“What do you mean, start looking?” Moose said. “Hell, it only took one date for the rest of us.”
“Yeah,” Coop said. “Trust BODS.”
Gage nodded. “It works.”
Tag couldn’t jump right into making his woman fall in love with him. He had to ease her into it. Hell, he’d have to date some poor girls to appease his buddies while he worked on his plan. Which meant playing the BODS system.
His phone vibrated in his pocket. He pulled it out and smiled. The beginning of his strategy was just starting into motion. He glanced up at his friends. “I’ll enter my data this week. In the meantime, I have to go.”
“What?” Sean glared at him. “This is an official meeting of the Billionaires Anonymous Club. Nobody walks out on the rest of us. Especially while there’s still beer in the pitcher.”
“Sorry, but I have to help a friend with some software issues.” He pushed back from his chair. “Besides, you guys’ll finish off that beer in no time.”
Coop stood and extended his hand. “You’ll be at the wedding?”
Tag took his hand and pulled him into a hug. “I’ll be there.”
“Will you be bringing your plus one from your BODS selection?” Moose asked. He stood as well and hugged his friend.
“I promised to bring Leslie.” Tag grinned. “She feels responsible for the match and wanted to see the happy occasion brought about by BODS.”
“She needs to sign up in her own system,” Moose said. “She’s a great gal.”
“She is,” Tag said. “And yes, she does need to sign up in BODS.” That was his plan. To get Leslie thinking about dating again. Then he’d find a way to show her he was the right man for her, even if he had to hack into BODS to do it.
* * *
“I can’t believe the site is down.” Leslie Lamb paced back and forth across the office. “I’ve tried everything I could think of to get it back up. I’ve rebooted the server, rebooted the modem, reinstalled the software and nothing.”
Ava Swan patted Leslie’s arm. “Don’t worry. I called Tag. He should be here in thirty minutes.”
Leslie’s eyes widened. “You called Tag?” She shook her head. “He can’t keep bailing us out whenever I can’t figure out the system. That’s my job. I’m the software engineer.”
“And he’s better at the networking aspect of BODS. He helped set it up.”
“I know. I know.” Leslie waved an arm out to the side, her pulse pounding, a full-on panic attack building inside. “He has his own business, a billion-dollar corporation, that requires his attention.”
Ava cocked an eyebrow. “He spends an awful lot of time here, helping you, for a man who has a billion-dollar corporation.”
Leslie smiled. “Ever since Randy died, he’s been there for me. I don’t know how I could have come through all that without Tag. He, Randy and I were such close friends from the very beginning.”
Ava tilted her head. “What do you mean?”
Leslie gave her assistant and friend a soft, sad smile. “Randy, Tag and I met at a cocktail party hosted by a mutual friend, Chance Montgomery. You might have heard of him…?”
“Wow.” Ava blinked. “Chance Montgomery? The most eligible bachelor in the state of Texas?”
Leslie nodded. “Back then, he wasn’t quite the building giant he is today. He was a rising star, as were Tag and Randy. They were just hitting their stride. Anyway, we shared a ride home in a taxi.” She shrugged. “The rest was history.”
Her assistant’s brow twisted. “You became friends after sharing a ride?”
“I know. It sounds crazy. They saw me home and made sure I got into my apartment safely. Tag and Randy bonded as well. They became good friends and included me on all their outings, even when they went fishing out of Rockport.” Leslie smiled, staring out the window at the Austin night skyline. “We had so many good times together.”
“But you married Randy, not Tag,” Ava raised her hands palms upward. “Why Randy over Tag?”
Leslie chuckled. “I have to admit, it was a tough decision. Actually, Randy asked me. Tag didn’t. I was ready to get married, settle down and raise children. So was Randy. I don’t think Tag was. He was still working his way to the top.” Leslie walked around Ava’s desk and stared down at the photos her assistant kept of her daughter Mica. “We wanted children.” She hugged Ava’s shoulders. “You don’t know how lucky you are to have Mica. She’s an amazing little girl.”
Ava nodded. “I know I’m lucky. She’s the center of my universe. And now, she’s the center of Sean’s and my universe. I can’t get over how much she loves him, and he loves her.”
“Love me, love my child?” Leslie asked.
“Exactly,” Ava said, her gaze going to the picture of Sean, her and Mica at the fair. Mica held a fluffy, stuffed unicorn in one arm with her other arm wrapped around Sean’s neck as he held her up. Ava had never laughed so hard or smiled so much as she had that night. The happiness in the photo brought back all the good memories of that night. “I’m so very lucky BODS matched us.” She sighed and looked up at Leslie. “You and I have been together for four years at the Good Grief Club. Three quarters of the members of our therapy group have moved on to new relationships. Even I have taken the step with Sean. And I have a daughter, which makes it all the more difficult.”
Leslie lifted the picture of Mica and stared down at it. “We so wanted children…”
Ava touched her arm. “You can still have children. You’re still young. You just have to get back into the dating scene, find someone to love and get on with living.”
Setting the photo back on the desktop, Leslie drew in a deep breath and walked into her own office then stood in the window overlooking the city of Austin. “Why do I have to find a man? Randy and I knew what was going to happen. Just because he’s gone doesn’t mean we can’t have that family we always planned on.”
“Excuse me?” Ava came to stand beside Leslie, staring at her friend’s reflection in the glass. “It might be blunt and insensitive of me, but there is no more ‘we’ in this scenario. Randy’s gone. Now, there’s you. Just you.”
Leslie smiled sadly. “I know. What you don’t understand is that Randy banked his sperm. He knew he was going to die. We didn’t get pregnant while he was sick, but that doesn’t mean I can’t still have his child.”
Already, Ava was shaking her head. “Leslie, Leslie, Leslie. You don’t mean this.”
Leslie continued in a rush, afraid if she didn’t, she wouldn’t get the words out and that, somehow, not speaking them would make her change her mind. “It’s called in vitro fertilization. They take my eggs and his banked sperm and combine them in a laboratory dish until the sperm fertilizes the egg. They implant the embryo in my uterus and voila!” She covered her belly with her arms. “I’ll be pregnant. Nine months later, I’ll have a child.” Tears welled in her eyes. “And the beautiful thing is that it’ll be a part of Randy.”