raises his face from Shane’s leg. “You are incredible,” he says.

Shane averts his eyes. “It wasn’t that hard,” he mumbles. “I’ve gotten pretty good at, you know. The prep stuff.”

Ilya smiles up at him. Something about it makes him look young. “Not that,” he says. “This.” And he slides his hand up from Shane’s knee, up his thigh and past his sticky cock, up over Shane’s belly until he reaches the lace trim of the bra.

Shane twitches as Ilya’s fingers draw back over the sensitive skin of his nipple.

Ilya licks his lips. His pupils visibly dilate as they fix on the press of his own hand over Shane’s chest. “You were nervous,” he says.

“Y—yes,” Shane says. Humiliating, the way he stutters on the word, but Ilya’s fingers on his nipple feel like they’re putting pressure on something deep in the core of him, and it’s hard to focus on anything else.

“You did anyway,” Ilya says. “For me.”

“Ilya— I can’t—” Shane’s foot kicks as his leg gives an involuntary spasm. “It’s too soon,” he grits out, squirming against the bedspread, away from the pressure of Ilya’s fingers, “It’s too much, I can’t—”

“And now,” says Ilya, his eyes wide, “You are uncomfortable, you hurt, but you let me— you would do it for me—”

“Ilya,” Shane whines.

Ilya releases his grip on Shane’s nipple. Shane doesn’t even manage to get his sobbing breath of relief all the way out before Ilya is licking the rest out of his mouth.

*

After Ilya leaves him for the washroom, Shane settles back onto the bed and tries his best to keep the self-consciousness from creeping in.

He doesn’t quite manage it. Instead, he looks down and, as abruptly as if someone had just pointed it out, notices he’s still wearing a bra.

Shane sits up, shuffles toward the edge of the bed. He swings his legs over the side before he reaches behind himself and fumbles for the catch.

It takes him at least a full minute of tugging to get it free.

The straps slip off Shane’s shoulders. When he brings the bra in front of himself and looks down, the thing suddenly looks absurd, with its thin fabric and delicate lace draped over the callus on this thumb from where he grips his hockey stick.

Shane winces, tosses the bra onto the carpet. Then he throws himself back onto the bed, flings both hands over his face, and grinds the heels of his palms into his eyes so forcefully his vision explodes into stars.

He's not sure how long he’s been lying like that when he feels the mattress depress at his side. Shane lifts his hands and cracks his eyes open to see Ilya, naked, lying down belly-up on the mattress, his body perpendicular to Shane’s.

Ilya shuffles backward, then, until his head is resting on Shane’s belly.

He smells of Shane’s shampoo. His hair is warm and damp against Shane’s bare skin.

Shane looks down. He hesitates for a moment before reaching down to slide one slow hand into Ilya’s curls.

Ilya doesn’t protest. He just wiggles the back of his skull against Shane’s stomach, like he’s working to get comfortable. Then he says, “Earlier. In the kitchen.”

Shane rubs his fingers slowly over Ilya’s scalp. He waits for Ilya to continue.

“Do you ever…” Ilya begins. He stops, hesitates. Shane can see his throat working as he swallows. “You ever feel like, everyone… wants.”

Shane decides to test his luck. He reaches down his other hand and traces his fingers along the edge of Ilya’s jaw.

It’s embarrassing, really, to see how visibly they’re shaking.

Shane clears his throat before asking, “What do they want?”

Ilya doesn’t stop Shane from touching him. He doesn’t acknowledge the touch, either. He just lies there and stares up at the ceiling as he says, “Different things. Always something.”

Shane strokes the hard curve of Ilya’s jawbone, considers the way Ilya’s profile is backlit by the sunlight leaking in through the gauzy curtains Shane’s mom had insisted he hang over his bedroom window. It is strange to be here, in daylight, afterward. Usually, it is nighttime when they meet, nighttime still when they part. “Like, your money?”

“They want money, yes,” Ilya says. “Other things, also. I had… bad phone call, before I came here. I was angry. But, not at you. Is not your fault. I should not have said.”

Shane has never spent this long touching Ilya’s hair, before. He’s surprised by how silky the damp strands feel between his fingers. “It’s okay,” he says, softly. “If you want to talk, before we— You know. We could just hang out, if you want, watch a game or something.”

Ilya snorts. “Yes,” he says. “Because you and I, we do not watch enough hockey.”

“It doesn’t have to be hockey. We don’t have to watch anything. I was just—”

“Is okay, Hollander.” Ilya sits up, abruptly, dislodging Shane’s hands. Shane lets them fall back to the duvet as he watches Ilya push himself to the side of the bed so he can swing his feet to the carpet and stand. “I am okay.”

Shane sits up on the edge of the bed, frowning, as Ilya collects the towel he’d apparently draped over the back of a chair on his way to the bed and ducks back into the washroom to hang it up.

When Ilya steps back inside the bedroom, Shane persists. “But we can do that. There’s no reason we can’t.”

Ilya frowns, reaches up to rub at the back of his neck.

Shane can’t help himself. “Is that something you would do with that girl you went clubbing with?”

Ilya’s hand stops moving. His eyes narrow slightly. “Girl,” he repeats.

Shane already regrets saying it, but it’s too late to go back now. “You know. The one you went out with in New York. The one on TMZ.”

“Hollander,” Ilya says. He drops the hand from his neck.

“I was just wondering.”

“You can’t do this.”

Shane can feel his jaw clenching. “Do what?”

Ilya sighs. “Is good to be seen with girls. To dance, with girls. To take photos with girls. To have gossip, rumors, about girls. You know that.”

“I know that,” Shane agrees, frowning.

Ilya looks away, studies the frames on the wall over Shane’s bed like he’s suddenly found them interesting. “I thought, maybe, you were doing this. When I saw photo, read about mystery girl. Maybe would be good for you, too.”

Shane wants, badly, to ask if it’s just a photo opportunity, for Ilya. He wants to ask if Ilya had gotten into a cab with that girl, after that photo was taken. He wants to ask if Ilya kissed her.

He wants to ask if Ilya kissed her the same way he kisses Shane, with a warm peck followed by a gentle sweep of tongue.

But Ilya is already so distant, standing all the way over there on the other side of the sunlit bedroom, and Shane is abruptly afraid of chasing him further away. “Okay,” he says.

“Okay,” Ilya echoes. He steps forward, reaches down beside the bed, picks up the bra from where Shane dropped it on the floor. “You didn’t fold,” he says.

“Oh,” Shane says. “Yeah. Guess I didn’t.”

“You always fold.”

“My clothes, yeah. That’s not— those aren’t my clothes. They’re—” He bites back, for you. Just sits there and chews his lip and leaves the sentence unfinished.

Ilya looks down at the silk bunched in his hands. He shakes out the fabric, then smooths one cup over his palm, folds it neatly over the other.

Then he looks around for a moment, finds Shane’s discarded panties. He bends to pick them up, folds them carefully in two.

Ilya pauses, then. Looks down, for a moment, at where Shane is watching him from the edge of the bed. He holds Shane’s gaze. “Very pretty,” he says, and places the folded silk on the bedspread beside Shane.

Shane catches Ilya’s wrist as Ilya goes to step away, tugs until Ilya leans down toward him. Then he closes his eyes, parts his lips, and waits.