Page 1 of Goalie and the Girl Next Door (Love in Maple Falls #5)

MARCY

W ith a flick of the wrist, I toss the wad of paper with draft calculations toward the garbage can on the other side of my cabin. It circles the rim and lands with a satisfying plop.

“Bingo.”

My softball days may be way behind me, but I haven’t completely lost my pitch.

The phone rings with an unknown number. I’ve alphabetized Happy Horizon’s financial files, but I haven’t touched my second cup of coffee, which makes the call feel like a personal attack.

"Your services are needed at town hall," says the voice on the line. It’s Phillip Bane, the assistant who always sounds like he’s in the middle of an existential crisis and a bag of salt-and-vinegar chips. I cannot stand the guy. “Please arrive at three p.m. sharp.”

I pause, pen hovering over a sticky note labeled “Invoice Anomalies: September,” and mentally scroll through every possible reason Town Hall might summon me without notice .

Happy Horizons Ranch. That’s the first thing that comes to mind.

My stomach tenses. Happy Horizons Ranch is the children’s charity I work for, but it’s also my home.

Technically, I handle their books, but I also shovel in the barn, feed chickens, and occasionally bake for the kids who come through.

In return, Happy Horizons allows me to live in a small but cozy and comfy cabin on their grounds.

When I arrived in Maple Falls three years ago with nothing but three pencil skirts and a bag of puppy love for my hockey-playing high school sweetheart… well, let’s just say that I was in the direst of straits.

Thank goodness Maple Falls’s primary accountant had retired the year before. I had the credentials and the desperation to set up my first accounting firm at the age of twenty-one, and Happy Horizons was my first client. Much of the town followed suit.

Marcy Fontaine Accounting, here to help you navigate the jungle of fiscal responsibility.

Angel, who runs Happy Horizons, has the heart of a saint, a ton of attitude, and the filing system of a rabid raccoon. I love her, but she thinks reconciling receipts is optional. Spoiler: it’s not. And that’s where I really earn my keep.

I’m proud of what I’ve done here. Three years ago, Happy Horizons was teetering on the edge of bankruptcy. Now, thanks to some deeply un-fun budgeting decisions and the surge in support from the local hockey team, the Ice Breakers, we’re stable. Which is why I shouldn’t be nervous about this call.

And yet a call from Phillip Bane first thing in the morning never bodes well.

The day goes too slowly, and despite working on a gorgeous puzzle of the French Riviera during my lunch hour, my stomach is in knots by the time I need to leave the ranch.

I smooth my blazer—navy, fitted, precise—and push my chair back. Most folks are still in sundresses and short sleeve polos, but I prefer structure. Structure breathes better than linen if you know how to wear it.

While Happy Horizons is a little distance from the center of town, I love the walk.

I walk a lot . It’s a great way to process difficult clients and challenging new tax laws.

I pass the ice rink where those overpaid grown men hurl themselves into plexiglass for fun and money.

I don’t get it. Hockey is just a mess in motion.

Give me a ledger and a quiet room any day.

I’m not what you’d call a sports person.

I cross in front of the Maple Grounds, where they always know my order and don’t attempt small talk before 9:00 a.m. And then there’s the Town Hall.

The air inside is aggressively air-conditioned.

Phillip Bane is waiting for me in the hallway, arms crossed over his salmon-colored button-up like he’s about to deliver the State of the Union.

His hair is tightly side-parted, and his expression is one of smug anticipation—never a good sign.

“Marcy Fontaine,” he says, drawing out the vowels like they’re expensive and he wants to get his money’s worth. “Glad you could make it.”

“You summoned me,” I reply, brushing past him toward the meeting room. “Unless ‘Please arrive at three p.m. sharp’ has a secret, more casual meaning.”

His loafers squeak behind me as he follows me into the singular meeting room of the Town Hall. Inside, he gestures to a stack of files waiting at the center of the table.

“I found something,” he says. If he had a mustache, he’d be twirling it. “In the municipal budget audit. A discrepancy. ”

My spine stiffens. “A discrepancy?”

