The silence stretched between us until I broke it. “I thought you were happy.”
She snorted derisively. “How could I be when I’m just a broodmare so Gio can get his money?”
I sucked in a sharp breath. “How?”
“The door wasn’t closed properly. Our doorbell cam picked everything up. I spent the night researching while he slept.” She laughed, the sound a tad hysterical. “He didn’t even hide it. How blind was I? Deep down, I knew he still held feelings for you. I knew about your birthday gift, for fuck’s sake! What did I get for my birthday?” She scoffed. “Flowers!” When I looked mystified, she shook her head. “Allergies.”
“Candice, I’m sorry,” I said with genuine sadness. For all that had happened, she wasn’t at fault for any of it.
She waved away my apology. “Oh, I knew you didn’t want him back. All I had to do was listen to how you spoke about Brady. Are you still with him?”
I shook my head. “Not right now. Working on it.”
“Gio, right?” She sighed. “He fucked up your relationship hoping you’d come back to him.”
“Yeah,” I said with a sigh. “Not happening.”
“I know. Can you help me, Xavi? I know it’s a lot to ask for considering…”
“You did nothing wrong,” I interrupted. “Gio lied to us both. He used you. If anything, you’re a victim in this.”
Candice straightened, her expression firming. “I hate being the victim, so will you help me? I need to keep the boys away from his family, make sure I get enough to support them…”
“Yeah, I know just the right person to help you out.”
Malik was going to get a kick out of helping Candice keep custody of her kids and wring Gio for every penny of child support the court would allow.
We didn’t talk for much longer. Both of us were too lost in our thoughts for much conversation. I offered any help with her case that Candice needed, though I doubted the court would take Gio’s ex-husband’s opinion into account. The whole thing left me with a bad taste in my mouth.
Before she left, I apologized for not telling her myself. “I shouldn’t have let you find out like that.”
Candice shook her head sadly. “I wouldn’t have believed you. I needed to hear it from him. Thanks for this, Xavi.” She tapped Malik’s details on my business card. “This helps a lot.”
The reminder dinged in my phone’s planner: Brady’s birthday. Two days had passed since Candice’s visit to my office, and my Mate Match profile was still pending. I was getting more than a little frustrated when an email from the app landed in my inbox.
Please contact Mate Match support regarding your Mate Match profile.
Strange. I picked up my phone and found the number for the support team. A tired voice answered. “Hello, this is Mate Match support. How can I assist you in your Mate Match search?”
“Hey, I got an email about my profile. It’s been three days. I know it’s normal to wait a day or two, but now I’ve been told to call.”
The person sounded far more alert. “Could you confirm your details, please, so I can pull up the profile?”
I told him my name, my email, and answered his questions until he asked for a moment to read it through. I swear I heard a tiny laugh. “Alright, Mr. Cross, I think I see the problem.”
“Problem?”
“You have a specific person in mind, don’t you?”
“Yes. How—?”
“That’s not really what Mate Match does,” he explained patiently. “We find compatible people based on our questionnaires, not hand you over a specific omega.”
“I don’t want you to just hand him over. The whole point of this was proving to him that I’m his person. To prove we are meant to be without a shadow of a doubt. If your program flags us as a match organically, then he can’t argue with it, can he?”
“What if it doesn’t?”
“Trust me, it will.” I made myself sound confident.
