Page 5 of My Mismatched Valentine

“Yeah, I didn’t include that in my application either,” he admits, scrubbing his free hand over the back of his neck. “Didn’t want the pity.”

I retract my hand, shoving it under the table as if that’ll rid the pesky tingles dancing across my skin.It’s nothing, Maggie. Just a man’s hand.I make a mental note to blow off some steam later with a new toy I ordered online. It’s waiting on my nightstand, still in the box. It promises to be better than sex. God, I sure hope it is. Because now my lady parts are tingling too.

“Let’s get one thing straight,” I say firmly, crossing my legs tighter to ward off the uninvited heat. “IfI agree to help you, there can be no more lies. No more secrets. Not with me. I can’t do my job properly if I don’t have all the information.”

“Can you be discreet about my … net worth?” Dustin asks, his voice lowered to nearly a whisper.

“At first,” I promise. “But Dustin, she’ll have to know before she agrees to marry you. That’s only fair.”

“Agreed.”

I shutter my eyes and draw a breath. I must have lost my goddamn mind. Am I seriously considering this? Taking on Dustin Wilde as a personal client? Even after he lied to me and quite possibly cost me my dream career?

Yes. I think the answer is reallyyes. Because, if there’s one thing consistent about me, it’s that Ilovea challenge.

“Do we have a deal, Maggie?”

I open my eyes and meet his. Ishouldcorrect him. Insist he keep things strictly professional between us. But selfishly, I enjoy the sound of my name leaving his lips. Probably a little too much. “You also must disclose this contractual requirementto your future wife before the vows are exchanged, or I’ll tell her myself. Relationships—especially marriages—don’t survive with secrets.”

“I will.”

“I know I said I didn’t want you to throw money at me—”

“You’ll be paid fairly for your services, Maggie.Morethan fair.”

I manage to keep a poker face in place, but inwardly, I’m relieved I’ll be able to make rent for a few more months since I poured a healthy portion of my savings into the Valentine’s matchmaking event. I haven’t exactly been getting an onslaught of matchmaking requests in my inbox. Ineedthis to work. “Then we have a deal.”

CHAPTER 4

Dustin

“Ibooked my plane ticket!” Glamma—we don’t dare call her Grandma because she’s too young to have such an old-person title—shouts into the phone. I wince. She might not beold, but she has a skewed view on volume control. “Not excited that you picked somewhere so cold to set up your new headquarters, but I suppose I’ll get to see the Northern Lights this way. I will get to see them, won’t I? And I can’t wait to meet your beautiful bride-to-be. Oh, a Valentine’s Day wedding! How romantic! And here I didn’t think you had a romantic bone in your body, Dustin.”

Truth be told, my fate rests more in Glamma’s hands than it does in Maggie’s. Glamma is the one who decides if I’m really in love with my wife. As my mother’s mother, she never had any interest in my father’s company and all its money. She knows it’s important to me, for sentimental reasons, that I keep it in the family. But she won’t sign off if she thinks I’m just going through the motions. It’s why she was selected to make the final decision. One that will affect not onlymyfuture, but the future of the family business.

Which is why I hope like hell that this plan works.

“You know she hasn’t agreed to marry me,” I remind her.

“But she will.”

The day after I met Maggie, nearly two years ago atThe Blue Sapphirein L.A., Glamma flew into town to stay with me for a week. We’ve always been incredibly close, and I had no reservations in telling her everything about the mysterious, intriguing, and dazzling Maggie Parsons.

Maggie had only just filed for divorce the day we met. To say she wasn’t emotionally available was the understatement of the year. I hated that she was at the bar, all alone, drinking away her troubles one glass of sauvignon blanc at a time. I caught more than one mother fucker eyeing her like weak prey. I felt compelled to protect her from those rich assholes who saw an easy lay.

But more than that, I was completely enraptured by the woman.

She stirred emotions inside me I didn’t think I possessed.

Love had never done me any favors. The second a woman found out who I really was, she’d start acting differently. Talking about luxurious vacations and wedding bells. She’d order room service everywhere we went, acting like they were having a fucking closeout sale. The second I cut off the shopping sprees, she’d bail. It happened so many times, I’d given up on ever finding someone who valued me for me and not the size of my wallet. Those materialistic women expected me to be equally shallow and acted accordingly.

I shifted my focus, instead, to the company. I threw myself into the work. Learning not only how to run the company, but how to build what we sold with my own two hands. I don’t regret the time I spent working alongside my dad, especially now that he’s gone.

But Iwaslonely.

Maggie made me feel different than all those other women. Despite her own troubles that night, she made me feelseen.

“Maggie doesn’t even remember me, Glamma. She thinks I’m her client.” I scrub a hand over my hair, making it stick up. If only slimy Martin could see me now—hair long enough to run my fingers through and a ragged beard growing from the stubble—he might keel over dead. Not that I’ve ever been that lucky. I’m not the clean-cut, dressed-for-success image the board thinks I should be. If I get control back of the company, I’m outlawing suits in the dress code.

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