Chapter Two
Birdie Grenadine was not doing okay.
She went over her notes one last time on conversation topics to possibly broach with Ava if there was an awkward silence, which there absolutely would be, because Birdie was in fact inherently awkward.
It was this reason that she held down an at-home job funding loans for a bank, but the downfall was her lack of socialization. Too many hours spent with herself and her rock collection, three of which were sitting on the dining table of the cabin for good luck.
Pyrite, or fool’s gold, in the shape of a penis named Gary.
Vermiculite named Barry.
And a perfectly flat river stone she’d found the last time she changed at Oak Creek a few miles away from her condominium. Its name was Sylvester, and she shoved it into her pocket now for good luck. She hoped her other rocks at home didn’t miss her too much.
“Oh my God, this is literally why I’m single.”
On second thought, she took the river stone out of her pocket and replaced it with the golden wiener rock. Felt right.
Birdie tugged her bangs down farther. She’d gotten a haircut a couple of days ago, so her bangs didn’t cover her eyes very well and she felt exposed.
People would notice if she wore sunglasses to dinner.
If she could just stay calm though, her eyes would stay a soft brown that was a normal human shade, and she could look normal.
A knock sounded on the door and she startled hard. One glance in the mirror, and her eyes were glowing gold. Fart.
She gritted her teeth and asked, “Who is it?”
When no one answered, she marched to the front door and yanked it open. On the porch sat an envelope. She looked around, but the only person out here was a dark-haired man who was making his way toward the main lodge.
She opened up the envelope and unfolded a piece of fine cardstock paper.
A poem had been handwritten in cursive.
Roses are red
Balls are blue
We hate Valentine’s Day
As much as you.
No more love,
And no more mush,
And anyone who complains
Can kiss our tush.
Dinner is served.
She laughed and peeked around the corner in time to see the dark-haired man jog up the stairs to the main lodge. At the other cabins, people were on the porches reading their poems too. Ha.
Okay, this was already a little fun.
Birdie set the poem on the bench inside the door and grabbed her purse, then locked up behind her.
Dinner was in five minutes, and the others were starting to file toward the main lodge too.
She selfishly hoped someone was weirder than her. There was nothing worse than being the weirdest one in the room.
“Don’t talk about rocks too much,” she murmured to herself.
Or the iridescence of fish scales because apparently she could get hyper-focused on that conversation too.
Which she proved with the poor banker who was just trying to give Birdie her travel money to come here, but got locked in a ten-minute conversation that poor woman did not have on her bingo card yesterday.
The worst part? Birdie knew how lame the conversation was, but she hadn’t been able to stop talking.
That lady had given her no less than fourteen polite but hollow-eyed smiles, like she was internally praying for Birdie to leave her bank.
That had been her socialization for the week until this afternoon, when she’d tried to knock on Lance’s shoulder and confused the hell out of him, and then threw his phone into the snow.
Heavenly wind, take the sails of this ship, she was not in control of these tumultuous seas.
Okay, self, don’t say stuff like that aloud either.
She offered the lady from Lodge 6 a smile and a wave, but the woman, all dressed in black, said sternly, “No,” and walked faster away from her.
And now the competitive little animal in her was pushing Birdie’s legs faster. This lady was trying to get to the lodge first. Not on my watch.
The black-haired lady grimaced over at Birdie and started walking faster.
Grrr. The trail through the snow wasn’t very wide here.
Birdie pushed her legs into a brisk walk, pumping her arms slightly.
A roaring engine sounded, but she was too focused on the race.
“What are you doing?” the lady ground out. “Stop following me!”
“I thought we were racing,” Birdie panted out.
“Why would we be racing? I was trying to get away from you.”
“Oh.” Birdie frowned and made her legs stop moving. “That’s way less fun than I thought this was.”
Honk!
Birdie startled as the last two…campers, she would call them in her mind…passed her by.
“Were you just racing that angry lady?” came a familiar voice. And sure enough, when she turned to the parking area, to Birdie’s utter mortification, Lance was hanging out the window of his truck with an annoying smile on his much-too-handsome face.
“No,” she lied, and then scoffed. “Why would I be doing that? That’s weird.” Her cheeks were on fire.
“Super weird,” he agreed, and rolled his window up.
She stood there awkwardly as he turned off his truck and got out. “Okay, bye. Have a good night at work.”
“Okay,” he said, still smiling. “Bye.”
