The Matchmaker's Playbook

by Rachel Van Dyken

  I nodded and pushed the bottle away. I’d had maybe two swigs, hardly anything noteworthy, but still, maybe I’d want to go for a drive afterward—you know, off a cliff.

  The first page wasn’t so bad.

  Then again, it only had my name, age, height, and weight. Shit, wouldn’t surprise me at all if Lex had my social security number too.

  Next page had Blake’s information, everything I already knew.

  And the third page had our results.

  Her match with David had been in the eightieth percentile. I had that freaking number memorized. Hell, the stupid bar graph was cemented in my mind like a nightmare that came back every time I closed my eyes.

  Fifty.

  The number was daunting. Our match was in the fiftieth percentile. Numb, I continued reading.

  I scored below average in the following areas: ability to commit and relationship history, and above average in sexual promiscuity.

  Swallowing the giant lump in my throat, I kept reading.

  Stats show that if Client A were to embark on a relationship with Client B, there is a 50% chance one or both hearts will be broken and that the relationship will end within two months once the honeymoon stage is finished.

  Two months.

  Our program even gave a freaking timeline of the relationship demise.

  I shoved the papers to the side. I didn’t need to read anymore. Curiosity was an evil bitch, so I grabbed David’s info and read.

  Stats show that if Client A were to embark on a relationship with Client C, there is an 88% chance that the relationship will bloom into success. The relationship will have an even higher chance of success once passing the three-month mark.

  No shit.

  I shut the folder and checked my watch.

  She’d been on her date for one hour. And I was sitting at home, well on my way to getting drunk and feeling sorry for myself because of a few stupid numbers.

  Without thinking, I grabbed my keys and marched toward the door.

  “Oh no you don’t.” Lex’s voice echoed through the hallway. “I’ll drive. I had one drink. You had . . . who knows how many. Where are we going?”

  I refused to answer.

  “Oh, good, so a stakeout? Sounds fun. I’m in.”

  “Don’t you have homework or something?” I pushed past him and grabbed my jacket. “Anything?”

  His smile fell. “No.”

  “What?” My eyes narrowed. “You’re never home on a Thursday night, or any night for that matter. What’s going on?”

  “Nothing.” His answer was quick, and his jaw ticked into place like he was trying to crack an entire row of teeth. “Drop it.”

  “Okay.” Pain pounded through my head. “And we’re going to U Village. He took her to dinner at Pasta and Co.”

  “Hah.” Lex laughed, then sobered. “Oh, you’re serious? Pasta and Co?”

  “Not everyone’s an expert in seduction, thank God.”

  “Pasta. Hands down the worst date food next to ribs.”

  “Again, thank God for that.”

  Lex paused in the doorway. “Look, do you really think this is a good idea? As much as I’m against any sort of relationship where you hang up the cape and actually stay committed to one person, this could end badly, you spying on her.”

  “Superheroes don’t spy. We . . . check in.”

  “And as the villain to your hero, I would just break in, so who am I to talk?”

  “Exactly.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  Spying didn’t feel wrong to me until we rolled up in my SUV like two dudes trying to scope out a bank.

  “Far corner,” Lex said lowering the binoculars. “She’s facing him, not sitting across but to the side. Bastard may have skills after all. Wanna see?”

  “No.” I stared straight ahead. “The absolute last thing I want to see is how close he’s sitting to her, or if he’s strategically dropping his napkin on the floor so he can have an excuse to scoot his chair closer.”

  “It’s scary,” Lex said in a low voice, “how well you know the male gender.”

  “Napkin drop?”

  “Yup.”

  “Chair scooting?”

  “Hell yeah.”

  “Shit.” I rubbed my eyes, my vision blurring from the headache. “He’s probably going to lean in and say he can’t hear her very well because of the crowd. There will be another chair scoot until they’re thigh to thigh, giving him a one-inch walk for his hand to cover her bare leg. Best erotic zone for a date.”

  Lex was silent. And then, “Shit, man, you should write a book . . . He’s frowning, he just looked apologetic . . . Another chair scoot, but I can’t see under the table.”

