Page 21 of The Long Game (Game Changers #6)

Ruby nodded without hesitation and Ilya got to work. He’d already painted her nails a bold combination of dark purple, neon pink, and light blue, but obviously the sparkles were necessary.

“How’s it going?” Shane asked as he entered the kitchen.

“Amazing. Look at this great job I am doing.”

Shane bent over the table and inspected Ruby’s manicure. “Wow. I’m jealous.”

“I’m next,” said Ruby’s twin sister, Jade, claiming her spot before Shane tried to butt in line.

“Is Amber asleep?” Ilya asked.

“Yeah. Conked right out after a solid hour of preparing food for us.”

Ilya smiled, remembering how seriously Amber had presented each of their plastic meals. “Was surprised you ate the hamburger. Red meat, you know.”

Shane lightly punched his shoulder. “Idiot.”

“That’s not nice,” Jade said.

“You are right,” Ilya agreed. “That is not nice, Shane.”

“Sorry.” He sat at the table between Jade and the middle child, Arthur. The Pikes’ only son was a remarkably quiet kid, seemingly content to watch whatever was happening around him. He seemed to be fascinated by his sister’s nails.

“Do you want nail polish, Arthur?” Ilya asked.

The five-year-old blinked at him, then nodded.

“He can’t!” Ruby insisted. “He’s a boy.”

“Boys can wear nail polish,” Ilya said. “Watch.” He carefully brushed a coat of the pale blue color on his thumbnail. “See?”

“Dad said it’s just for girls,” Jade said.

“Well, Dad is a—”

“Your dad doesn’t know a lot of boys who wear nail polish,” Shane cut in just in time. “But plenty do.”

Ilya painted the rest of the nails on his left hand and admired his work. “This is nice. I should have sparkles too maybe.”

“Here,” Shane said. He took Ilya’s hand in his, then grabbed the bottle of glitter polish. “It’s easier if someone else does it. Probably.”

Everyone watched as Shane bent over Ilya’s hand, concentrating intensely as he brushed polish on each nail. Ilya’s heart fluttered at the sweetness of it.

“Is he your husband?” Ruby asked.

Ilya flinched, nearly making Shane’s brush slip. “No.”

“Are you his husband?”

“That’s not how—” Shane said, then stopped himself. “We’re not married.”

“Are you going to get married?”

Shane locked eyes with Ilya, and Ilya saw the silent plea for help in them.

“Do you think we should?” Ilya asked.

“Do you love each other?”

“We’re friends,” Shane said stiffly at the same time Ilya said, “Yes.”

Jade grabbed her sister’s arm. “We could have a wedding today!”

Ruby jumped and clapped, probably making a mess of her nails. “Yeah! Can we?”

Ilya grinned at Shane. “What do you say, sweetheart?”

Twenty minutes later, Shane was standing in the Pikes’ living room wearing a magician’s cape, a top hat, and holding a pink plastic heart-shaped ring. Ilya was standing next to him wearing a red sequined bow tie and a headband covered in flowers. He was holding an identical purple ring.

Across from them stood two seven-year-old girls wearing princess dresses, and behind them was a large assembled audience of stuffed toys and Arthur (wearing a firefighter costume and a freshly painted blue manicure).

Arthur pressed a button on a toy that played fifteen seconds of a song from Moana, and they were ready to begin.

“This is the wedding of Shane Hollander and Ilya...” Jade narrowed her eyes at Ilya.

“Rozanov,” he supplied.

She nodded. “Rose-noff.”

Shane snickered, and Ilya nudged him. “Shane. Keep it together. Is our wedding day.”

“Shane, do you promise to love Ilya and be his husband forever?” Ruby asked.

Shane gazed at his ridiculous-looking boyfriend, who smiled back at him. One of the flowers on his headband was holding on by a thread, dangling in front of Ilya’s raised left eyebrow. Suddenly—absurdly—Shane’s throat felt tight.

“I do,” he said quietly, and with an embarrassing amount of feeling.

“Ilya,” said Jade, “do you promise to love Shane and be his husband forever?”

“I do,” Ilya said. “Forever.”

There was a slight tremor in Ilya’s voice, which surprised and relieved Shane. At least Shane wasn’t the only one getting inappropriately emotional.

“Okay,” Jade said. “Do the rings now.”

Ilya took Shane’s hand, and slipped the child-size purple heart ring onto his pinkie, down to his second knuckle. Shane huffed out a shaky laugh.

He took Ilya’s hand and smiled at his painted nails. He wiggled the ring onto the end of Ilya’s pinkie, barely able to get it past the tip. He glanced up, and caught Ilya blinking rapidly.

“I now pronounce you husband and husband,” Ruby said.

Jade elbowed her. “I was supposed to say that!”

“No you weren’t! You say the kissing thing.”

“Oh yeah. You may now kiss.”

Shane raised his eyebrows at Ilya, silently asking You wanna?

Ilya leaned in and kissed him quickly on the mouth while the kids whooped and threw handfuls of paper they’d ripped up into the air. Arthur hit play on the Moana song again.

