"Elite Connections has been trying to break into the athlete demographic for two years. The market is there. The access isn't." Her milk bath acrylics tapped a staccato on the desktop.
Emmy's pulse kicked up. She could see where this was going. The shape of the opportunity forming before Cecelia even articulated it.
"Your brother just got married. Beautiful wedding at the Four Seasons—I saw the photos in Boston Magazine. Shame, really. He would've been an ideal client. The publicity from matching a professional athlete could open doors we've been locked out of for years. One successful placement with someone like him, and suddenly we'd have credibility with an entirely new demographic."
The comment hung between them. Emmy knew what she was supposed to say. Something about West's happiness. Something about how some things mattered more than business development.
But her brain was already racing ahead, cataloging possibilities. West had teammates. Friends. People in his orbit who were single, successful, and probably dealing with the exact same dating challenges Cecelia had just described.
"West has teammates." The words came out smooth. Confident. "Friends in similar situations who might benefit from professional matchmaking."
"Do you have relationships with any of them?"
This was it. The pivot point. The moment between her current life and the one she wanted.
The truth was simple: shedidn'thave relationships with West's teammates. She barely had a relationship with West anymore, not since he'd moved to the suburbs with his wife and started his settled married life. It wasn't anyone's fault—there were seven years between them, and though they always been close, it was just what happened when someone's life leveled-up and yours didn’t. When you were still in the same apartment, still between things, still waiting for the version of yourself you'd promised everyone you were becoming.
But saying so would end this interview.
Except there wasoneperson. Not a teammate, exactly—not the way she thought of teammates. Someone who had been at her family's dinner table more times than she could count.
Grant Knight.
West's best friend since college. Quarterback. Three-time league MVP. Team captain. Face on billboards.Zerointerest in Emmy meddling in his personal life.
That was the problem. She'd known Grant her entire life—he'd been at their house since she was five years old, since West was twelve and Grant was the cool older kid from down the street who could throw a perfect spiral. He'd been at every graduation, every holiday, every Sunday dinner her parents still set a place for him at. He was so woven into the fabric of her family that she'd never once thought to look at him sideways.
Her brain had never filed him under anything exceptWest's. Except for approximately two years in high school when she'd filed him under something else entirely, but she'd been sixteen and he'd been twenty-three and that particular folder had been very firmly deleted.
You didn't matchmake family. You especially didn't matchmake family you'd once had a teenage crush on that both of you pretended had never happened.
But Cecelia didn't know that.
"Grant Knight." The name came out like a completely reasonable thing to say. "We grew up next door to each other—our families are close."
All technically true. The Woodhouses and the Knights had been neighbors for years. Grant had been at Emmy's high school graduation. She'd been at his NFL draft party. They were connected through a decade of proximity and shared history.
What wasn't true—what wascompletefabrication—was the implication that she and Grant were still close. That she had any claim on his time or attention. That she could walk up to him and say "hey, want to let me find you a wife?" without him looking at her like she'd lost her mind.
But Cecelia was leaning forward now, interest sharpening her features into something that looked hungry.
“TheGrant Knight." She didn't say it like she was testing the name. She already knew exactly who he was. "Thirty-two. Unmarried. No serious relationships in the past three years." She paused. "You could get him to sign on as a client?"
Emmy's throat went dry. Her heart hammered against her ribs. Everything intelligent in her was screaming that this was a terrible idea, that she was about to promise something she couldn't deliver, that she should backtrack right now before this went any further.
But everything ambitious in her—everything that had been waiting for an opportunity exactly like this since she'd graduated college and realized her Communications degree didn't come with a roadmap—was louder.
"Yes. I can do that."
Cecelia considered her with blade-sharp eyes. Emmy watched the calculation happen, risk versus reward playing out in real time. She forced herself to breathe normally. To maintain eye contact. To look like someone who absolutely could deliver on this promise.
Finally, Cecelia reached across her desk for a business card.
"Here's how this works." She slid the card toward Emmy. "Bring me Grant Knight as a signed client within two weeks. Contracted, committed, willing to let us represent him in his search for a partner. If you can do that, you have a position here. Junior matchmaker, athlete demographic specialty. You'll have access to our resources, our network, my expertise. You'll also have autonomy to build this division as you see fit."
Emmy took the card. Her hands wanted to shake. She didn't let them. "And if I can't?"
"Then you're remarkably good at interviews but not particularly good at delivering results." Cecelia's smile was thin. "And Elite Connections doesn't have room for the former without the latter."
