by Knox, Abby
Matched for Me
Abby Knox
Copyright © 2019 by Abby Knox
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Publisher’s Note: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. Locales and public names are sometimes used for atmospheric purposes. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to businesses, companies, events, institutions, or locales is completely coincidental.
Edited by Aquila Editing
Cover Designer: Perfect Pear Cover Creations
Created with Vellum
This book is dedicated to high maintenance women. You take as long as you need to to get ready. Go ahead and drink your coffee or tea out of fancy mugs that cannot be put in the dishwasher or the microwave. Do not feel guilty about traveling with seventeen bags.
If he can’t keep up with you, maybe the next one will.
Contents
Matched for Me
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Epilogue
Coming soon…
About the Author
Also by Abby Knox
Matched for Me
By Abby Knox
Fletcher Chase is the one-man security team behind his adventure-seeking best friend, Lars. When the former Marine Corps scout sniper is forced to take some time off after taking down a prominent bad guy, he finds himself with little to do except run into Lars's little sister, LuLu, at every turn. When she asks for his help with a Valentine's Day event she's planning, he readily agrees. The work she has him doing isn't his usual style -- but he'll do anything if it means spending more time with the woman who sees him as more than just the man hiding in the shadows.
Successful professional matchmaker LuLu Anderson helps people find true love, one match at a time. But she's never been able to find a match for herself. That could be because deep down, she knows she has always had eyes for one man. Even as a teenager, she loved to torment the quiet, enigmatic man behind the scenes. While home for a much-needed extended vacation, she devises a plan to get him to notice her as more than the spoiled princess she used to be.
You’ve been waiting and here it is! If you loved Lars and Wendy from Saved for Me, then this book is for you! WARNING: This romance is a slow burn with a little angsty will-they-won’t they push and pull, with a big swoony pay-off. Do you just love a big, mysterious, quiet, low-key hero who will lose his shit when someone’s bothering his girl? Then you will LOVE Fletcher Chase!
Prologue
Christmas
LuLu
Home.
I’ve been busy for so long, I had forgotten about that feeling that can wash over me whenever I pass through these gates.
Peace.
Or maybe it’s pleasant light-headedness from the altitude.
As the car crests the hill past the iron security fence, my jaw unclenches.
I check my phone. I have half a dozen messages from former clients.
“Happy Holidays, my friend. Just wanted you to know Billy proposed! I can’t thank you enough!”
I text Jenna back with well wishes and, “I had a feeling you would never need my services again. Cheers!”
I smile as I scroll through other messages.
But there’s one name I see that sets me on edge all over again.
“Have a good trip. I’ll be thinking of you.”
Chad. I thought I had blocked him.
A creepy shiver runs down my spine and I click off my phone screen. I don’t feel like responding to that one.
No more looming sense of dread, for now. It’s the holidays. I can deal with him later.
I gaze up at the trees dotting the edge of the cliff as we approach the house, and I marvel at how I used to take this view for granted as a kid. Even though it’s cold out, I open the window and breathe in the fresh air.
I successfully forget all about that unwanted text when the car pulls up to the front door, because…holy shit.
There is a gigantic holiday wreath adorning the front door. More wreaths hang from every window along the house’s front facade. The family estate, now occupied by my brother Lars, resembles a Victorian Christmas card.
I don’t reckon this level of festive decorating has been done since Mom and Dad retired and moved out three years ago, handing the property over to the siblings.
I’m not sure why he’s summoned us all to the house this year, but I have an inkling he has finally found someone to settle down with. As much as he can possibly do that.
I soon forget all of that wondering because I notice something else.
Someone else.
Before the driver can exit and step around to open my door, Fletcher Chase has got it. My god. My breath catches. Every cell in my body that was relaxing a moment ago is now on high alert.
He’s still here. And he’s still searingly, unbelievably, mysteriously…hot. There’s no other word for it.
If the fluttering happening in my tummy at the sight of him is any indication, I still haven’t gotten over him. Except the last time I saw him, I was a child who barely registered on his radar.
I’m not even out of my seat when Fletcher is grabbing my bags from the popped trunk and heading up the stone stairs.
This is the same tall, dark, enigmatic man who lurked in the shadows at my high school graduation party. Today, his hair is slightly longer and falls just above the tops of his ears in soft waves, dappled with silver. Three years is all it took to transform him into an almost-silver fox, and his salt-and-pepper stubble suits his air of authority and mystery.
That man can lord his authority over me any time.
Wait, did I just say that out loud?
I hope not.
