Karen Whittenburg - The Matchmaker's Apprentice

Just then, Uncle Edward stepped up onto the dais and cleared his throat. “Thank you all for waiting,” he said. “And thank you for your support today. While I can’t ask you to join us for the celebratory reception originally planned, I’m extending a heartfelt invitation for each of you to join us for dinner and dancing and whatever else we decide to do in order to put aside our—” he glanced down at Scott’s defeated and despondent slump “—disappointment.” Then, gesturing toward the doors, Uncle Edward bent down and offered his son a comforting pat on the shoulder.

Andrew looked at Ainsley. “See you at the buffet tables,” he said and walked over to offer Scott a few words of encouragement before heading for the fifth row, left, and Jocelyn, who welcomed his approach with a wide smile and a tinge of pink blush on her cheeks.

And for probably the first time since Ainsley had become the matchmaker’s apprentice, the possibility of a romantic match didn’t even cross her mind.

“Molly left Scott waiting at the altar and eloped with a cartoon character?”

The way Ilsa phrased it, the way her voice modulated the question into a simple inquiry, didn’t make Ainsley feel any better. If anything, having to relate the whole sorry story on a sunny Monday morning while sitting in Ilsa’s elegant office made it seem a thousand times worse. “It wasn’t really Mad Mack.” Ainsley stopped, realizing how ridiculous that sounded. “But, of course, you know that.”

Ilsa was patient—a trait Ainsley had run up against numerous times since she’d begun her apprenticeship six months ago—and she simply folded her hands on top of the polished cherrywood desk and waited.

Ainsley began again. “What we know is that Molly bolted out the front doors, jumped into a black sports car—which must have looked like the Mackmobile to Calvin—and was gone. Phyllis—she’s the wedding coordinator for the church—was so upset. She’s never had a bride elope before. At least not with someone other than the groom.”

“Molly didn’t leave a note?”

Ainsley shook her head. “No, and if she was having doubts, Scott didn’t have a clue. But then he never does.” Ainsley made a face. “He’s my cousin and I’m awfully fond of him, but he’s never been adept at reading emotions. Not even his own.”

“This must have been quite a shock to him.”

“He’s convinced himself she ran away with some guy who was a bartender at the restaurant where they met. Where Scott and Molly met, I mean. But I can’t really see her striking up a conversation with a bartender, much less running away with him.”

“It does seem an unlikely scenario,” Ilsa acknowledged. “On the other hand, IF Enterprises deals in possibilities and it’s been my experience that what seems impossible is sometimes exactly what happens. What I find more interesting is why she decided not to marry Scott…and why at the very last minute. The way you’ve described her, that does seem out of character.”

“It was my fault,” Ainsley said, blurting out her guilt in a rush and without an ounce of forethought. “It’s all my fault.”

Ilsa smiled. “How could Molly’s decision be your fault?”

Ainsley hadn’t meant to confess. When she’d walked into the office this morning, she’d had no inclination to own up to her part in the wedding fiasco. She didn’t want Ilsa to be disappointed in her, for one thing. She didn’t want to get fired, for another. But mostly, she didn’t want anyone else telling her she wasn’t responsible when she knew in her heart she was. “I set up the match,” she said, unable to prevent the misery of the past two days from welling up in her voice. “I know I wasn’t supposed to do any matchmaking until you gave me the okay. I know I’m only an apprentice and that I haven’t learned everything I need to before I start taking clients. But Scott’s a cousin. I didn’t think of him as a real client.”

She paused, briefly hoping Ilsa would just fire her on the spot so she wouldn’t have to confide the rest, but Ilsa didn’t say a word. “It was more like a…a favor,” Ainsley continued, feeling the words doubling up on her tongue, knowing she talked too much, too fast, when she was nervous. But there were mitigating circumstances in this case and she wanted Ilsa to understand. “I never meant to tell anyone—well, no one other than Miranda and my brothers—that you’d hired me as your apprentice, but with Scott, it just sort of slipped out. He pestered me about finding a match, begged me to set him up with someone who might want to have a relationship with him. He has a wonderful heart, but on the surface he’s your ordinary goofy, geeky type, the kind of guy women never give a second glance. I doubt he’s had more than a dozen dates in his entire life…and he’s nearly thirty.”

“Self-conscious, ill-at-ease, lacks confidence and consequently tries too hard.” Ilsa nodded. She understood the problems of a lonely heart.

“Yes,” Ainsley agreed, latching onto the sympathetic image. “On top of that, he’s never figured out how to handle social situations with any polish, so he routinely avoids them and spends way too much of his time in his lab studying the mating habits of bugs…or something equally unromantic and boring. His work is practically all he ever talks about, though, so when he pleaded with me to set up an introduction of possibilities for him, I couldn’t say no.”

“Naturally, you wanted to help your cousin.”

“Yes, and I just happened to know the perfect woman for him. You know Shelby Stewart, right? Well, she is exactly what Scott needs. She’s bubbly, fun and very different from him. Her personality would be such a complement to his. She’d bring out his sense of humor—he honestly does have one—and force him into social situations where he’d have to pull himself together. She’d put some sparkle in his life, and Scott is exactly the sort of man she needs, too. He’d help her organize her life—she’s been something of a wild child, you know—and provide her with some stability. He’d be good for her. She’d be good for him. They’d be good together. I just knew in my heart they’d be a perfect match.”

Ilsa’s expression remained interested, but neutral, so Ainsley stopped trying to justify her reasoning and rushed on with her confession. “To make a long story short, I set up a ‘chance’ encounter a couple of months ago. On Valentine’s Day. Except somehow, Scott wound up at the wrong table and met Molly by mistake. It was a fluke. Wrong place, wrong time, wrong table, wrong match…and it’s all my fault. If it hadn’t been for me, Scott would never have gone anywhere near The Torrid Tomato—it’s not his kind of place, at all. Too trendy and fun, if you know what I mean.”

An arching of eyebrows indicated Ilsa did know the place and what Ainsley meant.

“The truth is, Scott would never have been there if I hadn’t set up that introduction of possibilities with Shelby. He’d certainly never have noticed Molly if I hadn’t told him to keep an eye out for opportunity as he walked in. I wanted him to be thinking about something other than how uncomfortable he felt, you see, but I guess he took that to mean he was supposed to come in and start looking for Ms. Right. I don’t know what he was thinking. He was supposed to see me and come straight over to where I was sitting with Shelby. Then I was going to make an excuse to slip away for a couple of minutes and let them get acquainted. But he walked through the door and zeroed in on Molly, who was sitting all alone at a table for two back in the far corner. I still don’t know how he happened to see her, much less why he decided to walk over and introduce himself. I mean, he’s not normally brave. And I don’t know how she happened to catch his eye. She’s so shy and quiet, so timid and reserved…so much like Scott. Who would have imagined she’d invite him to join her for dinner? Or that he’d propose to her only a couple of days later?” Ainsley paused, knowing even as the words left her mouth that she should have imagined at least the possibility of something going awry. A good matchmaker would have thought out more than one scenario before she ever set up the initial encounter.