Matchmaker, Matchmaker

by Donna Ball

  Cassie took a moment to let the information sink in. The Long Acre property and the most sought-after— and expensive—architect in town. Shane Bartlett might be a nut, but he was a serious nut. With money.

  "Well," she said dully, "I guess I blew it."

  Emma was tactfully silent.

  Cassie looked around the elegantly furnished little room and no longer bothered to keep the despair out of her eyes. "I never should have moved the office. You tried to tell me. But, oh, no, I had to have an expensive address...."

  "Now you hush," Emma said sternly. "I'm just an old woman who doesn't like change and you were right not to pay me any mind. This swanky uptown address is just what you need for all those fancy-pants oilmen."

  "Who never come." Cassie's smile was wan. She slid down in her chair until she could rest her head against the back and lace her fingers across her stomach. "Let's face it, Emma. In less than a year I've managed to destroy what it took my mother a lifetime to build."

  "Stop talking that nonsense. You—"

  But Cassie shook her head firmly and got to her feet. "No, I was wrong from the beginning and I should have seen it coming."

  She moved restlessly over to the window, parted the blinds and looked out over the busy Dallas street. "Nobody needs a matchmaking service anymore. When Mother was doing it people cared about finding the perfect mate—with the right background, common interests, a compatible personality—the things you built a marriage on. They wanted catered dinners, gifts from Tiffany's, three-piece orchestras and moonlight sails to a private island. But why should they pay for our kind of personalized service when they can go online and scroll through cutesy videos for half the price? Who cares about forming a meaningful relationship when all you need is a web cam and a credit card to trade sex fantasies with a member of the opposite sex? My mistake was in taking this whole business seriously. And what do I get for my trouble? Somebody like this Shane Bartlett who comes strolling in here expecting me to pull his favorite fantasy right out of a filing cabinet."

  "Oh, I don't know," murmured Emma. "Wasn't it you who said that romance was a science, not an art? The right mixture of ingredients in the right amounts, a fail-safe formula, I believe you said."

  Cassie frowned a little, feeling trapped by her own words. "That's just the point," she said. "It is a formula, and like everything in science, each step has to be followed precisely, logically and by somebody who knows what she's doing. If people would just leave me alone and let me do my job, I could guarantee one hundred percent success every time. But these people who come in here with preconceived notions about what will make them happy..."

  "The very nerve," observed Emma with a twinkle in her eye.

  Cassie scowled more deeply. "You know perfectly well what I'm talking about. People like that cowboy who just walked out of here, expecting his dream girl to come wrapped in cellophane and expecting me to wave a magic wand and produce her. Well, there is no magic." Her voice grew more fervent as she warmed to her favorite subject. "That's the whole trouble with people today—they expect too much. Bells are supposed to ring and doves are supposed to fly and rose petals are supposed to fall from the sky, and if you give them anything else, they don't believe it's real. If people would just put aside their fantasies for one minute and realize that forming a relationship is no more complicated than baking a cake, they'd be a lot happier.' '

  “And you'd be out of business."

  That drew a rueful smile from Cassie. "Yeah, I guess I would." She looked at Emma intently. "I am good, aren't I? I mean, I have satisfied customers, haven't I? I know you don't always agree with my philosophy, but I do fulfill a need, and I keep them coming back." She saw the expression in Emma's eyes and lifted a defensive hand. "Oh, I know in my mother's day repeat customers weren't a measure of success, but that's not my fault. No one wants to get married anymore. I give people what they want, and what they want is an easy relationship."

  "Mr. Bartlett does," Emma commented.

  "Does what?"

  "Wants to get married."

  "Oh, him." Cassie waved a hand dismissively, bristling at the mere memory of the encounter. "He didn't want a wife. He wanted a windup doll. Well, I wish him all the luck in the world. With an attitude like that he's going to need it."

  "Still, it's a pity. Finding him a wife would have given you a chance to prove your theory."

  Cassie took off her glasses, rubbed the bridge of her nose and looked at Emma curiously. The glasses were heavy and made her head hurt, but typical of everything else that had gone wrong lately, Cassie had developed an allergy to her contact lens solution and would be forced to wear glasses for at least a couple of weeks. "What do you mean?"

  "What you're always saying," Emma replied innocently. "That there's someone for everyone and all it takes is the right scientific—" she emphasized the word slightly "—method to find it."

  Cassie made a face. "Well, he would have been a challenge, all right." Then she looked at Emma suspiciously. "You really don't think I know what I'm doing, do you?"

  Emma smiled gently and got to her feet. "I think you're very good at what you do," she assured her. "It's just that all your data files and probability curves and compatibility charts seem a little dry to me. Maybe I still believe in the power of good old-fashioned romance. And—" she lifted an admonishing finger "—it might not hurt you to give it a try, either.''

  Cassie opened her mouth for a rebuttal, but it was an old disagreement that led nowhere. Emma had worked for her mother and now she worked for Cassie, and she hadn't made the transition between the generations very easily. After a moment Cassie merely shrugged. "Well, it doesn't matter. The probability curve on finding Shane Bartlett a match drops off the chart— with or without that mythological thing you call romance. And I'm glad I kicked him out," she decided firmly. "A person's got to draw the line somewhere. Although—" her tone grew thoughtful as she was forced to admit honestly "—if I had it to do over again, I'd get his deposit first."