  “He’s touching her. Of course he’s touching her.”

  “Don’t assume.”

  “Because I’ve been wrong up until now?” I snapped.

  Lex didn’t answer, and I still couldn’t bring myself to look. Looking felt like the final straw, a betrayal. I’d said I trusted her, so at least by using Lex I was keeping my promise. Sort of.

  “So, Superman, what’s the next move?” Lex asked after a few seconds of silence.

  My phone buzzed.

  It was a text from Blake.

  Frowning, I opened it up and felt my entire body tense.

  Blake: Dinner is over. Ordering dessert, then I’ll be home. Don’t worry.

  “Lex?” I grimaced at the phone, rage pumping through my system as I contemplated slamming the phone against the dash. “Have they eaten yet?”

  “I see bread on the table . . . but no main dish. Wait, hold on.” He was silent again, and then continued, “The waiter stopped by, but David waved him off.”

  Nodding, I fired a text back to Blake.

  Ian: Is the food good? What did you order?

  I got a response right away.

  Blake: Food’s great. I got chicken pad Thai.

  “Lex . . .” I seriously needed to leave before I barged into the restaurant and raised hell. “Are you sure they haven’t eaten?”

  “Almost positive. Why does it matter?”

  “I guess it doesn’t.” Except she was lying to me about something small. Which meant if something big took place . . .

  Why tell me what she ordered and say it’s good if she hadn’t even eaten yet? Why make up a lie? Why the hell was I being so paranoid?

  “We should go,” I said. It wasn’t like I could confront her now, and it was just food after all.

  “Yeah,” Lex said, quickly putting the car into drive and tossing the binoculars in the backseat. “Great idea.”

  “Whoa, suddenly in a hurry?” I laughed as Lex turned the car around so that my window was facing the restaurant.

  It was a glance.

  One freaking glance.

  That I would regret for the rest of my life.

  Blake.

  David.

  Kissing.

  I held up my phone, unable to stop myself from taking a picture of the lip-lock, thinking at any minute she was going to push him away, slap him, stand up, and leave.

  She didn’t.

  I snapped the photo.

  And when Lex peeled out of the parking lot, I hit the final nail in our relationship coffin. Hey, look at that—we made it to three weeks.

  Apparently, our matchmaking program needed a bit more work.

  I clicked “Send” with the caption Hope you enjoyed dessert.

  “Lex,” I mumbled once we got back to the house. “Get me drunk. Now.”

  He stared at me, his face unreadable, which wasn’t like Lex. We’d been friends for years, and he’d never, in all our time hanging out, looked at me like that, not even when I was injured and in the hospital.

  For the first time in my adult life, my best friend looked at me with pity.

  It sucked.

  “We don’t have enough to get you drunk, that’s the bad news,” Lex announced once we were back at the house and I was staring down at the countertop, my m
ind a blur of anger and disappointment and, if I was being completely honest, a lot of sadness.

  The sadness I refused to deal with.

  Because dealing with sadness meant mourning, and that was stupid. Why would I mourn something that I barely even had?

  But anger? I could completely work with that. How the hell did someone like me get in this position? Granted, we were doomed to fail. Fine, I got that part, but why lead me on?

  “How’s it feel?” Lex poured me a glass of whiskey and sat across from me in the barstool.

  “Um, getting my heart broken? Gee, I don’t know, Lex. It kinda tickles, like a feather getting stuck up my ass. What the hell, man, are you serious right now?”

  “I mean, being on the other side.” He looked honest-to-God curious. “The one who gets rejected even though clearly he’s a better choice.”

  “Oh, please. You saw the numbers.”

  “Right. The numbers. Don’t tell me you really believe that shit. Yeah, we based our company on it, fine. And yes, for the most part it works. But it never takes into account chemistry. You get that, right? A computer can’t do that.”

  “And the day it can . . .”

