Book Title: Unrivaled
Author: Ashlyn Kane & Morgan James
Publisher: Dreamspinner Press
Cover Artist: LC Chase
Release Date: February 21, 2023
Genre: M/M Contemporary Sports Romance
Tropes: Rivals to lovers, professional athletes, fling to love, opposites attract
Themes: Found family, opening yourself up to love, old grief, letting people in, reinventing yourself
Heat Rating: 4-5 flames
Length: 100 000 words / 288 pages
It is book 3 in a series, but the story is independent of the other books in the series. (There are some cameo appearances but no real plot crossover)
The book does not end on a cliffhanger.
Buy Links – Available in Kindle Unlimited
Love doesn’t pull its punches.
Blurb
People say there’s a fine line between love and hate. If you ask Grady Armstrong, the line’s as obvious as the one across the middle of a hockey rink.
So he can’t explain why he doesn’t walk away when his Grindr hookup—a guy who accused him of impersonating himself—turns out to be Max Lockhart, a rival player Grady once punched in the face. Apparently Max can goad him just as well off the ice as he can on it.
Max Lockhart showed up thinking he was going to expose a fake. Instead he hooks up with a guy who claims to hate him. And has a good time. A really good time. But that doesn’t mean players from different teams can be together.
Max has always wished Grady would relax a little. When the season starts and Grady accepts Max’s offer of help with finding someone to date for real, Max gets his wish. But he should’ve been careful what he wished for, because now that he knows Grady is a big softie under that prickly shell, he’d rather keep Grady for himself.
Grady only goes on a handful of dates before he realizes he has a lot more fun with Max. But he can’t be falling for a rival player… can he?
Grady was on his fifth warmup lap and his hundredth repetition when a stick brushed his legs at center ice.
Fuck.
He sprayed to a stop. He’d only look more petty if he didn’t. “What do you want, shithead?”
Max leaned on his stick and batted his eyelashes. “Aw, baby, why you treat me so mean?”
Grady gave him a flat look. “How long do you have?”
Max barked with laughter. “Hey, if I tell you to suck my dick during the game, will they suspend me? Like, how does that work if it’s a sincere invitation?”
Fuck’s sake, Grady thought. “Try it and find out.”
Then he skated away to get his head in the game.
The teams were well matched, with more scoring power on the American side balanced out by an absolutely psychotic Canadian goaltender. Coach kept matching Grady’s line with Max’s, which Grady expected—grudge matches were good for viewership. Grady braced himself for Max to say something horrible, but by the end of the first period, he hadn’t come up with anything newly disgusting.
With two minutes left until the buzzer, Grady’s line was out trying to increase their one–nothing lead. He kept his head up going into the corner after the puck, but he could feel Max’s gaze on the back of his neck. He gritted his teeth. Don’t take a penalty.
A second later Max’s shoulder slammed into his. “Hey, bud, didn’t your mom warn you your face would stick like that?”
Grady gritted his teeth harder and shoved him back. “Thought you liked my face.”
Max dug at the puck, but Grady had it trapped between his skates. However tenacious Max might be, Grady was stronger. He flipped a pass to Yorkie, Max cursing behind him all the while.
Good.
The ensuing rush gave Grady a chance to show off. He wasn’t the flashiest guy on the ice, but he had good vision, always knew where he needed to be. Today he slipped into a gap left by two defenders in time to get his stick on Yorkie’s shot and tip the puck over the goalie’s pad.
2–0. Suck it, Canada.
He caught Max’s eye as he was crossing behind the net on his way to the group celly. Max was red-faced and narrow-eyed.
Grady smiled wider to rub it in.
For some reason, that only made Max laugh, but whatever. Grady was winning. He didn’t care what was going on in Max’s head.
The second period started out chippy, and Canada scored while Baller was in the box for holding. Half a dozen more plays that should’ve been penalties went uncalled.
Including one where Grady was against the boards with Max again, with Max’s stick hooked around his ankle while Max kicked at the puck. “Hey, so I was thinking—”
Fuck it. Nothing was getting called in this game. Grady brought his elbow back and Max’s breath whooshed out.
But he didn’t back off. “There’s a great little food cart outside my hotel. Let me treat you to a sausage—”
Grady snorted in spite of himself.
That moment of distraction was all it took. Max worked the puck off Grady’s stick and took off down the ice. It was in the back of the US net two seconds later.
Fuck.
Max clipped Grady’s shoulder as they skated back toward their respective benches, and winked when Grady glowered at him.
Grady brooded a little in the locker room when the period was over, which prompted Baller to tap his shins. “Eyes on the prize, Ace. Where’s your head?”
In the arena hookup basement, also known as his own personal hell.
Grady shook himself. “Sorry. I let Lockhart get to me.”
“Well, stop it.” Baller flicked him between the eyes. “You need some earplugs?”
Grady batted his hand. “No. I got it.”
“Attaboy.”
Baller’s actual pep talk was a little more dramatic, and involved standing in his stall and quoting something that might have been from The Mighty Ducks. Grady didn’t watch a lot of movies, even about hockey. Eventually someone threw a ball of sock tape at Baller, and he interrupted himself mid monologue. “Fine, you ungrateful fucks.” He threw the tape back, grinning. “Go beat Canada so I can lord it over my husband.”
In the end, Baller was the one who poked the puck through five-hole with thirty seconds before the clock ran out. The team mobbed him behind the net as the home crowd booed.
Music to Grady’s ears—almost as sweet as the scowl on Max’s face. Maybe if Grady had less of a stick up his ass, he’d blow the guy a kiss.
But probably not.
Ashlyn Kane likes to think she can do it all, but her follow-through often proves her undoing. Her house is as full of half-finished projects as her writing folder. With the help of her ADHD meds, she gets by.
An early reader and talker, Ashlyn has always had a flair for language and storytelling. As an eight-year-old, she attended her first writers’ workshop. As a teenager, she won an amateur poetry competition. As an adult, she received a starred review in Publishers Weekly for her novel Fake Dating the Prince. There were quite a few years in the middle there, but who’s counting?
Her hobbies include DIY home decor, container gardening (no pulling weeds), music, and spending time with her enormous chocolate lapdog. She is the fortunate wife of a wonderful man, the daughter of two sets of great parents, and the proud older sister/sister-in-law of the world’s biggest nerds.
Morgan James is a clueless (older) millennial who’s still trying to figure out what they’ll be when they grow up and enjoying the journey to get there. Now, with a couple of degrees, a few stints in Europe, and more than one false start to a career, they eagerly wait to see what’s next. James started writing fiction before they could spell and wrote their first (unpublished) novel in middle school. They haven’t stopped writing since. Geek, artist, archer, and fanatic, Morgan tends to pass their free hours with in imaginary worlds and people on pages and screens—it’s an addiction. As is their love of coffee and tea. They live in Canada with their massive collection of unread books, where they are the personal servant of too many four-legged creatures.
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