Miss Match

by Fiona Riley

  Table of Contents

  Synopsis

  Acknowledgments

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Chapter Twenty-five

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  Books Available from Bold Strokes Books

  Synopsis

  When Samantha Monteiro launched Perfect Match, Inc. a few years ago, she never imagined her matchmaking business would be booming while her own love life floundered. When her business partner drags her out of hiding to attend the wedding of one of their successful client matches, she meets a dancer with a dark past and a penchant for secrecy who excites her in a way she hadn’t thought possible. Samantha wonders if Lucinda Moss is the key to solving not one but two matches that have eluded Samantha since everything around her fell apart or if she is destined to find love for everyone but herself.

  In a world where nothing is constant, Lucinda has learned to keep herself emotionally at arm’s length and given up on the chance to find true happiness. Can the notorious Miss Match help her forget her troubled past?

  Miss Match

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  eBooks from Bold Strokes Books, Inc.

  http://www.boldstrokesbooks.com

  eBooks are not transferable. They cannot be sold, shared or given away as it is an infringement on the copyright of this work.

  Please respect the rights of the author and do not file share.

  Miss Match

  © 2016 By Fiona Riley. All Rights Reserved.

  ISBN 13: 978-1-62639-575-6

  This Electronic Book is published by

  Bold Strokes Books, Inc.

  P.O. Box 249

  Valley Falls, New York 12185

  First Edition: May 2016

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  This book, or parts thereof, may not be reproduced in any form without permission.

  Credits

  Editor: Ruth Sternglantz

  Production Design: Susan Ramundo

  Cover Design By G.S. Pendergrast

  Acknowledgments

  Without the encouragement and support of Bold Strokes Books, this wild ride would never have taken place. I feel privileged to be in the company of such amazing, talented, and creative authors. It is my absolute pleasure to be able to say that I have made friendships with many of you along this journey that I know will last a lifetime. I can’t wait to learn from you and am looking forward to the many opportunities in which you will undoubtedly astound me with your brilliance. In case I am unable to form words when those times occur, please know that I thank you in advance and I probably want your autograph.

  I’d like to thank Ruth Sternglantz for her undying patience, for sharing her genius, and for writing the most hilarious critiques in the margins of my manuscript that I have ever read. I have learned more about writing and editing from you than I thought was humanly possible. I imagine you will forever be reminding me to limit my use of exclamation points, but I just can’t help myself, I get so excited!!!! Thank you for fielding my late night emails and always taking the time to explain things to me, no matter how big or small they may be. You have an undeniable gift and I am grateful that you share it with me.

  To Toni Amato who took a hundred thousand words and helped me make sense of them, I am forever in your debt. You taught me to feel all of the words I put on the page as though they would be my last, and you changed my life in the process. I hope you are proud of the final product, because without you, this would just be a pipe dream. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

  Also, thank you to all of my friends and family who have acted as sounding boards to all of my nonsense and for all being crazy enough to inspire my characters. You are bottomless pools of resource for me and my imagination.

  To the real Myrtle the Sea Turtle at the New England Aquarium—you are gorgeous and graceful. Thanks for hanging out with me while I researched. It was fun getting to know you.

  Lastly, to my wife Jenn for being a literal saint during this whole writing process—I would still be talking about this story had you not encouraged me to sit down and write it. Thank you for always helping me to live in the moment and reminding me to laugh always. You are the funniest person I know, and I will continue to use your effortlessly hilarious daily dialogue as fodder for my future works. You are the best.

  Dedication

  For Jenn.

  You are the best part of my day, every day. You are my loudest cheerleader, my best beta reader, my truest friend, and the absolute love of my life. Life with you is what inspires me to write stories of love, passion, and adventure. I am forever grateful for the chance to learn with you, live with you, and love with you. Thank you for always seeing the potential in me and encouraging me to take all of the great leaps that have gotten us to this point in our lives today. I love you to the moon and back.

  CHAPTER ONE

  Lucinda Moss had crossed and uncrossed her legs a dozen times in the past thirty minutes. She doodled on the pad in front of her for a moment as Richard Thomas wrapped up his presentation.

  “Any questions?”

  “Comments, actually.” Lucinda, the first woman to be appointed the head of advertising and marketing for Clear View Enterprises, Inc., raised an eyebrow at Richard, making sure he could see her disappointment before she voiced it. She knew that Richard loathed working for a woman, especially one younger than him. He was one of the loudest grumbles when she came into her new position and his lack of preparation for this presentation clearly demonstrated the glaring absence of respect for her intelligence. “This is the same projected plan you had for the Devereux commission last month, isn’t it? This client warrants a more aggressive marketing structure to pursue its higher-end consumer population. How will your recycled, passive approach serve an office full of sharks?”