  “Right, we’re screwed, because robots will be taking over the world. Lucky for you, I’ll be heading up the takeover, so I’ll save you a spot on the mother ship.” He rolled his eyes. “Seriously, I can’t believe I’m having a chick-talk with you, but there is no mathematic equation for chemistry. At all. You can’t force it, and you can’t predict it. She and David may look good on paper, but does he turn her on? Do his smiles make her want to die inside? His kiss—is it panty-melting? Isn’t that what chicks say?”

  I held a hand up like a stop sign. “I think we need more alcohol if you’re going to use words like ‘panty-melting,’ Lex.”

  “Pretend I’m a chick.”

  “I’d rather not. Since I hate all women right now, I’m bound to do something stupid, like kiss you in hormonal confusion, then try to slam this bottle over your head in rage.”

  “First off, don’t kiss me—it will ruin our friendship.” He held up one finger, then another. “Second, we’re both into girls, so I think it goes without saying that the experimental stage passed around the same time we went through English 101.” Another finger flipped up. “And third, if you hit me over the head with a bottle or even a pillow, I’ll probably take you down like I did in the sixth grade when you told Amanda that all the metal in my mouth made it so that aliens could see me from space.”

  “You want me to talk?” I laughed bitterly. “About what it feels like to watch a girl you’ve just been screwing kiss another guy? Or the girl you care about lie to you? How about this?” I held one finger at a time as I made my own list. “It sucks. I want to kill David. I want her to hurt just as bad as I hurt. I want the pain in the middle of my chest to alleviate enough so I can freaking breathe. I want to slam the door in her face, then apologize and pull her into my arms and beg her to choose me.” I stared at my hand, all fingers extended, then shook it as though doing so would cross the items off my list. “I want so many damn things and I’m so confused that I think my only option is to drown myself in the whiskey we apparently don’t have enough of. That’s the truth.”

  Lex was silent.

  The kitchen clock ticked in the distance, grating on my already-frayed nerves.

  “Well.” Lex cleared his throat. “You have two choices. Tell her you saw her and confront her face-to-face, or just . . . let her go without explanation. One’s easier on you, and the other is hard on you both. Think about it, and don’t make the douche mistake of being dramatic about it. Remember, we have dicks.”

  “Could have fooled me, since it seems like she just kicked mine clean off and laughed while doing it.”

  “That was your heart, not your dick. You know the difference, so stop being an ass and drink the rest of that whiskey.”

  “Two drops left. Think if I close my eyes and click my heels together, it will turn into two bottles?”

  “Do it and I’m calling you a chick again.”

  With a frustrated sigh, I tilted back the bottle and tossed it in the trash, then pulled my phone out of my pocket.

  Seven missed calls.

  All from Blake.

  “What’s it gonna be?”

  “I’m a fixer,” I said, still staring at my phone. “So I’m going to fix it. We’re still under contract, but as per our agreement stated in the last section, at least for Blake, if he takes her out on a date and kisses her, the contract is complete.” I glanced over at his laptop. “Terminate it.”

  “Uh.” Lex shoved to his feet. “Are you sure that’s a good idea?”

  “What?” I sneered. “That’s what she wanted at the beginning, and regardless of how she got it, it happened. Terminate the damn contract, ask for payment, and delete her information from my schedule while you’re at it. I have to meet with Vivian in the morning, and then I have a new client next week.”

  “Ian, think about this.” Lex started toward me. “By ignoring her, you take the chance that—”

  “That what?” I yelled. “That she’ll be gone forever? She already is. She made her choice. She’s been in my bed every freaking night for the past damn near two weeks, and still she kissed him back. She kissed him, Lex. I’d almost rather she slept with him.” He knew as well as I did how personal a kiss could be. Sex could be mindless, but kissing? It never was. Thousands of thoughts led up to the kiss, millions of sensations took place during, and it was the only act of foreplay that replayed in women’s minds, most of the time more than sex, for years to come.

  You remembered every moment of your first kiss with someone.

  Your first time having sex? In a lot of instances, it’s cringeworthy, not notable, embarrassing, not good enough.

  Kissing, though, was always remembered.