The schoolgirl crush is not just bubbling to the surface, it’s rocketing.
Is my mouth actually watering? That’s a first. The view of him gliding silently up toward the door ahead of us… He moves like someone not of this earth. An angel.
I should call after him, but I wait, taking a moment to watch that stealthy ass.
Fletcher holds the front door and gives me a wide berth. I know I’ve gained a few pounds since we last laid eyes on each other—all that restaurant food while I travel for work—but not that much. He’s standing there as if me brushing against him would be lethal.
As soon as I’m through the door, Fletcher darts ahead again, presumably to deliver my bags to my old room. A room to which, I’m sure, he’s already administered fresh towels and bedding without being asked.
That’s Lars’s right-hand man. Above and beyond. Fletcher Chase.
The man I used to love to torment around the house by smudging the security camera lenses so I could sneak out undetected at night.
The guy I used to leave long, involved grocery lists for, just to get his attention.
The one whom I’d leave snarky sticky notes for in the kitchen, reminding him not to put my glittery coffee mugs in the dishwasher.
&
nbsp; I’m horrified at what a brat I used to be, when my memory flashes on it.
And here I am again. Insisting on him turning his attention to me.
“You there. Stop. Stop that man, he’s taken my bags!”
Fletcher whirls around looking confused and ready to fight someone. He drops my makeup case.
“Hello, LuLu,” he exhales, realizing I’m joking.
He was already a full-grown adult when we knew each other before, but is it possible he got taller? That’s not possible. He’s…what, 40 years old now? I think?
Fletcher’s brown eyes zero in on mine. My name in his mouth sounds more gravelly than I remember. I like it.
As usual, he’s dressed all in black. Stealth mode. His turtleneck hugs a very nice chest and well-defined shoulders.
I move to grab my bag that he’s dropped, but he’s already got it.
“Did you need something else?” Fletcher asks.
I shake my head and self-consciously lick my lips.
“I just wanted to say Merry Christmas, Fletcher.”
He hesitates before shaking my hand and muttering a Merry Christmas to me as well.
We shake hands for a beat. His hand feels nice around mine. It makes me feels safe, but yet he oozes danger at the same time. How is it possible to tell all that from a handshake? Some say I’ve got a gift. Sometimes it just feels like I’m overly sensitive to other people’s energies.
Fletcher has only ever presented me with one type of energy. Mystery. He nods curtly, and then he’s off again.
* * *
Fletcher
I had never noticed her that way before.
LuLu had always existed as a seamless part of the background at the Anderson estate.
If anything, she was a little bit annoying through her teenage years. No more and no less on my radar than my own teen siblings back in the day.
The last time I saw LuLu Anderson was about three years ago, at her high school graduation party.
I was there as an invited guest, as Lars’s parents took a shine to me. But I’m such a social fuck up that I spent most of the party securing the perimeter. I sometimes stutter when I nervous.
God knows why I had been invited. I don’t schmooze. I detest small talk. In fact, I’m not much of a talker at all.
Apart from that, the Andersons were hosting a lot of political high rollers at that party, and the guest list triggered me into high alert mode.
Doesn’t take much. I saw a lot of shit back in the day as a Marine scout sniper. I did a lot of shit. As a result, most people make me nervous.
At that party, I remember LuLu approaching me while I was counting all the parked cars and re-watching all the security camera footage on my phone. She was looking right pissed.
“Have some cake,” she had said, holding out a slice of German chocolate. “What are you doing back here anyway? The party’s over on the front lawn.”
The gesture was so unexpected from her, I actually smiled. An ex-Marine who had seen entirely too much of the world, I hadn’t done much smiling since returning from Afghanistan.
LuLu was always exasperated with me, trying to get me to be more social when her family was all together.
Oddly, though, when it was just a slumber party or a gathering of her girlfriends, she avoided me like the plague. She was probably too embarrassed by me to introduce me to her friends. I wasn’t very friendly or chatty like a lot of the circles that rotated around her.
I had zero interest in being around a bunch of high school girls. Hell, I had no idea what they were talking about half the time.
So today, when Lars asked me to be there to greet LuLu when her flight came in early because he and Wendy would be out Christmas shopping for everyone, I was unprepared for what I was about to see.
I am expecting the short girl with the squeaky voice and frizzy hair and boy band tee-shirt and a long-ass grocery list consisting of very specific demands for organic green tea. When the car pulls up, I don’t see that LuLu.
I see a grown woman sitting in the back seat of a town car. Long, smooth, shining hair. Glowing skin. Expensive black leather jacket. Diamond earrings I spot from the curb. And those huge, dark eyes refined by maturity, humor and kindness.
