Page 1 of Scouting the Single Dad

Prologue

Layla

The email comes through at 9:17 a.m., sandwiched between a newsletter from an author I’ve been a fan of for years and a message from my best friend, with links to the proposed group girl-trip she wants us all to go on, complete with the jaw-dropping budget for the resort.

But hers isn’t the message that stops me cold.

My eyes drop to the subject line: Congrats! You’re in Charge of Fall Fest.

I click it open. Skim it, stomach dropping into my butt.

Read the email again because surely this wasn’t meant for me.

Hi Layla,

Great news: the Events Committee unanimously agreed to appoint you as our Fall Fest Chair for this year’s celebration. Your calm under pressure, creative eye, and knack for getting people excited made you the clear choice.

Dates & Scope: Fall Fest is scheduled for Saturday, September 8th. You will oversee planning, vendor coordination, and day-of execution. I have put June in charge of volunteers, and George as head of programming—hopefully this alleviates first-time jitters!

I have previous years’ notes, contacts, and planning guides available for your disposal in my office.

Can’t wait to see what you come up with!

Angelina

Clearly this was sent to me by mistake; someone in the Parks & Rec office clicked the wrong name. Slumping back in my desk chair, I stare out the window of my tiny office, eyes gazing at the mountains beyond. Bite down on my bottom lip as they roam back to the announcement computer screen.

Congrats?

Congrats? This is no victory.

Organizing an event was never on my radar!

I’ve been running the Star Lake Community Center for two years, and sure, I can coordinate a youth soccer schedule like nobody’s business. I can talk a knitting club of eighty-year-olds and a high school robotics team into sharing the same multipurpose room without bloodshed.

But Fall Fest?

Fall Fest is sacred.

Seriously. I don’t think you understand the gravity of what I’m dealing with here, and I’m not being dramatic!

Fine. A tad bit dramatic . . .

Think: hayrides, chili cook-offs, donut food trucks, pie-eating contests. Last year, Annabelle had actual living, breathing lumberjacks, one of which turned out to be an actual living, breathing professional football player.

She is a legend.

Having run off with a football player of her own to the sunny state of Arizona, Annabelle coordinated the festival as if it were Star Lake’s Super Bowl. Except now she’s off living her best life as Mrs. Maverick McBride, leaving me—Layla Monroe, queen of broken vending machines at the baseball pavilion—in charge.

I shove my rolling chair away from my desk so hard the wheels squeak on the carpet, as I mutter, “There’s no way.”

With the email printed off and clipped to the board in my hand, I march down the hall toward Angelina’s office, the place where all bad assignments are born. Raise my fist to knock. Give it a few raps before peeping my head inside.

“Angelina?” I greet her. “Can I speak with you for a minute? There’s, uh, been a mistake.”

Angelina—who has been with the rec department over twenty years and is old enough to be my mother—blinks up at me. She’s surrounded by files, papers, Post-it Notes, and awards, all arranged neatly.

“Good morning to you, too, Layla.” She crosses her hands patiently in front of her, pen in hand. “You look like you have something on your mind.”