  Emma chuckled, came over and slid her arm around Cassie's shoulders in a brief hug. "You go home," she said, "and have a nice bubble bath and a cup of tea. Things will look better tomorrow."

  "The overdue bills will still be here," Cassie said glumly.

  "True," agreed Emma cheerfully. "But by then we'll have figured out a way to pay them. We always do."

  Emma went to close up the office, and after a moment Cassie gave a resigned lift of her shoulders and locked up her desk. She didn't really think anything would get better with a night's sleep, but there was no point in sitting around the office waiting for the phone to ring. She picked up her purse and started for home, where she could spend the evening looking at her own unpaid telephone bill and overdue rent notice while trying to figure out some way to turn things around.

  As Emma had said, she always did.

  ***

  Shane walked with his hands in his pockets, his head down and his stride long and angry. He felt like a fool. He had known it was a stupid idea to go to a place like that, and now he had not only wasted his time but had been soundly humiliated in the process. Matchmakers, indeed. He should have known nothing would be that easy.

  He stopped by his red Corvette, put his hand on the door handle, then hesitated. Somehow the sight of the gleaming car took the edge off his temper, and as he ran his hand along the flawless finish, his dark mood softened. There were racier models, he knew, and more expensive ones, and he could have had his pick of any of them. But years ago, when he had first started working on the line and leaves were few and far between, he had gotten his hands on a rare copy of a stateside magazine and had seen an advertisement for a red Corvette. He had torn the picture out of the magazine and had carried it around until it had literally fallen apart, swearing that someday he would have that car. When he set his sights on something, he wasn't easily dissuaded... like the car, like a wife.

  He decided he really didn't want to leave the city just yet and began walking again.
The sights and sounds of Dallas never ceased to thrill and dismay him. The towering buildings, the cluttered streets, the narrow alleyways. People everywhere, coming and going, hurrying and strolling, climbing out of limousines or waiting impatiently at stoplights... surely somewhere in this great sprawling city there was a woman for him.

  He knew where he had made his mistake, of course. He had been too blunt with the frosty-eyed, auburn-haired matchmaking woman. But things were much more straightforward in the wastelands of Alaska, and if Shane had been any good at gilding the lily, he could have no doubt found a bride in the conventional manner.

  The trouble was, he didn't know anybody in Dallas except Jack. Jack had done his part in taking him around to the clubs, cotillions and by-invitation-only parties, but the women Shane met at those places fell into three categories: vacuous debutantes who wouldn't know a frying pan if it hit them in the face, hard-eyed executive women who spent an inordinate amount of time trying to prove how much smarter they were than he, and overly made-up party girls whose interest in him waned when the sun came up. Was it too much to ask for a nice, normal woman who wanted nothing more than to settle down and raise a family and let him love her?

  Jack had assured him that if anybody could find that woman, Matchmakers could. Well, Jack had been wrong.

  It irritated Shane when he thought of the contempt in Cassie Averil's green eyes as he'd outlined his needs for her. What would a woman like that know about men and women, anyway? He should have asked if she was married. You can't sell a product if you've never tried it.

  But after a while the irritation turned to amusement as he replayed the conversation in his head. He supposed he had come off sounding like a caveman, but he couldn't help it; that was just his way. If she had given him a chance, he might have been able to make a better impression, but it didn't matter now. He was back to square one, and obviously he was going to have to think of something else.

  Maybe, he thought only half facetiously, he should place an ad in the paper.

  He walked down boulevards and side streets, pausing to look in the windows of jewelry stores and fancy dress shops, and before too long the sour memory of the unpleasant encounter was completely wiped away by his fascination with the city. He stopped in a pastry shop and bought something flaky and cream-filled, and by the time he wiped his fingers and tossed the napkin into a curbside trash can, all was right with the world. Sweets were such a rarity in the Great Northwest that now his taste for them was insatiable, and had he been a less active man he would have been fat within three months of stepping off the boat in Seattle.

  He was no longer interested in any of the errands he had planned for the afternoon and started walking back toward the car, peering in shop windows and wondering if he dared call up Jack and hint for an invitation to supper. That would make three times this week. And though Jack's sister, who kept house for Jack and always had room for one more at her table, seemed to like him, Shane was afraid he was going to wear out his welcome if he wasn't careful.

  Eventually he found himself in front of a pet store, and he grinned as he remembered Miss Averil's parting words. He tapped on the glass. A brown-and-white ball of fur with a bearded muzzle scurried over to the window and scratched on the pane. Shane grinned again and started to walk away. Then he stopped.

  As far back as Shane could remember, he had wanted only three things out of life: a red Corvette, a big, comfortable home and a family. The first two were his, and as for the third... well, he supposed he had to start somewhere.

  He went inside.

