When Monday finally rolled around, I woke up early, did my hair and makeup and made my way to Green Power Coffee. I arrived around 7:30 a.m. and ordered my drink and found a spot in the corner of the café. It was a delightful little café that had small tables and even smaller chairs, but made for the perfect meeting spot near work and home. I wanted the best possible view as I waited for this mystery man to arrive.
I checked my phone to see if the dating app had given me any further instructions, but there was nothing else. I didn’t know if he had the same instructions I did. I didn’t even really know what he looked like.
Secretly, all I kept hoping was that the guy from the club would come walking in the door. Maybe he lived around there? Maybe he liked to get his coffee early in the morning before work?
I looked over at Emma as she giggled with anticipation. She was doing really well until a balding man with a large pot belly started to look around the coffee shop. My heart sank. I wasn’t a really judgmental person when it came to looks, but how would it be possible that I could have a one hundred percent match with a man who I wasn’t at all attracted to?
I swallowed hard and closed my eyes as I tried to decide if I was even going to acknowledge he was there. The man looked right at me as he made his way across the room, though, and there was no denying that he was coming to talk to me. I resigned myself to at least having a conversation with him.
“Hey,” the man said as he extended his hand toward me. “I’m Robert, are you Kimberly?”
Thank God.
“Hi Robert; I’m actually Dakota.”
“Aww man, I’m sorry. I’ll keep looking. It’s a blind date.”
“It’s alright,” I said as I noticed Emma laughing hysterically across the room. “You know you should check with that girl across the way. She’s been watching for people this morning. Maybe she’s the one you’re meeting?”
When I pointed to Emma she instantly stopped laughing and sat up. Robert turned to look at her quickly and then back at me.
“Oh, she’s pretty. I hope it’s her. Thank you,” he said as he hurried off toward her.
It was very entertaining to watch Emma have to deal with the same interaction I had. She was nice to him, from what I could tell, but then sent him on his way. Her death star that she sent me was enough to make me laugh, though, and I could hardly stay in my seat as the anticipation built up.
Both Emma and I continued to wait for this mystery man to show up, but Emma got bored and started to play on her phone. I didn’t want to miss the guy, so I continued to sip on my drink and watched the people as they came in and ordered their coffee.
Whomever I was supposed to meet wasn’t there, or I had missed him. It was very disappointing, but after thirty minutes, we decided to leave.
“So maybe the app was wrong?” Emma said as she tried to reassure me.
“Or maybe he took one look at me and turned around.” I laughed.
“If that happened, he would have turned around because your beauty scared him, and he didn’t think he was worthy of you.”
“It’s alright. Let’s just get to the studio. I’ve got a client coming in at noon and was going to reorganize my room a little.”
Emma and I walked in silence as we made our way to the studio for the day. We didn’t need to talk. Emma knew I was feeling self-conscious and that talking wasn’t at all what I wanted to do.
I wasn’t ugly; my brain knew that. Yet I still felt the sense of ugliness and lack of confidence when it came to men. I wished I could walk into a room and feel like I was as beautiful as the rest of the women, but my brain just didn’t work like that. I constantly looked at the other women and what they were wearing. I examined how their jeans fit and how much better they looked in them than I did.
Being aware of your self-esteem issues didn’t exactly mean I could fix them, though. I just didn’t know how, and things like this made things worse for me. I ruminated on the possibility that the guy from the app had indeed come to the coffee shop but had not been interested in me at all. It was a sad feeling to think that you weren’t good enough; I hated it. The feelings were etched from my past and often came up for me, but on this day the feelings took over a little more than I wanted them to.
“Stop ruminating about this. I can see the thoughts going through your head!” Emma demanded.
“I’m fine. Don’t worry.”
“Seriously Dakota, you aren’t going to do this. You’re ten times more beautiful than me, and I’m not going to have you feeling all sad because some douche bag stood you up. How about we find out who those guys were from the club? I bet Bruce knows or can find out.”
“Yes!” I said instantly.
It was the first real chance I thought there was to figure out who that handsome stranger was. Maybe Bruce did know him or his friends. Maybe he would be able to get us in touch with them.
Chapter 11
Wyatt
“Ren, seriously, I don’t get it. This app tells me to go places, and there’s no one there. What happens if we never run into each other?” I asked.
There had to be another option. Ren invented the program; surely he could just hack into it and see who my match was. At this point, I would much rather just figure out who she was.
“I can do some testing. But the app will run this cycle for seven days.”
“Then what?”
“I’m not sure; I deleted it, remember. But it’s supposed to open up semi-direct communication again so you can message the match.”
“That would be great. You know you really should have worked some of these kinks out,” I joked.
“It worked great for people under the one hundred percent mark. Maybe you shouldn’t be such a damn perfect person.” He laughed.
Work was hard to concentrate on lately, and I was starting to realize why not having a relationship had worked so well for me all these years. I was trying to split my time between working, thinking about the dating app girl and thinking about the beautiful blonde that kept grabbing onto me in public places.
