.

grinned, waiting for voice mail to pick up.

      Darned if she wasn’t as big an operator as Mr. Quinn.

       4

      “HI, JUSTIN, NICE TO MEET YOU. Come on in.”

      Justin shook Marie’s hand, impressed by her grip. She wasn’t what he’d expected. Her rich voice on the phone had him imagining a broad-shouldered Amazon, not this intriguing mix of elfin and elegant. Small, plump, with short auburn hair and scattered bangs above hazel eyes emphasized tastefully with makeup. She wore a stylish reddish-brown suit with a silk scarf of beige, orange and yellow, the colors combining to evoke pictures of a New England fall.

      “Nice to meet you, too.” He stood looking around, hands in his pockets, portrait of a brand-new dating client nervously ready to put his ego on the line. He hoped the act was convincing. “Great office. Very inviting.”

      “I’m pleased you noticed.” She leaned over her desk to make a quick note in a folder—that he appreciated decor?—and gestured to one of the two chairs in front of her desk. “Have a seat.”

      “Thanks.” He dropped into the comfortable chair, rubbing his hands along his thighs, poor ill-at-ease dude who could barely handle the stress of putting himself out there. “So, how do we do this?”

      He was having fun already. Not that he wanted the lovely Marie and the even-more-lovely Candy to be involved in anything shady, but it was great to be back to the rush of an investigation. Writing the computer book with Troy was a good idea, a great career move, satisfying in many ways, but not exactly a thrill ride.

      “We ‘do this’ any way that makes you comfortable, Justin. You and I can talk, or you can fill out paperwork, or we can fill it out together. What do you think?”

      “Well …” He shrugged lamely. “I’m okay talking.”

      “Good.” She dimpled a smile, and instead of taking the Interviewer Seat behind her desk, came around and settled into the chair next to him. “That’s the way I like getting to know our clients, too.”

      “Do I tell you my life story?”

      “I’ve got some of it here.” She opened his folder; he could see part of the form he’d completed online with basic information—name, address, marital status, brief romantic history. “You’re straight, college educated, nonsmoker, never married but coming off a relationship in California. Would you mind talking about it with me?”

      Oof. He hadn’t planned on this. “No, not at all.”

      “How serious was it?”

      “More for me than for her.” He couldn’t help the bitterness seeping into his voice. “When a job came open in Milwaukee I knew it was time to cut ties and go.”

      “You’re a writer …”

      “I was a journalism major, did technical writing and some reporting on the side in California. Now I’m writing a non-fiction book with a friend and hoping to get back into the print-media business as well.”

      “Interesting career.” She made a note. Rating him on the Great Catch vs. Loser scale? “How long have you been single, Justin?”

      “Oh …” He rubbed his hands together, not having to fake the nerves and reluctance any more. Single? Calculations were hard, since as a couple he and Angie had been on-and-off and off-and-on for the better part of a year since he’d met her at a friend’s beach party. Finally last fall he’d left her apartment swearing it was over for good that time, and though he got suckered into one more night with her—saying no to sex with Angie was a skill he took a while to master—he’d never felt the same way about her again. You could only kick a dog so many times. “About five months.”

      “Five months.” Marie was watching him carefully, probably taking in more signals than he knew he was sending. He unclenched his hands, which he hadn’t noticed were fisted until Marie glanced at them. Bizarre interview, both of them talking on one level while searching for a deeper, possibly contradictory story lurking underneath. “And you feel ready to move on?”

      “I am ready to move on.” That much he could state firmly and with absolute honesty.

      “Good to hear.” Another note in his folder. “Are you comfortable talking about why the relationship didn’t work out?”

      “You don’t pull punches.”

      “No, I don’t.” She leaned toward him, eyes earnest. “This is what sets Milwaukeedates.com apart from other sites. I want my clients to find partners who can give them what they need. If you don’t understand what you need, or keep reliving destructive patterns by choosing and discarding the same type of person, you’re going to have trouble finding happy-ever-after. The best way to ensure future romantic success is to dig into the whys and whats of past relationships and sort those out before you meet someone new. This is why I always ask this question, even though it can be difficult and emotional to answer. That said, if you’re not comfortable with it, that’s entirely fine.”

      Justin nodded as if he were considering her words, keeping his face blank while internal chemistry urged him to run far and fast. He’d thought he’d be able to walk into Marie’s office, answer a few superficial questions, gather some evidence as to whether she threw Candy at every first-timer, then get out. He wasn’t expecting to have to eviscerate himself and lay his entrails out for her inspection.

      “The relationship didn’t work because …” He couldn’t say she was a man-eater and I was dinner, because it was more complicated than that. Angie had been a beautiful, sexual, vulnerable mess. She was a cheater and I was a sap didn’t work either. He needed a more balanced and less angry sound bite. “I was willing to commit to an exclusive dating arrangement and she wasn’t.”

      “She was seeing other men.”

      “Compulsively.” Justin resettled in the chair, beginning to perspire. He’d thought he’d be doing the investigating here.

      “You think her behavior was beyond her control?”

      “No. But it was her way of coping with baggage and avoiding commitment. She was trying to fill a black hole of need for reassurance that she was desirable and worthy of love.”

      Marie sent him a sympathetic look that stopped short of pity. “It sounds as if you have a good handle on the dynamic. How long did you date her?”

      He gritted his teeth. “Nearly a year.”

      “Was she dating other men that whole time?” Marie asked the question as if she wanted to know what was available for lunch, while he was using all forces at his disposal not to writhe too obviously.

      “I knew of one at the beginning. One at the end. I strongly suspect there were others. Flirtations certainly.”

      Marie pressed her lips together and let the silence settle for several seconds. Letting him relax? Building more tension? “Did you think that by staying with her you could save her, Justin? Fix her?”

      There it was, the sucker punch. He hated being dragged through this Dr. Phil torture. “I hoped … that what we had would be enough, yeah.”

      Marie let more time go by. Which probably meant he had another killer question to look forward to. He relaxed his diaphragm, made sure his hands stayed open.

      “Do you think there was something you could have done differently that would have affected the relationship’s outcome?”

      Boom. Marie knew her stuff. He felt like squirming in his chair, the schoolboy asked the tough question in front of the class, wanting to avoid answering at all costs. But he’d come this far; he had to fight on to the payoff—when he was matched up with Candy … or not.

      He forced himself to consider her question seriously, to think back carefully through a jumble of hot nights, cold mornings,