  A few moments later Shane emerged with a brown-and-white puppy tucked under one arm and a sales slip in his pocket. On the sidewalk he held the puppy up and looked into its big brown eyes. "Well, Whiskers, you're not exactly what I had in mind when I went shopping this afternoon, but I guess you'll have to do. Three meals a day, a warm bed and all the squirrels you can chase. What more could anybody ask for?"

  The puppy licked Shane's face and grinned happily. Shane grinned back. "Maybe," he added as he started toward the car, "at least you 'll appreciate what I have to offer."

  ~

  TWO

  Cassie didn't come up with the solution to all her financial problems overnight, but she did come up with one important resolution: she wasn't going to let this business go without a fight. And she would never again be as rude to a client as she had been to Shane Bartlett.

  Matchmaking was a family tradition that had begun with Cassie's grandmother back in the prewar years when Dallas was a boomtown and Ellen Craigston-Averil, newly arrived from Virginia and dripping of old money and social status, had made it her business to see that the raw, bustling oil town was made fit for civilized people. It began with a few letters: Darling, my son is moving out your way with his new company. Do see that he meets some nice girl, will you? Or My dear friends the Longfords are passing through with their lovely daughter. I assured them they could count on you to see that the child met the right sort of companions. It was all very quaint and old-fashioned and Grandma Averil had established a place for herself.

  Cassie's mother had been the first to realize that what was done for love could also be done for money. Dallas in the postwar years was growing so fast and in such diverse directions that the old-fashioned methods of forming social relationships were simply not reliable anymore. She had established a "social club" long before anyone had thought of dating services, but the old-fashioned rules still applied. She screened backgrounds, made introductions, gave chaperoned dinner parties and, with her uncanny sense for compatibility, soon gained a reputation for making marriages that lasted.

  By the time Cassie came along with her major in psychology and a lifetime of observing her mother and grandmother at work, the family business seemed a natural. And when Cassie's parents retired to Florida five years ago, Cassie was ready to bring the matchmaking business into the twenty-first century.

  She lay in bed with her eyes closed against the haze of morning sunlight, listening to the clock radio and trying to figure out where she had gone wrong. Certainly there was nothing wrong with her methods. She had kept the best of her mother's skills—hands-on service and attention to detail—and combined it with her own field of specialty to form a flawless method for bringing compatible couples together. She refused to rely on computers or random chance, as so many dating services did, and the extra effort paid off. Some of the relationships she arranged lasted as long as six months and the couples invariably parted friends--only to return to her for another "perfect match." Cassie wasn't bothered in the least by the fact that she rarely added a wedding picture to the collection on the walls formed by her mother and grandmother. Marriage was just another of those romantic trappings that had no place in the modern world, and she was glad for it. If everyone got married, no one would renew his contract with her and her profit margin would take a more desperate dive than it already had.

  Undoubtedly her only failing was poor management. With the new trend toward monogamy the business climate had looked better than ever, and she had plunged into the expensive downtown property and all the trappings without thought for the consequences. Following the family tradition, she spent an inordinate amount of time and effort on each client, concentrating on quality and not quantity. She was extravagant. She was a perfectionist. She wasn't, in short, a very good businesswoman.

  She sighed and rolled over in bed, then grunted as a soft weight landed on her chest. She opened her eyes and squinted into the amber gaze of a gray-and-white cat. "Hello, you little tramp. Out all night again, huh? Still looking for the perfect romance?" She scratched the cat absently behind the ears. "Take it from an expert, kid. There's no such thing."

  The cat nuzzled Cassie's face as though in protest, and Cassie sneezed. She was allergic to cats, but had never had the heart to tell Fluffy so. After the third sneeze, Cassie pushed the cat away and got out of bed, rubbing her itchy face and combing her hair back with her fingers. Fluffy jumped down from the bed
with a disdainful twitch of her tail, and Cassie watched her in sleepy amusement. Life would be much easier if people were as uncomplicated as cats.

  After a while she got up, put on her glasses and made her way to the closet. She grimaced at the full-length reflection of herself in the mirrored closet doors. Rumpled nightshirt, limp, shoulder-length hair, pale skin—she looked every one of her twenty-nine and a half years that morning. She leaned close to the mirror, lifted her glasses, put them back again and frowned over what were definitely the first signs of tiny crow's-feet on the outside corner of her left eye. "Great," she muttered. "That's what I get for devoting my life to the selfless service of others. Worry lines and overdue bills."

  She slid open the closet doors and spent a moment staring at her uninspired wardrobe. She had three suits for the office: one black, one gray and one navy, all of which were worn with a choice of five white blouses, not one much distinguishable from the other. If there was one thing she hated about her work, it was being required to go to the office every day looking like a mortician, but she had learned early on the importance of dressing for success.

  It was crucial that she obtain the confidence of her clients, because so much of the process revolved around the nuances that were revealed in a personal interview. People felt comfortable with Emma; her motherly, unpretentious manner put everyone at ease, which was one of her biggest assets. But with an attractively groomed, even stylish young woman, men tended to clam up and women felt threatened. No matter how she tried, Cassie couldn't make herself look motherly, so she opted for a neuter appearance instead. No one could feel defensive around a woman who was so undistinguished as to practically fade into the woodwork, and that was exactly the effect Cassie was aiming for.