Page 59 of Heated Rivalry 1
But Arthur had fallen asleep.
Shane imagined telling Hayden that he was into men. He knew Hayden wouldn’t shun him or anything. He maybe wasn’t the mostworldlyguy, but he wasn’t a bigot either. At worst it would probably make things awkward between them. Maybe it wouldn’t, but Shane didn’t want to risk finding out. There really wasn’t any reason to, anyway. Shane probablywouldmeet a nice girl someday and settle down and then his occasional attraction to men would be moot.
His imagination continued to wander, conjuring a scenario where he told Hayden that he’d been hooking up with Ilya Rozanov since their rookie season. The hypothetical look on Hayden’s face made Shane snort out loud. He quickly covered his mouth and turned to look at Arthur, as if to suggest that the sleeping toddler had made the weird noise.
“Excuse me, are you Shane Hollander?”
Shane looked up and saw two teen girls gawking at him.
“Erm...” he said smoothly.
“Oh my god! Youare! Can I get a selfie with you?”
“It’s pretty, um, dark in here,” Shane said. He tried to catch Hayden’s eye. If he started taking selfies with fans here, it would never end.
“Please?” The girls were both pouting now.
Shane kept himself from sighing. It wasn’t like he was doing anything else at the moment. “Sure. What’s your name?”
The girls lit up. “Oh my god, thank you! I love you so much! I’m Emma.”
“I’m Jessica.”
“Nice to meet you, Emma and Jessica.”
They arranged themselves so they would all fit in the frame of Emma’s iPhone screen. As she was snapping pictures, Hayden returned. “Uh-oh,” he said.
It only took a second for Shane to realize that Hayden was referring to the dozens of heads that were now turned in the direction of his little photo shoot.
Sure enough, as soon as the girls thanked him and walked away, a man and his son approached Shane. He ended up being stuck in the Antarctic room for twenty minutes taking photos with fans and signing whatever objects they happened to have on them. When Shane made his apologetic excuse to leave, he found Hayden by the exit.
“Those assholes,” Hayden grumbled.
“They’refans, Hayden.”
“They didn’t even recognizeme!”
Shane laughed and slapped him on the back. “I’ll take a selfie with you, if you want.”
“I never should have become friends with you.”
Shane smiled and held the door for him so he could push the stroller through.
“Seriously!” Hayden continued. “My ego can’t take it, man! It’s like being friends with the damn sun or something. Wait—do I have all of the kids? How many kids are here?”
“Three. Ruby is hiding behind you.”
“Okay.” Hayden exhaled. “I can’t believe we’re having another one.”
“You sure it’s just one?”
Hayden’s eyes were pure terror. “Don’t even joke, Hollander.”
October 2016—Washington
Ilya stretched out on his hotel bed and amused himself by tapping on the various customization options for the 2017 Audi Spyder. He had a 2015 Spyder already, so it wasn’t like heneededa new one.
But he didn’t have one in Vegas Yellow...