All day I found myself checking my cell phone to see if she had called. It wasn’t the best option to leave things in her hands; I would have much rather had her number. Waiting around for a girl to call wasn’t my thing normally, but I liked this girl. There was a connection between us that made me want to get to know her, not just screw her. I had to find her and explore whatever it was that was going on between us.
When I opened the dating app to see if there were any more messages, I saw one!
---Go to Green Power Coffee at 7:42 a.m.---
Fuck! It was 9:30 a.m. already. I had totally missed the message. I dialed up Ren in a bit of a panic. All of his stories about what went wrong when he didn’t follow the directions had me really worried since I had just totally missed this direction.
“Dude, I missed a message. It said to go to a coffee shop this morning, and I didn’t see it until now.”
“Do you want to delete the app and disable the phone? I can come help you?” he asked seriously.
“No, just use your hacking skills and figure out who this girl is. If I notice anything crazy going on, I’ll let you know.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes, but please just find out who she is.”
I hung up and instantly logged into my bank account through my work computer. I changed my passwords and moved some money into a separate bank account in the hopes that if one account were compromised, I’d still have access to the other.
I also went through my phone and updated my security measures, deleted my banking apps, and messed around with the dating app a little. There were some options that I hadn’t noticed before, so I decided to look through them.
One option was to give feedback on the program. It was mostly multiple choice questions, but there were a few areas that I could give feedback on. If there was a new developer working on the program, it was possible they had fixed the errors Ren talked about. But I made sure to note that I didn�
�t like the game as it was played up to that point.
Instantly after I clicked submit, a new window opened and asked me to explain in more detail what I was displeased about. It didn’t look like a regular e-mail window; instead, it looked like a chat window that had me connected to someone from customer service or something.
---I think the game would be better if we could see each other’s pictures.---
---THEN WHAT FUN WOULD IT BE?---
---How am I supposed to know who I’m looking for?---
---THE LOVE OF YOUR LIFE IS OUT THERE. LOOK WITH YOUR HEART INSTEAD OF YOUR EYES.---
Then the application disconnected, and the window closed. Looking with my heart wasn’t exactly what I was good at doing. I was a guy, after all. We noticed a woman’s looks and then fell in love with the rest of her. This application was becoming more and more frustrating, and I wasn’t sure how much longer I was going to be able to stand it.
I closed my phone and decided to focus on work for the rest of the day. There was no way I was going to be able to make money for myself and my clients if I was constantly worrying about what that stupid app had going on. Even though I did worry that I would miss a message, I had just to wait until the end of the day when my work was completed to look at it.
As 3:00 p.m. rolled around, the office was busy with excitement. A new Initial Public Offering, IPO, was doing very well that day, and we were all making a ton of money. Merrick was down on the trading room floor supervising some new traders, and I had just returned from there. It was pretty damn exciting to be on the floor when everyone was making money; it was a high that wasn’t equaled to anything I had ever been able to replicate outside of that environment. Not even an orgasm could compare.
When I stepped off the elevator, I felt an urge to look into the second elevator as I walked by. Normally, I would simply walk to my office, but I couldn’t help myself as I turned and saw the door closing. Inside was a red-haired woman and a blonde woman. I only got a very quick glance, but I could have sworn they were the same two women from the club.
Being on the tenth floor meant it would be impossible for me to run down the stairs to catch them, and my elevator had already closed. I froze as I tried to figure out what would be the best option.
I ran to my office and leaned against the glass as I looked down at the front door. If it were them, I would be able to tell if I could see their faces. They just had to look up for a moment, and I would know if it was them.
What felt like an agonizing amount of time passed, but then I saw the two women as they left the building. The blonde looked up at the street sign, and I was sure it was her! It was them! Why had they been on my floor?
Merrick—the redhead must have been visiting Merrick. I walked faster than normal to his office to talk with his assistant.
“Were there two women here to see Merrick?” I asked.
“Yes, they just left.”
“What were their names? Did they leave a number?”
“Wyatt, you can’t steal women from Merrick, that’s not cool,” the assistant teased.
“I don’t have their number. Please,” I begged.
“The redhead is Emma; she left a card for her dance studio. That’s all I know,” Wendy said as she handed me the card.
“Thank you!” I yelled as I took off back to my office with it.
“Give it to Merrick when you’re done.” She laughed.
I sat at my desk, trying to think of how I was going to handle this situation. Should I randomly just call this woman and see if she was indeed the one who had been friends with the blonde? It sounded crazy to do that.
Then I realized that the two women weren’t back at the studio yet, and maybe I could call and listen to the voicemail. Maybe they worked together there or something. I didn’t know. But I dialed the number anyways, to see what the message said.
“Hello, Dancetastic Dance Studio,” a woman’s voice answered.
I hung up.
What was I? A teenager? Had I seriously just hung up on this woman?
