Chapter 2
Calvin
Amanda Starkey was a glacier. Normally, having a gorgeous, leggy blonde in my arms would’ve been the ideal way to spend an afternoon. But Amanda despised me, and I had no idea why.
Okay, maybe it had something to do with my relentless mockery of her fandom. But what sane woman pined for short, troll-like men?
The woman was crazytown—even if she worked harder and accomplished more than almost anyone else on the third floor of SolutionX—or any other floor.
Nose ever to the grindstone, she never gave me the time of day. Wasn’t I good-looking enough for her? Not witty or charming enough?
Nah, I would’ve bet my favorite Reedsville Rhinos t-shirt it was that I wasn’t hairy enough. Or short enough. And my feet weren’t longer than my legs.
See? Crazytown.
But the way her perfume was circling my brain, I could’ve been Mayor of Crazytown. The chemistry between us could’ve singed the periodic table of the elements.
“Your eyes,” I muttered. “They’re the color of emeralds.” Their liquid depths and the fullness of her mouth were beyond tempting. Yeah, I could’ve freed her hair from my coat button a lot faster if I’d tried.
I didn’t try.
A text from Parley came in. Are you bringing a Serious Girlfriend to my wedding, or are you losing our bet?
Ugh. Speaking of Rhinos-related bets! That was one I never should’ve taken. I shoved the phone back in my pocket.
“Serious girlfriend, huh?”
“You saw that?”
A hint of mockery adorned her brow. “Sounds like a problem. For you, I mean.”
A poison-tipped arrow, those words. “I can get any girl I want.” It’s that I didn’t want any of the ones I’d met. Not seriously, anyway. I’m too much like Dad. “What about you? Where’s your boyfriend? Oh, right. Getting the hair on top of his feet groomed. Manscaped? Troll-scaped?”
I knew they were hobbits she loved. I reveled in watching her neck turn red. And it did. Very prettily right before my eyes. Her red blushes paired with her glittering green eyes like Christmas colors, a gift just for me.
Close enough to kiss.
“Sounds like you’re losing that bet.”
Probably, though it killed me to admit it. I shrugged. “Maybe, maybe not.”
She arched a brow. “How much do you pay when you lose?”
Ouch. I winced at the image of my doom. She never could’ve appreciated the depth of Parley’s penalty, since she probably didn’t give a rip about the greatest team in the history of professional hockey. “Has to do with season tickets to the Rhinos.” And being forced to wear a Vancouver Vikings helmet with horns to every single home game.
The Rhinos fans would trample me and rend me with their nose-horns.
“Rhinos.” Amanda rolled her pretty eyes at me, as if the Rhinos were insects on her picnic lunch.
“Don’t belittle our town’s biggest economic boon.”
“What exactly makes your fandom amazing and mine nerdy?”
“The fact that your fandom is nerdy?” I leaned a little closer to her face—at first to be a little intimidating, but when her gaze locked with mine, I was the one shrinking.
Amanda Starkey did that to me.
Every time.