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Elise messed with his head. No wine required.
She blinked, banking all the sexy behind a blank wall. “You’ll find it surprisingly easy to stop as soon as I match you with someone else. She’ll help you forget all about that kiss, which never should have happened in the first place.”
There it was again, slapping him in the face. Elise wasn’t interested in him. Her main goal was to get him paired off with someone else as soon as possible.
And that was the problem. He didn’t want to be matched with another Candy. The thought of another date with another woman who was perfect for him on paper but not quite right in reality...he couldn’t do it.
He wanted that blurred woman snuggled into his bed, ready to offer companionship, understanding. Contentment. Instantly, she snapped into focus, dark hair swinging and wearing nothing but a gorgeous smile.
Elise.
Yes. He wanted Elise, and when Dax Wakefield wanted something, he got it.
But if he pursued her, would this easiness between them fall apart? After all, she wasn’t his soul mate and that in and of itself meant she couldn’t be that woman in his imagination, with whom he could envision a future.
What a paradox. He’d finally arrived at a place in his life where he could admit he’d grown weary of the endless revolving door of his bedroom. And the woman he pictured taking a longer-term spot in his bed wanted to be friends, right after she hooked him up with someone else. Whom he did not want to meet.
Where did that leave the wager between them?
Seven
Bright and early Monday morning, Elise sat in her office and plugged the last of the data into the system. Dax had answered every single question and she firmly believed he’d been honest, or at least as honest as he knew how to be when the content involved elements a perpetual player hardly contemplated. But they’d stayed on track Saturday night—mostly—and finished the profile. Finally.
This would be her hour of victory. She’d built a thriving business using nothing but her belief in true love and her brain. Not one thin dime had come from Brenna, and Elise had fought hard to keep herself afloat during the lean years. She would not let all her work crumble.
She was good at helping people find happiness. Matching Dax with someone who could give him that would be her crowning achievement.
She hit Run on the compiler.
Elise Arundel.
Her forehead dropped to the keyboard with a spectacular crash. She couldn’t decide whether to laugh or cry.
Of course her name had come up again. The almost-kiss had been enough to skew the results the first time. Now she had a much bigger mess on her hands because she couldn’t get the oh-my-God real kiss off her mind. Or the not-a-date with Dax, which should have only been about completing the profile, but instead had eclipsed every evening Elise had ever spent with a man. Which were admittedly few.
They’d bonded over pizza and mutual distrust. And—major points—he’d never made a single move on her. When he confessed he still thought about kissing her, it had been delivered with such heartbreaking honesty, she couldn’t chastise him for it.
But his admission served as a healthy reminder. Dax liked women and was practiced at getting them. That’s why it felt so genuine—because it was. And once he got her, she’d start dreaming of white dresses while he steadily lost interest. They were not a good match.
It didn’t stop her from thinking about kissing him in return.
Her mixed feelings about Dax had so thoroughly compromised her matchmaking abilities she might as well give up here and now. It wasn’t as though she could fiddle around with the results this time, not when it was so clear she couldn’t be impartial. Not after Dax had made such a big deal about ethics.
She groaned and banged her head a couple more times on the keyboard. He was going to have a field day with this. Even if she explained that matchmaking was as much an art as a science, which was why she administered the profile sessions herself, he’d cross his arms and wait for her to confess this matchmaking business was bogus.
But it wasn’t, not for all her other clients. Just this one.
The truth was, she abhorred the idea of Dax being matched with another woman so much, she’d subconsciously made sure he wouldn’t be. It was unfair to his soul mate—who was still out there somewhere—and unfair to Dax. He was surprisingly sweet and funny and he deserved to be with a woman he could fall in love with. He deserved to be happy.
