Page 60 of Pity Parade

I tease Heath, “Instead of auctioning yourself off to help childhood diabetes, you could auction off vacations here.”

Heath suddenly turns toward me. “We could make a certain percentage of our accommodations exclusive for charitable use. My brother runs an organization that helps families with all kinds of disabled kids. We could offer to bring them here for family vacations that would give everybody a break. What do you think?” His eyes are bright with excitement.

“That’s an amazing idea,” I tell him.

I love that Heath’s including me in this, but I’m also nervous about being in a business relationship with him. Because let’s face it, being in business with him is not going to be enough for me.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

HEATH

Once we drop Prim off at the country club, I ask Trina, “You want to go somewhere and talk?”

What am I doing? I might as well go down on one knee and propose to her. I have no idea how I went from needing to stay away from her to practically offering to make her my business partner—a business I wasn’t even planning on going into.

“What do you want to talk about?” She sounds startled.

Staring straight ahead, I tell her, “How about us.”

In my peripheral vision, I see Trina turn toward me. “What about us?”

“I thought maybe we should discuss if we thought we could work together without any personal complications.” For instance, I’m not sure I can see her every day without wanting to hold her in my arms …

“First of all, Heath, so far, the only thing we’re doing is pipe dreaming. You just bought the land and there’s nothing on it. Secondly, I still have a television show to get out of before I can plan my next thing. If we work together, and that’s a big if, it wouldn’t even be for another year or two.” She adds, “Unless you know a genie who can build a lodge overnight.”

“Money can buy you just about anything,” I tell her. “Could you see moving to Elk Lake to do something like this?”

“Not if I’m only hosting an occasional dating weekend,” she says. “If I’m going to keep being a matchmaker, I should really start doing that in Chicago again. You know, more people looking for love and all.”

Pulling out onto the road, I ask, “Were you a matchmaker before your television show?”

“I was.”

“Did you have an office?”

She shakes her head. “I worked out of a spare bedroom in my apartment. I usually met with perspective clients in their homes or in restaurants. It kept the overhead down, so I was able to make a living.”

“How does that kind of thing work anyway?”

“I had a small data base back then. I’d definitely do things differently now.” She continues, “With Midwestern Matchmaker on my resumé, I’d rent out office space and I’d have people sign up for a minimum of six months. That way, I’d know money was coming in to pay my bills.”

“What if your client falls in love with the first person you set them up with?” I ask. “Would you refund their money?”

Trina snorts. “Heck, no. That would be the premium they paid for me doing my job so well.”

“Would you only take on big clients like that woman who had the millionaire matchmaking show?”

“You watched that?” She sounds shocked.

“My wife did. She thought it was the stupidest thing in the world.” I belatedly realize that might have come off wrong, so I say, “I didn’t mean to cause offense.”

“You’re not offending me,” she says. “That show was stupid. I mean, why should only millionaires find love?”

“That was Jess’s problem with it, too.”

“Also,” she adds, “it puts the millionaire in the position of power. The whole thing is kind of degrading to the non-millionaire.”

“Agreed,” I tell her.

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