“Yes,” he says, placing a finger dramatically on a spreadsheet like it’s a smoking gun. “Here in the equipment expenditures line for summer events. The numbers don’t match the ledger submitted last quarter.”

I flip through the pages he’s printed on thick, unnecessarily glossy paper, and feel my heart rate start to tap dance. But then I see what he’s talking about.

“This isn’t a discrepancy,” I say flatly. “It’s a timing issue. The invoice was processed in July but paid in August because someone didn’t approve the check request on time.”

His eyes gleam. “Are you suggesting I delayed municipal processing?”

“I’m not suggesting it. I’m stating it. You signed it five days late, Phillip.”

He bristles. “That’s hardly cause for?—”

“An emergency summons?” I cut in, snapping the file shut. “Agreed.”

“It’s just that I think we should hold our civic partners to the highest standard,” he says, voice smooth as artificial syrup. “Especially those handling sensitive community funds.”

There it is. The jab at Happy Horizons. Only a really icky person resents funding a program for children in need, because that’s what Happy Horizons specializes in: giving kids a chance when they’ve never gotten a break in life.

I stare him down, barely resisting the urge to beat him with the folder.

Phillip Bane wants to run the town one day, I’m sure of it.

But I’ve seen his leadership style. He treats every minor budgeting error like a criminal conspiracy and once tried to get the town to issue official business cards that read Phillip Bane, Acting Integrity Liaison .

He is a walking audit report with a savior complex—minus the actual saving.

“If your plan to take over Maple Falls involves undermining every accountant who works with a nonprofit,” I say, “you might want to revisit your strategy.”

He smiles tightly. “Oh, I think I’m doing fine. Just because you’re the only number cruncher around doesn’t mean you can take your position as a consultant to the Town Hall for granted.”

I inhale slowly. “That almost sounded like a threat.”

“Oh, no.” He leans against the conference table. “Consider this a helpful observation—your spreadsheets are overcompensating for something.”

I gasp and clutch the folder against me. “Are you insulting my attention to detail?”

“I’m just saying,” he calls breezily as he heads for the door, “someone who has no social life and is known across town for being in love with numbers is… suspicious.” The next part he mumbles under his breath as if I couldn’t hear it. “No wonder they call you the Ice Queen.”

No one insults an accountant’s love of order and walks away unpunished.

I’m about to lay into him when a voice fills the meeting room. The voice is loud, joyful, and deeply French.

“ Bonjour , bureaucratic friends!”

Phillip nearly jumps out of his loafers and my hand jerks reflexively, and the documents I’m holding scatter like leaves in a windstorm.

A tall man with sun-kissed skin, messy curls, and a hockey duffel slung over one shoulder strides in. He’s grinning like the world’s been personally generous to him this morning, and I’m too stunned to do anything but stare .

“I’m looking for Mayor Thompkins,” he says. “It’s about a building permit.”

He moves smooth, confident, annoyingly magnetic. His jeans cling in a way that is definitely not accidental, and the forest green Henley shirt he’s wearing looks like it was made for slow, appreciative glances. Not that I’m giving him one.

There’s an ease to him, that particular breed of European polish that turns heads even when it shouldn’t.

Wait, you’re angry, remember? Yes, I’m angry. At Phillip. At whatever manufactured budget disaster he is inevitably going to toss into my lap. At the idea that a man that attractive walked into a municipal building and I’m now questioning the cut of my blazer.

My better judgment crosses its arms, but my pulse, traitorous thing, doesn’t listen.

When I get over my momentary freeze-up, I drop to my knees, scrambling to recover the paperwork. He crouches to help me, entirely unbothered.

“Wow,” he says, flashing a smile as he picks up a page. “Do all town meetings start with this much paper throwing? Because I’m in.”

I don’t know who this guy thinks he is, but he’s holding the town’s most sensitive finances in one very large, very tanned hand.

I snatch the paper from him and say the first thing that comes to mind.

“You’re not supposed to be here.”

He winks, and I’d like to smack that smug grin right off his perfectly chiseled face. “I get that a lot.”