Picking up where The Long Game leaves off, Rachel Reid’s Unrivaled will see Shane and Ilya face a divided hockey world. Though they’re both playing professionally for the Ottawa Centaurs, enjoying married life, and receiving public support, Shane and Ilya are also dealing with backlash since they came out. A hockey podcast is leading the #TakeBackHockey movement, presenting the couple with what may be their greatest challenge since readers met them in Heated Rivalry.
Though she’s described The Long Game as Shane and Ilya’s happy ending, Reid felt there were things the couple still need to work through by the end of the sequel. “Yeah, because it’s so abrupt,” the author told Swooon at BookCon on April 19. “They went from being a secret and stealing moments together and all of this for years to suddenly [being] teammates, married, everybody knows about them. That’s a massive shift, and I felt a little bit robbed myself for not getting to see how that goes, because it is so, so huge.”
Reid is having fun writing Shane and Ilya as teammates for the first time, especially with Ilya being Shane’s captain. “[They’re] still very competitive, but also having a great time,” she said. “They are definitely at the beginning season, very… just giddy, really. Just so excited to be playing together, but still having a good time, lovingly roasting each other, and being competitive about scoring more goals, stuff like that. And also traveling together and just all these things that they’ve never gotten to do and just the joy of being openly out about your relationship and having people know about it.”
In the epilogue of The Long Game, readers get a small glimpse of Shane and Ilya’s new dynamic as teammates. Shane and Ilya are on cloud nine in the lead-up to the Centaurs’ home opener. Just before the game starts, Ilya teases Shane about moving to the front of the line, since the back is for captains. After leading the Montreal Voyageurs for years, Shane still isn’t used to not being in charge. Their teammate jokes that Shane is coming for Ilya’s “C” right before they hit the ice.
In Unrivaled, Shane is “telling himself [that being captain] is not important,” Reid said. “This is the first time he gets to see firsthand how good of a captain Ilya is, because I felt like it was something he’s always heard but has never gotten to see, so I think he’s just enjoying that too.”
Though he’s having fun with his new team, Shane still has some unresolved feelings about the Voyageurs. Toward the end of The Long Game, Shane decides not to re-sign with them. Most of his teammates react poorly to his relationship with Ilya. When Montreal and Ottawa face each other in the playoffs, Shane trips when he’s trying to catch Ilya on a breakaway. Ilya scores and wins the game, ruining the chances of a repeat Stanley Cup win for Montreal. The team thinks Shane tripped on purpose. Betrayed, Shane leaves for Ottawa when he becomes a free agent at the end of the season.
“The most complicated thing is Shane’s two best friends [Hayden and J.J.] still play there,” Reid said. “So, he had to leave abruptly. Shane still has some complicated feelings about leaving that team. Shane’s not a huge fan of change. And he did have a dynasty going with that team, and now he’s somewhere else, and he’s happy, but he still feels a little bit weird and sad about it, and it’s gonna take some adjusting. He doesn’t know these new guys that well.”
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