“What most woman wouldn’t do to find a man like that,” Lydia said, tapping her expensive gel manicure on the table. “I’m pretty sure he’s a real life unicorn of the dating world. Rich, handsome, and can fix things. The trifecta of mankind.”
“No kidding.”
Emily cocked her head to one side, staring at the space Michael Knight had once occupied. Had it all been a dream? Or a hallucination brought on by the scorching mid-August heat? She fingered his folder on the countertop, verifying that he was indeed real.
“Plus, he was totally into you,” Lydia said with a dramatic sigh, swiping the folder from under her hand. “You should go out with him. Here’s your chance. Take it.”
Emily flushed at the thought. He couldn’t have been into sweaty, rambling her. And besides, it was absurd to think of gaming her own system to pair herself with Mr. Perfect. It would be unethical. She couldn’t do that.
Could she?
“I’m not sure why I mentioned the idea. It’s a lost cause anyway,” Lydia said matter-of-factly, turning on her rear end to hop back off the counter. “Even if he was your perfect match, you’d never know.”
Emily bristled and turned to ask what that meant, but got one look at Lydia’s arched eyebrows and zipped her lips. She knew that look. It meant trouble.
Lydia twirled a pen in her hand and grinned up at her with a challenge flashing in her eyes. “Sort of makes you wish you hadn’t sworn off dating, doesn’t it?”
Chapter Two
Michael arrived at the downtown office building of Linex Investments firm and only spared a single glance up at the sleek, towering high-rise that threw the whole street into shadow. The guard at the door and the woman behind the lobby desk both greeted him with solemn head nods and tight-lipped smiles. He returned their greetings as he buttoned his perfectly tailored steel-gray Tom Ford suit.
His father’s iron grip on the Linex company had permeated every floor with a coldness that chilled new guests when they walked through the door. It was an attitude that had grown the fledgling company into the multi-billion dollar investment firm that would soon be all Michael’s responsibility.
He took the elevator up to the thirteenth floor and was immediately struck by the change in environment. Music pumped through the hall, something that resembled a remixed version of Beethoven’s fifth. The scent of freshly roasted cinnamon coffee hit his nostrils, making him inhale deeply. Exuberant shouting came from the other end of the temporary office spaces. Michael followed the sound, grinning when he found the source.
A man with curly dark brown hair, green eyes, and round cheeks rolled around the empty conference room in his wheel chair. He faced down another competitor in a similar chair, a miniat
ure basketball bouncing beside his wheel. They raced together toward a wastebasket on the other end of the room, shouting as they went. With a loud clang, the ball landed in the trash can and the yelling came to an abrupt end.
“Five bucks, pay up Smithy,” the competitor demanded with a grin.
“Next time, I’m taking you down,” Smithy said with an overly dramatic grimace, pulling out his wallet and handing over the green.
His competitor grinned and stood up from the wheel chair, pocketing the money as he walked through the door past Michael. Smithy spun himself around and stopped when he realized he wasn’t alone.
“Dude, any chance we can convince your dad to put in a full court somewhere in the building?” He grinned, his face flushing red.
“Let me think about that.” Michael rubbed a hand over his shortly trimmed beard and frowned. “Yeah, I’m not sure that’ll fly with the old man. He had the TVs removed from the break rooms last month. Said that a distracted employee was an inefficient employee.”
Smithy groaned in defeat and rolled toward Michael, holding out his hand. “Good to see you anyway, man. Are you here about the beta tests?”
Michael shook his hand and nodded. “I saw your report this morning. Got a minute to talk about them?”
“I’ve always got a minute to talk to you, boss.”
Smithy rolled down the hall and led him into a large office with peeling yellow wall paper and a stained carpet. He pulled up behind a chipped mahogany desk while Michael sat in the cracked leather seat across from him.
The floor had been scheduled for renovation, but Smithy’s new project had put that on hold. It had only been by the skin of his teeth that Michael had convinced his father to invest in his Yale buddy’s start-up project. Housing the team in the dilapidated section of the enormous building had been one way of insuring their work would stay under his father’s radar. For how long, he didn’t know. But the team was already making great strides. This morning’s report was just a bump in the road.
“Reports say that our testing groups love the user-friendly interface of the new app,” Smithy said, pulling a piece of paper from the stacks of disheveled folders on his desk. “The algorithms need a bit of tweaking, but we’re making serious improvements.”
“It’s the fifth point that concerned me,” Michael said, tapping his finger on the back of the paper. “The testers don’t believe we’ve got anything unique to offer. There’s nothing that separates us from the dating apps they’ve seen before. That’s not a promising sign.”
“My algorithm outperforms any of that junk science.” Smithy rubbed a hand over his curls and scowled. Frustration sparked in his green eyes. “They just don’t know it, yet.”
Michael leaned back in his chair and pursed his lips in thought. He’d had unwavering faith in Kevin Smith since their sophomore year of college at the Ivy League school. Even then, Kevin had been harboring plans for his big business idea. It had taken over ten years, a stint in the military, and a painful road of recovery to get to this point in his career. But Michael was determined to see his buddy’s plans come to fruition.
“I mulled over the comments this morning,” Michael said, leaning forward in his chair. His brown eyes lit with excitement. “For some reason, I couldn’t get out of my head the matchmaking company that my parents used back in the late seventies. It was called Sevenson Selective.”