The Matchmaker's Playbook

It wasn’t that it had been too long without a girl. It was that it’d been a lifetime without the right one.

Funny how words that are supposed to make people happy kind of make you want to punch a tree like Chuck Norris.

When’s dinner ready?” Serena bounced into the room, literally, her head bobbing from left to right. Maybe that’s how girls like her built up more brain cells. They shook the air, and the pressure between their ears exploded, making tiny little brain-cell babies.

At least we knew that all women had something to offer, regardless of how oddly shaped the package might be. There was always something. Always.

You’re mine, Blake, you hear me? Mine.” “Yes.” She gasped, pulling my head down, her lips meeting mine with desperation. “Yes.

And you run five point six miles every day at three in the afternoon, yet you hate running. We all do what we gotta do to get what we want. You want a nice body? You work for it.

Rule one: Make them curious, slightly jealous. Rule two: Don’t appear too interested. Always be polite. Rule three: Give them a method of contact, but keep the ball in your court. Rule four: Never answer the first text, call, e-mail, etc. For some reason, the brain picks up on the number three as being the final try before you look desperate.

And don’t even get me started on penis size. Really, it just gets better the farther south your eyes go—trust me.

Almost 60 percent of women marry down, meaning most women go for a man with the dad bod. The guy who is more than likely going to make less than them; never work out; eat hot dogs for breakfast, lunch, and dinner; and, let’s face it, need Viagra by age forty. All it takes is a simple Internet search to get the facts. Women are, by nature, insecure creatures, and if by the tender age of thirty-five they haven’t settled down, they’ll most likely marry the guy with the unfortunate bald spot and a heart of gold. And there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. It’s kind of like when you go to the pound and pick the dog with the lazy eye because you feel sorry for it, and you know without a doubt that bastard will never stray.

It was that it’d been a lifetime without the right one.

Blake rolled her eyes, then leaned in and blew over the tomato soup, her plump lips forming the perfect O. I watched. Even Lex watched. The room went dead silent. She finally glanced up at us. Lex turned around and started whistling while I continued staring. "You blow well," I said in my most romantic voice. "Coming from you" -she shook her head-"I'll take that as the highest of compliments.

Without asking for permission, I tugged her hair out of the rubber band and ran it through my finger, savoring the silky feel. "It's perfect. Men are suckers for long hair. I think it goes back to the early days when cavemen would grab women by the hair and tug them back to their hay beds and make sweet love to them." "That's" -Blake shook her head- "probably one of the most offensive things I've ever heard.

She was out the door maybe five feet before she turned around one last time. They always did. They always would. I waved. She flipped me off. She might as well have kissed me.

She has a name,” I teased. Not that I actually remembered it. But in my defense, while her lips were wrapped around me, her head was blocking the view of her name tag. See? Not my fault.

I braced myself against the door. “Are you sure you wanna go out tonight?” Blake stopped midturn, pressing her hands down the fabric currently mating with her thighs. “Is it that bad?” “Yes,” I growled, closing the distance between us. “It’s . . . horrific. Ugly, terrible. Gross. How could you possibly attract men in this”—my hands roamed from her arms all the way down to her hips, and then I couldn’t help it and just pulled her against me—“monstrosity?” “Monstrosity, huh?” She

Can I think about it?” “Sure.” I nodded. “You have two minutes. Also, did you miss the part where I said sunset? True love?