  Brian Edgars coughed to her right, flipping through his notes quickly. Undoubtedly checking to see if Lucinda was correct in her criticism of Richard’s proposal. He frowned at his notebook, obviously not liking what he found. She liked that Brian was so reliably thorough. He was a generation older than her with years more experience, but he had been one of very few who had embraced without hesitation her promotion and the direction with which she was taking Clear View. She respected Brian’s opinion and knew he believed in the structural changes she was implementing. It was nice to have a confidant in a sea of naysayers.

  “I think the general scheme would suffice for Levonbaum and Carlyle,” Richard answered, narrowing his gaze and focusing just to the right of her eyes, “with a few adjustments of course.”

  “Why don’t you try your final pitch again,” Lucinda said, standing abruptly. “Claire will help you iron out whatever details you may need.”

  The ten other men and women in the room begin to pack up their things as Lucinda’s heels clicked closer to the exit
of the conference room. She glanced back once to flash a quick smile to a blushing Claire Moseley, just one of a few handpicked employees that she knew would absolutely flourish with the right direction and nurturing. Claire was a little younger than Lucinda, in her late twenties, with shoulder-length auburn hair and a quick wit. Lucinda had quickly promoted the junior executive after observing her dynamic and tenacious interaction with Richard on a particularly challenging client case a few months earlier. What really impressed her about Claire though was the way she handled Richard’s intimidation and bullying at the end of the meeting when he thought everyone was out of earshot. As an unseen observer, Lucinda’s chest swelled with pride when Claire easily sidestepped his antagonistic comments about her perceived lack of experience with a series of well-volleyed retorts and sarcasm. It was a shame the rest of the marketing execs missed the learning experience.

  Lucinda smiled to herself as she walked through the corridor toward her office. She was eager to be done with the Richards of this place: stuck-up, self-consumed, and bigoted little shits left from the old regime.

  Her assistant met her at her office door with a hot coffee and a yogurt. Amanda had worked with Lucinda for almost five years, easily transitioning to the increased responsibility with every promotion Lucinda had earned. Without Amanda, Lucinda wasn’t sure she could juggle it all—Amanda made sure Lucinda never missed a meeting, a workout, or a paper clip. She placed everything on Lucinda’s enormous desk and asked how the morning’s meeting went.

  “The usual, Amanda. Boring. But thank you for the coffee.” Lucinda smiled as she settled into her chair, powering up her laptop. Today was Amanda’s first wedding anniversary. Lucinda fondly remembered the first and only time Amanda was late to work—she had floated into the office in a dreamy haze, announcing she had met the love of her life at a bus stop in the rain. It warmed Lucinda’s heart to see Amanda still so in love after all this time even if it made her wonder if she would ever find such happiness. “I think I’m all set for the rest of today’s meetings, so why don’t you take the rest of the day off?”

  “Are you sure?”

  Lucinda chuckled to herself before opening her bottom left drawer and pulling out a bottle of champagne with a decorative gold ribbon around the neck. “I’m sure. Here, this is for you and Tom. Have a good night, okay?”

  Amanda nodded quickly, taking the bottle from Lucinda and forcing a quick hug on her boss. The contact was unexpected, and Lucinda patted her awkwardly before Amanda broke away, thanking her again for the free afternoon.

  Lucinda let out a content sigh before returning to the project outlines and photographs of a new client’s building specs that were patiently waiting on her desktop for her attention. Hours later, Brian knocked at her door as she began packing up at the end of the day.

  “You are mighty popular with some, Miss Moss,” he teased gently as he closed the door behind himself, before sitting on one of the chairs in front of her desk. “And not so much with others.”

  “Can’t win ’em all, Edgars,” she replied coolly but with a small smile, happy to have a chance to chat with Brian about the meeting earlier. “What’s up?”

  “I was curious about your pairing of Claire and Richard.”

  She looked at him expectantly, waiting for him to continue.

  “We both know that Richard is an entitled ass, but this client is a relatively big fish and he has much more experience working this type of crowd than Claire does. Aren’t you worried that assigning Claire as co-lead will exacerbate the already rocky office dynamics?”

  “It’s time people get comfortable with the idea that I’m not going to tolerate subpar performance. Claire has more intuition in her pinky finger than Richard has in his whole body. This is a good opportunity for her to flex her muscles and really get involved on a high-priority client. I expect great things from her.”

  “And this is why you’re the new chief. I’m interested to see their final pitch.” Brian nodded as he stood slowly, calling behind him as he closed the door, “Have a good night, Lucinda.”

  Lucinda leaned back in her desk chair, slouching low enough to rest her new Louboutin heels on the expansive oak desk in front of her. The sunset perfectly illuminated the Boston skyline, casting shadows in harmony with deep orange hues, making a beautifully haunting portrait of her metropolitan playground. Her corner office had floor-to-ceiling windows on two of its sides, which, if she stood close enough to the glass, made her feel like she was standing in the sky, not limited by the confines of gravity or her mortality.