After the kiss, Ilya pressed his forehead against Shane’s, and they just stood there like that, frozen in the moment.

“Does this mean tonight is our honeymoon?” Shane asked quietly.

“Let’s pretend it is.”

Shane was having a difficult time getting his key to work because Ilya wouldn’t stop kissing his neck.

“Quit it for a sec, would you?” Shane said, tipping his head to the side to try to block Ilya’s attacks.

Ilya wasn’t deterred. He switched to the other side and nibbled under Shane’s ear. Shane let out a childish-sounding giggle and pretended to try to get away when Ilya wrapped an arm across his chest from behind.

“Give it to me,” Ilya said, snatching the key from Shane’s hand. He deftly inserted the key in the lock and turned it while continuing to make a meal of Shane’s neck.

“Show-off,” Shane complained.

“Always.” Then Ilya scooped Shane into his arms, bridal style. The same way he’d carried Jackie to the car earlier that day.

“What the hell?” Shane said, though he knew he sounded more delighted than outraged. “Put me down!”

Ilya grinned at him, and nudged the door open with his foot. “Is our wedding night.”

“This can’t be good for your knee.”

“My knee is fine,” Ilya scoffed. “And you are very light.”

“I’m two hundred pounds!”

“Sure you are.”

“I am!”

“Like you are five-ten.”

“I am five-ten!”

Ilya shook his head and stepped over the threshold.

The Pikes had been at the hospital for hours, but thankfully Jackie’s ankle was, as she’d repeatedly told her husband, only sprained.

She’d hobbled through the door on crutches around dinnertime, Hayden hovering close behind looking exhausted and concerned.

Ilya, Shane, and the kids had been gathered on the sofa, watching Frozen 2.

Ilya’s arm had been wrapped snugly around Shane, which had been nice, in the presence of others.

Hayden hadn’t even seemed bothered by it, but that may have been because he’d been distracted by the floral headband Ilya had still been wearing.

It had been a thoroughly enjoyable day.

Ilya carried Shane to the living room, then stopped and glanced around. “Now what?”

“Now you put me down!”

“This is how it works? I thought maybe I put you on our bed? With rose petals?”

“God, fuck off.” Shane squirmed until Ilya had no choice but to release him.

Shane landed on his feet, but stumbled forward and almost collided with the coffee table.

When he turned around to glare at Ilya, he found him smiling at him with the same soft expression Shane had seen on his face during their make-believe wedding vows.

“What?” Shane asked.

“Nothing.” Ilya scratched the back of his own neck. Looked away. Looked back at Shane. “Today was nice.”

“It was.” Shane took his hand and tugged him closer. “I mean, not the part where Jackie sprained her ankle, but the rest of it.”

“She is lucky it was not broken.”

“Hayden is lucky,” Shane said. Hayden was his best friend and a wonderful father, but Jackie took care of about ninety-nine percent of everything that went on in that family.

“I like those kids,” Ilya said. “I can’t believe Hayden made them.”

“You’re great with kids.” Shane brushed their noses together, then kissed Ilya’s mouth. He tasted like the lemonade Shane had declined at the Pikes’ house but that Ilya had happily drank two glasses of. Shane guiltily enjoyed the taste now, sweet and tangy.

When they broke the kiss, Ilya said, “You will be a good dad.”

Shane rested his forehead on Ilya’s shoulder and smiled. “Not as good as you.”

Ilya huffed. “Not everything is a competition with us.”

“We’d find a way to make parenting a competition.”

Strong arms tightened around Shane. “No. It will be together. Peaceful.”

Shane, feeling brave, admitted, “There were moments today where I felt like I was looking into our future.”

Ilya pulled back to meet Shane’s gaze. “And it was okay?”

“It was amazing.”

Shane saw joy flash in Ilya’s eyes, and then he didn’t see anything because Ilya was kissing him thoroughly.

Shane lost himself in it, enjoying the familiar but still exhilarating heat of Ilya’s mouth.

Shane touched him everywhere: the rough scratch of Ilya’s ever-present stubble, the soft curls of his shaggy hair, the long line of his neck and the mounds of his muscular shoulders.

He slid a hand up under Ilya’s T-shirt and glided his palm over Ilya’s abs, his perfect bellybutton, and the neat trail of hair beneath it.

Then up to his broad chest, over his chest hair and stiff nipples, finally resting over his heart and his stupid bear tattoo.

“I love you,” Ilya murmured against Shane’s lips.

“I love you too.”

“But we are not having four children.”

Shane laughed. “God no. Of course not.”

“It would be too much. With the dogs.”

“Um. I think you mean cat.”

“I did not mean cat. Definitely not.”

“How many dogs exactly?”

“Some. Maybe one, to start. And then he needs a friend, so two. Maybe they don’t like each other so we get number three to be, um...”

“A mediator?”

“Okay. Maybe, yes.”

“And if they don’t like that one?”

“The fourth dog will—”