  And there was always a reason for it.

  “Ian, I’m going to ask you one more time—are you sure?”

  “Delete the file, Lex. I’m still your boss, technically, right?” It was a low blow. Even though we were partners, I had a slightly larger stake in the company—60 percent. I knew my bringing his attention to it stung.

  He looked pissed, ready to punch me in the jaw. “Yes.”

  “Then do it.”

  I left him in the dark living room and stomped my way up the stairs. When I was halfway up, the doorbell rang.

  Lex answered it, like I knew he would.

  “Is Ian here?” Blake asked.

  I paused on the stairway, lingering in the shadows, eavesdropping.

  “No,” Lex lied. “Blake, you should go.”

  “No!” she yelled. “I can’t. He doesn’t understand what he thinks he saw. I just—I need to explain.”

  “Fine.” Lex crossed his arms, bracing himself in the middle of the doorway. “Explain to me. Why the hell was some other guy kissing you?”

  She was silent for a few breaths. Then she said, “I’d rather talk to Ian about that.”

  “Tough shit. You’ve got me. Talk or leave, I don’t give a damn.”

  “He kissed me!”

  “Tale as old as time.” Lex sneered. “And you kissed him back. Am I missing any important details, where you pushed him away, kneed him in the balls, screamed at the top of your lungs?”

  “I did . . . push him away . . . after a bit.”

  “And you hesitated. That doesn’t speak well for you, or for the way you think about my best friend. The same best friend that I’m pretty sure is going to want to quit the most lucrative business concept I’ve seen in decades, all because some girl who doesn’t even know how to dress without his help thought she would aim a bit higher and cheat.” I clenched the wood stairwell so tight my hands hurt. I was torn between wanting to defend her and wanting to yell at her like he was.

  “Aim higher?” She laughed. “With David? Are you insane?”

  “You must be so proud of yourself,” Lex said in a low voice. “The one
girl to take down Ian Hunter, and you didn’t even keep him. You just tossed him aside once your childhood crush looked your way. Do you think David would even care about you if Ian hadn’t put you on his radar? Do you think he cares about you now?”

  “We’re friends. That’s it.”

  “And you and Ian were . . . what?”

  “Dating! We are dating!”

  “You kissed another dude. That means whatever you and Ian had is over. Be expecting the contract termination in the morning. I’m tired of talking to you, and honestly, I think you’re a bitch. There. I said it. Go cry into your pillow about how horrible men are. Better yet, I bet David would love to comfort you. Spread your legs for him. We’re done here.”

  The door slammed.

  Stunned, I waited for Lex to say something to me, but he was silent, scary silent, as he paced in front of the door, then kicked the wall with his foot.

  “Heard that?” Lex asked in a hoarse voice.

  “Hard not to.”

  “I didn’t mean to call her a bitch. I got caught up in the moment.” Lex suddenly jerked his head up and smiled. “You can thank me later.”

  My eyes narrowed. “What do you mean, thank you later?”

  “You ever wonder why you do dates so well?” He gave a careless shrug. “Why I’ve always been happy to let you train the clients in the art of seduction while I only work on kissing techniques and breakups?”

  “No, but I feel like you’re about to reveal some hidden talent.” The pain was less severe when I wasn’t thinking about her voice, about how sad she sounded.

  “My specialty? Breakups. I’ve been meaning to talk to you about it, but . . . I think we can add that specialty to Wingmen Inc. We help people break up, we can also help them get back together. If she cares for you, she’s going to be back, in three, two, one.”

  A knock sounded at the door.

  Lex lifted an eyebrow at me, then jerked the door open. “Didn’t I tell you to run along?”

  “Just”—Blake pushed against Lex’s chest—“stop talking for two seconds so I can speak without having to defend myself. Tell Ian I’ll be back. And if he doesn’t answer his phone, I’m going to climb into his window. And if he locks me out, I’m going to break it with my Caboodle, or something equally as heavy. I won’t stop until he hears me out. And I think . . .” She was silent. Was she crying? “I think I love him.”