Luckily, I had called from my office line, and I knew if she called back it would just direct her to the main line. My call hadn’t confirmed anything to me. I still didn’t know for sure it was the same women, but I was fairly confident. I needed to see that woman again. There was an urge inside me that told me to stop worrying about that silly game and instead try to find this girl.
“Are you almost done?” I said when I called Merrick.
“Not ’til closing bell.”
“Come see me when you’re finished.”
I closed out my accounts for the day and tried to figure out how on earth I was going to get to meet this girl without looking like a totally insane person. The redhead had come to see Merrick, but the blonde hadn’t called me at all. Maybe she didn’t want to see me? Perhaps, I had felt a connection that was purely based on lust and not at all what was really going on between us. I was a man, after all; I could have thought the lust between us was a real connection. Either way, I needed to talk to her. To know her name, to actually take her on a date, and it was looking like Merrick was the key to making that happen.
It felt like forever before he came back from the stock exchange floor and walked into my office. I literally felt like I was going to explode as I tried to explain to him what had happened while he was gone.
“So you want me to call her and get the blonde girl’s number for you, even though you gave her your number and she didn’t call you?” Merrick said suspiciously.
“Well, when you say it like that, it doesn’t sound as good as it did in my head.”
“Maybe she thinks you’re ugly,” he joked.
“Maybe, but she seemed interested in me when we talked. Can you just call your girl and set up a double date or something? I mean she did come all the way down here to see you, and she left her business card for you.”
Merrick looked at the card and smiled.
“She was a nice girl. Feisty, though.”
“So, is that a yes?”
“I’m actually going out with Bambi again tonight. This will have to wait.”
“Come on Merrick; do this for me. I just need some time with this girl.”
Merrick contemplated my offer and then started to dial his phone. He wasn’t a man who sat back and waited for things to happen. He liked to take control and make things happen right away; that was probably why he was the one running the company, and I had just hung up on a beautiful woman.
“Hello, this is Merrick Stanley; you dropped your card off for me?” he said sternly, not at all like a man who was flirtatious with women.
“Yes, and you’re the woman who argued with me and turned me down,” he said as a grin flashed across his face.
I couldn’t hear what the woman was saying, but it was funny to watch Merrick as his face responded to her. There was a connection between those two also, but it was close to an explosion, and not just a fun and flirty connection.
“How about we take you ladies out to dinner tomorrow?” Merrick asked. “Yes, that’s the one. I’ll bring him along so your friend can have her way with him.”
I covered my eyes in embarrassment. This wasn’t at all what I had hoped for when I asked Merrick to call the women back.
“We will be there at eight. See you then,” he said as he hung up.
“What the hell happened? Did you get her name?”
“Nope. I didn’t get her name, but we are taking them out tomorrow, so get yourself together man. What’s come over you lately?”
“I don’t know. Just too much going on, I guess.”
The truth was I had too much of a love life going on. I wasn’t used to thinking about women and relationships so much during my day. Typically, I didn’t have to think about them at all. I had my women at night, and my work in the daytime, and that was how I liked things. Everything would be better after I met this girl again.
Then the app made a noise. I rushed to open it and saw the loo
k on Merrick’s face at my excitement. I couldn’t help it. I hoped there would be something different than what I had dealt with so far.
---Meet her at FAO Scwartz tonight at 8:00 p.m.---
I just rolled my eyes at the message. This whole idea of chasing down a girl I didn’t even know was getting exhausting. I didn’t really want to play the game any longer, especially since Merrick had arranged for us to go out with the two girls from the club.
“What did it say?”
“It’s just another message about where I’m supposed to go and try to meet this girl. It’s getting old. I don’t know how much longer I’m going to be willing to keep this up.”
“What does Ren say about it all?”
“He’s working on hacking the program. I just don’t think it’s worth it. I really liked that girl from the club; she seemed very sweet. Maybe I’m just not making an effort for the right girls. I think I’m going to go after this one a little different way.”
“Like I go after them?” Merrick winked.
“No, I’m not sure yet. But I’ll figure it out.”
“Are you going to do what the app said?” he asked.
The truth was that I really didn’t know. I didn’t want to keep running around the city after this girl, but I was curious as to what she would look and act like. I wasn’t willing to give up on this 100% match from the app just yet. But I certainly didn’t want to give up on the delicious blonde from the club either.
“Yeah, I guess I’m going to FAO Schwartz tonight.” I laughed.
“And the date tomorrow?”
“I’m doing that too. This is my dating phase, I guess.”
I felt like it was all culminating into some sort of meeting, and I wanted to follow everything through.
Chapter 12
Dakota
“Was that him?” I asked, barely able to control my excitement.
“It was Merrick. We are going out on a double date tomorrow with him and his friend.”
The rumble in my stomach from excitement was hard to control. We were so lucky that Bruce had known who Merrick was and how to get in touch with him. And that Merrick had called Emma back so quickly.
Four Reasons to Come: A Reverse Harem Romance Page 51
