“I was scared!”
“About the consequences of your own actions?”
“No!” He grabbed my arm again, more firmly this time. “About losing you. I was scared of losing you before I even had a chance to figure out what this was between us.”
I wanted to believe him. God, I wanted to believe him so badly it physically hurt.
But I couldn’t. Not after what I’d heard.
“Let me go, Dane.”
“We matched,” he blurted out.
I froze. “What?”
“On Cupid’s Arrow. We matched.” He was talking fast now, the words tumbling out in a rush. “I made a profile. I answered every question honestly. I put in my actual interests, my actual values, what I’m actually looking for. And the algorithm matched us.”
I stared at him. “You’re lying.”
“I’m not. Check your email.”
I didn’t have to check my email. I had seen it, but I had no idea it was him.
“Look. Here’s my profile. Here’s yours. The system matched us at almost a hundred percent compatibility. Do you know how rare that is? The algorithm doesn’t lie.”
I felt like I’d been punched in the stomach. “You made a fake profile to trick me?” My voice came out hollow.
“No! It’s not fake. It’s the realest thing I’ve ever done.” He was holding his phone out to me like it was proof of something. “I spent hours on it. I answered every single question as honestly as I could. I didn’t game the system or manipulate the data. I just put myself out there and the algorithm found you.”
“The algorithm,” I repeated flatly. “Here we go again.”
“Yes! Don’t you see? This is what I’ve been trying to tell everyone. The data doesn’t lie. The system works. We’re compatible. The science proves it.”
And just like that, whatever tiny fragment of hope I’d been clinging to shattered completely.
“The data,” I said softly. “The algorithm. The science.”
“Yes.” He looked so earnest. I could see he was desperate for me to understand. “We match. It’s meant to be. The numbers?—”
“Stop.” I held up my hand. “Just stop.”
He looked confused.
“You really don’t get it, do you?” Fresh tears burned my eyes, but these were different. These were angry tears. “You’re standing here trying to convince me that we belong together by citing data. By showing me percentages and compatibility scores. Like I’m some kind of equation you can plug your dick into.”
“Whoa, that’s not what I’m doing,” he said, shaking his head.
“That’s exactly what you’re doing!” I groaned in frustration. “You needed an algorithm to tell you it was okay to want me. You needed data to confirm what you were feeling.”
“I’m not saying that’s the only reason, but the data?—”
“The data, the data, the data!” I was shouting now. “That’s all you care about! You can’t just feel something and trust it. You have to have proof. You can’t even trust your own heart without it.”
He reached for me but I stepped back.
I felt tears streaming down my face. “Love isn’t something you can buy and sell, Dane. It’s not a product. It’s not data. It’s magic. It’s a feeling. It’s trusting someone enough to be vulnerable even when you’re terrified. It’s jumping without knowing if there’s a net.”
“I know that.”
