The game ended 4–2 for Columbus. Most of the crowd had left by the middle of the third period.
“Rough one tonight,” Harris said to Ilya in the locker room after the press had finally left.
“Rough one every night,” Ilya sighed. He remembered when hockey had beenfun.
“If it makes you feel better, I regrammed this photo of a pumpkin a fan carved your portrait into. It’s pretty impressive.” He held out his phone so Ilya could see.
“Wow.” As far as pumpkin portraits went, itwasimpressive. Ilya loved how weird North American Halloween was.
Then he got an idea. He took a few seconds to weigh the pros and cons, then stood up and announced, “Halloween party this year is at my house, okay?”
Everyone cheered and clapped, which made Ilya smile. He never hosted parties, and rarely went to them. Because he was a terrible captain and teammate.
He would host this party, and it would be talked about for years. The best party ever. Epic. In Boston he’d been the one who organized impromptu outings. He’d been the guy his teammates called when they wanted to go out and get drunk and dance and get laid. He could be that guy again. He could try.
Chapter Ten
“Holy! What’s up, sexy?”
Shane ducked his head so Rose wouldn’t see how embarrassed he was. “As if.”
“I’m serious! Look in the mirror.” Rose grabbed his arm and hauled him in front of a full-length mirror. “Look!”
Shane looked. Rose had convinced him to come shopping with her during his day off in L.A., and shopping with one of the biggest movie stars in the world did not mean, as Shane had expected, going to a mall. It meant private shopping sessions at tiny designer-owned boutiques. He’d also quickly realized that Rose wasn’t even looking for clothes for herself, and was mostly interested in dressing Shane up like a doll.
So now he was wearing an ivory-colored silk T-shirt that was basically transparent and cost more than most people earned in a month. It looked more like something Ilya would wear.
“Your body is ridiculous,” Rose said. “Look at that ass!”
The dark brown slacks had some stretch in them, and were hugging his thighs and ass in a way that, Shane could admit, looked pretty nice. “The pants are good,” he allowed.
“It’sallgood. Trust me. And here. Try this with it.” She held out a reddish-brown leather bomber jacket. “It’s short so you won’t be hiding that juicy butt.”
“Stop it,” Shane said as he slipped the jacket on. He’d never really been a leather jacket guy, but maybe...
“I love this look with your longer hair,” Rose said. “You look like trouble.”
Shane turned from side to side in front of the mirror, examining himself. Hedidlook different, but still himself. Just...cooler.
“I like it,” he admitted. “Do these pants come in other colors?”
An hour later, he and Rose left the boutique with several bags, all containing clothes for Shane. Rose had insisted on paying for everything, which was completely unnecessary, but Shane allowed it because it seemed to make her very happy.
Shane was vaguely aware that there were people—paparazzi, most likely—taking photos of them as they walked the short distance from the store to Rose’s chauffeured car, but Rose didn’t mention them so he didn’t either. Shane didn’t know how she dealt with that level of public scrutiny. It made his own life as a superstar hockey player in Canada seem downright private.
“I’m starving,” Rose announced when they got into the car. “You wanna get tacos?”
Shanedidwant to get tacos, but... “I’m on a pretty strict diet,” he said. “For, like, performance.”
Rose laughed. “Aw geez. I thought I finally had a lunch date I could eat real food with. Okay, what can you eat, then?”
After Shane rattled off an embarrassingly long list of forbidden foods, Rose asked her driver—who she seemed to have a very friendly relationship with—to take them to a place that had, according to her, the best poke in town.
“So how are things?” Rose asked once they were at a patio table with their bowls. “With...y’know?”
“Great,” Shane said quickly. “Really great.”
“Yeah? No plans to go public?”
