Page 4 of Her Age Gap Match

She held my gaze just long enough that I felt the back of my neck go warm.

Then she stood, smoothed her jacket, and smiled like she hadn't just said exactly what she'd said.

"I'll walk you out," she said.

Poppy looked up when we came back through. Her shirt was still crooked. The flowers were still listing.

"All good?" she asked, looking at me.

"Taking a little break," Sophie said pleasantly, before I could answer.

Poppy’s lips parted. “Oh,” she said. “Oh—okay. I’ll note that in the system.”

"Thank you, sweetheart." Sophie touched her shoulder briefly on the way past, heading back toward the stairs.

Which left me standing at the front desk.

Poppy looked up at me. I looked at her. The office was very quiet.

"So," she said. "No fifth date."

"No fifth date."

She nodded slowly, pressing her lips together. "That's — I mean, a break is good. Probably. Regroup." She was typing something that I was fairly certain was nothing. "Very smart."

"Poppy."

She stopped typing.

"The flowers are crooked," I said.

She looked at them. Reached over and straightened them without a word.

When she looked back up I was already pulling on my jacket.

"Take care of yourself, Mr. Lawson," she said quietly.

"You too," I said.

I made myself walk out the door without looking back.

I almost made it to my bike before I admitted to myself that Sophie had been asking about Poppy.

CHAPTER 2

Poppy

Thursday nights at Bloom meant Happy Hour.

It wasn’t technically a happy hour…that was just what we called it. Every Thursday, we stayed late, split a bottle of wine, and recapped what was going on with all the clients and with each other. Fridays we worked from home; no meetings, just catch-up.

It was just one of the reasons I adored this job—the first job I got out of college in Kansas, the only job I ever really wanted. Staff meetings consisted of me, the office manager; Sophie Bloom, the mastermind behind it all; Jasper Ellison, the guy who’d designed the matchmaking algorithm; and our legal advisor, Cole North, who worked at another law firm but worked closely enough with us that he needed to be in the know.

Also…Cole had a thing for Sophie. None of us talked about it, but me and Jasper knew.

We were currently camped out in the conference room upstairs, a charitably named space which looked a lot more like a dorm lounge. A giant rolling whiteboard took up one side; there was a beanbag on the floor where Jasper was hanging out, his tablet in his hand. Sophie and Cole sat on either side of the couch, Cole in a suit that made him look totally out of place, while I was wearing my PJs and sipping a hot chocolate in a giant armchair.

“Okay,” Sophie said, scrolling through her phone—looking at the client list, probably. “So…we have four active cases in the baby stage, which I know is a lot for us—but they’re going well.”