Faking It to Making It by Ally Blake

Author:Ally Blake
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2013-07-08T16:00:00+00:00

SEVEN

First thing Monday morning Saskia sat in the foyer at Dating By Numbers, humming to herself. Her eyes roved happily over the golden-framed artwork, the fresh flowers on every surface, the discreetly frosted glass walls, the thick white carpet that must be a bitch to keep clean.

With many online businesses run from a home offices these days, instead the dating site took up the top floor of a beautiful old building in elegant Kew. It seemed there was a lot of money to be made in facilitating the search for true love. And in random hook-ups, one night stands, invites to friends of friends’ weddings...

“Saskia? Marlee Kent,” said a tall, elegant woman with a slick dark bob. She could have been aged anywhere from early forties to late fifties.

Saskia pulled herself from the overly soft couch and shook the woman’s hand, before following her through padded velvet doors into a discreetly elegant office beyond, where on a tidy desk sparkled two big glass bowls—one filled with Baci chocolate kisses, the other with condoms.

“So you joined the site?” Marlee asked as they sat, her long red nails wrapped around the handle of an old-fashioned china coffeepot as she poured without asking how Saskia liked it.

Saskia reached into her bag for her yellow legal pad. “I did. A few weeks back.”

“And what did you think?”

“It’s very thorough. As a researcher, I like thorough.”

Marlee’s smile didn’t reach her eyes. “And you’ve found someone?”

“Excuse me?” Saskia said, wondering if it was written all over her face that she’d been on the receiving end of some very hot and thorough loving only a couple of hours before, when Nate had turned up at her door before work for a breakfast special.

“You mentioned a case study in your email?”

“Oh. Yes. Well, studying him, getting the man’s perspective, has been most helpful.”

“I see.” Marlee clearly saw plenty, as that time the smile did reach her eyes. “Then my job here is done.”

“No,” Saskia said, her cheeks threatening to ripen like a tomato. “It’s not like that. We’re not...romantically involved.” Financially, sexually, mutually helpingly, at times frustratingly, but not romantically.

After he’d left that first night she’d found the dossier. Her heart had fluttered as she’d opened it, her stomach tumbling as she’d giddily imagined what he’d revealed to her only to find a few random titbits such as his favourite footy players, how he liked his coffee, the phone number of the best dry cleaner in East Melbourne. She’d thought he’d turned a corner. Instead he’d given a lollipop to quieten a noisy toddler.

And while Nate might be charming, hot as the sun and could make her melt with a whisper of breath, the touch of his lips, the slide of a hand, even after he’d given her the most exquisite sex of her life, she didn’t feel any closer to breaking down that door.

“So, honey,” said Marlee, gently breaking into her reverie, “what do you need from me?”

“Well, okay,” Saskia said, pulling herself together. “I have the preliminaries down.

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