Chapter 32

It wasn't until after Val was home that night, after he'd eaten leftover pizza and watched a movie on a cable science fiction channel that he booted up his home system and started scrolling through his emails again.
There it was. Damn it.
"Forwarded by: Compu-Cupid
To: Valentine Holiday
Hi there. My name is Cora, and according to Compu-Cupid, we're a perfect match. I'd love to meet you and talk, maybe over coffee. Let me know if that's okay with you. (By the way, love the photo. The strategically placed hearts are very cute.)"
How the hell was he supposed to answer that? His mother had raised him to be a gentleman, after all. It wasn't the poor woman's fault that he hadn't really signed up for this. And what the hell did she mean about the photo? He'd never posed with strategically placed hearts in his life. Being stuck with the name Valentine was bad enough. He tried not to fuel the jokes any more than necessary.
Slowly and carefully, he typed a response.
"From: Valentine Holiday
To: Cora: c/o Compu-Cupid
Hi Cora, this is Val. (I know, it's an odd name for a guy - blame my parents.) You sound great, but I have to tell you, I didn't sign up for this. In fact, I've been trying to delete my account. Thanks for the offer of coffee though, and believe me, this is no reflection on you. I haven't even seen your profile."
He hit send, feeling just a little like a louse, shut down his computer and went to bed.
Cora made it home earlier than usual - meaning before midnight - and flipped on her laptop while she ate her microwave "spa food" dinner, which, as far as she could figure, was foodie talk for tiny portions of trendy food. Still, if it helped take that extra twenty pounds off her hips and butt, she was all for it.
Oh crud, there was another email from Compu-Cupid.
"Forwarded by: Compu-Cupid
To: Corazon Lopez
Hello, Cora! My name is Val and apparently you're my perfect match. I know, it's an odd name for a guy. It's a long story...maybe I can tell you over coffee? I see from your profile that you're a social worker, so I know you're probably busy, but hey, you've got to eat sometime, right? Also, the picture of you in that slinky, red dress is fantastic. I love a lady with curves. Please let me know if you're interested in meeting up sometime. Have a good night.
Val"
Huh. How to go about this without coming across as a total bitch? The man sounded nice enough, and it wasn't his fault she hadn't signed up for this. He'd even said he liked her picture and loved curves. Guys like that were rare. Wait a minute, what picture? Cora didn't even own a slinky, red dress.
Hell, what had Marla done? Cora couldn't ask her because Marla, a medical sales rep, was out of town on a business trip. The best she could do was shoot off a text. Now she had to reply to a guy named Val, which was probably his real name, because, after all, who would lie about something like that?
"From: Cora Lopez
To: Val: c/o Compu-Cupid
Hi Val, thanks for your nice note. You sound great, but I'm sorry to say that I'm not in the market for romance right now. I didn't even set this up - I think my friend did as a joke. Thanks for the offer of coffee, and please don't take this personally. They never even sent me your profile.
Sincerely, Cora"
Okay, good enough. With that taken care of, Cora fed her cat Ringo and curled up in bed with the big tabby and a romance novel. That was about the closest she was going to get to her perfect match - a warm cat on her feet and a hot hero on a page.
"Oh hell." First thing the next morning, Val had another email from Compu-Cupid. It wasn't a response to the cease and desist letter he'd sent them last night either. Instead it was a profile for a woman named Corazon Lopez. Apparently she was thirty-two, a social worker here in Charleston, and had never been married. Nothing to complain about there, he had to admit. Three years either way was no big deal. Her picture showed a Latina beauty in jeans and a snug sweater, with long, night-black hair, dark brown eyes and a figure that made him drool into his keyboard. Fairly average on top, she had a slender waist that flared out to the most womanly hips and generous ass Val had ever seen. Oh hell. Yeah, he was repeating himself. But damn, Val had always been an ass man. Maybe he should give in and go have coffee with this woman, just so he could see if she looked as good in person as she did in her photo.
Instead though, he saved the file but shot off another letter to the company. Then he went online to see what he could find out about Compu-Cupid.
Nothing. As far as his research could find, the company didn't exist. They didn't pop up on any sort of search engine, and he couldn't find corporation records on any government sites - even ones he had to hack to get into. Compu-Cupid came up as a big fat zero on every single search.
He had to get into the office, so he was forced to set his curiosity aside for a bit. The weekend was coming up. He could spend all the time he wanted tracking the assholes down.
Cora groaned. Compu-Cupid had ignored her second "get me out of here" letter and sent her a file. Valentine Holiday - apparently that was the poor guy's real name - was an IT director for a greeting card company. Given that the only one headquartered here in Charleston was the "Holiday" card company, it wasn't a big stretch to figure out which one.
He was twenty-eight, which was just enough younger than her to make her eyes roll. At thirty-two, that wouldn't exactly make her a cougar, but still, why would a young, hot, bright guy want to go out with someone as boring as her?
She looked again at the picture that had come with the file. He was wearing a tux - and not a cheap one. It was a cropped photo and he was flanked by two other shoulders in the same jackets, telling her it might have been a wedding. His profile showed he had two older brothers and two older sisters, so that wasn't an unlikely conclusion.
Damn, the man was gorgeous. Six foot four according to his profile, he was slim and sexy with dark brown hair showing just a hint of coppery highlights. He wore it a little long, and it waved back from his sleekly sculpted face, showing off a pair of stunning hazel eyes under thick brows and lush dark lashes. Clearly Compu-Cupid's computer matching software had more than a few glitches in the programming. He was way out of her league.
A knock sounded on the door and Cora's assistant poked her head in, reminding her that she had a court appointment in fifteen minutes. Grabbing up the file and checking her hair, Cora hurried down the hall toward the family courtroom. Damn, custody hearings - especially messy ones - were a really crappy way to start the day. Maybe she could get through it just by imagining a date with the handsome-as-sin Mr. Holiday.