She was an expert at detaching from emotion and all its foibles. It made her an excellent teacher; it had allowed her to build a perfect life. A few months ago she had bought her own tiny house, and now she had added a dog to the picture she was building.
Okay, the dog, a rescue, was maybe not quite as imagined, but—
Rap. Rap. Rap.
Krissy let out a little squeak of surprise at the firm sound and then laughed at herself, and at how hard her heart was beating.
For a moment, had she really believed her beloved aunt was knocking?
“No,” she said out loud.
Yes, a voice inside her whispered.
The sound came again, more insistent. Not from heaven, after all, but from the direction of the front door. She squinted in that direction. It was dark out, nearly 10:00 p.m. A shiver ran up and down her spine, and not because a wind, too chilly for the first week in June, chose that moment to rattle the door.
There was a man standing out there, his knee-length black coat unbuttoned to reveal long legs in knife-pressed dark slacks, an expensive belt, a tailored shirt, a bold tie. He had dark leather gloves that he was slapping with faint impatience against his wrist, as if he expected her to jump up and open the door, despite the Closed sign, despite the fact it was an unusual hour, despite the fact she was in here alone.
Krissy regarded him for a moment. She did not go for blond men. Actually, there was quite a long list of the kind of man she did not go for, which explained why she was single.
And blissfully so.
Still, she could almost hear Aunt Jane’s voice.
“Darling, I know I could make you the perfect match if you would just give me the chance.”
And Jane was nothing if not tenacious. Just before she had died, she had called, breathless with excitement.
“I found him. I found the one for you.”
There is no one for me, Krissy had told her aunt, not for the first time. Her aunt, of all people, should understand Krissy’s allergy to relationships.
But the fact that Krissy had decided against entanglements of the permanent variety didn’t mean she didn’t enjoy the odd outing, a date, a peek. If Krissy was watching a movie, or studying cologne ads on the train, her ideal man was not blond. He was the quintessential tall, dark and handsome.
The man at the door was tall, and he was handsome. He was broad at the shoulder, narrow at his hips, long in his legs. His face was GQ gorgeous—a wide, intelligent brow; high cheekbones; dark whisker-shadowed jaw; perfect nose; firm lips.
Under the outside light, his eyes appeared midnight black. The dark whiskers and eyebrows, the dark eyes, made the blond hair a bit of a shock. In fact, he radiated successful—very successful—businessman, but his hair was wheat and platinum, something sun-kissed and surfer-off-the-waves about it that was in sharp and intriguing contrast to the rest of his image.
He cocked his head at her, and Krissy gave herself a mental shake. She pointed at the Closed sign that hung in the door, and then at her watch.
Charades: too late to be calling on a closed business. She pretended to dismiss him, by looking down at Alexandro Helinski’s file. She opened it officiously, being careful not to look at that question.
What do you do for fun?
That man outside the door looked like he might know a thing or two about having fun… Not that she cared!
The second question on Match Made in Heaven’s application form.
What would you describe as your life philosophy?
Alexandro had answered, in a firm hand,
Take the high road.
Something sighed within Krissy.
Rap. Rap. Rap.
She deliberately looked at the next question, instead of looking up.
What do you consider the most important attribute in another human being?
Alexandro had answered Honor.
Krissy thought this was a man she would be interested in meeting. If he wasn’t sixty-eight!
Her visitor at the door was not getting the message. He rapped at the door again. She glanced up, irritated. She was not opening the door to a complete stranger. It was practically the middle of the night.
When he saw he had her attention, he held something against the door, a small white card. His business card? Why would she open the door for a business card? Any ax murderer could have a card printed!
Still, from the look on his face, he wasn’t going anywhere, one of those extraordinarily good-looking men far too used to getting his own way. Making it very evident that she was annoyed, Krissy got up from the desk and stomped over to the door.
She looked at the card being held to the glass.
It wasn’t a business card, after all. It was an appointment card, for Match Made in Heaven, the blanks filled out in her aunt’s own distinctive handwriting.
Jonas Boyden had an appointment here. And the date on it was for today. At 10:00 p.m. What was her aunt thinking, conducting business at that time of night in this quiet Queens street?
Now what? Krissy couldn’t even make phone calls to tell people her aunt had died. It felt even worse to try and shout that horrible announcement through the thick glass of the doorway.
Besides, one of her aunt’s many strengths had been her tremendous ability to vet people before they ever got through the door. Jane had taken to the internet like the proverbial duck to water. She was proud of announcing that she could find out anything about anyone. She had loved playing online detective. Krissy sometimes felt Jane enjoyed rejecting clients as much as she had enjoyed accepting them.
Jane claimed her high reject ratio made people want her services even more, had