  As the last sliver of orange slipped beneath the skyline, a memory of Dominic crept into her thoughts. Nothing in particular incited such recollections: sometimes it was a smell, a sound, the texture of a fabric, a perfectly trimmed goatee. Her exchanges with Brian of late brought memories of Dominic to the forefront of her mind. No matter how good a friend Brian had been during these transitional months, she missed her best friend. Dominic’s unexpected and sudden death had devastated her in more ways than just derailing her professional dance career. He was the brother she never had, the one who had rescued her from the foster system by teaching her to direct her pain into dance—Dominic had helped Lucinda find an identity. He gave her some stability. He probably saved her life. It was no surprise that she struggled to form relationships with people following his death—both personal and professional ones.

  Brian was the closest thing she had to a friend these days, but he was no substitute for Dominic. How badly she wanted to pick up the phone and tell him all about her feisty new junior executive and how much she hated the way Richard sort of made eye contact with her ear when he addressed her. She could almost hear his carefree laugh in response to the conversation she was desperate to have with him. What she would give to have one more moment instead of just a memory.

  Her phone rang loudly, catching her off guard.

  “Hey, Luce. How are you?”

  She could hear the smile in her little sister’s voice. “Hi. I’m good. You excited?”

  “Yeah, maybe a little nervous too.” Connie paused before asking nervously, “You’re going to be there, right?” She sounded more concerned about Lucinda actually showing up to the wedding than at the prospect of being married.

  “Of course! I wouldn’t miss your wedding for anything in the world. I promise.” Lucinda’s reply was confident but she was less than thrilled at the prospect of dealing with all the emotions this event would likely stir up. Connie and Dominic had been her world for as long as she could remember, and Connie growing up and getting married was never something she thought she would have to experience without Dominic by her side. Life was moving on without him, and she sort of hated it.

  “Good. Okay, I have to go do rehearsal stuff, see you soon!”

  “Bye, Connie.”

  Lucinda adjusted her skirt as she stood and closed her laptop, then shuffled the photos into their folders, effectively ending her long day. She frowned as she shrugged on her tailored blazer, realizing that her fridge was empty and thus, nothing was waiting to quell the angry rumble of her stomach when she got home. “Well, takeout it is, I guess,” she mumbled to herself as she packed her bag and walked to her office door, glancing back once before flicking off the light and closing the door.

  *

  “Ms. Monteiro.” Claudette Frost’s sneer was as legendary as her love of old money. “I expect better results for the money we are dumping into this ludicrous company.”

  “Mrs. Frost,” Samantha Monteiro replied with her utmost diplomacy, although it was wearing thin, “you need to understand that I can only bring the women to Alec—he has to be the one to make the connection. I can’t do it for him.”

  Alec Frost was a typical wealthy playboy searching for someone to drag to his boring society family dinners: tall, handsome, and filthy rich, but with a hot temper and a propensity for womanizing and hard partying. Finding someone he liked physically wasn’t hard: tall, blond, and thin. Most of the w
omen Samantha set him up with were eager for the life of leisure his money promised, but everyone had a breaking point, and his antagonistic nature coupled with his short fuse eventually landed eight crying women in her office.

  She frowned, trying to retain her professional timbre. “He has to meet me halfway if he ever expects to get further than a half dozen dates with these girls.”

  “Really, it’s a wonder you came so highly recommended to me,” Claudette scoffed. “Obviously, you and Mr. Stanley have been mismanaging Alec’s female prospects.”

  “I understand your frustration, really I do.” Samantha turned to address Alec directly, who up until this point was distractedly playing with his phone. “We’ll try one more time, Alec, but please, stick to the plan we lay out for you. The system works, but you have to follow the guidelines.”

  Alec glanced up from his phone. “Maybe if you gave me something to work with, I could actually get somewhere with one of them.”

  Samantha had reached her quota of insults from this family. “You know what, Alec,” she snarled, “why don’t you—”

  Andrew Stanley appeared in the doorway of her office and interrupted before Samantha had a chance to give them a piece of her mind. “Why don’t you let us give you a call next week with another list of ladies and a plan for a mixer meet-and-greet, free of charge.”

  Claudette stood, smoothing out her Chanel pantsuit and pulling Alec from his slouch to a standing position as she glared at Andrew. “Make this one count.” She punctuated her statement with an angry gesture to Andrew and Samantha before she stormed out and dragged her overgrown brat behind her.

  It took Samantha a good twenty minutes to calm down after they left. Her leisurely stroll to get coffee next door turned into an hour-long retail therapy trip that did nothing to calm her throbbing head but did result in the acquisition of two lovely pairs of Jimmy Choos and a pair of Prada sunglasses that begged her to take them home. Back at her desk, she contemplated her purchases with satisfaction.