The Matchmaker's Playbook (Wingmen Inc., #1)(74)

It was a glance.

One freaking glance.

That I would regret for the rest of my life.

Blake.

David.

Kissing.

I held up my phone, unable to stop myself from taking a picture of the lip-lock, thinking at any minute she was going to push him away, slap him, stand up, and leave.

She didn’t.

I snapped the photo.

And when Lex peeled out of the parking lot, I hit the final nail in our relationship coffin. Hey, look at that—we made it to three weeks.

Apparently, our matchmaking program needed a bit more work.

I clicked “Send” with the caption Hope you enjoyed dessert.

“Lex,” I mumbled once we got back to the house. “Get me drunk. Now.”

He stared at me, his face unreadable, which wasn’t like Lex. We’d been friends for years, and he’d never, in all our time hanging out, looked at me like that, not even when I was injured and in the hospital.

For the first time in my adult life, my best friend looked at me with pity.

It sucked.



“We don’t have enough to get you drunk, that’s the bad news,” Lex announced once we were back at the house and I was staring down at the countertop, my mind a blur of anger and disappointment and, if I was being completely honest, a lot of sadness.

The sadness I refused to deal with.

Because dealing with sadness meant mourning, and that was stupid. Why would I mourn something that I barely even had?

But anger? I could completely work with that. How the hell did someone like me get in this position? Granted, we were doomed to fail. Fine, I got that part, but why lead me on?

“How’s it feel?” Lex poured me a glass of whiskey and sat across from me in the barstool.

“Um, getting my heart broken? Gee, I don’t know, Lex. It kinda tickles, like a feather getting stuck up my ass. What the hell, man, are you serious right now?”

“I mean, being on the other side.” He looked honest-to-God curious. “The one who gets rejected even though clearly he’s a better choice.”

“Oh, please. You saw the numbers.”

“Right. The numbers. Don’t tell me you really believe that shit. Yeah, we based our company on it, fine. And yes, for the most part it works. But it never takes into account chemistry. You get that, right? A computer can’t do that.”

“And the day it can . . .”

“Right, we’re screwed, because robots will be taking over the world. Lucky for you, I’ll be heading up the takeover, so I’ll save you a spot on the mother ship.” He rolled his eyes. “Seriously, I can’t believe I’m having a chick-talk with you, but there is no mathematic equation for chemistry. At all. You can’t force it, and you can’t predict it. She and David may look good on paper, but does he turn her on? Do his smiles make her want to die inside? His kiss—is it panty-melting? Isn’t that what chicks say?”

I held a hand up like a stop sign. “I think we need more alcohol if you’re going to use words like ‘panty-melting,’ Lex.”

“Pretend I’m a chick.”

“I’d rather not. Since I hate all women right now, I’m bound to do something stupid, like kiss you in hormonal confusion, then try to slam this bottle over your head in rage.”

“First off, don’t kiss me—it will ruin our friendship.” He held up one finger, then another. “Second, we’re both into girls, so I think it goes without saying that the experimental stage passed around the same time we went through English 101.” Another finger flipped up. “And third, if you hit me over the head with a bottle or even a pillow, I’ll probably take you down like I did in the sixth grade when you told Amanda that all the metal in my mouth made it so that aliens could see me from space.”

“You want me to talk?” I laughed bitterly. “About what it feels like to watch a girl you’ve just been screwing kiss another guy? Or the girl you care about lie to you? How about this?” I held one finger at a time as I made my own list. “It sucks. I want to kill David. I want her to hurt just as bad as I hurt. I want the pain in the middle of my chest to alleviate enough so I can freaking breathe. I want to slam the door in her face, then apologize and pull her into my arms and beg her to choose me.” I stared at my hand, all fingers extended, then shook it as though doing so would cross the items off my list. “I want so many damn things and I’m so confused that I think my only option is to drown myself in the whiskey we apparently don’t have enough of. That’s the truth.”

Lex was silent.

The kitchen clock ticked in the distance, grating on my already-frayed nerves.

“Well.” Lex cleared his throat. “You have two choices. Tell her you saw her and confront her face-to-face, or just . . . let her go without explanation. One’s easier on you, and the other is hard on you both. Think about it, and don’t make the douche mistake of being dramatic about it. Remember, we have dicks.”

“Could have fooled me, since it seems like she just kicked mine clean off and laughed while doing it.”

“That was your heart, not your dick. You know the difference, so stop being an ass and drink the rest of that whiskey.”

“Two drops left. Think if I close my eyes and click my heels together, it will turn into two bottles?”