Page 69 of You've Got Male

“But because of you, all the You’ve Got Male-Mamas made a pact to put dating and love as a priority,” Alex said. “Some of us even shot our Man Wanted videos right here in the shop. See.”

Alex took out her phone, pulled up the app, and played a video of one of the women behind them standing in front of the Grinder sign rattling off her list of boxes a man needed to check.

“They all did that?”

Alex nodded. “We aren’t the only group, either. Last week, we ran into the You’ve Got Male-lorettes, a group of older Gen Z-ers who are doing the same thing. We also post updates every week and people are following us to see how our dating journey is progressing.”

This was exactly what Camila was talking about. One person posted and the trend caught on. All they needed was the right spark and news of Grinder could spread like wildfire through the Denver area.

“We all figured that the Cupid Vibes are strong here. I mean, Grinder is practically a wishing well for love. It’s said that if youwish on a penny and put it in the Lucky in Love tip jar Cupid will strike.”

Well, that explained all the penny tips.

“None of us are at your level—”

Evie swallowed hard. “What do you mean ‘my level’?”

“That video of you and Prince Jonah was pretty spicy. Not that I have to tell you. It has over a million views.”

“A million?”

“Even my coworkers are talking about it. You’re like the Kardashian of ClickByte.”

“I don’t know about that,” Evie said to Alex.

Twenty minutes, ten romance stories, and a Cupid’s Cappuccino later, Evie had not only made a new set of friends, she’d also picked the brains of ten new regulars on ways they thought Grinder could improve. Jonah and her mom had been right. All the ladies said that they’d eat lunch here if there were a selection of healthy food options. They also said they’d make it their morning coffee stop if there were a selection of definitely-not-healthy bakery items.

Which was why Evie was going to go straight into the back office and investigate the list of vendors Jonah had compiled once she was done here. Jonah’s life might be a mess, but he’d helped declutter hers. Even sweeter, the man had somehow made a spreadsheet appear romantic.

“I have an idea! You should join some of us and go to Shoot Your Shot for Tequila Tuesday.”

Shoot Your Shot was an upscale wine bar and local catch-and-release establishment for professionals in the downtown area. It was the Tinder of watering holes.

“Isn’t that a weird place for a first date?” she asked.

“Laura has a first date with a single dad who illustrates children’s books for a living—isn’t that the cutest?—but she’s a little shy when it comes to asserting herself. So she wanted anenvironment that encouraged a little risky behavior,” Alex went on. “We’re going to support her. Oh, we’ll be standing on the other side of the bar, of course.” Alex smiled conspiratorially, then lowered her voice. “We don’t want them to know our level of crazy right off the bat. We have to reel them in first.”

“Of course we do,” Evie laughed.

Although for Evie, her man knew every one of her eccentricities—including the fact that she’d hung him out to dry with the Beautification Board. He knew her professional life, at present, was currently a dead end. Her home life was one Goodwill bag from the Clampetts. And her personal life required a beard. And he still looked at her like she was dessert.

“The girls and I would just get a kick out of you coming.”

“We’ll be there,” Julie said, slinging an arm around Evie’s shoulder. “Right, You’ve Got Male girl?”

This was normally the kind of invitation Evie could get out of by using one of her million excuses—all were valid—but something inside her was telling her to shoot her shot at being that fun, extroverted, and bold woman she’d been before. She’d spent the past sixteen years finding reasons to say no, maybe it was time to start saying a few yeses.

“What time are you meeting?”

Chapter Twenty-Six

Evie

Chaos. Zombie apocalypse chaos had erupted inside Grinder. And of course, it had to happen right on the day of Camila’s overnight cheer camp.

A summer flu was spreading through her staff like the plague, leaving her down two employees. Julie wasn’t scheduled to come in until four. Her mom and dad were at dialysis, Evie was scheduled to carpool some of the cheerleaders to camp, and she got a flat tire on the way to work. She’d managed to get the spare on, but she didn’t want to chance driving on it to Boulder and back—not with a group of teens in her car. It was too dangerous.

Evie had already called three other parents to see if they could cover for her, but they either already had a carload of cheerleaders or they couldn’t get off work. Since she wouldn’t expect her parents to drop their lives to come to the rescue, she was SOL. So she’d called a service to come and change her tire. The earliest they could make it was three, which meant she’d be pushing it, since the girls were set to depart Evie’s house at fourthirty.

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