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“Evie. But I’m not going out with you.”
“Why not?”
“Because I don’t even know you.”
“Have coffee with me then. Here, right now. There’s a vending machine near the locker rooms. Then you can get to know me, see that I’m a great guy, and say yes to dinner.”
“I don’t know…” She twisted her lips like it wasn’t a hard no. “Don’t you have to take care of the ice?”
I hadn’t lied to her, just let her draw her own conclusions. I grabbed the clipboard that always hung on the wall and looked at the schedule. “No one else comes in until eight.”
She looked over her shoulder at the empty arena. Her face changed, and I got the feeling the seesaw she’d been straddling was about to come down on the wrong side. I might’ve only met the woman, but I knew one thing about athletes: They love competition. So I changed my approach. “I’ll tell you what. How about we race for it?”
“Race? You mean on the ice?”
I nodded. “If I beat you, you have coffee with me. Then it’s up to me to charm you into dinner.”
She laughed. “Are you serious? You know I’m a professional ice skater, right?”
“I do.” I extended my hand. “But you don’t know how well I skate.”
She chuckled. “I think you’re offering a losing bet.”
“Do we have a deal anyway?”
“Sure. Why not?”
I stood. As I rose to full height, Evie almost looked concerned for the first time. She’d only seen me standing from a distance, and the rink was elevated from the surrounding surface.
“You’re so tall.”
I winked. “Longer legs make me a faster skater.”
She smiled, still overconfident. “Whatever you say.”
We walked side by side to the entrance and slipped off our plastic blade guards at the same time before stepping onto the ice. Evie skated backward to one side of the rink. “Do you want to take a warmup lap?”
I was too cocky for that. “No need.”
She laughed. “Where are we skating to? The other side or the other side and back?”
I shrugged. “Your choice.”
“Then let’s go there and back. I’ll count, and we go on three, okay?”
“You got it.”
We both took our stances, leaning over with feet spread and skates digging into the ice, waiting for push off.
“You ready?” she said.
“Born ready.”
She shook her head. “One. Two…Three!”
We blasted off, flying across the ice. I had to hand it to her. For a little thing, Evie gave me a decent run for my money on the way there. But I could cut a turn better than every man in the league, so I smoked her ass on the way back.
She bent over with her hands on her knees, panting. “How did you learn to skate so fast?”
