Everyone But Herself

I've built my empire on understanding desire.

Not the shallow kind—not the swipe-right, check-a-box, looks-good-on-paper kind. The deep kind. The kind that makes a forty-two-year-old CEO tear up when I tell her I've found someone who will actually see her. The kind that makes a cynical divorce attorney soften when he realizes his match laughs at the same obscure jokes he does.

Ashford & Associates has a ninety-three percent success rate. The highest in Manhattan. I've been profiled in Vogue, interviewed by the Times, and name-dropped at dinner parties across the Upper East Side. When the wealthy and discerning want love, they come to me.

What they don't know—what no one knows—is that I've never found it for myself.

My office occupies the top floor of a brownstone on the Upper West Side. Floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking Central Park. Soft lighting. Furniture chosen to put nervous clients at ease. Everything intentional, everything curated, everything under control.

Just like me.

It's Tuesday afternoon when Marcus Blackwood walks into my office for what should be a routine check-in. He's been a client for four months. Media mogul. Built his streaming empire from nothing. The kind of man who walks into rooms and rearranges the energy to suit himself.

I've matched him with three exceptional women. He's rejected all of them.

"Vivian." He settles into the chair across from my desk, unbuttoning his jacket with the practiced ease of a man who's comfortable everywhere. His dark hair is threaded with silver at the temples, and there's something almost leonine about the way he watches me—patient, predatory, utterly certain of his eventual success. "We need to talk about your methodology."

"My methodology has a ninety-three percent success rate, Mr. Blackwood."

"Marcus." His dark eyes hold mine. "And I'm not interested in your other clients' success rates. I'm interested in why you keep sending me women who aren't you."

The words land like a slap.

I've been propositioned before. Wealthy men often confuse the intimacy of the matchmaking process with something more personal. But Marcus isn't propositioning. He's stating a fact, the way he might state quarterly earnings or acquisition targets.

"I'm your matchmaker," I say, keeping my voice even. "Not your match."

"Then you've been misreading the data." He leans forward, elbows on his knees, and for a moment I see past the media mogul to something rawer underneath. Hunger, barely restrained. "I've done my research on you, Vivian. You know everything about your clients—our fears, our desires, what we need versus what we think we want. But you've never let anyone know you that way."

My throat tightens. "That's not—&q...