Eyes trained on the snowy trail of footprints ahead of her, she walked stiffly toward the lodge, but Lance fell into step with her.
She walked faster.
So did he.
So did she.
So did he.
She picked up to a lazy jog, and so did he.
“Are you racing me?” she demanded.
“No, I’m winning.” He took off running.
“Oh, fart,” she said as she kicked her legs into motion. She hated losing races.
“Did you just say fart?” Lance called behind him.
She zoomed past him and pushed him over into the snow as she did.
His cackling laugh echoed through the Woodpecker Inn. Out of breath because she was honestly in mediocre shape, she straightened the wrinkles out of her skin-tight jeans and blew out a steadying breath, preparing her thoughts to meet Ava.
A pair of strong hands pushed her into a snowbank.
Birdie yelped as the world was shrouded in white.
She sat up and wiped snow from her face just in time to see Lance open the door to the lodge and let himself in. “I win,” he said as the door swung closed behind him.
“What a buffoon,” she uttered, appalled.
Now she was covered in snow for her first meeting with Ava. And yeah, Ava didn’t know she was here to meet her, but she didn’t want to be coming in late to the dinner soaking wet.
What a jerk.
She stood and went to work dislodging snow from her clothes. She wasn’t wearing a jacket, because shifters didn’t get that cold, so all the snow was clinging in clumps to her sweater. “Ball sack,” she cursed as she dusted harder.
Panicking slightly, her heart started racing. No, no, no! Her eyes were probably bright freaking gold now.
Stupid boy. Stupid hot and slightly fun boy. Stupid sexy, handsome, green-eyed, gym-rat boy. She hoped he was just here to fix a toilet or something and not serving dinner.
To her dismay, when she finally braved her way inside, Birdie noticed the dining tables were getting full.
The dining room in the main lodge was made up of two tables underneath a rustic chandelier, with a huge stone hearth behind it with a cozy, blazing fire. It was all dark woods and exposed wooden beams, and wow, this place was like a dream.
Or it would be a dream if one Lance-the-rude-man wasn’t sitting at the table. Ava was nowhere to be seen. Crap.
Lance was grinning a baiting smile at her, and the chair was loud against the wooden floors as he dragged out the one beside him invitingly.
“No thanks,” she said and made her way to the other table. She took the only open seat by the lady in the funeral clothes.
“Seat’s taken,” the woman said blandly.
“By whom?” Birdie asked.
“By my imaginary friend.”
“Oh, that’s interesting.” Hell yeah! Birdie wasn’t the weirdest in the room! “What’s your imaginary friend’s name?”
“I don’t have an imaginary friend. I just don’t want you to sit by me.”
Birdie tried not to pout, truly she did, but it was shaping up that Birdie was indeed the weird one. She’d been genuinely excited to get to know all about Debbie Downer’s made-up friend. She supported creativity.
Lance’s green eyes were dancing and he scooted the chair beside him out farther.
Deflated, she slumped her shoulders and meandered over to him and plopped into it.
“Are you pouting because I won?” he asked.
“Yes.”
His chuckle was deep and had a nice tone to it. “I have something that will make you feel better.”
“What is it?” she asked.
“Gran made homemade individual chicken pot pies tonight.”
Birdie’s mouth instantly watered. “Like they are little pies? With pie crusts?” she asked, cupping her hands.
“Yes. I saw them.”
“How big are they?” she whispered hungrily.
He gestured a size with his hands. “Big as my dick,” he whispered.
Birdie frowned. “Ew gross you swine.” She looked away and then back at him. “Wait is it really that big?”
He shrugged and said, “Maybe bigger,” as the tinking of a glass sounded behind them. “Your mouth is hanging open,” he whispered in an amused voice as the dark-haired man who had delivered the poems started talking about the drink specials for the night.
Roberto, their bartender and server for the night, was listing off the names of the specialty drinks on the menu. “UnValentine’s Day Cranberry Blitz, Single and Unready to Mingle…”
“I’m very small,” she said quietly. “We wouldn’t be a match for sexy time.”
“I like tight.”
“Oh my gosh, why are you even talking like this? You just pushed me in the snow.”
“Just getting you back for throwing my phone in the snow earlier.”
“Shh. I’m trying to concentrate.”
“Flowers Are for Money Wasters. I Unlove You. And my personal recommendation, Candy Hearts Taste like Farts.”
“Oh lookey, it’s your favorite word,” Lance murmured.