I had been prepared to speak to the precocious little bossy LuLu. I am not prepared for grown-up, curvaceous, curious LuLu.
I immediately go tongue-tied…not much of a leap for me. I’m what women call “monosyllabic” a lot of the time.
So, instead of making a jackass of myself, I simply open the door and speed over to the trunk to grab all of her luggage.
When I get a look at all of it, I let out a groan that was a combination of angst and something else. The sheer number of bags and cases gives me the impression she might be staying for a while. I hold the front door for her while keeping my eyes averted from her tempting cleavage.
Even still, she traps me with her scent. Oh shit, that’s nice. What is that?
There’s a hint of something spicy and warm. I flash on a memory of little heart-shaped Red Hot candies. That, mixed with chocolate and coffee.
You don’t even drink coffee, but I bet you’d drink her up in a heartbeat, old man, says my conscience.
I make my way to the grand staircase on the opposite side of the foyer, pushing down thoughts of what her mouth might taste like, reminding myself that although she’s a 21-year-old businesswoman, I’m still almost 20 years her senior. I’m hired to protect this house and everyone in it, including her.
“Stop that man! He’s taken my bags!”
LuLu’s voice crying for help has me reacting before thinking. I spin around ready to tackle someone, and a nanosecond later I realize she’s making a little joke.
I drop one of her seventeen bags on the floor. I pick it up again and say hello like a proper human being. As much as I can.
“Did you need something else?” I ask, trying to sound normal.
And then, finally, we make eye contact, and I’m completely sucked in. All it takes is an instant, and I don’t want to look away, ever.
Instead of a Medusa effect of snake-hair turning me to stone, it’s the sight of a shining-haired beauty with eyelashes for days. A slightly amused, upward curve at the corner of full lips. A pencil skirt and Italian heels giving her child-bearing hips a noticeable sway as she approaches me. Her belted leather jacket is cinched in tightly at the waist, highlighting her hourglass shape full of barely hidden promises: the top half promising a pair of full perky breasts; the bottom half promising two nice hands full of a rounded ass.
I want to look away. I have to look away. It almost hurts my heart to look at her, she’s so stunning. I might not turn to stone completely, but my cock is already halfway there.
Shit, I can’t be having horndog thoughts about my best friend’s little sister. My best friend who is also my employer. Whose little sister is in no way little anymore.
But oh my fucking shit. If I ran into her on the street, would I have even recognized her? I doubt it. I probably would have asked her out.
But then, when was the last time I asked someone out? That would have been before I went into the service. Yeah, that girl. The one who dropped me like a rock the moment I came home from Afghanistan a changed person.
LuLu is still approaching and now she’s a double threat. The sight of her and the scent of her have me frozen to the marble floor.
She’s too close. A little closer than handshaking distance.
“I just wanted to say Merry Christmas, Fletcher,” she says. Her voice still has echoes of that little-kid squeak that used to bug me, but now it has a sultry edge to it.
She is holding out her hand in friendship. I would be a dick if I didn’t take it. I do, and I’m flooded with heat. It feels as if somebody lit a sparkler and handed it to me. I can’t look away, but I don’t know what to do with it, except see if I get burned.
“Merry Christmas, LuLu.”
She smiles, and it’s game over for me.
I feel … different.
This is it.
This is how your friendship and employment with Lars ends, old man. With you boning his little sister.
1
LuLu
I don’t know what Fletcher’s problem is.
He’s been skulking around the corners of this house like a ninja ever since I got here.
At Christmas Eve dinner, I think we might be having a moment. I can feel his eyes on me across the table while Wendy, my brother’s fiancée, and I are getting acquainted.
I’m asking her all about how she and Lars met, and my mouth hangs open as she tells me the whole story of getting kidnapped and rescued, and nearly kidnapped again. The story ends with Fletcher actually shooting her captor.
I look across the table and take a mental picture of Fletcher wringing the shit out of a fancy linen Christmas napkin and clenching his jaw. He’s staring down, staring up, glancing at the doorways. He does not like people talking about this incident.
Wendy finally changes the subject and asks me to explain exactly what I do.
“I’m a one-on-one matchmaker. I don’t use algorithms or a computer to do the matching. I’m an intermediate. I take one client at a time and I interview them. And after I get a feel for them, I match them with another client whom I’ve interviewed before, and then I make decisions based on my personal feelings. I just sort of…use my heart to guide me.”
Wendy is nodding and asking more questions, fascinated.