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Breaking the Bachelor
by Maggie Kelley

Copyright © 2015 by Maggie Kelley. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce, distribute, or transmit in any form or by any means. For information regarding subsidiary rights, please contact the Publisher.

Chapter One

@KathieLeeandHoda Lay down your bets, America, the NYC Love Gamble starts now!

“Totally. Screwed.” Standing outside Rockefeller Center, Jane Wright pulled out her phone one more time to look at the article on the NY Singles Facebook page. Even clad in her super-insulated North Face jacket, reading the post made her break out in a cold sweat.

Love’s a gamble, right? Not according to local matchmaker, Jane Wright, who claims a logic-based algorithm in her company’s new dating app can find a perfect match for any New Yorker in five days— she’s even willing to bet on it.

Bet on it? Had she suffered a blow to the head she didn’t remember? Sure, her pain-in-the-ass, push-her-to-the-limit business rival had made her furious, mocking her logical love theories on television, but betting her company down to the studs to prove her point was Crazytown. Crazy. Town.

Boy, had that bastard cornered her.

The interview with Kathie Lee and Hoda had been complete sabotage. What should have been a morning spent sipping Prosecco, and chatting about the success of Smart Cupid, generating buzz for her company’s new dating app, had morphed into her nemesis making an appearance to tout his company’s new matchmaking strategy.

Oh, yes, the battle lines had been drawn. DatesRUs— and, really, who could take a matchmaking service with the nomenclature of a giant toy store seriously—had thrown down the gauntlet.

On live television.

“We generate fifty matches a week,” the Antichrist, Adam Walters, had said.

Hoda and Kathie had bobblehead-swiveled at that comment. The whole studio audience had waited silently for a rebuttal. Jane recalled the panic, the just-keep-swimming mantra she’d repeated in her head. Sweat had popped on her brow and she distinctly remembered hoping she wasn’t glistening all over national television.

“That’s wonderful, Adam.” Kudos on not sounding snarky. “But here at Smart Cupid our focus is quality. Not quantity. We take the gamble out of love. Our matches have a statistical compatibility criterion that guarantees success.”

“Is that right?” Adam had replied.

She should’ve bolted right then and there.

“So you wouldn’t be opposed to a little wager then, would you?”

Bet? Oh, no. She didn’t gamble—ever.

“Let’s see,” Adam-the-Asshole had begun, conspiratorially nudging Kathie Lee until a picture popped up on the screen behind them. A picture that had the sweat on her face turning to ice. He hadn’t picked a normal New Yorker.

No sirree. A-hole had done his homework. By the glint in his beady little eyes, he knew it, too.

“Hold the phone!” Hoda shouted. “Isn’t that Charlie Goodman?”

It sure the hell was. He smiled back at her from the photo, casual and seductive in a pair of faded Levis and white shirt, unbuttoned at his throat. She looked away. Maybe if she refused to look at him, she could pretend it was someone else—someone other than New York Magazine’s sexiest mixologist. Someone other than Charlie Goodman.

Talk about Karma biting her in the butt.

Adam leaned back in his chair, “I dare you” written all over his face. “Think your new dating app can handle him?”

The ON AIR light blinked bright red across the studio, and she fought back the urge to give that chair of his a little push. “Absolutely, Adam,” she said, amazed by the calm in her voice. Calm was the last thing she felt.

Panic. Anxiety. Assaulted by her own personal shitstorm.

Much closer.

The hosts swiveled back in her direction. “Ready to take a risk for love, Cupid?”

Jane smiled. “If Adam agrees to sit outside my office on Valentine’s Day, passing out conversation hearts and chocolate…”

“No problem. It’s a bet!”

Jane refused to rehash any more of the memory. Could she ignore the social media surrounding her Today Show appearance? Um, no. Could she undo the wager she’d been cornered into taking in front of an audience of five-point- two million viewers? Again, no.

Today was all about damage control.

She pivoted to walk down Fifth toward Bryant Park, forced her attention back to the article on her phone, and tried not to pass out.

Rumor has it DatesRUs has chosen super-stud Charlie Goodman, the city’s sexiest bartender according to the annual
Hot List unveiled in this week’s New York Magazine. According to the interview, while the Midtown mixologist is habanera hot, after a break- up earlier this year, this particular NYer claims to be a confirmed bachelor. Tough luck, Cupid. Better aim for the <3. “Aim for the heart, my ass.” There were already six hundred and nine comments. Seems New Yorkers had a lot to say on the subject. Or maybe they smelled the blood in the water. She glared at the screen looking for a loophole—wiggle room, even. But no. Damn her for staring at Kathie Lee like a tourist in the middle of Times Square. Unable to take it anymore, she shoved the phone deep into her pocket, only to stop short in front of a local newsstand stacked with copies of the offending New York Magazine. Unbelievable. The man was literally everywhere. Charlie Goodman. He grinned at her from the cover, oozing sex and charm. She sighed. There was no way around it. She’d have to call him—the man she’d grown up with. The man she’d fallen into bed with while on vacation in the Caymans six months ago. The man whose kiss made it hard for her to think. Or breathe. Her stomach fluttered at the thought. No. No fluttering stomachs. She balled her hands into fists and kept walking. That kind of passion couldn’t be trusted—the brighter it burned, the colder it was when it burned out, and it always burned out. Even when there was history like hers and Charlie’s to back it up. Passion wasn’t for her. She needed a safe, predictable guy, and during her six days with Charlie, nothing had felt safe. If anything, she’d been in a free fall, on the verge of falling hard, and falling fast...right up until she’d seen him cozy up to the Rum Runner girl the very night she’d planned to ask him to give things a shot when they got back to New York. After dumping him unceremoniously via cocktail napkin, she’d made herself a promise. No more free fall. She bit down on her bottom lip. Okay, so it was, perhaps, a tad more complicated than just seeing him chat up another woman. But she wouldn’t go...there. They hadn’t spoken in twenty-three and a half weeks. They’d ruined their friendship the second they’d slept together, so there’d been no point. Yeah, Charlie had called, and called, and tweeted, and hit her up on Facebook in those first Post-Paradise Hookup days. Yes, he’d even solicited her brother, Nick—talk about awkward—to reach out on his behalf. But she hadn’t been ready to hear his halfhearted excuses. She still wasn’t ready. Not for the first time, she cursed her genes, because surely only a fluke of DNA could’ve landed her in a bet that put her at the mercy of Charlie Goodman. Guess it was now or never. She wrinkled her nose at the keypad and dialed the number she knew by heart. A few agonizing rings later, she landed straight in his voicemail. Her eyes narrowed at the glowing screen. 8:13 am. Like he wasn’t available to take her call. Fine. She’d call again, and if he didn’t pick up...well, then... she’d simply hunt him down. Of course, tracking him down would mean seeing him again, and considering that a glimpse of his sexy cover shot for the New York Magazine interview had sent her pulse bouncing around like a SuperBall, actually seeing him might be more than she could handle. But with the bet going viral, she didn’t dare renege because NY Singles and good ole’ Hoda and Kathie Lee were following the whole damned deal, and if she failed, it’d mean that the Adam-the-A-hole would win, and her company’s reputation would be DOA. Jane drew in a long, messy breath. Only one thing to be done. She needed to match Charlie Goodman with his one true love. In five days. Guaranteed.